Nell
PRESENT
“Sadie, I know this might be a stupid question,” I say, when I get to work the next morning. “There was a bouquet of lilies waiting for me on my doorstep when I got home on Friday and there was no note to say who they were from. Do you have any idea who might have sent them?”
“Um, a tall French-American?” she says.
“No, they weren’t from him. We spoke on the phone over the weekend and he never mentioned sending me flowers. Anyway, I think they were hand-delivered.”
“Maybe they’re from a neighbor. Did you do something kind, like rescue a cat?”
“No. I don’t really have neighbors, not ones that I know. The thing is, they were dead.”
“The neighbors?” Sadie jokes.
“The flowers.”
Sadie rearranges her face. “You could ask the florist. They might have a record of who ordered them.”
“That’s the problem. The florist’s card was missing but there was a redundant staple where it should have been.”
“Hmm. Unless that’s where the message was.”
“What do you mean?”
“Well, let’s say they were from a secret admirer who hand-delivered them to your door with a note declaring their love for you. Maybe they got cold feet and removed it at the last minute.”
“But if they were hand-delivered, the person would have known that the flowers were dead.”
“True.” Sadie hesitates. “I know Simon already asked you this and I don’t want to spook you, but is there anyone who might have a grudge against you?”
“I can’t think of anyone.”
“Nobody from here, from the charity? I can’t ever remember you arguing with anyone but did you ever refuse anyone access, or something like that?”
My mind leaps, wanting to believe more than anything that the mysterious bouquet is something work-related because then I’d be able to breathe again.
But there have been very few negative incidents since I started working at Drop In and the fact that the flowers were dead tells me they are from Damon Parker, a warning that he is coming for me.
I don’t waste time wondering how he discovered my new identity or where I live.
I imagine him in prison, biding his time, living under the radar, waiting patiently for his twelve years to be up so that he’d finally be able to finish what he’d started all those years ago—what I’d started all those years ago.
I curse my naivety. I’d known all along that he could be out after twelve years, so why hadn’t I done more to protect myself from his eventual release?
I could have sold my house, moved to another country, made it more difficult, if not impossible, for him to find me.
Instead, I had stayed, because I felt that I deserved to die.
It’s too late to regret not having told DC Moss about my change of identity, because she would have let me know that he was being released from prison.
I doubt it’s something I can find out by googling his name but I do it anyway, finally acknowledging that facing my demons is the only way forward.
When the same headline articles flash up on the screen, along with my old name, Elle Nugent, and the words “stalker,” “obsession,” “murder attempt,” “court case,” I don’t slam my laptop shut but force myself to carry on scrolling, absorbing the horror of everything I lived through.
My eyes are caught by an article from when Damon Parker pushed me into the path of the approaching tube train.
At the time, I hadn’t read anything about what had happened, but as the details of my link to my attacker are laid out in stark detail—how I’d harassed his father in a case of mistaken identity to the point where he’d lost his life—it becomes obvious, from the tone of the article and from the subsequent comments, that most people felt I got what I deserved.
Much was made of the fact that I’d stalked a man twice my age and I was shocked at how much my attempts to speak to Brett Parker, whether in person or by phone, had affected him, if his wife and son were to be believed.
I also realized that in being too scared to speak to the media I had never given my side of the story, my motivation, which was that I truly believed Brett Parker had picked up Bryony Sanders in his car that day.
I make a plan. The first thing I need to do is find out where Damon Parker is and the only person who might be able to tell me is DC Moss.
I still have the number she gave me all those years ago but I doubt it’s still valid.
She could have been assigned to a different police force in another part of the country, she might even have changed careers. But it’s all I’ve got.
I call the number. A male voice answers and I explain that I’m trying to trace DC Moss.
“You mean Superintendent Moss,” the officer corrects. “Can I ask who’s calling?”
“Elle Nugent.” The name sounds strange on my lips.
“And what is it you’d like to speak to the superintendent about?”
“Damon Parker.”
There’s no sign that the officer recognizes the name, just a promise that he’ll pass the message on to his superior.
I don’t expect to hear anything for at least a few days so I’m surprised when the officer calls back within the hour, asking if I’m free to see Superintendent Moss the following morning.
I go and find Sadie to tell her I’ll be working from home the next day, happy that I’m finally taking back control of my life.
I think of all the years I’ve spent punishing myself for my past because I didn’t feel I deserved to be happy.
I’d devoted my life to working for charities, often for a minimum salary, and when I’d begun to earn more, I’d plowed some of it back into whichever charity I was working for at the time.
Anything to atone, atone, atone. I only let Romy in because I craved just a little bit of a normal life, to be able to meet a friend for a drink, to not sit in the cinema or theater alone as I’d done for so many years.
And I’d been content with that until I met Alex and realized I could have more.
But now something burns inside me, something that makes me want to live, and that’s my newfound desire to be a mother.
It fills me up, makes me fierce. I will not, I cannot, allow Damon Parker to take that away from me.
I will fight him with my bare hands if I have to.
I am done with atoning.