Chapter 41 Witness X
Witness X
My entire life could be annihilated in forty-eight hours. Just two days until this trial begins. I know he will protect me; I trust him with my life. But the rest of them are unpredictable. Who knows what they’ll dredge up?
It’s crazy to think all of this started nearly a year ago. I should have known right then and there it would end badly.
I didn’t plan on going there, obviously. Why would I go there on a Friday night? Alone?
We’d had a row, so I stormed out of the house just to get away from him. I can’t even remember why, now. All the arguments were the same anyway, the same issues yelled in different ways. I couldn’t stand being in the house a second longer.
What took me there? Initially, I went into Durham city center thinking I might bump into someone I knew.
I can usually find someone on a Friday night to meet up with.
I have lots of acquaintances. But I don’t really “do” friends.
As soon as I parked the car, though, I realized I didn’t want to talk to anyone.
Not anyone I knew. I can’t stand most of them. They’re nothing like me.
It dawned on me that I was alone. Totally alone. That’s the thing: pretending to be someone you’re not, wearing a mask. It’s a solitary existence.
But that night, I needed to pull it off.
I wanted to be somewhere I knew none of them would be.
Nobody I know would dare go near Innocence. Well, they would, but they certainly wouldn’t be wanting to chat if they saw me.
It was busy when I arrived; full of young twenty-somethings in their tight bodycon dresses taking selfies and sipping porn-star martinis.
When Jack and I locked eyes, I knew instantly something would happen between us. The attraction was magnetic. It was impossible not to notice the shape of his toned arms through the thin material of his black, long-sleeved shirt. Messy, dark hair framed his strikingly attractive face.
I’m not going to say, “Oh! It was so unlike me!” because it wasn’t.
It was exactly the kind of thing I’d do.
I didn’t think about my husband for a second.
He didn’t deserve my guilt. After leading me through Temptation up to his flat, we enjoyed a glass of whiskey before Jack pinned me up against the door and kissed me so passionately I felt we were destined to be lovers.
He could tell I wanted it. Hard and hot.
That was it at first. Passion.
The problem with passion is that it’s dangerous, unpredictable. People say it all the time, don’t they? “Follow your passion!” It’s the worst thing you can do. You don’t think rationally if you’re acting out of lust.
I fell in love with him. The kind of love I’d pack up my entire life and run away for.
And maybe it would have ended that way, if not for that night.
The night everything went so horribly wrong.
Now here we are, a year later, Jack accused of murdering Anton Smythe.
What I do know is that this jury isn’t going to hear what really happened that night. They’ll get a different version, one they can tolerate, one that will make sense, one that will make Anton look better than he was. They will hear a version that is “just.”
Not necessarily the truth.
When Anton went to Jack’s apartment that night, the last person he expected to find was me. You see, I know his secret, the one that would have had him sacked as a judge if anyone found out. And that’s why Jack is protecting me.
Sometimes, I wake up in the middle of the night and replay the entire thing in my head.
I hear the thud of that kettlebell on his skull seconds before his body fell to the floor.
I remember the desperation in his voice, the last words to leave his mouth.
The ones he’d never want his family to know.
His big secret. The one that had led him to Jack’s flat in the first place.
But they can never know the truth.
Nobody can.