Page 69

Story: Dead to Me

They had slowed to a stop on the road outside, and Anna asked the driver to drop her next to the gate, unsure about what she would be walking into.

She shoved an extra twenty-pound note she’d found in the purse at him and asked him to wait and be ready if she needed him.

He’d looked a little alarmed at this but seemed willing to hover.

There had been no sign of any activity as she’d stepped quickly and quietly up to the front door, but it had been locked, an eventuality she hadn’t thought about.

They could be killing him , she thought, numbly.

And without any more thought, she’d started running round the side of the house, out towards the beautiful, pristine lawn. She ran until she heard voices floating out through the French windows, and then she slowed rapidly and flattened herself against the nearest wall.

It was Marcie’s voice she’d heard. Marcie’s shrill words, calling someone a whore.

Oh , she thought, just afterwards. That must be me.

How had Marcie understood that her husband was a cheat, and been clever enough to kill a young woman and almost get away with it, and yet been stupid enough to misidentify his mistress twice over ?

Though maybe it wasn’t so hard to understand. Anna herself had been wrong; looking at every man with suspicion and letting sweet Marcie jab her with a syringe full of scopolamine and laughingly apologise for her spiky sequins making her hugs uncomfortable.

Anna almost gasped as she heard Reid’s voice in reply. Reid, actually him in the flesh, for the first time in eighteen months. Reid, saying loudly and clearly that she wasn’t a whore.

About fucking time , Anna thought, while, in spite of herself and the circumstances, she was smiling about as broadly as she’d smiled in months.

She was just on the point of wondering where Ned was when she heard the unmistakable sounds of a struggle. Anna abandoned stealth and turned to peer in through the open French window.

None of them were looking her way. Ned had Reid pinned up against the far interior wall with his back to her, the two of them locked together painfully. And Marcie was fixated on them, her back almost entirely to the French windows, too.

Fuck, fuck, fuck , Anna thought as she ducked down and crossed the threshold into the room. She scooted across the floor until she was behind the kitchen counter and out of sight.

Marcie had gone full nuclear. Obviously. She didn’t seem to have a middle ground. And Anna was going to have to do something, because there was no sign of the police yet. Why hadn’t she pulled up loudly with the taxi driver and banged on the door? Maybe that would have stopped them.

Or maybe it would have panicked them.

Anna wasn’t dressed for this. A crumpled ballgown wasn’t good combat gear, even with the flat shoes. And she had no weapons. The spiky Jimmy Choos were in the Uber, and the most she had in her handbag was a phone, a May Ball programme and a wallet.

Come on, Anna , she thought, as behind her the conversation went on. You can improvise.

This was a kitchen. And kitchens had knives. In fact, there was a great big wooden block of them on the counter across to her left. She only had to be quiet enough to get to them.

The process of scooting across the floor again, standing up and sliding out a knife at random– inwardly thinking, please, please, not a cheese knife – was the most heart-pumpingly, spine-crawlingly awful thing she could remember doing.

Well, it was the most awful right up until Marcie came back and she had to stand up and creep up behind her until she was close enough to do some damage, all the while wondering what she’d do if it turned out that Ned had a gun.

Neither of them was looking at her. They were both too focused on Reid, and his arm, just waiting for the syringe in Marcie’s hand.

Even Anna struggled to look away from Reid. He was really here. He’d come to try to save her.

But now she needed to save him right back. And fast.

Anna took another step, until the knife was touching Marcie’s back, enough for her to stiffen slightly.

‘You’d better let go of him, Ned,’ Anna said, loudly, ‘or I’m going to stick this knife into your sister’s kidney.’

There was a moment of absolute silence and then Marcie suddenly jabbed backwards with the syringe towards Anna.

‘No!’ Anna yelled, because she was done with this woman. She grabbed Marcie’s arm with her free left hand, blocking it.

Marcie twisted round to face her and pushed hard against her grip. She was trying to shove the syringe into Anna’s body, clearly not caring where it went as long as it hit her.

But Anna wasn’t going to let that happen, whether Ned got involved or not. She might not be at her best, but she hadn’t spent all those hours at the gym to be overpowered by a forty-something woman who looked like she might break in a strong breeze.

Or to let Reid die at the hands of an ex-military psychopath, for that matter.

She held Marcie’s wrist back and started to twist it. The expression on Marcie’s face was extraordinary. It was like every ounce of civility had been peeled back. She just kept trying. Pressing forwards with her whole body.

‘Fuck– you!’ Marcie yelled, her arm now in an impossible position. ‘You and that little slut Holly can die!’

Anna gave a roar and dug her fingers into the tendons of Marcie’s arm. The syringe clattered to the ground.

‘You know what?’ Anna said, staring her down with her grip still in place. ‘I am so tired of women blaming other women for their husbands being cheating assholes! Go and talk to Philip and stop killing innocent girls!’

She zoned back in on the fact that Ned could take her down in about ten seconds. But James’s uncle was staring at them both, his face strangely blank. He was still holding on to Reid, but his grip had finally slackened and Reid was getting his feet back under him.

‘It wasn’t Philip’s fault!’ Marcie spat.

Anna was still holding Marcie’s arm, while the woman tried to tear it free.

Does she just not give up?

Anna looked past her, to Ned. ‘OK. You need to let him go now,’ she said. ‘Do it! Or I really will…’

It was only at that point that she realised she’d basically lost track of the knife.

It was still in her hand, but it wasn’t loosely held out in the air.

In trying to force the syringe into Anna’s flesh, Marcie had driven her abdomen onto the blade.

It had sunk into her somewhere above her hip.

Anna could even half remember feeling it happen, but she’d been so fixated on Marcie’s arm and that needle.

The weirdest thing was that Marcie didn’t seem to realise it had happened, either. She was still staring at Anna with her eyes full of rage. Was still trying to twist her wrist free.

Even as Anna faltered and stumbled slightly backwards, Marcie didn’t wince.

‘Crap,’ Anna said. ‘Just… stay there. We need to keep the blade in and get you some bandages.’

But instead of staying there Marcie pulled backwards, away from the blade. Anna felt the horror of it sliding free, but Marcie just turned to her brother like nothing had happened.

‘You have to stop them,’ she said, her voice shaking. Pleading. ‘Please, Eddie. She’s just as bad as Holly. She’s just as bad. She’s been sleeping with Philip, too.’ She began crying, while Ned’s wide eyes went from her stomach to her face and back again. ‘Please stop them.’

There was a momentary pause while Anna thought frantically about what she could do. And then Ned said, quietly, ‘You told me it was James.’

Marcie rubbed her eyes, roughly. ‘It… doesn’t even matter.’

‘You said he’d killed her by accident,’ Ned said, more loudly. ‘You killed her? Deliberately?’

‘Wouldn’t you have wanted to help, even if you’d known?’ Marcie asked, pleading.

Ned shook his head. And then he stepped away from Reid completely. Reid slumped the rest of the way down the wall to the floor.

‘Reid!’ Anna ducked past Marcie and skidded to her knees on the floor next to him.

‘I’m OK,’ he said, making an effort to push himself off the floor, and she half turned to see whether Ned was about to punch one or other of them. But he was still staring at his sister.

She saw Marcie shudder slightly and look down at her abdomen, and then slowly fold towards the floor as her brother tried to catch her, as if it was only now she saw it that the wound had become real.

Later, Marcie’s health would probably matter to Anna a lot. Anna had, after all, been the one wielding the knife. But right now, she couldn’t seem to care.

She was here, and Reid was Reid. She levered him as gently as she could into a sitting position against the wall. He’d closed his eyes and there was sweat along his forehead.

She saw the full glory of his bruised face now, and it made her ache.

They beat the shit out of him , she thought. All because of me.

‘God, Reid,’ she said.

He opened one eye, blearily, and gave her a half-smile. ‘I’ve never been so glad to see anyone in my life,’ he said. And he reached out clumsily and grabbed her hand. ‘Though I may love you more if you can find me some fuck-off-strong painkillers.’

Anna was smiling and crying at once as she answered. ‘So you’re saying you love me even without the drugs?’

‘Yes, I am,’ he said. ‘And I do.’

And Anna leaned in and kissed him, accompanied by the highly romantic sound of sirens approaching– finally– at speed.

There was, of course, no easy resolution to what had happened that day.

As Reid and Anna were helped to sit in the back of one ambulance Marcie was already being loaded onto another.

The doors weren’t yet shut when a Jaguar slewed into the driveway and disgorged Philip and James, the two of them white-faced with fear.

With perfect timing, Ned was brought out of the house at this point, wearing handcuffs, the result of Reid having explained his role in covering up Holly’s murder.

‘Shit,’ Anna said, half rising to her feet.