The Exes' Revenge

by Jo Jakeman

  He sat on the edge of the bed and I stood out of his reach.

  He bent down to the handcuffs and looked at me. “Come on, then. I’m going to need the key.”

  “Not yet.”

  “I can’t tell you the whole story until you let me go, Imogen. We had a deal.”

  “Later.”

  “Imogen?” His voice was dripping with menace now. A warning.

  “Don’t worry,” I said. “I’m letting you go, but not yet.”

  I had no more pain in my nose and my ribs had stopped aching. I felt strong, invincible. I felt more myself than I had ever felt. I had stopped wondering what other people thought of me and now only cared what I thought of me. As long as I could look myself in the mirror and say honestly that I had done my best for me and my son, then I would be happy. The door to my future was wide open and I couldn’t wait to pass through it and close the door to my past.

  I balanced one foot on the bottom step and looked over my shoulder at him. I tried to fix him in my mind. He was flesh and bone like anyone else, but his heart was empty. I felt absolutely nothing for him. Not even pity. He was solely responsible for the position he was in and he would get what he deserved.

  CHAPTER 39

  7 days before the funeral

  I walked out the front door under the early-dawn skies and ambled along the road, past the blackened windows and stationary cars. For most people, the day hadn’t yet started. For me, it was still the tail end of yesterday.

  A lone cat stalked me for half a mile before jumping over a wall and disappearing down an alleyway. I missed its company as I walked the last few yards on my own. The streetlights clicked off suddenly, announcing the arrival of morning. I hadn’t noticed them until they weren’t there.

  I turned sideways to slip through the gap in the fence, but my clothes caught on the bushes that had thrown out long grasping branches as rain had turned to sun had turned to rain over the past week. I slipped my bag off my shoulder. It was heavy with essentials—clothes, passport, book, phone.

  I settled onto Iris’s bench as the early-morning traffic began pulsating behind me every ten seconds or so. Workers eager to be the first to their desks. The keenest, the hardest working, the ones replete with self-importance impressing no one but themselves.

  I took my phone from my bag and dialed Phillip’s number.

  It rang and rang, and I began to panic, thinking I’d left it on silent or that I’d placed it where he couldn’t reach, but then the ringing stopped suddenly.

  “Imogen,” he said.

  I breathed in. Breathed out. Breathed in and spoke.

  “Surprised?” I asked.

  “Not really. You’ve always been weak. Should have known you’d be hiding from me.”

  I was tempted to leave him locked, remind him who had the power, but it was even more appealing to set him free to face the disciplinary panel so I could clear away the evidence that he’d ever been there. Tomorrow it would be all over the papers; Chris had seen to that. Today it would be all over social media; Naomi had promised that.

  “Are you going to tell me?” I asked.

  “Are you going to set me free?”

  “I’m going to tell you the combination lock. Once that’s open, you’ll be able to leave the cellar. The key to the cuffs is on the shelf in the hallway.”

  “I’m not telling you anything until you give me that code.”

  “I wouldn’t expect anything less from you,” I said. “It’s eighty-five thirteen.”

  I heard him grunt with the exertion of bending over and fiddling with the lock. “So it is. Got to tell you I’m surprised. I’ve been trying all kinds of combinations of birthdays and anniversaries but I would never have expected you to use the number thirteen.”

  “You don’t know me as well as you think you do,” I said.

  “Really? Then how did I know that you would be the one who’d give in? I knew you couldn’t resist.”

  I could hear him walking up the stairs. There was less of an echo to his words now that he was at the top.

  I tried to envisage my life without Phillip, but couldn’t grasp the shape of it. There was no blueprint for freedom; it was formless, endless, and it alarmed as much as it excited. Soon, everyone would know what Phillip was capable of and his reputation would be just where it should be.

  “Well, well, well,” he said into the phone. “And the keys are just where you said they’d be. You’re desperate for this information, aren’t you? No more playing games. Now, where should I start?”

  “I don’t want to hear what you have to say, Phillip.”

  It would have been easy enough to sit and listen, to let him tell me something between a truth and a lie, but I realized that it would make no difference.

  “Nothing you say will bring her back to me. Nothing you can say can undo the past. I thought I wanted to know, but now it’s come to it, I don’t think I could bear it. It’s done. We’re done.”

  “We’re not done until I say we’re done. I thought you wanted to hear the truth?” His voice was harsh in my ear.

  “I do,” I said. “But I’ll never get it by listening to you.”

  I hung up on Phillip and immediately scrolled through for Tristan’s number.

  I felt lighter than I’d ever felt. Free. Tranquil.

  I sent a text to Tristan, hoping to catch him before he set off for work. I told him my car was out of commission and he was right, my ex shouldn’t be allowed to get away with what he’d done. Was there any chance he could drive me to the police station later this morning? Get a coffee afterward? His response came almost immediately.

  I’d love to.

  I switched off the phone in case Phillip tried to call me back.

  I wasn’t deluding myself. I knew that the chances of a healthy relationship coming from all of this were slimmer than remote, but it was nice—comforting—to think that somewhere out there was a person who liked me enough to want to spend time with me.

  I thought of Naomi and Ruby—women I had despised this time last week. I should have known they were nothing like the picture I had painted of them. Should’ve known better than to believe anything Phillip had told me. I had grown fond of them. More than fond. Ruby had a big heart, even if her loyalties had been misplaced.

  And Naomi. Vulnerable, damaged, and yet stronger than the rest of us put together. I could see now that I had been jealous of her confidence and her easy life, not knowing that it was only a sugar-spun shell.

  I closed my eyes and felt the day settle around me. The traffic was heavier now, the intermittent rush of cars replaced by a steady buzz. Birds shouted to each other from treetop to treetop. A swish overhead from the bowing of the branches. A rustle to my side of wind-ruffled leaves. Minutes passed easily and I reveled in the new-world smells that I’d barely noticed before. The air was tangy with the promise of more rain. I thought of the passport nestled in my bag. Once I’d finished at the police station, I was getting on the next plane to Spain to see my son.

  “So, what now?”

  “Jesus!” I jerked and knocked my phone to the ground. I scrabbled to my feet and turned to face him.

  Phillip.

  “How did you—” I began. My arms were outstretched, warning him to keep his distance.

  Phillip’s slow smile and raised eyebrow uncovered his pleasure at having found me. His hands were behind his back. Solid stance like an army major. Superior.

  “You think I don’t know that this is where you come? You think this is your secret place? You have no secrets from me, Imogen.”

  “What do you want?”

  My heart was beating out of my chest. I hadn’t expected him to come here. This was my place, somewhere I should have felt safe. He was between me and the gap in the hedge. I was trapped. This wasn’t how it was meant to happen. He should have
been heading home to shower and shave, to get ready to put his case at the hearing. He shouldn’t be here. He shouldn’t be looking at me like he wanted to kill me.

  I thought about shouting for help, but no one would hear over the sound of the traffic. My phone was out of reach, and Naomi and Ruby were long gone. No one knew where I was.

  “To talk,” he said. “C’mon. Like old times.”

  “We don’t have anything to talk about. You really should leave.”

  “Should I?” His eyes shone with malice. He jutted his chin out and looked past me, something on the horizon catching his eye and making him smile. He looked down at his toes and pushed himself up onto the balls of his feet and back onto his heels. I glanced where he was looking and almost missed the lightning movement of his hands as he whipped something out from behind his back. A knife.

  “You left before we could talk, Imogen.”

  He gripped the kitchen knife in his hand, the tip slightly raised and splitting the reflection of the weak sun. I’d misjudged him. Revenge meant more to him than reputation.

  I had just enough time to think So that’s where the knife is before he lunged at me.

  I staggered backward and Phillip laughed. I couldn’t outrun him, couldn’t beat him in a fight.

  The traffic was insistent now, but the people in the cars couldn’t see me, hear me, or help me. I edged around the side of the bench, using it as a shield.

  “Phillip, remember last time you tried to get revenge on me? It didn’t turn out so good for you. Don’t make the same mistake again.”

  “Mistake? No, Imogen, it’s not me who makes mistakes, is it?”

  I licked my lips, considering whether I could dash past him to the road, whether I’d be better off running across the field, but my darting eyes gave me away.

  “Don’t even think about running,” he said. “You’ll never get away from me.”

  There was something in the way he said “never” that made me think he was talking about more than today.

  “Phillip, please. What about the hearing? You said you needed to clear your name. This isn’t going to help.”

  I was starting to panic. If he didn’t care about his job or his reputation, he had nothing to lose.

  “That was the plan, but then you hung up on me. Rude, Imogen, rude. You do disappoint me. But then, you always have. Come, sit down.”

  He pointed with the knife at the bench. I did as he asked, buying time, slowly lowering myself onto the bench without taking my eyes from the blade. He sat heavily by my side and I recoiled from him. Phillip grabbed my right hand in his left and held tight when I tried to wrestle it from his grip. He pressed the tip of the blade into the fleshy inner part of my arm and smiled when I winced, but I wouldn’t cry out. When he took it away again, there was the fleeting imprint of a crimson bird in flight before my blood distorted the image.

  “Set me up nicely, haven’t you?” he said, pushing my arm away from him in disgust.

  “You brought it on yourself.”

  He laughed. A volley of nasal coughs.

  “You hung up before I could tell you the truth about your little accident.”

  I dipped my head but kept my eyes fixed on the knife in his hand. He was waving it up and down like he was assessing its weight.

  “You’ve still got time to get to the hearing,” I said. “Surely this can wait.”

  “Not so quick. Not so quick. Somewhere else you’ve got to be?”

  “No,” I said. “Nowhere.”

  My eyes traveled from the knife to his face. He was looking over the horizon again, in the direction of our house. Eyes narrowing to keep the thoughts from spilling out. The skin under his chin quivered. It was slack and gray and belonged to a man much older than him.

  “I know who was driving the car that night,” he said.

  “So go to the police,” I said. “There’s nothing I can do about it now, is there?”

  “But you want to know, don’t you? You’ve always wondered why it happened to you. Were they drunk? Was it an accident? Would you recognize them? Were they aware of what they’d done? Remember, I understand you, Imogen. There isn’t a thought in your head that I don’t know about.”

  “Tell me or don’t tell me,” I said. “I don’t really care.” I tried to sound casual, but it was true. I really didn’t want to know.

  He sucked in a sharp breath over his teeth. “You know I hate it when you lie to me. You’re going to make me angry, Imogen. Don’t do that.”

  The side of his little finger touched my leg. I could feel his icy skin through the denim. I flinched away from him, but he grabbed my thigh. His fingers dug into my flesh and I tensed as he leaned toward me.

  “Where’s Alistair?” he asked.

  “I’ll never tell you.”

  He put his arm around my shoulder and clamped me to him. He raised the knife to my face. I tried to lean away, but his hand pushed my head into his shoulder and brought the blade to my eye. I blinked and felt my eyelashes graze the sharp edge.

  “Where’s my son?” he asked.

  “Where you won’t find him.”

  He stood and pulled me up with him. He grabbed my hand, and with his hand clenched around my thumb he started to bend it back. I yelped with pain. There was no longer any point in pretending it didn’t hurt. He was an expert in disabling people, in causing the maximum pain for the slightest of effort. I had police training to thank for that. My knees started to buckle as I bent away from the force.

  He shoved me with such strength that I fell to the ground. I rolled as I hit the ground and spun away from him. I grabbed at a thin branch on the ground and brandished it in front of me. He laughed loudly, throwing his head back.

  “Don’t make me laugh,” he said. “Never played rock, paper, scissors? Knife beats twig any day.”

  He put his head to one side like he was considering something. I noticed he was glancing behind me, over the horizon again.

  “What are you looking at?” I asked.

  He rolled his shoulders like he was releasing tension and smiled at me, ignoring the question.

  “So, what now?” he asked. “You throw me to the dogs and then carry on with your life? Happily ever after? Do you think I don’t know that you three witches are planning something? You’re in cloud-cuckoo-land if you think I’m going to let that happen.”

  “I don’t have any plans. I guess I’m just hoping that we both get what we deserve.”

  “You will,” he said. I moved to my right and Phillip moved with me. We were facing off four feet away from each other. He could have the knife at my neck in seconds.

  He was letting the knife drop slightly, his mind preoccupied. I adjusted my grip on the branch.

  “Don’t you have any regrets?” I asked.

  “Oh, plenty. I shouldn’t have married you. Should never have divorced Ruby. But otherwise can’t say I’d do anything differently. You?”

  “I don’t know. I can’t say I wish I hadn’t met you. Because without you I wouldn’t have Alistair. I feel like everything was necessary to lead us to this moment. Don’t you? Even losing the baby. Everything. It was all . . . I guess it had to happen.” I took a deep breath. “You know it was here that Iris died, don’t you? That’s why I come here.”

  “For God’s sake, Imogen. She never existed.”

  “She did to me.”

  Phillip scratched the back of his head with the knife still in his hand. The wind played with the branches of the trees that lined the field. It ruffled my hair and blew the past away. Phillip wasn’t someone to be feared; he was only a man. A weak, damaged, and empty man. I blinked and took a deep breath.

  I no longer felt afraid. He had tracked me down to tell me about the accident because I didn’t want to know. He hated that. It was Phillip who was desperate, not me. He was impatient
to regain control, for a vestige of the power he used to have over me. His weakness for control was making him reckless.

  I stood straight and took a step closer to the hedge.

  “You don’t want to hurt me,” I said.

  “Don’t I?”

  “Phillip, you can still walk away from this. If you don’t, you’ll only make it worse for yourself.”

  I took another half step along the fence. He was looking away from me. Again, the horizon. Again, in the direction of our house. He turned to me suddenly.

  “I hope you’ve enjoyed playing your little game, thinking that you had any authority over me, because you’re nothing now. You’re mine. You do what I say, when I say it.”

  Now his attention had flipped back to me. I could feel his anger start to build again. Specks of rain dotted my face and I wiped my hair out of my eyes. Phillip’s grip tightened on the knife and his eyes grew hard. I took another couple of steps. Closer to him but also closer to the gap in the hedge. If I could get there without him stopping me . . .

  “I was there,” he said.

  He held my gaze, a malevolent look on his face.

  “Where?”

  “I was there. Here.”

  He gestured with his knife to the bench and my discarded bag. “I saw it all.”

  “I don’t believe you,” I said, without conviction, wondering what kind of reaction he was hoping to get from me.

  “Yes, you do.”

  “Don’t do this.” I readjusted my grip on the tree branch and straightened up. The wind was gusting about us and throwing the rain like spears into my cheeks. Could he have seen Ruby mow me down and done nothing about it? . . . My mind was racing but getting nowhere.

  “I left you at home.”

  “I followed you. In the car.”

  Phillip’s sneer slipped from his face. He lowered the blade. It was me and him now. No games.