by M K Farrar
“I’m sorry,” she said, still pinning her down. “It’s just something that will help you sleep. This is for your own safety. I promise. I need to make sure he can’t find you.”
Ellen’s eyes widened and she shook her head beneath Liv’s palm. She tried to speak, but her words were muffled. She struggled against Liv’s hold, kicking her legs and trying to lift her arms to claw at Liv’s face, but Olivia used her entire body weight to pin her down, and any scratches she delivered fell harmlessly against the leather jacket Liv had stolen.
Liv felt wretched. She didn’t want her friend to be frightened, but what choice did she have? She would rather Ellen was frightened for a short while than dead for good. Ellen struggled, but as the drugs worked their way into her system, she gradually grew weaker, until she finally fell still.
“I’m sorry,” Liv said again, but she was asleep now and couldn’t hear her.
Liv looked around for her next step. Her gaze landed on a small walk-in wardrobe. That would do.
She climbed off her friend and caught hold of her ankles. With her back bent and straining, she dragged Ellen into the wardrobe. She didn’t want to tie her up, not wanting to leave her defenceless if Michael somehow found her before Liv found him. She wouldn’t keep her here for long, she hoped, but Ellen would need to remain here for as long as she was in danger. Thinking of something else, she remembered Ellen’s bag. Ellen had dropped it when Liv had jumped her, but a quick rummage through located the keys to Ellen’s flat. Ellen might need a change of clothes or something, so at least now Liv had the keys and was able to let herself in when needed.
There was one more problem, however. She needed to figure out how to keep Ellen in the wardrobe. She’d just let herself out again when she woke.
If she found some wood, she’d be able to hammer the doors shut.
There was a skip out the back of the block of flats—Liv had noticed it a couple of times. There was bound to be some discarded wooden planks or boards there she could use, and they had nails and a hammer in the flat from all the times they’d needed to put up pictures or shelves.
Yes, she’d barricade Ellen in with the wooden planks, and let her out as soon as she knew her friend would be safe.
Chapter Thirty-two
Present Day
SHE STAGGERED BACK from Michael. “No. Oh, no.”
Liv covered her face with her hands as the memories flooded over her. She’d blacked out because she hadn’t wanted to remember what she’d done to Ellen, some part of her knowing that remembering would also mean admitting what she’d been ignoring for so long.
She was sick again.
“You remember, don’t you?” Michael demanded. “You know what you did!”
“Ellen. I have to get to Ellen.”
“Wait, you fucking bitch! Untie me.”
But she ignored him, backing away slowly on shaking legs, before turning and running. Her heart pounded hard in her chest, making her dizzy. She had to hold it together. How long had it been since she’d taken Ellen? Two days? Two days without food or water? Or had she left her something? Her memory was blurry, like pieces of it had been cut away. The medication. She’d stopped taking her meds, had convinced herself they were somehow harming her.
It had happened again, and she hadn’t even realised.
Memories of when she’d been Sarah poured back into her mind. A floodgate had been opened. Twenty years old and at university, struggling to hand in coursework and finding exams overwhelming. Had it started then? No, she could go back further, to when she’d been a teen. Her obsessive behaviour, the depression, the self-harm. Her parents had thought she wouldn’t cope with the stress of university, but the doctor had put her on anti-depressants, and she’d convinced them she’d be all right.
She hadn’t been.
After it had all happened, she went to a psychiatric unit, but then moved back home. She had been better, her meds controlling her anxiety and paranoia. But she’d carried the knowledge of what she’d done with her at all times, and she knew she needed to start again. She’d told her parents she was going travelling to stop them looking for her, but then moved to London and changed her name. She sent the occasional email to her parents as Sarah, but told them it was better for her this way, and felt too much contact, or her going back home and seeing them would only make her go backwards in her recovery. Her parents were too nervous of her to argue. She knew they felt like they were constantly walking a tightrope with her, terrified of doing or saying something that might push her over the edge.
So, she’d moved to London and become Olivia Midhurst and had left Sarah Longdown far behind. Or at least she thought she had. Now, it seemed, Sarah had caught up to her once more.
She stumbled up the stairs to the bolted door of the converted wine cellar of the property the estate agency had on its books. The huge, six-bedroom house with its gated driveway and high walls had seemed like the perfect place to take someone if you wanted to get answers out of them. There were no neighbours attached—which was rare in London—and she’d known the place was standing empty. They weren’t supposed to be showing anyone around yet, so she hadn’t been expecting anyone else to come here. She wondered who had let themselves into the property. One of her colleagues, she expected. How was she going to explain all of this to them? But then she figured her job was going to be the least of her concerns. It wasn’t as though she could show people around houses from prison.
She reached the top of the stairs and pulled back the lock with a crack.
“You can’t just leave me here, Olivia, or Sarah, or whatever the fuck your name is!” Michael yelled after her. “At least untie me first. After everything you’ve done, you owe me. You fucking owe me!”
Standing at the top of the stairs, she spun to face him. “You fucking bastard. Don’t make out like you’re some innocent. I knew something was off about you. Maybe my head twisted everything, but that doesn’t mean you’re blameless.”
Rage contorted his features. “Let me go, you bitch!”
She didn’t blame him for his fury, but her head was spinning. She couldn’t release him. She wouldn’t blame him if he attacked her for what she’d done. She deserved it. But she also remembered what she’d done to Ellen, and her fear for her friend’s safety far outweighed any remorse she felt about what she’d put Michael through. Maybe he wasn’t guilty of what she’d accused him of, but he’d still been cheating on his wife for the past month, and had lied to them all. It wasn’t as though he was a good man.
“I’m sorry,” she shouted back at him as she turned for the door. “I’ll send the police. They can come and get you, and you can tell them everything. Of course, then I’m sure your wife will also find out everything, but I think that’s probably the one good thing that will come out of all of this.”
“Fuck! Fuck you, you fucking bitch!”
She ignored him. Hopefully, the last piece of rope would hold long enough to let her get away.
As she ran from the house, memories tumbled over her, coming thicker and faster. Those days leading up to this moment, when she’d truly believed Michael was a danger to both her and everyone around her. She’d only wanted to keep Ellen safe, and when Ellen had told her she’d found something out about Michael and was going to confront him, all she’d wanted to do was keep Ellen safe. So, she’d done what she had, but then her dysfunctional, misfiring, crazy brain had blocked out what she’d done, so all she’d known was that Ellen was missing and Michael was dangerous, and that he was the only one who’d known where she was.
She burst out of the house into fresh air. It was the first she’d tasted in two days, and it hit her lungs like a bucket of cold water. She suddenly became aware of the state she was in. The bandages around her arms which had been administered by the hospital had grown hard and were stinking. All the violence had opened her wounds time and time again, bleeding fresh into the old bandages before crusting over again. She’d be lucky if she didn’t get an infecti
on. She still wore those same clothes as well, the bloodied t-shirt and jeans, and the leather jacket she’d stolen. The stink of rot was oozing off her, but she didn’t have time to take care of herself. She needed to get to Ellen.
God, she couldn’t believe what she had done. She’d forced sleeping tablets down her friend’s throat and held her down until she’d passed out. Tears filled Liv’s eyes, and she swiped them away, angry at herself. Ellen must have been so confused, so frightened as to why her best friend had suddenly turned on her.
Liv reached the driveway and stood still, looking around. The car wasn’t parked here. What had she done with it? Her mind was spinning, all the pieces of what had happened falling into place. She’d taken the agency car. What would Tony have thought when neither she nor Ellen turned up to work? Did he think they’d stolen the vehicle and run off together?
That didn’t matter now. What mattered was remembering where she’d left the vehicle.
It came back to her with a jolt, and she snatched a breath before running around the side of the house. There was a double garage attached to the house, and she’d moved the vehicles—both the agency’s and Michael’s—so they wouldn’t be seen. She still had the keys in her pocket, so she opened the garage door to reveal both cars.
With tears streaming down her face, Liv climbed behind the wheel, shoved the car into gear, and stamped down on the accelerator. Her only thought was to reach Ellen. She didn’t even care if she was pulled over by the police for speeding—at least then she’d be able to confess what she’d done, and they would go and help her friend.
She drove faster than she’d ever dared to before, and within fifteen minutes she was back at her building. Abandoning the car on double yellow lines outside, she sprinted up the stairs to her flat.
Liv slammed her palms against her front door, astonished that she’d managed to lock her flat on top of everything else. Scrabbling back in the pocket of her stolen jacket, she found the keys and opened the door.
“Ellen!” she cried. “Oh, my God. Ellen, I’m so sorry. I’m coming!”
She burst into her bedroom and gasped as she saw the boards she’d nailed across the doors of her walk in wardrobe. How had she done all this and then completely blocked it from her mind?
“Ellen?” she yelled again. “I’m coming!”
She listened hard for any response, but there wasn’t one. Oh, God, please don’t let her be dead. Please don’t let her be dead. She’d never prayed before, not really, but her prayers weren’t for her. They were for Ellen, who never deserved any of this.
She yanked off the boards she’d nailed across the doors, splintering her nails but not caring. She lifted her foot, bringing her heel down on the board at the bottom.
“Ellen?” she cried. “Ellen, can you hear me? I’m sorry! I’m so, so sorry!”
But her apologies wouldn’t mean a thing if Ellen was dead.
Chapter Thirty-three
Present Day
Olivia yanked away the final board holding her walk-in wardrobe doors together and threw open the door.
“Oh, God.”
She reared away as the stench hit her like a slap in the face. This was far worse than the vomit had been back in the wine cellar. This was shit, and piss, and puke. She just prayed it wasn’t also the stink of a decomposing body.
It was dark inside the wardrobe, but on the floor she could make out the shape of her friend.
“Ellen!” Tears filled her eyes. She’d done this. She’d done it to her friend. Michael had been right all along. He hadn’t been the dangerous one. That had been her. She drugged her friend and then boarded her up inside the wardrobe. What the hell had she been thinking? She hadn’t. This wasn’t her in her normal state. She’d had a psychotic break again; she knew that now. All the signs had been there, but she’d projected them onto someone else.
The stench was unbearable. Ellen must have used the corner of the wardrobe as a toilet, though Liv could hardly blame her.
Clothes had been pulled from the hangers and used to create a bundle on the floor to sleep on. Cast to one side were metal clothes hangers, bent out of shape. Ellen must have pushed them between the gaps in the door and tried to force off the boards Olivia had nailed on. The metal had been too bendy, however, and the hangers had just changed shape rather than done anything productive. The idea of Ellen, weakened from the drugs, dehydrated, starving, and all the while wondering why her friend had turned on her in such a hideous way. It broke her heart.
She dropped to her knees beside Ellen’s body.
“Ellen?” With a trembling hand, she reached out and tentatively rolled Ellen onto her back.
Ellen let out a groan, and Liv clamped her hand over her mouth, holding back a scream.
She was alive.
Realising Ellen had been without water, she scrambled back to her feet and ran into the bedroom. A half drunk, plastic bottle of water was beside the bed, and she snatched it up and took it back to her friend.
“Here,” she said, unscrewing the lid and holding it to the other woman’s lips. “I brought you some water.”
Only barely conscious, Ellen’s eyes flickered open. Understanding brightened their blue depths, and they widened as she realised who had shaken her awake.
“No, no, not you!” she croaked.
Ellen managed to get herself onto her elbows, pushing back with her feet.
“It’s okay. I’m not going to hurt you. I’ve come to get you out. I’m so sorry.”
Ellen lifted her hands in front of her body to ward her away. “No, I don’t believe you. You’re crazy. Stay the fuck away from me.”
She had been backing away, but now her line of sight landed on the open door behind Olivia, and the freedom it offered. She shot Olivia a wild glance, and Liv was horrified to see how much she’d deteriorated in a matter of days. Her eyes were bruised hollows, her skin waxy and white. Already, the weight loss was visible in the hollows of her cheeks.
“It’s okay. You can go. I’m just so relieved to see you’re still alive. I was so scared—” Her voice broke, and she pressed her knuckles to her mouth to try and hold it in. “I was so scared you might be dead.”
The desperation to run morphed into furious disbelief. “You were scared I might be dead?” Ellen spat. “You did this to me, Olivia! You drugged me and locked me up for days. Don’t you dare fucking cry! You don’t get to turn on the waterworks for this.”
“I’m sorry, I’m sorry. I’m sick. I didn’t mean to. I was only trying to keep you safe.”
“Well, you could have killed me instead. You need help. Serious help.”
Liv nodded. “I know, I know. Please. I brought you some water.”
She held the bottle out to Ellen, who hesitated, before reaching out and snatching it from Liv’s hand like a stray dog grabbing a snack from a passing stranger. She put the bottle to her lips and drained the contents, before wiping her mouth with the back of her hand.
“This isn’t the first time you’ve got sick like this, is it?” Ellen asked.
She shook her head. “I thought I was better. That’s why I moved to London. I wanted to leave it all behind me.”
“Leave all what behind you?” Ellen demanded. “What did you do, Olivia?”
Chapter Thirty-four
Seven Years Earlier
DUE TO HER ANXIETY, Sarah Longdown started university late.
She moved into the student halls and tried to forget the reason she was several years older than all the other girls here. She caught them giving her strange glances, as though they could already tell she was the odd one out. On moving in day, the other girls had somehow instantly bonded, though none of them had met each other before, and she was standing on the outskirts looking in. She wished she could understand this somehow easy congeniality other women had with each other. For her, the moment anyone tried to talk to her, she flushed bright red and looked down at her feet, stumbling over her words.
But she’d convinced her
parents it was time for her to do this. She was an adult now, twenty years old, and she needed to have a life of her own. She was smart and had done well at school and her exams, despite everything else, and now she felt like she was ready to take the next step.
Besides, student halls was practically like being at home. Or at least it was a good halfway house to having a place of her own. They had security here, so she had someone she could call if anything was bothering her. She’d made a promise to herself that she wasn’t going to allow every little thing to spook her, however. The last thing the security guard needed was her calling every few hours because she worried all the time.
Still, those first few days were hard, with everyone seeming to make friends so easily, and her always feeling on the outside. The university did their best to try to encourage everyone to mingle, including a ton of events in the first week of Freshers.
It was at one of the Fresher socials that she first met May. The university social club was at its worst and finest at this time of year, when everyone was putting on a show and many were experiencing freedom for the first time in their lives. It wasn’t really her thing, but she hadn’t wanted to stay in her room—her need for inclusion warring with her desire to hide away. She’d bought herself a drink, though she knew she couldn’t have many or they’d interfere with her meds, and then found herself a corner where she could sit down and watch everyone else dance to a DJ she’d never heard of but who apparently used to play on Radio One.
A second glass slammed down on the table in front of her. “You look like you could use this.”
She looked up to see a pretty blonde with thick black-rimmed glasses that she somehow managed to make appear cool and funky standing in front of her. She glanced down at the drink and then back up at the girl, unsure if she’d meant the drink to be for someone else.