Last Seen Alive

by Claire Douglas

  ‘You’re supposed to be in Cornwall,’ he repeated, his teeth clenched. ‘With your prick of a husband.’

  ‘I don’t have a husband … except you.’

  He shook me then, so hard that I bit the inside of my mouth. I could feel the iron taste of blood on my tongue. ‘Don’t lie to me, you stupid bitch. What the fuck are you doing here?’

  ‘I’m not lying!’ I yelped. ‘Please. I don’t know what you’re talking about. I’ve come to see Karen Fisher.’

  He stopped shaking me. ‘Karen Fisher?’

  ‘She was a friend I met when I went travelling,’ I said, trying to wriggle from his grasp but he gripped my upper arms tightly. ‘I saw a photo of her in the newspaper …’

  ‘That was you in all the newspapers,’ he hissed.

  ‘No, it wasn’t. I thought … I thought she’d died, in Thailand. But she took my identity. She’s pretending to be me. I don’t know why … I don’t …’

  His eyes flashed. ‘So you don’t live in this flat with Jamie Hall?’

  ‘I’ve never heard of Jamie Hall.’

  ‘Then what are you doing here?’

  ‘I came to confront Karen.’

  He staggered backwards as though I’d been the one to deliver the blow. ‘For fuck’s sake,’ he groaned, putting his hands to his head, stalking up and down the hallway. ‘For fuck’s sake!’ I couldn’t understand why he was so agitated.

  ‘What have you done, Sean? What have you done with Karen?’

  He always was a manipulative bastard. I’d been too young to see it then, but in that moment terror shot through me. Had he hurt Karen?

  He leapt on me then, grabbing my hair and dragging me into a bedroom. ‘I’ve been looking for you for years. Nine fucking years. You stole ten grand from me. Did you think I was going to let you get away with that? And then that photograph. I thought I’d found you. And now you’re telling me it wasn’t you at all but some other stupid cow pretending to be you?’ Spittle was flying out of his mouth as he shouted, his face so red and angry that his eyes bulged. ‘I want to kick the shit out of you. You’ve ruined everything …’ His eyes glinted and I could see right to his rotten core. I always knew that Sean would kill me if he saw me again. I’d betrayed him, tricked him, stolen from him and run off. I knew he’d never forgive that. Which is why I’d kept away all these years. He raised his arm, his meaty hand clenched into a ball, and I cowered, protecting my head, awaiting that first blow. It took me back to when we were married, although he was careful then to hit me where the bruises wouldn’t be seen.

  A vibrating buzz emanated from him and he paused, lowering his arm in surprise, taking his mobile from the back pocket of his grubby-looking jeans. They would once have been designer. Had he fallen on hard times? He frowned as a name flashed up on the screen. His mouth twisted into a sinister smile. ‘Well,’ he said, glancing at me, ‘look who’s ringing.’

  I stared at his thick neck and the tattoo on his arm. My name had once been inked on that left bicep, but now I could see it had been turned into an ugly, green snake.

  He positioned himself between me and the door as he talked into his mobile in a fake jovial voice, something about a man called Jim trying to spot fossils. Then he cleared his throat. ‘Listen. I’m glad you called actually. There’s been a change of plan …’ He hesitated, shooting a glance in my direction. ‘My daughter’s coming out of hospital earlier than we expected. I know, I know, it’s great news. So we’ll be going back to our place in London tonight, tomorrow at the latest. I’ll leave the key with your neighbour, shall I?’

  What was he talking about? What daughter? And then he smirked again. Whatever he was up to he was clearly enjoying himself. ‘… Just drop the key back at the petrol station on your way home. Thanks again … Libby.’ Libby?

  ‘Who were you talking to?’ I asked him as he slipped the phone back into his pocket. He grinned, looking ghoulish in the half light.

  ‘It seems your friend Karen Fisher is calling herself Libby. Not Beth.’

  ‘Why are you speaking to Karen? What’s going on, Sean?’

  He stared at me as if seeing me for the first time. ‘I don’t like to admit it but I’ve been had. She looks more like you than you do. What happened to you? You look like shit.’

  My guts twisted. Even after all these years his words hit a nerve.

  ‘I thought I’d have a bit of fun with you before fucking up your life. But that’s gone tits up now, hasn’t it?’ He emitted a cynical laugh. ‘You’ve even messed up that pleasure. Now I’m going to have to think of something else for you.’

  What had he been planning to do? Knowing Sean, it was obviously something warped.

  I played for time. He always was arrogant. He’d enjoy filling me in on what he was going to do. ‘Were you going to kill me?’

  ‘Of course I was going to fucking kill you. Do you think I’d let you get away with making a fool out of me? With stealing my money.’

  My mouth was dry but I asked anyway. ‘How?’

  ‘I was following you – or someone I thought was you – in Cornwall. Watching her and her weedy husband. I pushed him when they were visiting a lighthouse. Didn’t plan to hurt him then, just wanted to freak them out, but she nearly went over the edge of a cliff. I thought there was something different about you. Your walk, your laugh. But it has been ten years.’ He shrugged and grinned nastily. ‘I came back here to steal your bank account details so I could get my ten grand back, plus interest. Oh, and I poisoned some of the food in Cornwall. In the fridge. Covered your underwear in animal’s blood and buried it in the garden. But I fucked up. Got the wrong person …’

  ‘My underwear?’

  ‘That expensive basque I bought you, remember? I kept it. All these years. I knew I’d be seeing you again. That eventually I’d find you. I treated you well, took you away from that disgusting squat you were living in. Bought you nice things. And this is how you repay me?’

  ‘Treated me well?’ Despite my fear I couldn’t keep my mouth closed. ‘You beat me up. You abused me. You took advantage of me, my age, my vulnerability …’

  The punch when it came was unexpected and knocked me back against the bed; it felt like my cheekbone was about to explode. I could feel nearly ten years’ worth of pent-up frustration and anger in the force of that fist. Then he straddled me and I hit out at him, but my blows were as ineffectual as water. He flipped me over so that I was on my front and grabbed my arms roughly behind my back. I could feel him tying something around them, cutting into my flesh. ‘I’ll be back for you,’ he said, getting up off the bed. And then he left me there, in the dark, my eye throbbing where he’d punched me.

  As soon as I heard him slam the front door I worked on loosening my ties. I sat up against the wooden headboard and ran my wrists against the sharp edges, gradually sawing away. He’d used some kind of thick tape – did he carry it around with him? Nothing would surprise me with that psycho. I was sweating as I toiled away, and my wrists were rubbed raw, but I eventually managed to cut through the tape. Sean had been too cocky. He’d forgotten that I’d had enough practice at this when we were married.

  I jumped up, glancing around the bedroom that Karen slept in; modern and clean, with Scandinavian oak furniture, her dressing table cluttered with different potions and perfume bottles, a photo of her and her husband sitting proudly amongst the mess. Sean had called him Jamie. Jamie Hall. I needed something hard, heavy, something to use as a weapon for when he came back. I opened her wardrobe, hoping to find a sharp stiletto heel or a heavy book to smack him with. But there were only trainers and ballet flats. No heels at all. And then I spotted something shoved in the corner of the wardrobe among some summer clothes and handbags. Something familiar. I leaned in and grabbed it; the stone was cold under my fingers. The Buddha that Harry had given her. Why had she kept it? Did she still yearn for him? The one that got away?

  I thought we’d be OK, Karen and me. Two strong women escaping our pasts without
the need of a man. But she’d betrayed me. The thought of teaching Karen a lesson gave me the impetus and the strength I needed. That’s the thing about me and Sean, we were more alike than he realised. Perhaps that’s what had attracted us to each other when we were young. We would have made a great team if we weren’t constantly trying to outdo each other with our power struggle to come out top. Then I thought of Matteo; kind, loyal Matteo, with his big brown eyes that always looked sleepy. My heart twisted with longing for him. He’d kept the darkness at bay. He had made me want to be a better person. But he’d seen through me in the end too.

  The room was drenched in darkness. Where was Sean? I daren’t leave the bedroom in case he suddenly came back. I pocketed the Buddha – it was heavy enough to use as a weapon if needed. I didn’t want to risk the front door so I wrenched open the bedroom window and climbed into the garden. The light was dwindling, casting shadows on the overgrown grass. I wondered what was beyond the garden. Would it be easy to escape? Before fear could kick in I sprinted across the lawn. Then I heard a bellow and turned my head, stumbling in my eagerness to get away. Sean was clambering out of the window. I ran for the bushes, but he was so quick he was soon only an arm’s length away. I forced down a shriek of terror and darted behind a large bush, my hand reaching inside my leather jacket for the Buddha. I crouched down, my breathing shallow, my heart beating so ferociously I was worried he would be able to hear it.

  ‘I know where you are, you stupid bitch,’ he called, sounding amused. He peered around the bush. I screamed and swung the Buddha at him with all my might, smacking him in the temple, relieved and horrified as the ornament made contact with his skull. He staggered, his shocked eyes finding mine as he went crashing backwards like a tree being felled.

  Fear took hold of me so that, for a few moments, I was rooted to the spot, staring at the dent in his skull and the arc of blood that had sprayed from the back of his head, staining the grass red. Then I knelt down beside him, my knees sinking into the damp lawn, careful not to touch him. I must leave no evidence.

  I glanced up furtively. The building was over two hundred feet away, the windows opaque, some with curtains hanging open, others with the blinds rolled up. Was anybody watching? I was already starting to think like a criminal. Was I seen at the bottom of the garden among the weeds and overgrown grass?

  Was I seen killing my husband?

  So I was a murderer. It had been surprisingly easy, killing a man. The moment my fingers encircled that ornament I knew I’d wanted to do as much damage as possible. I wanted to kill. I felt no guilt, no remorse. And now he was out of the picture. For the first time since I was sixteen the threat of him no longer hung over me. He’d taken enough of my life and I wasn’t going to let him take any more.

  I stayed in Karen’s flat that night, too scared to leave. But it spooked me, the thought of Sean’s body at the bottom of her garden. How long before it was discovered? I was terrified that someone – maybe that old crone upstairs – had seen me. I snooped around, of course, saw that everything was in my name: her bank details, her credit cards, her driving licence. There was nothing that betrayed who she really was. So she had even been lying to that husband of hers. I was shocked by how effortlessly Karen had stepped into life as Elizabeth Elliot. Clever to use Libby instead of Beth. Maybe she felt that sounded posh, more in keeping with her new middle-class life. Perhaps she felt she could disassociate herself from what she had done if she used a different name.

  How had she survived the fire? I couldn’t understand it. I was the last person to be rescued from the hostel and I had been lucky. Nobody had been rescued after me – that’s what the fireman said. So how could Karen Fisher be here, pretending to be me?

  Unless she wasn’t in the hostel that night. Unless she’d already left.

  A hundred questions filled my head as I pocketed her bank statements. It would be easy to access her money – she was complacent enough to have a four digit number scribbled onto a piece of paper in the filing cabinet: her pin. She was obviously using my National Insurance number. She really must have thought I was dead to do something so audacious.

  And then it hit me so hard that I had to sit down on her sofa; I thought I’d been the one in control. But she had been more cunning, more daring, than I’d ever given her credit for.

  I spent ages washing the Buddha, making sure to wipe away any traces of my fingerprints from its surfaces, its creases and dents. My stomach turned at the sight of Sean’s blood. Then I put it on her sideboard, where she’d be able to see it. All this fuss, I thought. All this fuss about Harry and she’d hidden the Buddha away as though it meant nothing.

  I prowled around her flat, examining the photos of her and Jamie at various events or holidays; they looked happy together, usually joined by a big, dopey-looking dog. I was relieved to see there was no evidence of children.

  Oh Karen. She had no clue that I was already married and that when she’d tied the knot under my name with her precious Jamie she was committing bigamy. A bigamist. It tickled me, to think that. Her one mistake.

  And when Sean’s body was found, as it inevitably would be, Karen would get the blame. And then the whole sorry tale would come out. What would Jamie think when he found out the truth about his not-so-perfect wife? All I needed to do for now was stand back and watch as her whole world imploded.

  30

  I took a perverse enjoyment out of spying on them when they returned from Cornwall; their disintegration as they realised that someone had stolen their credit cards and emptied their bank accounts, their paranoia as they wondered who was behind it all, the fear eating away at their relationship. I opened an account at a catalogue company in my name and sent Karen items to jog her memory of our time in Thailand: a wig the colour and style that her hair used to be, a backpack similar to the one we’d both carried.

  And then there was the old biddy who lived upstairs. A few times she spotted me hanging around while Karen – Libby – was at work in the job that should have been mine. Karen never saw me though. She was too engrossed in her own smug little world.

  I didn’t know what my plan was exactly. All I could think about was that Karen must have left me behind in that hostel. And she needed to pay.

  One afternoon, I was hovering in the alleyway between her building and next door. I was waiting for Karen to get home from work when I heard a tap on the bay window and the old lady’s face peered over her net curtains, beckoning me in. I was intrigued, and a little afraid. It had started to rain and I was getting impatient and cold in my thin jacket, so I’d made my way tentatively to her front door. She opened it only partially, as though she was scared of me. It made me wonder what she had seen from her windows. Had she seen me killing Sean? I dismissed this idea at once. If she had seen me then she wouldn’t be inviting me into her home, would she?

  ‘Are you looking for someone, love?’ she said, not unkindly. ‘I’ve seen you before. Can I help you with anything?’

  Nosy old bat. The lie slipped easily off my tongue. ‘I’m Libby’s sister,’ I said, smiling politely. ‘But we’ve sort of lost touch. I don’t know whether I’d be welcome …’ I shrugged, averting my eyes shyly and shuffling my feet, staring down at her Victorian floor tiles. She’d opened the door then, as I knew she would, and invited me inside. My hands were so cold that they burned with chilblains in the too-warm house. She fussed around, making a cup of tea while I stood in her large sitting room, gazing around in wonder. It was cosy, with knick-knacks covering every surface and gilt-edged plates on the wall. Old-fashioned but homely, the sort of place I would have loved to have grown up in, instead of the sparsely furnished vicarage with pictures of Christ above the beds. My eyes went to the array of photographs on the mantelpiece, all showing her in another life; various stages of being young, happy and in love. She’d been pretty once, the black-and-white photos reminding me of actresses from old films, with her pin curls and her dark lips. An old-fashioned radio sat on a shelf, the male prese
nter talking in dulcet tones. I found his voice soothing. She noticed me looking and turned it down with a self-conscious smile. ‘I always have it too loud, but it’s company.’

  I found myself nodding. I wondered if she was lonely. Like me.

  ‘I’m Evelyn,’ she said. ‘Please, take a seat.’ She indicated the chair by the window. She had a tea-tray on the side table next to her with a teapot and two china cups. Was she expecting someone? She offered me tea and I nodded, blind-sided, while she poured and then handed me a cup. As I sat there, numb and unsure as to what I was hoping to achieve, she reached over and took my hand, her eyes going to the bruise on my cheekbone. ‘Libby has never mentioned a sister …’ she said.

  ‘Oh. A family rift. A long time ago. Has she told you much about her family?’

  She shook her head. ‘No, not really. She said once her mum had died. Libby is very private. But she’s a lovely woman, she would welcome you, I know she would. Don’t be afraid, my dear.’

  I felt a punch of jealousy to my gut. A lovely woman? Hardly. This Evelyn was like a grandmother and by the way she spoke about Libby, her eyes shining with pride, I realised how much she must care for her. All I wanted – all I had ever wanted – was for someone to care about me in that way. Maybe my mother had once upon a time, before unhappiness had seeped into her, changing her, making her bitter. And my father had always been hard. He loved God but not much else. I had never known a happy home with laughter and love. I imagined Evelyn would have made a good mother, a good grandmother. The fight began to abate as I sat there. And I realised I was afraid. I thought of my depressing hotel room with its single bed, how alone I felt, nothing but a few belongings to show for my thirty years of life. I yearned in that moment for my baby. For Matteo.

  She leaned forward, her eyes kind. ‘What happened?’