Page 127 of The Dead Ex

After David’sdisappearance, I had simply handed it over to the police, explaining I’d taken it during a business dinner as part of my ‘portfolio’. The obviously aggressive body language in the picture was perfect ‘proof’ that the ex-wife still had an axe to grind. As Mum had said, it was all part of ‘making the guv pay for what she did to us’.

‘I followed him sometimes,’ Vicki is saying. ‘I couldn’t get Davidout of my head. But I was scared of telling the police that I’d seen him in case they thought I was guilty.’

Too late. The jury already look as though they’ve made up their minds on that one.

‘But where does it all end?’ says a little voice inside me. Vicki had clearly suffered too. She’d lost her baby. I place my hand protectively on my own stomach.

Then I push the doubt away. It’s Mum’s sideI’m on. Besides, I know what happened on that day with Tanya. Vicki Goudman deserves to go down.

53

Vicki

16 July 2018

The prosecution is like a dog chewing away at a bone. Me. And there’s nothing I can do about it. It’s partly my fault for being so open when I’d talked about Tanya. But something had taken me over during the questioning. I wanted to tell everyone what kind of a woman she was. Now I wish I’d kept quiet and been more careful.

‘Would you describe yourself as an aggressiveperson?’

‘No.’

‘Is it true that you attacked a prisoner in your first week as an officer?’

The man who called me in when his toilet was overflowing? ‘I was defending myself. He yanked my hair by the roots and tried to put my head into the toilet.’

‘Anything else you’d like to add?’

‘No.’

The barrister is waving a piece of paper in the air. ‘I gather from these medical reports that you brokehis collar bone at the same time.’

I begin to sweat even more. ‘Like I said, I was defending myself.’

‘I see.’

Several members of the jury are beginning to look even more doubtfully at me.

‘I gather that you had to retire from the prison service because of your medical condition.’

‘Yes.’

‘Your marriage then broke down. Was there a final trigger for this?’

My nails are digging into the palmsof my hands. ‘Yes.’

‘Can you tell us what?’

‘You mean “who”.’ I raise my face, aware it is hot with anger. ‘Tanya. I told you before. She stole my husband.’

‘Would you like to go into more detail?’

Despite my earlier thoughts about being more careful, all the old anger comes rushing out. ‘I’d always suspected them of being close but then one night, David came home drunk. I asked him wherehe’d been, and he came straight out and told me that he was in love with Tanya.’

‘This is the woman you refer to in your diary, I believe.’

I nod.

‘The one whom you said you could “happily kill”.’