Trust Me: An absolutely gripping and unputdownable psychological thriller

by Sheryl Browne

  Suddenly perilously close to tears, she swallowed hard, arranged her face into a smile and turned to Nicky. ‘Why don’t you go off for lunch?’ she suggested, needing some time to herself. ‘I can handle everything here now things have quietened down.’

  Nicky looked at her in surprise and then checked the clock. ‘But it’s only quarter to.’

  ‘It’s been a full-on morning, though. You might as well grab a few extra minutes. You could get some cakes from the village shop on the way back,’ Emily suggested. ‘My treat. We could all do with a bit of cheering up.’

  ‘That sounds like an excellent plan.’ Nicky was out of her seat and grabbing her bag and jacket in seconds flat.

  ‘Thanks, Nicky.’ Reaching for her purse, Emily handed her the money, and then, realising there was something Nicky had obviously forgotten, stopped her short of the door. ‘Oh, Nicky …?’

  ‘Hell.’ The girl twirled around. ‘Sorry,’ she said, coming back to close her computer down. ‘It went clear out of my head with all the excitement.’

  Emily gave her a despairing look. She was going to have to have a firm word with her, particularly under the current circumstances.

  Waiting until Nicky had gone, she blanked her own screen, picked up a file and went quietly across to Jake’s office. She hated that she seemed to have turned into someone who could give Fran a run for her money, listening at doors, spying on people, but after Tom belittling him like that, she was concerned about how Jake would react. He was stressed enough without having to deal with his father winding him up. She wondered why she was worrying about him under the circumstances, but she couldn’t just stop any more than she could stop loving him. And she did love him, still. So much it hurt.

  Pausing guiltily outside his door, she flicked through the file she’d picked up for the benefit of anyone who might be looking in her direction as she listened. Hearing Tom from inside, she was immediately agitated.

  ‘It was unprofessional in front of the patients, Jake,’ he was saying, with a heavy sigh. ‘I gather the man was being aggressive and that you were upset, understandably, but—’

  ‘You have to be kidding.’ Jake laughed scornfully. ‘After the way you behave, you have the gall to preach to me about inappropriate behaviour. I’ve never heard such hypocritical bollocks in all my life.’

  Tom didn’t answer straight away. Emily could almost feel the tension crackling between them. ‘I’m only concerned for you, Jake,’ he said eventually. ‘Not just from a professional point of view, but—’

  ‘I think it might be a good idea for you to leave,’ Jake cut across him angrily.

  Hearing movement inside – Jake scraping his chair back to show Tom the door, she supposed – Emily stepped back.

  ‘Look, Jake …’ Tom hesitated just the other side of it. ‘I know we’re not as close as we should be, but I’m sensing you and Emily seem to be having a few problems. If you ever need someone to talk to …’

  ‘Now you really have to be joking.’ Jake’s tone was one of incredulity. ‘I wouldn’t confide in you if you were the last man on earth.’

  ‘I was just offering.’ Tom sounded wounded. ‘Sometimes it helps to talk. A problem shared and all that.’

  ‘Right,’ Jake replied flatly. ‘And you would be qualified to offer relationship advice, would you?’

  ‘Don’t, Jake,’ Tom said awkwardly. ‘There’s no need to bring all that up. It’s ancient history.’

  Jake was quiet for a moment, and Emily imagined him looking his father over with that mixture of bemusement and contempt she’d often seen. Then, ‘Really?’ he said. ‘So how’s the new relationship going? She’s a bit young for you, I would have thought, but—’

  ‘Okay, look, forget I said anything,’ Tom interrupted irritably. ‘I have work to do. I’m sure you do too.’

  ‘Did the meeting in Pembridge not go too well then?’ Jake enquired, with pointed innuendo. ‘You two seemed to be getting along extremely well from where I was standing,’

  Pembridge? Emily tried to think back through the constant muddle in her head. Tom had had a meeting with some people from the medical committee there, she recalled. Wasn’t that the same night that Nicky had been meeting friends in Pembridge? No, surely not. She pondered Jake’s implication in disbelief. Tom and Nicky? That was utterly preposterous.

  ‘You were spying on me?’ Tom’s tone was now one of shock.

  ‘No, Tom,’ Jake assured him. ‘Just satisfying my curiosity.’

  Her mind racing, Emily headed quickly back to reception as the door opened. Jake had been spying on him. He must have been. Why else would he have followed him? Unless it was out of jealousy. Might she have got this all wrong? Could it be Nicky that Jake was involved with?

  No. She laughed at her own absurdity. He wouldn’t, not right under her nose. Her suspicion was running riot, imagining that every attractive female in the vicinity was behind that email. Nicky would never do that to her. She was woolly-headed sometimes, and Emily despaired of her continually flouting data protection rules, but she was hard-working and conscientious otherwise. A nice, genuine sort of—

  As her eye snagged on the ‘Meet Our Staff’ board behind the reception desk, her step faltered. Oh dear God. Reading her full name, Nicky Jade Horton, Emily realised that Nicky could easily be the owner of the email address beginning ‘nja’, and her heart almost stopped beating.

  Fifteen

  Dean

  Letting himself back into the flat, Dean counselled himself to keep calm. There would be an explanation. There had to be, he tried to reassure himself. No, there wouldn’t. He’d been through every possible justification she could have for telling him cruel, bare-faced lies. She’d let him think it was a miscarriage, left him feeling so bloody guilty for not being here for her. Why had she done it? Why did she want to hurt him so badly? He needed to know what he’d done to deserve it, though he didn’t want to actually hear it: that he was such a useless prick she’d decided she didn’t want to be saddled with his kid, meaning she would be stuck with him too.

  Going quietly into the bedroom, his gaze was drawn immediately to the holdall on the bed. Zoe was hurriedly stuffing clothes into it. Sensing him standing there too stupefied to speak, she paused, her gaze shooting to his. Her eyes were wide, filled with fearful apprehension. She knew, then, that he knew. Jake Merriden had obviously felt obliged to alert her to the fact that he’d been close to losing it at the surgery, and why. Pity he hadn’t felt a similar obligation to keep him, the child’s father, in the fucking loop.

  Attempting to keep a lid on his emotions, he took a deep breath, pulled the folded card from his jacket pocket and tossed it on the bed. The cracked heart on the front of it would make the point succinctly, he thought: that she was breaking his heart into a million pieces, each piece piercing his chest like a knife.

  Emitting a small gasp, Zoe glanced down at the card. She didn’t look back at him.

  ‘You need to explain,’ he said over the loaded silence between them.

  She didn’t say anything for a second, and then, slowly, she brought her gaze back to his. ‘Dean, I …’ She faltered, wrapping her arms around herself. She was shaking. Was she cold? It was always cold in here. Was that why she’d done it, aborted their baby … without even telling him? Because she didn’t want to bring a child up in a poxy two-bedroom flat with under-floor heating that was too expensive to run and black mould decorating the walls?

  ‘I meant to tell you. I wanted to. I …’ she stammered, as if reading his mind. She’d always had an uncanny knack of doing that. She’d always guessed when he was feeling down – about his job mostly, the fact that he couldn’t provide for her as well as he wanted to. She’d told him not to worry, that things would get better in time. Yeah, right. He should have tried pissing off down the pub every night, spending what little money they had getting off his face with his mates, instead of putting away whatever he could for the baby. He would be a far happier bloke than he was no
w. Had she wanted to go back to work? it occurred to him to wonder. Was that why she’d done it? A part of him hoped it was, that in some misguided, back-to-front way, she’d been thinking of them, their future. Even then, though, to have done what she’d done … He wasn’t sure he could ever forgive her.

  ‘I should have spoken to you, I know I should have,’ Zoe stumbled on, ‘but—’

  ‘Why?’ Dean yelled over her, causing her to flinch. Anger and confusion twisting his gut, he took a step towards her.

  She stepped back, her face paling, her huge blue eyes darting past him to the door. She looked like a tiny porcelain doll, so fragile. He’d always thought of her that way, as someone who needed to be looked after. She wasn’t, though, was she? Appearances deceived. She was clearly as hard as nails under the surface. Emotionless. Must be.

  Desperate for her to offer him something, anything that might sound remotely like a valid reason for crucifying him, Dean took another step into the room.

  Zoe backed away from him, into the wall. There was nowhere to go. The room was barely big enough to accommodate the bed. She couldn’t get past him. He wasn’t about to let her, not until she’d offered him some kind of explanation.

  ‘Why?’ he repeated, his voice choked, his gaze fixed hard on hers.

  ‘I had to,’ she cried, her eyes filling up. ‘The baby … It wasn’t right. I didn’t want to tell you because of your job. I knew you’d want to take time off and I … I should have said something, but I didn’t know how to. I was—’

  ‘Bullshit!’ he grated. Jake would have told him if there was something wrong with the baby. He would have. That wouldn’t have broken with whatever protocol crap he’d been spouting. He would have told him. ‘Do not lie to me, Zoe, or I swear—’

  ‘I’m not!’ she said frantically. ‘I promise you I’m not. He wasn’t growing properly. He—’

  ‘He? You knew it was a boy? You knew we were having a son and you didn’t even tell me that much?’ Eyeballing her with a combination of heartbreak and insurmountable fury, Dean moved towards her again.

  ‘Dean, stop this,’ Zoe pleaded shakily. ‘Please. I need to get past. I want to go to my mum’s. Just for a few days,’ she added quickly. ‘I need some time. We both do. Please let me—’

  ‘Your mother’s?’ He laughed incredulously at that. ‘You do nothing but argue with your bloody mother. You said you’d never go there again after she had a go at you for getting bladdered in the pub with your girlfriends last …’ He trailed off, his world careering completely off-kilter as the penny began to drop. She’d stayed with one of her friends that night. On another long-distance trip, he’d been worried sick when he couldn’t get her on the phone. She’d been too drunk to trust herself getting back, she’d told him. She’d stayed with that same friend a couple of times since. She’d said she’d been lonely.

  His gut clenching, Dean narrowed his eyes, searching hers quizzically. Was that why she’d done it? Had she worked out her dates and realised they didn’t add up? ‘Where are you really going?’ he asked her.

  ‘My mum’s,’ Zoe mumbled. ‘I said. Just for a few days. I need to get away, Dean. I …’

  Lies. Dean noted the averted eye contact. ‘It wasn’t mine, was it? The baby …’ His voice cracked. ‘It wasn’t mine.’

  Zoe’s eyes came back to his, and what Dean saw there ripped his heart from inside him. Guilt. She’d been cheating on him. While he’d been working away from home, sleeping in his cab, worrying about her being on her own, feeling guilty – always feeling so fucking guilty – she’d been shagging someone else behind his back. Seeing her writhing and groaning with some other bastard in his bed, blind fury rose white-hot inside him.

  His knuckles hitting the wall a millimetre from her face jarred him from the murderous thoughts in his head. It was as if time stood still for a second. Frozen with shock, her terrified eyes were locked uncomprehendingly on his. And then, as he realised the enormity of what he’d done, she moved. Pressing both hands against his chest, she shoved him back hard, a muted cry escaping her as she ducked past him to scramble for the door.

  Jesus Christ. ‘Zoe!’ Spinning around, he raced after her, catching up with her in the hall. ‘Zoe, don’t,’ he begged, the flat of his hand against the front door as, tears streaming down her face, she wrestled to open it. ‘Please don’t go, Zoe. I’m sorry. I—’

  ‘Get out of my way.’ Struggling with the door, Zoe sobbed harder.

  ‘Zoe, please …’ Dean caught hold of her arm. ‘Don’t do this. Please stay. We can—’

  ‘Let me go.’ She wriggled away from him. ‘Leave me alone!’ she screamed, fleeing to the living room.

  ‘Zoe, come back. You can go. I’m sorry. I didn’t mean …’ Desperation climbing inside him, Dean followed. Fear gripped his stomach like a vice as he realised she was heading out onto the balcony.

  ‘Zoe, don’t go out there.’ He moved towards her.

  ‘Leave me alone, Dean,’ she warned him, stumbling over the washing rack in her haste to get away from him. ‘Don’t you come anywhere near me.’

  Sixteen

  Emily

  Emily tried to act normally, to ignore the wild palpitations in her chest, the churning in her stomach. Attempting to calm herself, to think rationally, her eyes slid towards Nicky, who was back from lunch and talking on the phone to the medical suppliers.

  Catching her looking, Nicky gave her a smile. ‘They’ve admitted they made a mistake,’ she said, placing her hand over the receiver. ‘The new blood pressure monitor should be with us tomorrow.’

  ‘Excellent.’ Expelling a breath she hadn’t realised she’d been holding, Emily forced a smile in return. She was wrong. She had to be. Please God she was. Nicky was acting naturally, making full eye contact with her. If she was gazing distractedly after anyone, it was Tom. But that was an even more ludicrous idea than her and Jake … Yet Jake had seen her with Tom. He’d followed Tom. Why? Unless … Had Nicky been involved with Jake and then become involved with Tom? That might explain why Jake would follow him.

  Emily’s heart plummeted, her stomach clenching at the thought of what might have been going on. Had Jake been meeting her here? It was perfect, after all, wasn’t it? Nicky had a set of keys. No one would think anything of her coming and going. Dear God, had he …? In his office? Absurd though they were, the thoughts came rapid-fire in her head. She simply couldn’t stop them. She had to know.

  Ask her, a little voice urged her. She won’t admit it, but you’ll know if she’s lying. An averted gaze, angry denials – those would be the signs that would confirm her guilt. But on the other hand, wouldn’t Emily be affronted if someone levelled that kind of accusation at her?

  She needed to talk to someone before she did go out of her mind. The alternative would be to storm into Jake’s office, which she was dangerously close to doing, and then her marriage would undoubtedly be over. Jake’s reputation would suffer. Tom would imagine his own deplorable behaviour had been vindicated in some way. The children would be utterly humiliated.

  She was about to ring through to Sally and ask her if she had time for a quick chat when her mobile rang. Hell, she thought, checking the number and realising it was Peter, the landlord at the Plough and Dog pub. He would want to know her drinks order for Edward’s party. She’d been so preoccupied; she had no idea how many people might be going yet, and she was clueless about beers and ales. She’d meant to talk to Jake about it, but now it seemed they were incapable of talking without arguing. She needed to get on with organising the arrangements. She’d promised herself she would do this. She couldn’t let Edward down and end up leaving Joyce in the lurch. She had to focus – not that she seemed capable of focusing on anything lately.

  Was she overreacting? Might everything she thought Jake was doing be in her feverish imagination? The truth was, she did feel paranoid. Her emotions were out of control, her sleep patterns all over the place, which made concentrating on anything almost impossible. It
was as if her body were waging a war against her. She had to get some perspective. Sally wasn’t exactly the soul of discretion, prone to gossip with the best of them, but she was a good friend, someone who’d known Jake before he’d left the village to get away from the pain of his childhood. If anyone could help her see the wood for the trees, Sally could.

  Blanking her screen, she was rising from her desk when Sally emerged from the treatment room, heading towards the kitchen. ‘Won’t be a tick,’ Emily mouthed to Nicky, who was still on the phone, and followed her.

  She was passing Jake’s office when she heard voices from inside and realised that Sally had stopped short of the kitchen and gone in there. Realising she would have to catch her later, she turned to go back to reception, but stopped when she heard Jake say, ‘I’m fine, Sally, honestly. I’m sure things will sort themselves out once Emily and I have a chance to sit down and talk.’

  Deciding that her eavesdropping this time was justifiable, since she appeared to be the topic of the conversation, Emily frowned and stepped closer.

  ‘Well, if you ever need a shoulder …’ was Sally’s reply, leaving Emily confused. Wasn’t she the one Sally was supposed to be offering a shoulder to?

  ‘Thanks, but I don’t,’ Jake answered brusquely, which went some way to appeasing her.

  ‘Right, well, I just thought I would offer,’ Sally said, sounding hurt.

  Jake blew out a discernible sigh. ‘Sorry, Sally. That sounded ungrateful. It’s just … I really don’t think it would be a good idea for us to … you know, behind Emily’s back.’

  Behind her back? Emily’s antennae stood on red alert.

  ‘It’s fine,’ Sally assured him. ‘I get why you would be a bit edgy. I’m not completely insensitive, Jake.’