Chapter 31
I knew it.
I think I love you too. It’s creased in the middle, as if it had been folded in half. On the other side, Max – and I’m convinced Max wrote this – has scribbled a large B. That’s it, just the letter B. What does that mean? Because this has to be the reply to the note Holly found under Max’s laptop.
The one that read, I think I love you. With a kiss.
I wonder how they did it. Slipped them into each other’s pockets? Left them stuck on the mirror in the bathroom of the hotel where they stayed for a whole week?
I’m going to be sick. Well, at least I’ve got the answer to my question. It is her. And that’s why she hates me so much.
The sound of a door closing. She can’t find me here. I have to get out. I tiptoe to the door, listening intently. I can just make out a tap running downstairs.
I slip through the door as quietly as I can and walk down the top step, then another.
It creaks under my foot.
I close my eyes, my heart pounding. The tap has stopped running. Is that because she heard me? A door closes, followed by footsteps.
Oh, God. Please don’t let her come up here.
‘Well, they paid two hundred and ten thousand pounds at auction for this tired two-bed terrace…’
I jump and put my hand on the wall to steady myself.
‘…but did they make a profit?’
It’s the TV. I wait for my heart to slow down. There’s a little burst of jaunty music, then another voice chimes in: ‘We’ve knocked through the kitchen, added French doors onto the garden…’
She must be in the living room, which means I can’t get out through the front door. She would absolutely see me walk past.
But if I go back the way I came, through the utility room, I could make it.
Okay. Deep breath. I continue down the steps, staying close to the wall so I don’t set off another creaking step.
‘We’re hoping the valuation’s gone up…’
I turn right down the corridor and hurry to the utility room in quick, silent steps.
I slip inside, turn around and push the door.
It clicks shut. Oh God. I meant to leave it ajar, but I misjudged.
Did she hear that? Is she coming? What the hell am I going to say to her if she finds me in here?
That I was looking to borrow some washing powder?
I wait. Silence, except for the beating of my heart. I turn to the window which I’d left wide open. I’m surprised she hasn’t felt the cold draught, but then the whole downstairs is cold and draughty.
I hoist myself onto the windowsill and again wonder how my life has come to this. A splinter lodges itself in the heel of my hand. If she doesn’t kill me, I’m pretty sure this disgusting splinter will.
Somehow, I manage to squeeze myself out and drop into the narrow passage. I stand on my toes and push the window in a bit, as much as it will go, which is still more open than it was.
I crouch down, praying that nobody walks past at that very moment, because if they see me, they’re going to call the police. That’s what I would do.
I slip back through the gap between the hedge and the wall, and now I’m turning the key in my door. I close it behind me, lean against it and wait for my heart to slow down.
I knew it. It’s her. The woman Max had an affair with back in London. But I still can’t believe it.
Except I can. Little odd details come back to me, like when she said about sending Max the video of Holly.
I remember finding it odd, how casually she said that.
I remember blurting in surprise, ‘You don’t even know him.
’ And there was something about her expression.
What was it? Triumphant? But then she gave me this story about how she could get his phone number from his place of work, and I bought it.
I feel so stupid. To think that I had to convince Max to move to give our marriage another chance.
Move to this place. And she followed us here.
My God. Of course he never got the opportunity to see her.
He never realised his mistress – his I think I love you too – as if he were remotely capable of love – had moved in right next door to us.
I go upstairs to change back into my own clothes. And the whole time I am remembering moments when I mentioned Max. I knew her reaction wasn’t quite right. I just couldn’t put my finger on it.
I cringe at the memory of pouring my heart out to her, sitting together on the floor in my bedroom. What was it she said? ‘For Max to have an affair at work means he must have been unhappy at home, don’t you think?’ And I remember thinking, how does she know it was at work?
Unhappy at home. For the first time I truly wish Max weren’t dead.
Just so she could rekindle their affair and run away into the sunset with him.
See how she likes it, living with a monster.
Come to think of it, they’d probably have a wonderful time making other people miserable.
A match made in heaven. Or in hell, I should say.
I put Holly’s clothes back in her wardrobe.
To think Teri has come all this way to get him back.
She bought the house next door, for Christ’s sake.
She befriended Holly. She befriended me.
To think that she let me spill my deepest and darkest secrets, and now she’s toying with me.
She’s not after money. She wants me gone. She said as much to Holly yesterday.
She’s leaving you. She’s renting a house. She’s not your friend. She’s going to Hull without you.
All this for what? So I would leave him? So she could have him? God, if only she’d shown up two weeks earlier. I could have agreed to leave with Holly. We could have spared ourselves all this drama. They could have lived miserably ever after.
She must have felt incredibly confident that I wouldn’t know who she was. I never asked Max her name. I didn’t want to know. Maybe he said as much to her.
I never told her your name. But still, things change.
And then I realise my mistake. The letter Max scribbled on the note isn’t T – it’s B. Her name isn’t Teresa or Teri. It’s something that starts with B.
I have to know.
I go back into our bedroom, open the drawer of his bedside table and pull out his phone. I sit on the bed and stare at it.
Don’t do it, Kate.
I bite on my thumbnail. Don’t do it. It’s a really bad idea.
My finger rests on the power button.
Don’t do it.
I turn it back on.