Safe With Me

by K. L. Slater

  Still, Liam continues to gather the cuttings. Carla and I look at each other.

  A wave of nausea hits me, and I scramble to my feet, heading back towards the kitchen door to get some fresh air. Confused, I turn full circle.

  Liam and Carla seem to blur into each other, their voices sound deep and slow, like an old record playing at the wrong speed. I collapse to the floor.

  When I open my eyes, Liam crouches in front of me. His eyes are wide, his face pale. After what seems an age, everything snaps back into sight and my eyes focus on his face.

  ‘What happened?’ I say, struggling but finally managing to sit up.

  ‘Anna,’ he says, shaking my shoulders. ‘Look at me.’

  My head swarms and buzzes, full of pictures I’d rather forget. But I lift my chin and look at him.

  ‘Anna,’ he says. ‘What on earth have you done?’

  His voice sounds as if it’s far away. So far away I can hardly hear what he is saying.

  Like the flick of a switch, the words race closer and closer until his voice echoes painfully loud in my ears.

  And then there is nothing.

  Chapter 75

  DC Gant clicks his fingers in front of my face. ‘Anna, take us through what happened one more time.’

  ‘I was trying to tell him,’ I whisper. ‘About her lies.’

  ‘Whose lies? Ivy Bradbury’s? What did you do with her cat?’

  I close my eyes. I feel so tired, so utterly spent.

  ‘Anna, you need to concentrate. We found your neighbour, Joan Peat, with a serious head injury, and the emergency call came from your phone. Did you hurt her?’

  I open my eyes and look at his flabby, whiskered face, too close to my own.

  ‘Where is Amanda Danson?’ he asks.

  All that has gone wrong is her doing. She tried to fool me that Carla Bevin was her twin sister, and it nearly worked.

  He glances at his colleague. ‘What do you mean, all her doing?’

  Have I spoken out loud? I feel sure the words stayed inside my head.

  ‘Anna, did you kill Ivy Bradbury and assault Joan Peat?’

  I look at his hands. He has a wedding ring on, a thin gold band that is scratched and worn.

  ‘Danny didn’t tell me about the fire,’ I say. ‘I would have helped him.’

  ‘Who’s Danny?’

  ‘This is hopeless,’ the other policeman says.

  ‘Did you get angry? We all get angry sometimes, Anna.’

  ‘I just wanted Liam to know the truth,’ I say.

  DC Gant nods.

  ‘I understand,’ he says. ‘You wanted him to know the truth but they made you angry.’

  ‘Yes,’ I say. ‘Her blood is on my hands.’

  I raise my arms to the light but I can’t see the spatters any more.

  ‘Liam told us,’ he says. ‘How you got angry and pushed Ivy down the stairs. Do you know where Amanda Danson is? Where did you take her in your car?’

  ‘Her name is Carla Bevin,’ I correct him.

  He turns and whispers to the other man.

  My mouth is a sour pit. My insides feel hollow and withered, as if my organs have been replaced with a tangle of dried-out rags.

  ‘Carla was Amanda’s twin sister, Anna,’ DC Gant tells me. ‘Her identical twin. Carla committed suicide thirteen years ago.’

  Lies, lies, lies.

  I close my eyes and try to remember. Did this all happen today or yesterday. . . or was it weeks ago now?

  Climbing up the stairs, newspaper cuttings fluttering down, and Liam’s pale face in front of mine. Ivy’s crumpled shape lying at the bottom of the stairs, and the blood. So much blood.

  ‘Do you remember?’ He presses me as the other man slips out of the room. ‘Pushing Ivy Bradbury down the stairs when she made you angry?’

  ‘She held out her hands,’ I say. ‘Like this.’

  I stretch out my arms far in front of my face. My hands are shaking and I see there are clumps of hair knotted around my fingers.

  ‘You remember pushing her?’

  Did I push her?

  I remember climbing the stairs and seeing Ivy at the top. The newspaper fluttering down like big torn monochrome petals.

  I think about the mail in the spare room: how it was there and then it wasn’t. The smell in the house that nobody else noticed.

  I bury my head in my hands. My elbows are tapping up and down on the table while thoughts slip through my mind like sand in an egg timer.

  ‘I didn’t push her,’ I say.

  The other detective comes back into the room.

  ‘We know you had a scuffle with Amanda Danson in the street. Witnesses have come forward.’ I hear the snatch of impatience in his tone. ‘You attacked her. Where is she now, Anna?’

  ‘She’s gone to hell,’ I whisper.

  The two men huddle their heads again and then DC Gant stands up and sighs.

  ‘Well, nobody can say I didn’t try,’ he says to his colleague.

  When they’ve gone, I stand up and pace around the small floor space. I count my steps then I replace the numbers with words.

  ‘Where – did – the – mail – go – where – is – the – smell – coming – from – what—’

  ‘Anna?’

  Two women have entered the room without me noticing. One is in police uniform; the other is dressed in ordinary clothes.

  ‘I’m PC Cullen,’ the officer says. ‘We’ve met before at your house; can you remember?’

  Paper burning, a million bits swarming in the air like white locusts. A broken toilet that was not really broken.

  ‘And this is Dr Marsh.’

  The doctor smiles at me and holds out her hand. She has short, neat nails and a perfectly round chocolate-coloured mole on her wrist.

  ‘Where’s Danny?’ I say, sitting down.

  Chapter 76

  One year later

  Anna

  My favourite place to relax in the clinic is the sun room where floor to ceiling glass windows look out over the lawns.

  On warmer days they open the folding doors and it’s possible to sit reading a book while enjoying the gentle breeze.

  It is also where the visitors come on Tuesdays.

  Visiting lasts all day long but the rule is that one visit shouldn’t exceed two hours. It’s so the lounge doesn’t get overcrowded with people.

  Today is Tuesday, and I’ve been looking forward to visiting time all week.

  I walk through the foyer into the lounge and pause for a moment by the door.

  I smile when I spot him sitting by the window waiting for me, looking out on to the manicured gardens.

  When I get closer I notice the sunlight speckling his face, his eyes crinkling up against the light.

  ‘Hello, Liam,’ I say, putting down the basket of fruit on the small table.

  He looks up at me but his eyes are blank.

  ‘It’s a lovely day.’ I sit in the chair opposite him. ‘Albert and Boris have been lying on the balcony in the sun since eight o’clock.’

  I even did a spot of drawing out there when I woke up this morning.

  I like my small, neat flat. It feels good to have left the house behind at last.

  It doesn’t mean I have to forget my happy memories with Danny; it is more like I am allowing myself to finally leave behind the bad that happened there. I get that now.

  Linda, the care assistant, contacted me a few months ago. We met up and she presented me with a beautiful framed cross-stitch of a little cottage that Mrs Peat had sewed for me in the care home.

  She had included my name and even a picture of Albert. The picture was called ‘New Beginnings’.

  I’m going to visit her next week. She sent a message with Linda that there was something very important she needs to tell me.

  I doubt that very much but I’ll humour her, of course.

  I am keeping Liam’s house maintained for the time being; it keeps me busy now I’m no longer working.
Resigning from my job was the best thing I did for my health.

  They couldn’t prove that Ivy’s death was anything but an accident, and consequently, her life insurance paid off the mortgage. Nobody knows when Liam will be well enough to leave the clinic, but when he does, I want him to have a home to return to, somewhere he recognises.

  ‘Liam?’

  He blinks, fixated on the glossy emerald lawn outside. His fingers are working into his thigh. I can see them scratching through the special mittens he has to wear.

  I look up and see Nurse Janet waving to me across the room. I smile and return the gesture. All the staff know me here now; they’re always saying how I’ve been such a great help to Liam on what will be his very long road to recovery.

  It’s not as if I do anything special. I just talk to him about this and that. I don’t ask him any questions about unpleasant subjects.

  If I learned one thing from my months of counselling sessions with Dr Marsh, it is that you can’t push people to talk until they’re ready to open up.

  I study his profile in the sunlight, his long dark eyelashes and the way his hair curls into his neck. He doesn’t really look like Danny at all. I can see that now.

  He is still staring blankly through the glass but I remind myself you never know what’s bubbling away in someone’s head.

  Who’d have believed he got his memory back just a couple of days after waking up from the accident? All that time he had us fooled.

  They said the trauma of the accident had opened up a sort of crevice in his psyche and revealed a personality he had managed to cocoon away for years. Until the accident shook it all loose again like rotten apples falling from a tree.

  It must be awful to burn your own family to death and then forget about it. As a young boy there was nothing they could do to punish him. He had psychological help for a few years and then the system just forgot about him.

  Ivy had protected him all those years, moved away and even changed their surnames so it wouldn’t follow him around. She’d kept him medicated and reliant on her, treating him like the little boy he used to be to try and keep things under control.

  But in the end even she realised that Liam was losing his mind.

  I have forgiven him for telling the police it was me who killed Ivy. It wasn’t Liam who attacked Mrs Peat when she threatened to call the police, it was the other one as I like to think of it now; the other side of Liam we never knew was there.

  When I fell into a drugged sleep, Liam discovered the deeds to the house and bank statements in the dresser drawer. He knew what I was worth before I even confided in him.

  He must have realised it would scupper his plans if I got arrested for the mail backlog upstairs, so while I slept, he removed all the mail from the spare room with the help of Beryl’s son. Apparently Liam had agreed to give him a cut of my money if he helped him.

  But I’m not one to hold a grudge.

  I have even forgiven him for saying I had abducted Amanda when it was him all along.

  They found her curled up, barely breathing, in the wooden chest in Liam’s front room.

  He had used my sedatives to drug Amanda when she refused to go along with his plan to frame me for Ivy’s death. Who’d have thought my old adversary would defend me like that?

  And PC Cullen, who I’d got down as an interfering do-gooder, well thank heavens she was curious enough to do a bit of detective work herself and discover Liam’s hidden past.

  They arrested him, took him to the station for questioning and that’s what caused his meltdown.

  He admitted everything, even his plan to fleece me of the house and the lump sum I hadn’t touched since Danny and our parents died.

  It wasn’t the real Liam that did all that, of course; the real Liam is gentle and kind. This time the bad stuff won but I believe that, one day, he’ll be good as new again.

  I’m going to be here for him when that day comes.

  Later this week, I’m meeting up with Amanda for a coffee. Roisin is coming with me for a bit of moral support. It’s so nice to have a friend at last.

  Dr Marsh showed me photographs of Amanda and Carla as kids, looking like peas in a pod. All these years I thought she was living it up, she has been in the ground just like Danny. Amanda has had to deal with the fallout just like I have.

  It took Amanda months to recover from her ordeal at Liam’s hands but after everything was revealed, including Liam’s vengeful actions at her workplace, the nursery stood by her and offered her a new position, a fresh start.

  She is working in Derby now, in a new childcare manager job, but this weekend she’s back in Nottingham.

  She has been to see Liam a couple of times in here but she leaves me to look after him mostly, and it is an arrangement that suits us both.

  People sometimes surprise you in good ways and you can never be sure how your life is going to turn out. Sometimes, there is no logic to it.

  Your life takes a turn and, suddenly, everything changes and it just can’t be put back together again the same way as it was before.

  ‘Would you like a piece of fruit, Liam?’

  He doesn’t respond.

  I sigh and look around the room at what everyone else is up to. Everyone has a visitor except for the boy who always sits alone in the same place by the French doors piecing together his jigsaws.

  ‘I’ll get you a glass of water,’ I say and stand up.

  The water dispenser is situated near the boy’s table. As I walk by I look down at his half-completed jigsaw.

  ‘You’re doing well with that.’ I smile.

  I can’t help but be thrilled with my new ability to talk to people. With Dr Marsh’s help I have learned to start from a better place of assuming people are trustworthy and kind.

  He looks up and his sombre face breaks into a grin.

  ‘It’s a level four puzzle,’ he says.

  ‘It does look difficult.’

  ‘Sit down if you like,’ he says. ‘You can help me.’

  I glance back at Liam but he is still staring out of the window; he’s not even aware I have moved away. Nurse Janet is busying around talking to the patients and their visitors. There is nothing spoiling.

  ‘Just for a minute or two then,’ I say and pick up a jigsaw piece.

  His name is Darren. He shows me where the piece fits when I have trouble.

  ‘You’re very good at this,’ I say and he beams.

  We place a couple more pieces and then Darren says, ‘are you my visitor now?’

  I look across at Liam.

  Darren’s face falls. His fingers begin to drum on the table edge.

  ‘I suppose I am,’ I say. ‘For today, anyway.’

  I take Liam a cup of water over and then come back to Darren’s table.

  ‘Will you help me do more of the puzzle?’ he asks.

  His light brown hair is floppy and falls over his eyes when he looks down, studying the puzzle. Danny had hair just like that. It used to drive him mad.

  Once when Mother was out I put a girl’s Alice band on him and we laughed and laughed as he danced around with it on.

  I swallow down a scratch in my throat.

  After a few more minutes, I decide it is time to get back to Liam.

  ‘Don’t go,’ says Darren, placing his hand on mine.

  I look down and slide my hand gently away.

  ‘I’ll come and sit with you next week,’ I offer.

  His brown eyes look sad, and with his floppy fringe, he reminds me of a forlorn puppy. I wish Liam was a bit more responsive when I make the effort to visit him; it is so nice to feel needed.

  ‘Please stay,’ Darren says again, chewing his lip. ‘Stay and help me.’

  I take a slow breath and look out over the lawns stretching out like a smooth, green carpet all the way down to the pond.

  And gently, I extract my hand from his.

  Acknowledgments

  Firstly, huge thanks to Lydia Vassar-Smith, my editor, f
or seeing the potential in Safe with Me and for feeling so passionately about the book. Thanks also to Lydia for her expertise and guidance in the editing process.

  I’d like to thank all the Bookouture team for everything you do, especially Kim Nash who is so giving of her time, advice and enthusiasm. Also, the other Bookouture authors who are so supportive of each other.

  Secondly, a massive thank you to my agent, Clare Wallace, who worked on early edits with me and pulled out all the stops to submit Safe with Me just before embarking on her maternity leave. Now I have a book deal and she has Minnie, her beautiful baby daughter!

  Enormous thanks to the rest of the incredibly hardworking team at Darley Anderson Literary, TV and Film Agency, especially Naomi Perry, Mary Darby, Emma Winter, Kristina Egan and Rosanna Bellingham.

  Special thanks must also go to:

  Angela Marsons, my writing buddy who encouraged me to give up the day job last year and to get Safe with Me out of the drawer and follow my gut . . . thank goodness it worked!

  Julie Sherwin, for her early insight into the job of a postal worker. Any mistakes are entirely my own.

  Carol Roberts for giving her time and feedback as an early reader.

  Henry Steadman for designing such an amazing cover for Safe with Me which I loved the instant I saw it.

  To my husband, Mac, for his unwavering belief in me in everything I do. For always being there through both the highs and the lows, for his patience and love and for keeping me well supplied with tea while I write. To my daughter, Francesca and my mum, Christine, who are both always there to support and encourage me.

  To all family members and friends who show an interest in and are supportive of my writing – you know who you are!

  Letter from K.L. Slater

  Thank you so much for reading Safe with Me, my debut adult novel.

  After many unsuccessful years of sending out my work to agents and publishers, I made the decision to go back to university at the age of 40 to give myself time and space to develop and focus on my writing.