Chapter 35 Rosie – Day 8
Rosie only got a place at Queen Mary’s because her dad worked there. They could never have afforded the fees otherwise. She wishes she could go back in time and change so many things. She would never have let him take that Italian teaching job if she knew what was going to happen.
Danielle Dixon. The girl that would ruin her life.
Rosie was transfixed with Dani throughout high school.
The cool girl in the year above. Both were bursary students.
Both had to find ways to fit in. Dani was granted a place due to her intelligence, spotted by a police officer when she was arrested for shoplifting, or so the story goes.
She came from a rough council estate and had been in and out of care.
However, her intelligence was a double-edged sword; she grew bored easily and acted up.
She also had a temper. She was headstrong and feisty and opinionated, and Rosie loved that. Dani was all the things she was not.
Once she overheard the PE teacher say how ‘Dani’s mouth would be the death of her’. The same PE teacher gave a heartfelt interview with a local radio station telling the world how Dani was an angel and how she had always thought there was something ‘off’ about Mr Mills.
Everyone’s opinion of her dad changed overnight. He went from being a much-loved teacher to the most hated man in Britain.
Rosie foolishly went back to school for the new term, hoping that being with her friends would provide a distraction from the car crash of her life.
She lasted one day. The rumours of his involvement had started and cruel whispers trailed down the school corridors after her.
Horrific graffiti was scrawled in the girls’ bathroom.
She remembers the splintered wood on her dad’s classroom door – his brass nameplate prised off as if doing so could erase the past.
After her dad’s death, her mum suggested moving up to North Yorkshire. It would help them both as they tried to heal. A new area. A fresh start. She used her mother’s maiden name, despite it feeling like losing her dad again. The only friend she kept was Lydia. Her singular link to the past.
Rosie doesn’t know how she scraped through her exams at her new school.
She thought things would get easier over time but with every anniversary of the disappearance there would be an appeal in the news for information.
Danielle’s family were desperate to know where her body might be so they could have a proper goodbye.
The hate-filled, hurtful comments resurfaced.
Her dad’s assumed guilt was shared as if it was fact.
People still thought he did it, taking the secret of where he’d put the girl’s body to his grave.
Six months ago, her mum discovered a box of Rosie’s dad’s belongings that was mislabelled and stored in her grandma’s loft. That’s when her world split in two again.
Inside was a notebook. His notebook. The years slipped away as she turned the pages.
He had started an investigation into Dani’s disappearance, and it was all in there.
Documented. Labelled. Scribbled pages full of his thoughts.
Some legible, some not. One name stood out. A thick question mark beside it.
Fraser?
In the box, beside the notebook, was a dictaphone. As soon as she pressed play and his voice filled her bedroom, she realised there was no going back. He’d left himself audio notes in a breathless panic.
August 22nd 2010
12.05. Text received from Fraser. It reads:
You still up for hanging out later?
23.59. Text received from Fraser. It reads:
You made me do it. You gave me no choice. Sorry—
Who is Fraser? DD only added this number into her contacts the day she went missing. No other text messages between these two people. This person is key. Will tell police to investigate. It must be significant. The last person to see her alive?
This evidence had never publicly come to light.
At first Rosie thought Fraser was a boy’s name, but as soon as she realised it could be a surname, her investigation picked up.
She discovered the retired artist Marianne Fraser who owned a holiday home in the same small Italian village of Laprezia.
She was there with her family when Danielle disappeared.
One of the Frasers had to be the contact in Dani’s phone, the person who messaged her on the night she vanished.
Rosie was certain that it was one of Marianne’s sons – Luke or Theo – but she couldn’t jump to conclusions.
She needed to find a way into the family.
As soon as she had concrete evidence she could go to the police and clear her dad’s name.
Internet digging revealed Marianne Fraser would be at the Dursak Gallery in Soho the following month for a prestigious award.
The Frasers’ lives were so charmed compared to the hell Rosie had endured.
She bribed a bored doorman to let her into the London event.
She hid in the shadows of the packed room, listening to Marianne give an impassioned speech on authenticity in art.
There was an after-party at the bar next door.
Rosie had a backstory ready. She positioned herself near the door of the pub, a vulnerable woman recovering from a terrible fictional Tinder date, a damsel in distress. Theo was her knight in shining armour.
All she needed was answers to her dad’s questions, but she couldn’t come out and grill him. Patience was needed to buy his trust.
It wasn’t long before she shared a fabricated version of her life with him.
It was exhausting coming up with excuses as to why he couldn’t meet her mum, not even on FaceTime, or why there were no photos of her father.
He has no idea she has a connection to the tragedy that happened in the small Italian village that he knows so well.
She learnt that he had aspirations to be a professional footballer when he was younger and had competed for scholarships all around Europe.
The dates he was in Croatia at a training camp meant that he couldn’t have been in Laprezia.
So that left Luke as the prime suspect. Unless Gerry or Marianne texted Dani on the night she went missing – but why would they have her phone number?
Rosie couldn’t leap to assumptions. She needed to investigate more.
However, the more time spent together, the more Rosie grew to like Theo. Feelings got involved. No one had treated her so nicely. As they grew closer, she started to feel anxious thinking about life without him.
For months she’s wrestled with the fact that she is trapped in a lie. She had to make a decision to come clean or not. She couldn’t live like this forever.
Then Theo’s mum invited them on holiday to Villa Speranza.
It was her ticket in.
She instantly knew something was off when she arrived and saw all the security cameras around the enormous estate.
Who needs that much security in a quiet little town?
The taxi driver telling her to be careful cemented the risk she was taking.
If her dad’s investigation was right, she could potentially be on holiday with a murderer.
She set out to discover the truth but knew that doing so will ruin the best relationship she’s ever had. This love story has played out on borrowed time. She doesn’t belong in this family. And never will. Yet she still tricked herself that it could be different.
Since arriving, she’s been bathed in luxury and welcomed by a kind and generous family.
Everything she’s always wanted. When Theo unexpectedly proposed, part of her was desperate for this lie to carry on a little longer.
That’s why she said yes. Why shouldn’t she have some happiness after all the trauma in her life?
But none of this is real.
The truth had to come out one day.
And now Fenna knows. It’s going to come crashing down. All she can do is beg her to help.