When She Finds You

by A J McDine

  ‘Bloody hell, Lou. You look like the mother of the bride. It’s only a christening.’

  She tuts good-humouredly. ‘The godmother can’t let the side down, can she? How is my gorgeous boy?’

  Teddy is already holding out his arms to Lou and I hand him over. He adores her. I call her his second mum. And she’s been my rock, too, helping me through the difficult first few weeks when I was on my knees with exhaustion, my hormones all over the place and my anxiety levels still through the roof.

  I spent what seems like ages in a fugue state and the few memories I do have of those early days are confused and indistinct. Now that’s behind us, Lou is still there when I need her, but we do the fun stuff together now, like trips to the swings and the zoo and coffee and cake in our favourite cafés.

  ‘Did you know about this?’ I say, waving my hand at the flowers.

  ‘Rosie may have mentioned it a hundred times or so,’ she grins, tickling Teddy until his small body is convulsed in giggles. ‘But she swore me to secrecy. And anyway, I thought you deserved a nice surprise.’

  Lou started volunteering at Cam not long after Teddy was born. She wanted something to take her mind off the booze. She spends half her life in the garden these days. But she always was an all or nothing kinda girl. Angela is also back at work after a few months off with stress. She walks on eggshells around me and is much less snippy with the gardeners than she used to be. Geoff thinks the arson attack had more of an impact on her than she would ever admit. I think she’ll probably revert to type eventually, but I’m enjoying the ceasefire while it lasts.

  The door swings open again and this time Rosie bursts in, her face beaming. She sees me and runs over. ‘Do you like it, Sophie?’

  ‘I love it,’ I say, hugging her tightly.

  She was pragmatic when she found out I’d had a boy and not the girl she’d been hoping for. ‘We’re not going to be able to call the baby Little Rosie now, are we?’ she’d said, peering at his sleeping face. ‘That wouldn’t do at all.’

  ‘I was thinking I might call him Teddy,’ I’d said, metaphorically crossing my fingers.

  Her face had split into the biggest grin. ‘Like a real-life Teddy Bear!’

  ‘That’s right,’ I agreed. The nickname has stuck ever since.

  Lou hands Teddy back to me and I nuzzle his neck and blow raspberries to make him chortle. The fragrance of the flowers is wonderful but my baby smells totally delicious. I breathe in his scent of warm skin and Johnson’s baby shampoo and watch as a stream of familiar faces arrive and take their places in the beautifully-decorated pews. Angela and Geoff. Mary and her WI friend Margaret. The not-so-new volunteers Derek, Mike, Bev and Trev. Even Martin and his mum are here. Martin is still subdued - they’ve upped his meds since his manic episode - but he smiles and gives me a little wave.

  Lou taps her watch and looks at me.

  I shrug helplessly. She doesn’t need to tell me the service is due to start in a couple of minutes and Matt’s still not here. Bored, Teddy wriggles in my arms. I root around in my coat pocket for his teething ring. He grabs it and thrusts it straight into his mouth.

  The vicar glides over, his hands clasped in front of him, and gives me an awkward smile.

  ‘Five more minutes?’ I plead.

  ‘Of course,’ he says. He knows my situation.

  I flash him a grateful smile and stare at the church doors, as if Matt will miraculously appear if I will it hard enough. Minutes tick by and I can tell the congregation is getting fidgety by people’s forced coughs and shuffling feet.

  At ten past two the vicar approaches again and says in a gentle voice, ‘I think we’d better get started. I have a funeral at three.’

  I nod miserably and turn to face the altar as the organist plays the opening notes of the first hymn, Lord of all Hopefulness, and the congregation stands.

  Even though they are behind me I recognise so many of their voices. Lou’s confident contralto. Geoff’s rich baritone. Angela’s reedy soprano. Tone deaf Rosie, the loudest of them all. I want to sing but there’s a lump the size of a golf ball in the back of my throat. Because I’m suddenly overcome with emotion. They are my friends, my people, and with them in my corner I know I’ll never be alone.

  We’re halfway through the third verse when the church doors open, bringing with them an arctic blast of freezing air. Teddy sees him first, his face breaking into a gummy smile. Relief floods through me and I turn to watch my husband tiptoe up the aisle, nodding and smiling his apologies to our friends as they jokingly mouth ‘what time do you call this?’ and ‘nice of you to show up’.

  ‘Sorry,’ he murmurs as he takes his place beside me and holds his hands out for Teddy.

  Teddy drops his teething ring in excitement and tilts his little body towards his father. Matt drops a kiss, as light as a feather, on top of his blond curls.

  ‘Did you get it?’ I whisper back, as the hymn draws to a close and the vicar ambles over to the lectern.

  He nods and I smile with relief. The woman making Teddy’s christening cake was in tears when she phoned yesterday to say her lurcher had slunk into the kitchen when her back was turned and gorged himself on it. She’d promised to work through the night to make us another, as long as we didn’t mind a sponge instead of the fruit cake she’d originally baked. I’d urged her not to worry, that we’d make do with a plain birthday cake from the supermarket, but Matt had taken her up on her offer. He wanted everything to be perfect for Teddy’s big day.

  He’d set off for Faversham with oodles of time to spare. And then, typically, a lorry had jack-knifed on the Boughton bypass and he’d phoned me in a panic when the sat nav warned him it would take two hours to get home.

  ‘I’ll be there if it kills me,’ he’d said, and I’d felt a frisson of fear.

  ‘Don’t say that.’

  ‘It’s a figure of speech. I’ll be there. I promise.’

  Looking sidelong at him now, his blue eyes crinkling as he coos at our baby, I know I should never have doubted he’d make it. I should never have doubted him full stop. There was never an affair. He loved Tess, of course he did. Just as I loved Ed. But he loves me, too. For a couple of days after Teddy and I were discharged from hospital we tiptoed around each other, barely talking, guilt and resentment eating us up. Lou was the one who forced us to sort ourselves out, arriving one evening and ordering us to the pub, where we talked until closing time.

  I told him about Ed and the abortion. He talked about Tess and what she’d meant to him. It was liberating, knowing all of him. No skeletons in the closet. No more secrets. I suppose it was the same for him, too, as we’ve never been closer than we have these last few months.

  The vicar clears his throat and Matt slips a hand in mine. Happiness fizzes like sherbet through my veins and I steal one last look back at my friends before the service begins. Lou smiles, Rosie waves, Geoff gives me the thumbs up. A movement catches my eye. I swivel on my heels to get a better look. But I’m too late. All I see is a flutter of midnight-blue fabric before the doors clunk shut.

  I rack my brains, trying to picture what everyone was wearing as they took their seats. I realise with a mounting sense of panic that I can’t remember anyone in midnight-blue. Biting my lip, I wonder whether I should race out of the church and confront our uninvited guest.

  What if it’s Roz, finally coming to claim her prize? Because the police never found her, despite DC Bennett’s best efforts. In the empty hours between midnight and dawn, when sleep often eludes me, I picture her lying in wait, watchful and ready as she plans her next move.

  Maybe she’s still obsessed by us. Perhaps she’s found someone new to fixate on. I desperately hope she’s found someone who will love her back, despite her flaws. Because if life had been kind to Roz she could have been a good person, I know she could.

  Matt squeezes my hand, bringing me back to reality. Let her go, says a voice in my head.

  You can’t spend your life looking over your
shoulder, not when the people you love most in the world are right by your side.

  I cast one final look behind me.

  And then I let her go.

  THE END

  Afterword

  I hope you enjoyed When She Finds You. It would be great if you could spare a couple of minutes to write a quick review on Amazon. I’d love your feedback!

  To join my readers’ list to hear about my latest releases, promotions and giveaways click this link.

  Acknowledgments

  Writing a book is always a leap of faith and When She Finds You was no exception.

  I have received much help and encouragement along the way, without which I would never have reached The End.

  Firstly, my thanks go to my wonderful, patient and talented editor, Sacha Black. Sacha’s insights and suggestions were invaluable and helped make the book the best it can be.

  Thank you to Penny, Barbara and Terry for their expert advice on medical and police matters respectively. Any mistakes are my own.

  I owe a great debt of gratitude to my early readers for their feedback and support. You know who you are.

  Most of all I’d like to thank my long-suffering husband, Adrian, who inspires me to push boundaries every single day.

  About the author

  A J McDine lives deep in the Kent countryside with her husband and two teenage sons.

  She worked as a journalist and police press officer before becoming a full-time author in 2019.

  Endlessly fascinated by people and their fears and foibles, she loves to discover what makes them tick.

  She writes dark, domestic thrillers about ordinary people in extraordinary situations.

  When she’s not writing, playing tennis or attempting to run a 5K, she can usually be found people-watching in her favourite café.

  When She Finds You is A J McDine’s debut psychological thriller.

  Book club questions

  Spoiler alert! Look away NOW if you haven’t finished the book!!

  The prologue followed one of the characters on their way to hospital. Was it Sophie going for her abortion, or Roz going for electroconvulsive therapy?

  Sophie has major issues with trust, yet at times she is too trusting. Is it possible to be both sceptical about some things and gullible about others?

  Do you think Sophie should have told Ed about her pregnancy when she was seventeen? If she had, what different path could her life have taken?

  How do Sophie and Lou’s characters evolve over the course of the book?

  Did your opinions about any of the characters change?

  What choices would you have made differently if you were in Sophie’s shoes?

  Rosie is perhaps the only completely unflawed character in the book. Do you think it’s important that all characters have flaws in order to be believable?

  Roz believes in nature, not nurture and that our character traits are determined by our genes. What do you think - are we all, as Roz claims, ‘pre-wired’?

  Sophie showed Roz mercy. Do you think Roz will reciprocate and leave Sophie and Matt to enjoy their happy ever after?

  Do you agree that gardening can help with depression because it allows people to be nurturers, gives them a sense of responsibility and helps them be less insular?

  Copyright

  Copyright © 2019 by A J McDine

  All rights reserved.

  No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.

  This book is a work of fiction. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.