Chapter 39 Freya
FREYA
I take Coco’s watch out from the plastic bag and slip it onto my wrist, wondering how something so understated could be worth so much.
Even more surprising is that someone with so little taste would wear something so tasteful.
I’d have expected her to go for something gaudy, but this, with its deep-blue dial and diamond bezel, reeks of class.
Despite not wanting to admit it, it feels good on, and as I hold my arm up to the light from the window, the diamonds send the sun dancing across the ceiling.
I imagine Coco waking up each morning, going to her safe, and deliberating over what she’s going to take out.
Having to make the difficult decision of which piece will work best with each Hermès Birkin.
On any given day, she’s probably walking around wearing in excess of two hundred thousand pounds’ worth of jewelry and accessories.
While a few miles away, there are children like Harry, whose lives hang in the balance, and could be saved for a lot less.
If there were some way to sell this, for the money it’s worth, and give it to Maria, I would. But how can I, without Charlie finding out? And plus, it might need papers, it might be tracked … everyone will be looking for it. Can I really take that risk?
But what else am I supposed to do with it? I can’t just leave it hidden under the bathroom sink, pretending I don’t know it’s there.
A sound comes from downstairs, and I momentarily freeze.
I wait for Charlie’s size 11s to trample along the parquet flooring of the hallway, their steel-toe caps invariably scuffing the skirting as he rounds into the kitchen.
He’ll make a cup of tea—the first thing he always does when he comes in—but the kettle doesn’t get filled and his favorite mug doesn’t get put on the counter.
The familiar noises that I long to hear are instead replaced by the sound of glass breaking.
I snatch the watch off my wrist and throw it back into the plastic bag before shoving it into my bedside drawer. Not knowing whether I’m more scared of a burglar finding me with it, or Charlie.
I tense, my breath trapped in my chest, as I listen to the scurrying of indefinable movement. It feels as if someone is inside the house, but I convince myself that a bird must have fallen down the chimney or the squirrels are back in the attic.
But then comes the unmistakable sound of furniture being dragged and cabinet doors being slammed. I stand, paralyzed with fear behind the closed bedroom door, willing myself to be brave enough to open it.
Tess had told me there had been a spate of daytime break-ins in and around Gloucestershire as audacious burglars take advantage of empty houses rather than incur a homeowner’s wrath in the middle of the night.
But what would be worth stealing from our inconspicuous two-up, two-down cottage, largely bought for the anonymity it afforded us, having felt like a spotlight had been shone on us in London?
We have nothing of any real value. Certainly nothing that would make it worth taking the risk in broad daylight. But then I remember the seventy-thousand-pound watch dumped unceremoniously in a carrier bag.
Turning the doorknob, I flinch at the mouselike squeak it makes.
The noise downstairs stops, as if whoever it is knows they’re not alone.
My trembling hand slowly releases the handle, and I inch the door open, taking a sudden gasp of breath when it creaks.
I wait a moment, trying to spy down the stairs to see if there’s movement, but a couple of heartbeats later, the shuffling begins again as drawers are pulled out and thrown onto the floor.
Someone is definitely in the back room, and as I peer down the narrow stairs, I wonder if I’ve got time to reach the front door.
I place a bare foot onto the landing, easing my weight gently in the hope that it will dissipate the groan of the floorboards.
The lead weight on my chest makes me feel as if I’m in between land mines with every heel-and-ball step.
I’m at the top of the stairs, teetering on the edge, when a figure dressed head to toe in black comes into the hall below. I stop breathing, and my bladder threatens to give way as terror rushes through me. I squeeze everything tight, but it’s taking all my effort not to cry or call out.
The relative safety of the bedroom is a good four steps behind me, but I’m poleaxed by fear, unable to move.
He’s gone into the front room, and the upending of our precious possessions continues, making me feel nauseous and violated.
What makes it worse is that there’s nothing of any worth—the artifacts and memories only of value to me and Charlie.
I bite down on my lip as my lungs fight to get the air they need to inflate. He’s going to come up here next, leaving no stone unturned in his search for whatever it is he’s looking for. I have to make a move.
Leaning on the banister, I tentatively make my way down the stairs, knowing it’ll only be a matter of minutes, if not seconds, before I risk coming face-to-face with whoever has come into my house uninvited.
Charlie, come home, I beg silently, as if manifesting the plea will make it happen.
Few men would be brave enough to take on his six-foot-four frame, knowing that once he had you in a headlock, there was little chance of escape.
I imagine him picking this piece of shit up with one hand and dangling him by his throat as he pleads for mercy.
A terrified tear falls onto my cheek when I realize that my prayers are going unanswered, and I tiptoe down the last four stairs, holding my breath for fear that it will give me away.
I make a leap for the front door, not daring to look behind me. But the catch is fiddly and as I battle to release it, I can feel a presence. The shard of light that had momentarily offered the chance of freedom as I’d pulled it open is slammed shut from behind.
I cry out as my head is yanked back, a rough hand grabbing a fistful of hair and pulling me down the hallway.
“No!” I scream, before a gloved hand reaches around to silence me.
I try to bite down, my teeth searching for bone, but my mouth fills with nothing but foul-tasting filthy material.
I squirm, thrashing my torso from side to side as my limbs seek purchase on a passing doorframe or banister spindle, but he’s dragging me at speed.
“You’d better shut the fuck up,” he says, menacingly, as he throws me onto the floor of the back room.
I fall heavily, twisting my wrists underneath me in an attempt to cushion the landing. I don’t want to show a weakness, but I can’t help but cry out in pain.
“Shut up,” he yells, his manic eyes, the only part of him I can see, veering wildly from behind a balaclava. He reaches into the black bag beside me and takes out a rope.
“No … please, no,” I yell, pushing myself away from him, even though I have nowhere to go.
“I’m warning you,” he says, grabbing hold of my hands and roughly binding them together.
I don’t want to imagine what he might do to me, but yet I can’t stop myself from going there. Is he going to rape me? Torture me? Kill me? My shoulders convulse as I sob, praying that whatever it is, it’ll be over with quickly.
Pulling me toward him by my flailing legs, I refuse to make it easy for him. I kick out at anything I can reach, making contact with his crotch.
He instinctively buckles. “Fuck,” he groans, wincing as he holds onto himself.
But I don’t stop. I keep going, fueled by a sudden desire not to be overpowered by a man who has dared to come into my home. Thrashing with my feet, baring my teeth, I scream like a banshee, fighting for survival.
“You crazy bitch,” he roars, grabbing hold of my ankles and tying them tight with rope, its rough fibers cutting into my skin.
“Help me,” I scream, before he covers my mouth with tape, making me feel like I can’t breathe.
I’m helpless and can do nothing other than watch as he picks up my laptop from the table and throws it into a black rucksack. I squirm and wriggle as he goes up the stairs, knowing that my safe place will never feel safe again.
Heavy footsteps rush from one room to another overhead and I imagine him rifling through my underwear, snatching up my worthless jewelry, which will mean nothing to him, yet everything to me.
The ring that Pete bought me when he promised we’d be together forever.
The brooch my grandmother wore to my christening.
All a part of my history that I will never be able to get back.
Then I remember the watch, thrown so casually into the drawer.
It’s still in a plastic bag, but would he think to look in there?
I imagine his surprise—and delight—that a seventy-thousand-pound watch had come to be left in a supermarket carrier bag, surrounded by nothing worth anything more than a tenner.
He must think it’s his lucky day. And a part of me can’t help but wonder if it isn’t mine, too.