Chapter 7
NOW
Late August
Monday
I filled the kettle and set it on the base, more out of habit than intention.
Tea was what you did in moments like this, wasn’t it? Tea fixed everything. At least according to Janine.
Feelings were complicated. Inconvenient. Tea was simple.
I stood, my hands braced against the counter, staring at the kettle as it began to hum. Usually, I’d move. Tidy the kitchen. Wipe down the worktop. Put away whatever had been left in the drainer beside the sink. There was always something that needed to be done, a way to be productive.
But not this time. I just stood there, my gaze locked on the water inside the glass kettle, lit from below in a cold blue glow. Tiny ripples shivered across the surface. The low hum deepened, building steadily.
It didn’t make sense.
I was home. The wig and glasses had been stuffed into the bathroom bin. The hire car had been returned. Everything from this morning had been disposed of. And yet I still couldn’t settle.
Had Charlotte recognised me? The question looped relentlessly, but the answer remained elusive. And even if she had… what then? I frowned. What was the worst she could do? Tell Ryan?
A hollow laugh rose in my throat.
He’d already left me. It wasn’t as though he was coming back – not this time.
Charlotte had already taken everything that mattered from me. So, what power did she really have left?
That thought should have calmed me. But it didn’t.
It’s not about Ryan, I reminded myself again.
Stay where you belong. Where you can cope.
I gave myself a little shake, trying to physically pull myself free from Janine’s persistent voice in my head. But, like always, it lingered.
Perhaps that was it. Perhaps that was why I felt so unsettled.
I hadn’t stayed where I belonged.
My discomfort wasn’t about Ryan. It was about being seen. Exposed. Caught doing something I shouldn’t have been doing. Letting Charlotte know she’d affected me. Enough for me to follow her. Obsess over her.
She’d disrupted my life for a second time. There was no doubt that she had won. Yet, I didn’t want her to know that.
My disguise should have been enough. I’d hidden myself well. I was sure of it. And yet…
Maybe it had been too much. Too theatrical. Too obvious. Perhaps I had overdone it.
But, even so, how could she have known? She had no reason to expect me. No reason to think I’d follow her. No reason to believe I was capable of something like that.
That wasn’t who I was. I wasn’t bold. I didn’t take risks. I was careful. Restrained. It was who I had been taught to be.
Don’t be ridiculous, Kirsty. Janine’s voice sliced through me so clearly, she might as well have been in the room.
You’re not capable of something like that.
I squeezed my eyes shut. Maybe she was right. Maybe this – whatever I thought I was doing – was ridiculous. Pretending I could slip into Charlotte’s world. Pretending I could outmanoeuvre her. I wasn’t built for that.
But I wasn’t trying to outsmart her.
I was trying to hurt her.
The thought landed, sharp and undeniable. I wanted Charlotte to feel what I’d felt. To lose what she had taken from me. To understand what it was to have everything ripped away from you without warning. Without control. That desire hadn’t gone away. If anything, it had hardened.
But my method… that was the problem. It had been too clumsy. Too exposed.
I flinched as the kettle clicked off. The frantic bubbling slowed, then stilled. Automatically, I reached for a mug from the drainer, dropped a teabag inside and poured the water. The routine was familiar. Normal.
Normal.
The word lodged in my brain.
Nothing about this morning had felt normal.
The castle.
The vet.
The envelope.
Be careful.
The water grew darker, but I didn’t move.
Was it an affair? The idea surfaced again, but something about it felt off.
It was too simple. Too weak. It didn’t fit.
Charlotte had worked so hard to get Ryan. Again. Why would she risk an affair when she finally had everything she’d wanted?
But then, what had been in the envelope?
And why meet there? Away from the stables. Away from everyone. Unless they didn’t want to be observed.
I replayed the encounter again. There’d been no warmth between them. No touch. Just distance. Caution. My stomach tightened as the realisation settled, cold and certain. They didn’t trust each other. I didn’t know why. But I knew that much. And I couldn’t let it go.
Maybe I should. But I couldn’t. Because she hadn’t.
Charlotte had never walked away.
Not from me. Not from Ryan. Not from anything she’d decided she wanted.
So why should I?
My breathing steadied, the edge of panic dulling into something sharper. Clearer. More focused.
I wasn’t going back out there. I wasn’t going to follow her again. That had been a mistake.
But that didn’t mean I had to give up.
Charlotte liked to be seen. That was the thing about her, she couldn’t survive without attention. It wasn’t enough just to live her life. She had to capture it too.
I reached for my phone. I didn’t need to chase her. I could follow her without leaving the flat.
I shuffled to the kitchen table and sank into a chair; my gaze fixed on the phone in my hand as I jabbed at the screen.
Instagram opened and I smiled slightly as I switched accounts. Charlotte would never allow me to follow her. Not from my account. But I didn’t need to. I already had a way into her world.
My time at the stables might not have been the experience I’d hoped for, but I’d done my best to be useful.
I might have been clueless about horses and the practical side of running an equestrian business, but I knew enough to know any business needed a social media presence. Something they were lacking.
I’d set up their accounts myself. It was one of the few things they’d actually let me do. I’d created the accounts. Set the passwords. And no one had changed them.
A faint smile tugged at my lips. They couldn’t. It was all linked to my personal email address. My phone number. Anything they wanted to change would come through me.
Of course, I’d unfollowed the stables from my personal account when I’d left two years ago. I’d unfollowed Ryan too. I’d cut myself out as cleanly as I could. But that didn’t mean I’d stopped keeping track. I lingered in the background where no one noticed me.
I leaned back against the chair, a smug sense of satisfaction building in my chest. They’d wanted me out of their lives. Out of their business. And yet they’d never truly gotten rid of me.
Not then.
And not now.
I found Charlotte’s profile and scrolled through the images. Sweeping views of the Purbecks. Horses, some I recognised the names of, and some I didn’t. But among them was photo after photo of Charlotte.
Laughing.
Posing.
Perfect.
Lunches with friends, their glasses raised and smiles wide.
Photos of her horse riding, snapped along her usual morning route.
Gym selfies showing off her perfectly toned and tanned body in cropped workout tops and leggings.
Group shots outside cinemas and clubs. Dim lighting, blurred focus, but still full of movement.
Charlotte’s whole life was captured, preserved and displayed.
I inhaled sharply. It felt like she was taunting me with the perfection of it.
But it wasn’t just what she was posting. It was what I wasn’t.
No lunches. No spontaneous plans. No groups of friends. Just early shifts. Late finishes. Careful budgeting. Beans on toast and evenings snuggled on the sofa beneath a fleecy throw to save on heating weren’t worth photographing, let alone sharing.
Charlotte was living.
I was surviving.
My life wasn’t something to post. It was something to get through. Thoughts of Janine sprang back into my head…
Six Years Ago
‘I could apply,’ I said quietly. ‘Just to see what happens…’
Janine smiled, that tight smile of hers that looked more like a grimace. The one that told me I was overreaching. Again.
‘University?’ she said, her voice laced with something bordering on disbelief.
‘That would be a lot for you, don’t you think?
Especially one so far away. You’d have to actually move out.
Manage on your own…’ She let her words hang for a moment before giving a small shake of her head, as though she was answering her own question.
‘Other kids do it,’ I pointed out.
‘True. Other kids do.’
Even her agreement felt like a correction.
I wasn’t other kids. I was me.
‘I just think you need to be realistic about your limits.’
I swallowed. Maybe she was right. There were universities closer to home. Ones in Birmingham. Ones I could commute to.
‘Let’s put our heads together and come up with something a bit more manageable for you.’
I nodded gratefully. Janine’s words might be blunt, but she was only looking out for me. Helping me. Protecting me. Even if that needed to be from myself, sometimes.
‘Why don’t you pop the kettle on and make us a nice cup of tea while we work? You’re good at that.’
I inhaled deeply, pushing the past back where it belonged. Back then, I’d listened to Janine. I’d stayed home. Commuted to university. Kept everything manageable. Stayed within my limits. It had felt like the sensible choice; safe.
Yet something about it still felt off. I’d felt off.
And then I’d met Ryan.
Five Years Ago – Mid September
I arrived early. I always did. And yet I didn’t go in.
I lingered outside the lecture theatre, watching people drift past me in groups, talking, laughing, already bonding as though they’d known each other for years instead of only just meeting.
I waited until the crowd thinned. Then followed the last of them inside, slipping into an empty seat on the back row.
Present, but not really part of it.
‘Morning, everyone,’ the lecturer called, his voice cutting through the chatter. ‘Welcome to Finance for Managers.’
‘Ugh.’
I glanced to my right as a guy slid into the seat beside me, the look on his face telling me he wanted to be here even less than I did.
‘Sorry,’ he whispered, realising I’d heard him. ‘It’s a bit of a brutal start for the first day,’ he said, jerking his head towards the screen at the front. ‘Business finance.’
My lips quivered as I tried not to smile. ‘It is a business degree…’
He rolled his eyes. ‘Yeah, don’t remind me.’ He ran his hand through his short dark brown hair. ‘It wasn’t my choice. My parents have a business back home; they want me to take over eventually.’
‘So what would your choice have been?’
‘Environmental studies,’ he said almost wistfully. He gave a shrug. ‘Or something like that,’ he added, acting as though it didn’t matter. ‘How about you? Was this your choice?’
I hesitated.
‘That’s a no then.’ He chuckled. ‘So what would yours have been?’
‘Hospitality,’ I admitted. ‘But they don’t offer it here. So this is the next best thing.’
‘Other universities would have hospitality management degrees though…’ he said, looking confused.
‘My family wanted me to stay local.’
‘Ahh.’ He nodded. ‘Mine wanted the same.’
‘You’re from Birmingham too?’ I asked, surprised. His accent hadn’t sounded like it.
He shook his head. ‘Dorset.’
I frowned.
‘They picked the course. I picked the uni. You’ve got to do something for yourself, haven’t you?’ He paused. ‘Or at least try to.’
He said it as though it was simple.
I nodded, even though the idea felt alien to me.
Ryan’s words had stayed with me through the three years of university. And so had he.
Then, after our final exams, everything changed. I escaped to Malta. Started over.
With him.
Things had finally been different. I’d been different. Happy. Optimistic. We were building a life, a future, together.
And now…
She had that.