Before I Let You In

by Jenny Blackhurst

  ‘I found this once, hidden under some of Karen’s things. I opened it up and it had your name in it, and Eleanor’s, so I put it back thinking it was personal.’

  Bea pulled a notebook from the top.

  ‘There’s all sorts in here. It’s like a dossier of everyone she’s ever met. I’m in here, and Eleanor,’ Bea murmured, pain shooting through her chest at the picture of her friend. ‘What we like, what we dislike, what we’re scared of, practically everything about us. It’s like one of those journals you make as a kid.’

  ‘Maybe that’s what it is. Maybe she’s just kept it for the memories.’

  ‘Then how come you’re in here?’ Bea held up the notebook, open at a page that contained a picture of Michael, along with every detail of his life: where he lived, the names of his wife and children, even their pictures.

  ‘Not Anne, though, she’s not in here at all,’ said Bea, scanning through. ‘It’s like Karen never knew about her.’

  ‘She might not have. Like I told you, Anne’s adopted. We were never allowed to put photographs of her on Facebook, and she moved out before I met Karen. Jesus,’ he breathed. ‘I always thought she didn’t want to know about them. She never asked.’

  ‘She never really needed to, did she? I mean, she has it all written down here. What is this even for?’

  ‘Maybe it’s just a really detailed way of not forgetting things about the people she loves. Like some people keep lists of birthdays and special occasions; maybe this is just an extreme version of that.’

  ‘Fran’s in here. Adam too. There’s half a page on Gary from work. That’s hardly memories.’

  Bea turned page after page, details of her own life jumping out at her. It was like how This Is Your Life would be if Michael Aspel was actually a deranged stalker.

  ‘See this?’ She pointed to a yellowing newspaper article glued to one of the pages. ‘I knew this guy.’ A hand clenched at her chest to see the picture of him staring out from Karen’s album. ‘At university.’

  Michael studied the article. ‘Says he had an accident. Why has Karen kept that?’

  ‘No idea,’ Bea murmured. Or rather, she didn’t want to have an idea.

  ‘There’s a train ticket here for Shrewsbury to Liverpool, it’s dated two days before the article.’

  Bea shook her head. ‘I don’t understand. Why wouldn’t she have told me she was in the same city when this happened?’

  ‘There’s a lot she hasn’t been telling either of us by the looks of it.’

  Bea held up a stack of photos that had been left loose in the box. ‘Look at these.’

  Michael looked at the scenic shots, each one showing the place Karen went when she needed to think.

  ‘I think I know where they’ve gone.’

  85

  We were holding on to one another so tightly that it didn’t matter any more who was dragging who down. All that mattered was the freezing, dirty water that waited to suck us under should we lose our footing.

  She was stronger than me, surprisingly so for someone so slight. Or maybe she was just more scared. There is a certain strength that comes from fear, and from the knowledge that you no longer have anything to lose. She’d been following me, she knew what I had done, what I was capable of, and she didn’t want to meet the same fate as Eleanor. Maybe she’d thought she wouldn’t care any more, but everyone fights back in the end, when they feel the life slipping from them; however much they have craved death, moved towards it like an old friend in the last moments of their life, everyone fights for one more breath.

  I’d heard the splash a second before I felt the breath sucked from my lungs by the freezing water. She released me then, the shock of the impact rendering her temporarily immobile. She’s not going to fight, I realised, even as my legs were propelling me towards the surface. She’s just going to give in.

  But the survival instinct had been stronger than her despair, and she’d broken the surface of the water seconds after me. The river that had looked so calm on the surface was a churning tide underneath that threatened to drag us both down to our death. Maybe that was the way it should have been. We were both guilty in this; we’d both had our part to play. Mine had been the hands that had taken Eleanor’s life, but she had been to blame as surely as if she’d been there with me. We were partners in a crime neither of us ever intended to commit. And now we were going to pay our penance.

  86

  How would you feel if I told you that Adam wasn’t sleeping with Anne Lenton?

  He was. I saw them together.

  You saw what you wanted to see.

  What is that supposed to mean? Why would I want to see my best friend’s marriage fail? Why would I want her to be in danger? Myself in danger?

  So you could be the one to fix it when it all fell apart. Like you always did.

  Say what you want – I know what I saw.

  Take a look at this, please, Karen.

  Who is it?

  It’s the manager of the Pandora shop. See her hair? It’s similar to Anne’s, don’t you think? She recognises Adam; he checked the store’s electrics a couple of months ago. And here, here’s a still of the store’s CCTV. See how she’s touching his arm as she leaves? She was going on her lunch break; it’s why you couldn’t see her uniform.

  Why are you doing this?

  Adam wasn’t having an affair.

  Yes, he was.

  No. He remembers working at the shop. He’s never seen Anne Lenton.

  He’s a liar. What he’s saying can’t be true.

  Why not, Karen? Would it be so terrible if you were wrong? If your friends had never been in danger?

  They were. I know they were. It wasn’t for nothing. I was just trying to protect them. Like I always did.

  Is that why you took Noah? As a warning?

  I just wanted to make her see. She wasn’t taking me seriously.

  And the other things? The hair cream? Bea’s date with the man from the internet site?

  Nothing I did made them see the danger they were in. What she was capable of.

  What Jessica was capable of?

  Yes! That they were in danger.

  And yet Anne Lenton never went near your friends, did she? She lied about having an affair with a married man to make you ashamed of what you were doing with her father, but she never did a single thing to hurt anyone. The only danger to your friends was you.

  Liar. Liar. Liar LIAR LIAR.

  87

  Bea

  They found both cars pulled up at the spot in the third of the photos, but neither woman was in sight on the banks. Bea jumped out before Michael had even cut the engine; she was at the edge of the river before she heard his door slam.

  ‘Can you see them?’ he shouted, jogging up to meet her. Bea’s eyes scanned the river.

  ‘Oh God.’ She reached out to grab his arm, but he’d already seen the two women surface fifty yards away and had broken into a run, shrugging off his jacket as he went.

  ‘Call 999!’ he shouted back to her.

  Bea was rigid with fear. Her fingers fumbled as she pulled the phone from her pocket and swiped in, punched 999. Afterwards she couldn’t even remember giving the operator the details; all she could recall of that moment was the question running through her mind about the horrific choice Michael had to make.

  His daughter or his lover. Which one would he save?

  88

  What happened then? Before Bea and Michael pulled you out of the river?

  You know what happened. I told the officers already. She grabbed me. She dragged me in. She tried to kill me.

  Your boyfriend—

  He’s not my boyfriend.

  Your ex-boyfriend saw you both come up for air and then he said you pushed her back down.

  He’s mistaken. How can anyone have known what was really happening? What was going on under the surface? It was an accident.

  Are we still talking about what happened in the river?

  W
hat happened in the river, what happened to Eleanor, what happened to Amy – does it matter? I couldn’t save any of them in the end, could I? She was right about that – they all were. You can’t save everyone. Some people are beyond saving. I tried.

  Your sister’s death was an accident.

  It was still my fault. I could have saved her. She would still be alive if I had done my job.

  You weren’t old enough to be put in charge of your sister in that situation. She was your mother’s responsibility.

  Do you think I don’t know that? I’ve dedicated my entire life to helping people who had childhoods like mine. You can tell yourself over and over that you weren’t to blame, you can reason and plead with yourself, but in the end there is always that voice whispering that if you’d only paid more attention, been more responsible, no one’s life would have been ruined. A baby wouldn’t be dead. You wouldn’t be evil.

  Is that what you think? That you’re evil?

  Most people go their whole lives not killing anyone at all. I’ve killed my sister and my best friend. Do you think I’m evil?

  I think you need help.

  You can’t help me. No one can. You can take me back to my cell now.

  89

  The first time I killed someone I was just four years old. For so many years I tried to tell myself it was an accident – I wasn’t responsible for the death of my sister. But I didn’t save her either. I have spent my whole life trying to protect the people I love, to try and make up for the baby girl I couldn’t save. Sometimes I’ll admit that I went too far, but all I ever wanted to do was protect them. I blamed myself for what happened to Bea at university; I should never have been so far away from her. It’s why I installed the camera in her laptop – to look out for her when we couldn’t be together.

  As we grew up, me on the outside of our triumvirate looking in on the friendship Bea and Eleanor shared, I made sure they always needed me. I suppose looking back I felt like I couldn’t be phased out if I was indispensable. When it looked as though things were ticking along too neatly for them, all it ever took was a little help from me to make sure their lives were shaken up enough for me to save the day. At school it was a rumour, or a boyfriend caught cheating; as we grew up it was easier to show my worth without having to intervene in the first place. Thoughtful gifts when they were having a bad day, dates I remembered that they barely remembered themselves. I prided myself on making these women the centre of my universe without them even knowing. And in return they gave me a taste of normality, a peek into an ordinary life with family feuds that came from stealing each other’s clothes rather than from the aching loss of a baby girl.

  I honestly thought as we entered adulthood that they were mine and I was theirs. I had integrated myself into their lives so completely that I was part of the machine rather than the third wheel.

  Until that day.

  I’d gone into town on my lunch break to post some letters when I saw them together. Without me. It will sound meaningless to you; in thirty years of friendship of course we’d met without all three being present before, but not often, and usually only because the other couldn’t make it. We’d dropped in to one another’s houses without sending out group invites, but if you asked me why this time was different, I’d say I just knew. In that moment all my fears were confirmed – theirs was the true friendship and this would the beginning of my descent into loneliness. You see, I had no one else. I had put all my eggs in their basket, so to speak; even Michael wasn’t really mine. There had always been something stopping me from giving myself fully to relationships, and this was the consequence. How many clandestine meetings had there been? How many furtive glances – don’t let Karen know, let’s make it just the two of us.

  And once I’d seen them, and I’d known, it was all I could think about. Our every interaction was tainted with their imagined betrayal; my time in their reflected sunlight was coming to a close.

  Jessica Hamilton walked into our lives at just the right – or the most horrifically wrong – moment. As soon as I met her I knew there was something not quite right about her, that she was wearing a mask not too different to my own, but it wasn’t until I saw her with Adam that I knew how dangerous she would be, to me and my friends. I didn’t know what she wanted or why, but I knew that I had to protect them from her. This was my chance to show them how much they needed me. My psychiatrist, Sheila, tells me that I can’t have seen what I thought I saw; that Adam was there innocently and Jessica wasn’t there at all, but I don’t believe that. If all this was for nothing, then what does that make me?

  But they couldn’t – or wouldn’t – see the danger that was right in front of them. I had to make them realise! The things I did – moving Eleanor’s car, setting Bea up on a date doomed to remind her of the past – I was never putting them in real danger. I was always right there, ready to swoop in and remind them I was the only person they could rely on. Not Adam, or Fran. Not even each other. And when they realised how much of a threat Jessica Hamilton was to them, it would be me they turned to, to tell me I was right all along. To ask me to help them.

  The police say that Jessica, or Anne Lenton as we now know her to be, was never interested in my friends; that it was me she wanted to cause trouble for, but I know that can’t be true. I was protecting them. And when I went to Eleanor’s house that afternoon, I just wanted to make her see. I’d been careless; she’d recognised the bracelet I’d hidden in Adam’s car from an old photograph – so stupid to use an old one of my own, but I hadn’t worn it in so long, I never thought she’d remember it – and she started accusing me of all sorts. She thought I was the one having an affair with her husband. Me! She didn’t even believe Jessica existed. It was far from the vision I’d had of promising her I would fix everything for her and her falling gratefully into my arms. I can’t pretend it wasn’t frustrating, or that when she lashed out at me I didn’t push back, just a little harder than I’d intended. When I saw the blood, I realised what I’d done.

  And there it was. The second person I’d loved was dead because I couldn’t save them. First from my mother, and then from Jessica Hamilton. Because she was responsible – I wasn’t in any doubt about that. She might not have been in the room, but it was her fault. All I ever wanted to do was love them, protect them from everything. They needed me. I just wanted to save them all.

  You can’t fix me. Those were some of the first words she said to me, and I remember thinking she was wrong. I fixed people all the time, it was my job. It turned out that she never wanted to be fixed. She was there to fix me, she was my Inspector, my Marley’s Ghost. But I don’t feel fixed. And I don’t think I ever will be.

  Final report – Karen Browning

  Psychiatrist: Dr Sheila Ford.

  Length of treatment: 1 year and two months.

  Karen suffered severe trauma as a result of bereavement in childhood, resulting in her blaming herself for the death of her sister. Although she recognises that the responsibility for her sister lay solely with her mother she still bears the emotional scars caused by guilt and as such has spent her life trying to atone for the accident by protecting those around her. The almost symbiotic relationship she has cultivated with her close group of friends has reinforced her belief that she needs to ‘save’ these women, and when there was no immediate threat her mind manufactured one in the form of her patient Jessica Hamilton.

  There is still much work to be done with Karen. The God complex that she has cultivated since the death of her sister in childhood has given her the inflated belief that the harm she caused was all collateral damage in the grand scheme of keeping her friends safe from outside threat, and I understand from police reports that it is believed she has been manufacturing ways in which she can protect her friends for quite some time – although the events of twelve months ago mark an accelerated decline in her mental state. Confronting what really happened will be the last emotional barrier to breach, after which I fear we may see a complete break
down. Once Karen loses the image she has of herself as protector and admits that she was the sole threat to her friends, there will be considerable fallout.

  Having worked with Karen Browning for over a year now it is my opinion that she remains a high-risk patient, with the severest risk she poses being that to herself. It is my recommendation to the courts that Karen Browning should remain in custody for the maximum sentence available.

  Table of Contents

  Title Page

  Copyright Page

  About Jenny Blackhurst

  Praise

  About the Book

  Dedication

  Acknowledgements

  Part One

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28