Chapter 18
Chapter Eighteen
Pippa’s heart was racing. What was dangerous? As she turned the page it was blank, she made a discovery – one that was a huge disappointment. The last chapters of the book were missing. In fact, it had skipped right to the end, when Andrew Wetherby was pleading his innocence.
‘No! Damn!’ she muttered. She flicked through the end pages, skim-reading as fast as she could, but there was nothing further about the intoxicating, dangerous commission.
Just at that moment she heard a phone ring.
Next, she heard movement, then Theo’s voice, and even though she knew she absolutely, definitely should not be listening, Pippa found herself doing exactly that, book open in her lap, eyes not moving, ears tilted towards the door like a human satellite dish.
His voice was low and he sounded tired. Pippa knew exactly who it was when Theo said, ‘So you’ve now decided you made a mistake?’
For a moment there was silence until Theo spoke again. ‘Unbelievable. He’s tossed you aside so you want to give our marriage another go.’
It appeared that Clara had suddenly remembered she used to like being married to a decent human being.
Pippa swallowed. She didn’t dare move in case the bed creaked and Theo realised she was listening.
‘Do you really think this is a conversation for this time in the morning?’
Those words surprised Pippa. Was he actually thinking about giving it another go? That certainly hadn’t been a straight ‘No, not a chance, I wouldn’t go back to you even if hell freezes over’.
There was a pause, and when he spoke, it was more quietly.
‘I don’t know…’ His voice caught. ‘I don’t know if we can go back, but yes, I’ll think about it.’
Pippa’s stomach knotted; a sharp, hot twist of something ugly and unwelcome.
Theo sighed. ‘Sebastian. Of all people. You know how he treated me, Clara.’
Another long stretch of silence followed, and she realised Theo must have ended the call.
Pippa found she was holding her breath and tried to tell herself the odd ache blooming under her ribs was nothing dramatic. Just the residue of awkwardness. Of overhearing something she shouldn’t have.
Except … it didn’t feel like nothing.
Not at all.
It felt suspiciously like jealousy. Loud, neon, ‘hello, yes, unfortunately I exist’ jealousy.
Which was ridiculous.
Absurd.
Absolutely not allowed.
But the thought of Clara – beautiful, elegant, history-with-Theo Clara – trying to reel him back in made Pippa’s chest tighten in a way she hadn’t experienced in years.
Trying to bat the feelings away and distract herself, she woke up her phone.
Surely there had to be some information somewhere about this high-profile secret client Wetherby had written about.
The room was dark except for the glow of the screen and the bedside lamp. Outside, the wind and rain rattled the cottage gutters, and from the room next door she could hear Theo tossing and turning in bed.
She typed, ‘Wetherby Vale Brothers high-profile commission’.
Nothing.
Well … not nothing. There were a few articles about Wetherby’s theft from the Vale Brothers, but nothing new.
There were mostly short local news items. A police press release.
A crime forum years later where someone named ClockFan1972 who also was obsessed with the Vale Brothers had written a forty-paragraph theory involving a disgruntled apprentice, a jealous brother-in-law, and a forged Tudor timepiece.
But nothing that mentioned the client.
The mythical, hushed-up, highly important client who had commissioned the secret Vale Brothers project. The one everyone kept referring to like some sort of horological Voldemort.
Pippa clicked another link. Then another and another.
She refined her search:
‘Andrew Wetherby family’.
‘Wetherby court case’.
‘Vale Brothers secret commission’.
Still nothing. It was like the universe had collectively agreed not to talk about it online. Which of course was an exaggeration as this crime happened before the internet existed. But Pippa was determined to find something. She tried again.
‘Andrew Wetherby interview’.
A handful of links popped up. Most were dead ends, or subscription-only articles from newspapers with paywalls the size of Buckingham Palace.
But then one link caught her eye.
A lifestyle magazine.
A women’s magazine, actually, called HerSpace: the kind you usually found in waiting rooms, filled with relationship advice, slow-cooker recipes, and tearjerking real-life stories.
Sandwiched between ‘Seven Signs You Need a Holiday’ and ‘My Mother-in-Law Stole My Wedding Dress’ was the headline:
THE CLOCK CRIME: HOW ONE WOMAN LOST HER HOME, HER HUSBAND, AND HER FUTURE IN A SINGLE WEEK
Pippa’s pulse raced.
She clicked on the link and the article loaded slowly, as if knowing full well it had excellent gossip and wanted to build suspense.
At the top was a photo, not of Andrew Wetherby, but of a generic silhouette behind blinds. Dramatic. Slightly cheesy. Perfect magazine fodder.
Pippa scrolled down and began to read.
THE CLOCK CRIME
By L. Harding – HerSpace Magazine, Archive Edition
‘You never think it’ll happen to someone you know,’ says Emma, hands wrapped tightly around a mug she doesn’t drink from. ‘You never imagine the police will show up at your door because of something your husband did.’
When the police raided the Wetherby home five years ago, the small Northumberland village they lived in didn’t just wake up to flashing blue lights; it woke up to a scandal that shook the community.
Andrew Wetherby was charged and later convicted of theft, along with what authorities called ‘an associated offence involving a high-value, confidential commission’.
The details of this commission remain sealed to this day, and all requests for information have been declined, citing ‘ongoing confidentiality obligations’.
But while the village speculated wildly, one person suffered most from the fallout: his wife.
Emma, who lived in the village for nearly a decade, describes the moment everything changed.
‘I was putting the boys to bed,’ she recalls quietly. ‘Then there was this knock … heavy, not normal. When I answered, the whole street was filled with police cars. They pushed past me. The boys were crying. I didn’t know what was happening.
‘I remember thinking: this must be a mistake. Andrew’s made a mistake, but it can’t be anything serious.’
But as the investigation unfolded, the evidence mounted. Tools matching those missing from the Vale Brothers’ workshops, and sketches of mechanical parts and gold scraps with distinctive Vale Brothers markings, were discovered at Wetherby’s home.
Neighbours stopped making eye contact. Parents avoided her at school pickup. Rumours spread faster than she could keep up with, and when Andrew’s court date finally arrived, no one was surprised by the verdict except, it seemed, Emma herself.
When the conviction was announced, the backlash was immediate. Local neighbours posted nasty letters through their doors. People she’d known for years stopped speaking to her.
Within a week, Emma packed two suitcases, collected her sons from school, and left the village she once thought would be their forever home.
‘We were being blamed for something that wasn’t ours to carry. I had to choose: stay and drown in what people thought of us, or go somewhere my children could grow up without being whispered about.’
She chose to leave.
She moved across the country, changed her name, changed her boys’ names, and built a new life from scratch. Not out of guilt, but for survival.
‘I’m not hiding because I did something wrong,’ she says. ‘I’m hiding because people can be cruel and I refuse to let my children grow up defined by their father’s crime.’
When asked if she ever contacted Andrew after she left, she answered, ‘No. He made his choices. I had to make mine.’
Today, Emma works part-time in a local school. She and her sons are thriving. Their new neighbours know nothing about their past and she hopes they never will.
‘If there’s one thing I’d want other women to know,’ she says, ‘it’s that you can survive something like this. Even when it feels impossible, you can start again.’
As for the still mysterious ‘confidential commission’ Wetherby was accused of stealing, the truth remains buried in sealed records, nondisclosure agreements, and speculation. The question is, did it ever actually exist?
Pippa sat back against the headboard, heart thudding a little too fast. She had wanted information, but she hadn’t expected that.
A whole hidden family. Two children uprooted.
A woman forced to run because the world had pointed fingers at her for something she didn’t even do. ‘Crikey,’ she whispered to herself.
She scrolled back up, rereading in case she’d missed something.
Wetherby was guilty of taking the items that were discovered in his home, but there still seemed to be no evidence that this secret commission even existed.
Somewhere in Pippa’s brain, beneath the part currently sympathising fiercely with Emma Wetherby, another part clicked.
If this article existed … what else might be out there? What else had slipped into public knowledge without anyone quite noticing?
She tried another search. Nothing new appeared.
One more. Still nothing.
She heard Theo get up and use the bathroom. They were both very much awake. No doubt the conversation with Clara was playing on his mind, and now she’d read that article, her brain wasn’t likely to switch off anytime soon.