First Date: An absolutely jaw-dropping psychological thriller

by Sue Watson

  I go into the kitchen, where Alex is now slicing peppers and humming to himself, it’s the picture of domestic bliss. But that’s all it is – a picture.

  ‘God, I love this place,’ he says, as I walk in.

  ‘Me too,’ I say, trying to sound like I mean it while watching the knife go into the peppers like butter. ‘Just going to the bathroom,’ I add, leaving the kitchen and heading upstairs to see where he’s put the front door keys. I know from experience, he usually puts his house keys in his jeans pocket, but he’s wearing jogging bottoms with no pockets, so the keys must be somewhere. I pick up his jeans, folded neatly on the bedroom chair, I push my hand into his pocket, and there they are! I slip them into my hoodie pocket, while trying not to creak the bedroom floor.

  ‘You know, I was thinking—’ he calls from down in the kitchen.

  I drop the jeans and head to the bathroom, flushing the toilet so he thinks that’s where I’ve been. I don’t want him to know I’m in the bedroom, he might put two and two together. He knows I’m not happy, and he’s hoping bloody pasta bake’s going to change everything, but it isn’t.

  ‘Hang on…’ I call, coming down the stairs. ‘What were you saying?’

  He turns round as I walk into the kitchen and smiles at me. ‘There you are. I was just saying, babe – we could move out here, buy a nice little cottage, raise our three kids by the sea.’

  I nod. ‘That sounds good,’ I say, but inside I’m screaming NO!

  He laughs, almost to himself. ‘I mean, we’ve already got the dog, we’re picking Kevin up next week… I make dreams come true, don’t I, babe?’

  ‘You certainly do.’ I smile, and head back to the living room slowly, as if I’m just pottering, but once in there, I push the keys under the sofa seat.

  I don’t know what to do next. He also has the keys to the car, and God knows where they are. I’m wondering how quickly I could get outside and get the car started before he realised and came after me, when I pick up my phone to see several missed calls and a text from Jas in the last few minutes. Christ, why did I leave my phone here? He obviously came in when I was upstairs and he must have seen the first few lines of her text, which says:

  Get out of there asap!

  I can hear the sound of chopping and Alex singing to himself in the kitchen, so I quickly open her message. She’s sent me a news link, and for a moment my heart stops, thinking it might be about Chloe, that the police have arrested whoever gave her the drugs, or, worse still, that she hasn’t pulled through. But when I open the link, it’s a news report on a man being killed outside The Orange Tree wine bar on Wednesday night. Killed? He turned away the first ambulance that came, insisting he was fine, and walked home, but was later found and taken to hospital, where he died of his injuries.

  I look through into the kitchen at Alex still humming. Does he know?

  I read on, apparently police are seeking a man who fled the scene. I’d never told Jas about that night, and Alex said he’d seen his policeman friend, who said the guy was fine.

  I immediately text Jas back.

  How did you know?

  The guy said it was a businessman in a suit who attacked him. I guessed. You were quite jumpy the next day. I knew something was up. Now you HAVE to tell the police. x

  Just as I put down the phone, Alex walks in. I’m sitting among the cushions by the fire and he comes and stands over me.

  ‘Who’s on the phone, Hannah?’

  ‘No one.’

  ‘Must be someone?’ He’s smiling, but it’s frozen on his face. He’s still holding the knife he was chopping the peppers with.

  ‘Do you know?’ I ask, looking up at him.

  ‘Know what?’

  ‘That he’s dead – the guy you punched.’

  He takes a deep breath, then nods, slowly. ‘Yeah, I know. It was on the news this morning…’

  I gasp. ‘I only just saw it. You have to call the police.’

  ‘I can’t. Hannah, you have to understand – I’d lose everything – including you.’

  ‘You’ve already lost me,’ I say.

  ‘No, I haven’t. I need to work it out, but just give me some time. As soon as I knew I called the cottage company and booked the cottage for another two weeks. In a different name.’ Then he looks at me with such a strange expression. ‘Please tell me you haven’t told that idiot friend of yours where we are.’

  ‘No, I haven’t,’ I lie. ‘But we can’t hide here. We need to call the police.’

  ‘We can’t – we just need to lie low and it’ll all die down… No one knows it was me, we left before anyone else turned up. Hannah, we can have Christmas here,’ he says excitedly, as if nothing’s happened.

  ‘Alex, are you out of your mind? You’re talking about Christmas – a man is dead, you killed him. This is something you can’t hide from, the police will find you.’

  ‘It’s okay, don’t worry. If they do ever find me, I’ll say I hit him because he was trying to assault you. I saved you, and you can vouch for me, say how scared you were – you could even say he roughed you up a bit. Then we’ll say you were so distressed I had to get you away from the scene.’ He says this like he’s reading a well-prepared script. ‘But it’s an outside chance that anyone will ever know it was me,’ he says, holding out his hands as if he’s waiting for me to congratulate him on his story.

  ‘Whoa, hang on,’ I say, standing up. ‘That’s all lies and you know it.’

  He lifts both hands as if to calm me down, but given he’s got a kitchen knife in one of them it’s having the opposite effect. I don’t dare take my eyes off it as he talks to me slowly, as if I’m a child who doesn’t understand.

  ‘Hannah, listen to me, we have to keep to the story here – and if we say it was done in self-defence, everything will be fine. I’ll get away with it.’

  ‘But it’s lying, Alex, it’s perjury – we have to tell the truth. You didn’t mean to kill him, it was an accident.’

  ‘It’s not a solution,’ he says, beginning to pace the floor. They’ll do me for manslaughter. I’ll still be locked up for years. I won’t see you, I won’t be able to look after you,’ he says, sounding like a child who’s about to lose his favourite toy. ‘Someone might take you away from me, or you might leave me.’

  I get up from the floor where I’ve been sitting by the fire, and sit down on the sofa. When I’m sure he’s not looking, I reach under the seat cushion, keeping my eyes on the glint of knife still in his hand.

  ‘You’re not going to leave me, are you, Hannah?’ he says, alarmed, as he suddenly stops pacing and turns to me.

  ‘I… No, no I’m not,’ I say, discreetly retrieving the keys while still keeping my eyes on the knife – it’s down by his thigh. He’s twisting it with his fingers, and I’m only too aware that one swift movement, one wrong word – and the knife could be in my chest.

  I have the front door keys in the palm of my hand, but he’s watching me intently.

  Suddenly a buzzer goes off in the kitchen, making us both jump.

  ‘The pasta,’ he murmurs almost to himself and turns away for a split second.

  I see my chance, and make a mad dash for the door. I push the key in hard, it’s stiff, and takes all my strength to turn it and then heave the wooden door open. I can’t believe I did it, and I’m yelping as I get through the door. But Alex is shouting my name and running towards me. Just as he gets to me and tries to grab me, I slam the door in his face – hard. I hear him shout out in surprise and pain, but I’m already running through biting wind in slippers and a thin jumper.

  It’s dark and freezing, but I don’t care. I feel nothing, just an urgent need to escape, to survive. I just need to get far enough away from him and call the police. I’m heading out onto the main road now, a coastal road, where the wind is bitter and relentless, but I keep running. I’m not used to this exertion and, eventually, just a few hundred yards down the road, I have to stop, even though he may be close behind me. I stan
d behind the trees on the side of the road, my hands on my knees, my breath short and rasping. I’m holding my phone, ready to use it, but suddenly, my stomach tilts and I vomit into the frozen grass. I wait in silence. The road’s empty and black in front of me, and behind me there’s only the whispering of trees. After a little while, when I’m sure there’s no sign of Alex, I click on my phone and try to call the police, but I’ve got no signal.

  The wind’s whistling, and the little spots of frozen rain are now snow, landing from a great height, a silent blanket on the world. It’s then I hear him calling my name, it’s softened by the snow, but I hear the loss, the desperation, the grief in the darkness.

  He has the knife and I remember his words, when we were happy and in love and the world was a different place. ‘People do dangerous things when they’re scared of losing what they love, Hannah.’

  Who knows what he’ll do now? So I stay by the tree, waiting, his voice faint in the distance. He can’t find me, and like a lost child he’s becoming more desperate, more distraught. Then, suddenly, I see a car in the distance. Is it more dangerous to stay here by the trees with no hope, and die of cold, or wait for Alex to find me and take me back to the cottage, and hold me there in some horrible parody of love that turns into weeks, years? Or do I run out into the road and wave the car down?

  I make a snap decision. It isn’t even a rational decision made by my brain, my body just shoots out into the road, my arms waving. I’m crying, and calling for help. As the car approaches, the headlights block my view, and for a moment I think it might be Alex coming from the other direction in the car, to fool me. I hold my breath, knowing my fate is in the car, but then I hear Alex in the distance calling my name again.

  I run towards the car. I know he’s behind me, I just hope whoever’s driving lets me in and drives off without asking questions. If we don’t get away, Alex might attack them too. He’s already killed one man and now I know that he’d do it all over again.

  The car stops, and the driver’s door opens, and it’s Harry, waving. ‘Hannah, Hannah is that you, mate?’

  I almost collapse with surprise and relief. ‘Harry, Harry.’ I am sobbing now, and he runs round to the passenger door and helps me in. Climbing into that warm car is the best feeling, I feel weak from running and crying and cold.

  ‘I’ve been up and down this road looking everywhere for you.’

  ’Thank God. But how did you…?’ Then I laugh. ‘Jas?’

  ‘She called me, said she was worried about you.’

  ‘And you and Gemma are in Somerset this weekend?’

  ‘Yeah, it took me less than an hour to get here, then another half an hour to find the cottage, but no one was there.’

  ‘Jas knew something wasn’t right.’ I gasp, still out of breath from the cold and the running and the fear.

  ‘Yeah, she called me to tell me about the… the fight… the guy died.’

  ‘Yeah, I don’t—’

  ‘And that photo of Alex watching you guys in The Orange Tree – Jesus!’

  ‘I know, it was so weird that he was there…’ I don’t finish the sentence. I can’t even begin to explain Alex to a nice, sane person like Harry who doesn’t stalk someone to become his girlfriend or kill people outside wine bars.

  He pats my arm. ‘It’s okay, Hannah, we don’t have to talk about it.’

  I’m flooded with relief. ‘I can’t thank you enough, Harry. If you hadn’t come, I might have… I was so scared…’ I start crying, and I know he finds emotions a bit much because he’s a guy in his twenties, but he turns to me and talks calmly.

  ‘Hannah, please don’t cry. I hate it when girls cry. I don’t know what the hell to do.’

  This makes me smile in spite of everything, and I rest my head on his shoulder, and squeeze his arm, desperate for a comforting hug. He has one hand on the wheel, and is hugging me back as best he can, when a car suddenly pulls up in front of us, and Alex gets out.

  ‘He’s got a knife,’ I squeal to Harry, who central-locks the car.

  ‘It’s okay, we’ve got this. He’s not hurting anyone,’ he says calmly, never taking his eyes from Alex, a dark figure silhouetted in the headlights, arms in the air.

  He walks closer, comes around to the passenger window, and it’s then he sees Harry. The realisation makes his mouth fall open in surprise, and he starts banging hard on my window, as if he’s hitting me in the face.

  I flinch and yell, ‘Drive, drive,’ and Harry puts his foot down, swerving on the icy road, the snow adding extra slide as the wheels spin, giving Alex time to get back in his car. I watch him in the side mirror, shouting at Harry to ‘go, go,’ and eventually we start to move and slide along the ground, with Alex tearing after us.

  Harry is as scared as me, and driving so fast I’m worried for our lives. On the coast road, the sheer drop is terrifying, but on black ice, it’s treacherous. We can’t see a thing in the dark, and Harry’s having trouble keeping the car on the road. We turn a bend and almost go over the edge, and Harry’s so frightened he pulls up at the next visible gap in the road, with Alex right behind us.

  ‘Harry – we can’t stop here.’ I glance behind me to see Alex pulling up a few feet away. ‘Harry! He’s getting out of the car! Please drive,’ I’m begging him, terrified.

  ‘No,’ he says calmly, turning off the engine, the lights. ‘I’m going to talk to him.’ And he opens his door, the icy wind whips through the car, cold and dangerous, and he steps out into the darkness.

  ‘NO!’ I’m yelling at the top of my voice. But he’s gone, and has closed the car door behind him and locked the doors. I watch him in the rear-view mirror walking back a few yards to where I presume Alex is waiting. I can’t see him, and now I can’t see Harry either.

  I sit and wait, wondering if I should have got out of the car and helped Harry. I know he wanted to talk, but Alex may have turned it into a fight, and I’ve seen how angry he gets. Two of us might have overpowered Alex, but on his own, I can’t imagine Harry standing much of a chance if Alex starts on him. Harry’s always said he’s a lover not a fighter, and whereas he thinks talking will work with Alex, I’m not convinced. I hope to God it isn’t Alex who returns and finds me locked in the car, a sitting target. I check my phone to call the police, but there’s still no signal out here. I have nothing to protect me, and if Alex hurts Harry, and returns with the knife, I know my life is over.

  Eventually, I see someone in the rear mirror. They are walking towards the car, and I swear I see the flash of metal. It’s Alex, he must have stabbed Harry and now he’s going to get me. I duck down, lying my head on the gearstick, unable to breathe I’m so scared. I hear the thud of the lock being opened by the key fob, and hear myself gasp, then I hear a whimpering noise, and realise it’s me. The door opens, and a blast of freezing wind whips into the car and I slowly lift my head to see who it is.

  ‘You okay?’ It’s Harry, and as he climbs in, I grab him and hug him too tight.

  He hugs me back and we sit there for a long time just holding each other, as I sob into his chest.

  Eventually, we pull apart. ‘Did he hurt you?’ I ask, but he doesn’t answer, just sits with his head on the steering wheel and for a few moments he seems shaken.

  ‘Harry, what happened, where is he?’ I say, looking behind the car – my relief was temporary, I’m now scared again.

  Harry turns on the interior light, he’s visibly upset. ‘Hannah, I can’t believe you were with that guy. You should have heard the stuff he said, the creepy way he talks – the things, the terrible things he was planning to do to you in that cottage.’

  My stomach plummets. I’m not wholly surprised, but it’s still not easy to hear. I look behind again to see where Alex is; he may still be planning those terrible things.

  ‘Let’s go,’ I say. ‘He might try and ram us off the road if he feels he’s got nothing to lose now.’

  ‘No, he won’t, I promise you. I’ve had a serious talk to him, I think
I made him see sense. From what he said, he’s more likely to take his own life.’ He sighs.

  ‘Oh no.’ I start to cry, even after everything I don’t want something terrible to happen to Alex. I won’t be in his life, but I don’t want him to die.

  ‘Hey, hey, I’m sure he’ll be fine. It’s you I’m worried about,’ Harry says.

  ‘I just… I don’t know… I can’t imagine what might have happened if Jas hadn’t called you.’

  He nods. ‘Yeah, yeah. Hey, don’t cry,’ he says gently, and wipes away my tears with the cuff of his jumper. ‘I called the police, they’re on their way. We have to wait for them here, you warm enough?’ he asks, and I nod, but still he takes off his coat and puts it round me.

  ‘Thank you, I owe you and Jas such a lot.’

  ‘A lot of alcohol.’

  I smile and grab his hand, I just need to feel the warmth of another person. ‘I didn’t know him – I thought I did, we were talking about marriage. But he’s a stranger to me.’

  ‘Well, you dodged a bullet there, mate.’ He smiles, and starts the car to keep us warm. ‘I’ve explained as much as I can to the police on the phone, but when they get here, they’ll want to talk to you.’

  ‘Yes, of course. Do you think Alex will make a run for it?’ I ask.

  ‘Nah, he’s broken.’ Harry sighed. ‘He knows what he has to do. I left him sitting by the side of the road, he knows the police are coming, I reckon he’ll go quietly.’

  A few minutes later, we hear sirens and flashing lights.

  ‘It’s all over, Hannah.’ Harry smiles. ‘The police can deal with him now. And after we’ve talked to the police, I’ll get you home.’

  ‘I feel such a fool, Harry.’

  ‘Don’t,’ he says. ‘You just fell in love with the wrong guy – let’s hope next time it’ll be the right one.’

  Chapter Thirty-Nine

  Alex meant what he’d said about not being able to live without me, and today I said goodbye to him for the last time. I’m still finding it hard to come to terms with what happened, but it seems that on realising it was over, on that cold, snowy night, just days before Christmas, he took his own life.