The Housewife: A completely addictive and gripping psychological thriller

by Valerie Keogh

‘Papers?’ he said puzzled. Then his face cleared. ‘The GP who came the night you were taken away left some papers behind. Just leaflets and stuff. They weren’t important so I dumped them on my desk and then shoved them into a drawer and forgot about them.’ He frowned. ‘You’ve been going through my desk?’

  Ignoring him, she frowned. ‘Why didn’t you just throw them out, why keep them unless you were going to use them?’

  He threw up his hands. ‘I didn’t even know what they were. I just wanted them safely out of the way. Where did you find them?’

  Was it a trick question? ‘Under a folder in the bottom drawer.’

  ‘Well, there you go,’ he shouted. ‘I shoved them in and forgot about them.’

  Diane looked at him, trying to see if she could believe him. ‘So, you weren’t trying to drive me crazy and get me sectioned, it was all her idea?’

  ‘I told her you were doing much better, but I never mentioned you had gone to work in the charity shop. She stopped at the shopping centre on the way to visit her aunt and popped in to look at the books. There’s a photograph of you in my office, so she recognised you immediately. You gave her quite a shock, she said.’ He ran a hand over his face. ‘She was worried if you were doing so well that you’d fight for custody, so she thought she’d weigh the scales in my favour by unbalancing you a bit.’ He looked up at her, his brown eyes pleading. ‘She didn’t tell me because she knew I wouldn’t have approved.’

  Diane shook her head. ‘Nobody in their right mind would have approved, Paul! It’s deranged! And if you seriously think you’re going to have Emma staying with you and that…that psycho…then you’re deranged.’ Clasping her hand to her head, she turned away. ‘I can’t believe this.’ She paced the length of the room and then stopped. ‘Sophie Redmond? I did see her going into her house, didn’t I? I wasn’t imagining that.’

  He looked confused for a moment. ‘I don’t know. Sophie is Pam’s aunt, she was taking time off work to visit her. What has she got to do with anything?’

  Feeling her head was going to explode, she whirled to face him again. ‘The police mentioned Sophie Redmond that day in the manager’s office. You have to have known then that she was involved.’

  He shook his head. ‘They didn’t,’ he said firmly. ‘They said you’d been harassing a vulnerable old woman, but they never said who or where. And, anyway, you had to admit you were doing a pretty good job of making everyone believe you were crazy without help.’

  She shook her head, it was all just too unbelievable. Then she gave a short laugh, her eyes narrowing as she looked at him. ‘You had to have been in on it,’ she said, ‘what about the wine bottles?’ He lifted his head and looked at her, puzzled. ‘Don’t play games with me, Paul. You know damn well what I’m talking about.’ She waved a hand toward the cupboard. ‘I emptied the cupboard of bottles and then suddenly hey, presto, it was full again.’

  His face cleared. ‘Believe it or not, that was supposed to help.’ Seeing her disbelieving face, he continued. ‘You thought I didn’t notice how much you were drinking, but I did. For goodness sake, Diane,’ he said, his lips curling in a sneer, ‘do you think I’m stupid? That I wouldn’t guess why your breath often had a minty smell, that I didn’t hear you opening the fridge door as soon as I’d left the damn room. When I filled the cupboard with the empties, I thought you’d know that it was me, that I knew about your drinking and maybe,’ he shrugged, ‘slow down or give up.’

  Her sceptical look continued. ‘You didn’t think that maybe speaking to me about it would be easier than playing damn stupid games?’

  Paul held his hands up. ‘We haven’t talked for a long time, Diane.’

  She opened her mouth to argue and closed it again. He was right, of course, they hadn’t. He was also right, putting the empty bottles in the cupboard had been a stupid idea, but it had worked. She pushed on. ‘What about the crying?’

  He was rubbing his eyes, he stopped and looked at her. ‘What crying?

  Pulling out a chair, she sat heavily. He really didn’t know anything about it, he’d no reason to lie now. ‘It doesn’t matter.’ She was wrong about so many things, it seemed she was wrong about this too. He looked sad, weary. She supposed it hadn’t been easy on him since her breakdown. ‘How long?’ she asked.

  He didn’t insult her by asking what she meant. ‘Over a year,’ he admitted. ‘She’s a marketing analyst, she works in the same building. I saw her in the lift a few times, and then one day I asked her if she were free for coffee. And that’s all it was for a month or so, just coffee. We talked about work, problems we were having with staff, things like that. It was good to talk. We’d been meeting for a couple of months before it became anything more.’ He took a deep breath, ‘I knew then I wanted to be with her. I was going to tell you, ask you for a divorce, but—’ He broke off and shook his head.

  Diane was still trying to deal with the idea he’d been seeing another woman for a year. She blinked away tears and looked at him in disgust. ‘Did I know? Was that what made me have a breakdown?’ She hated the thought of being so weak.

  He shook his head quickly. ‘No, you didn’t know anything about it. We were careful.’

  Careful. She looked at him. Was she supposed to be grateful? ‘You were going to ask me for a divorce? When?’

  ‘Several months ago,’ he said, hanging his head.

  Several months ago! She frowned, trying to unlock some of the memories that were still hidden. ‘But something happened, and you didn’t?’ She stared at him, trying to read his expression. ‘Why don’t you just tell me, Paul?’ she said quietly.

  His eyes were bleak and there was a crack in his voice. ‘I…can’t, I just can’t, Diane.’

  A memory flashed into her head: her waiting for Paul, bursting with news, expecting to see a look of delight on his face when she told him, stunned by the sight of a quick flash of dismay that he’d struggled to cover. A memory; it faded before she could get a grip on it.

  Lost in her reflections, it took a while to realise that Paul was speaking. ‘Sorry,’ she said. ‘I missed what you said.’

  His groan was part frustration, part irritation. ‘I said Emma will be better off with us. Me and Pam. We can offer her stability, a calm family environment. I think you still need more help than we realised.’ Then he added, reassuringly, ‘You’ll be able to visit, of course. Maybe, have her for a weekend now and then, once you’re doing better.’

  He was wearing his most sincere expression. She shot him a sharp look. He was good; she’d almost been fooled, almost convinced she wasn’t well enough. With a twist of her lips, she thought of the other papers she’d found in his desk drawers, the ones she’d so carefully photographed.

  ‘Does the CEO know you’re creaming money off some of the company accounts?’ she asked, watching as his face changed from eager and sincere to confused and then worried. She gave a quiet laugh. She stood, walked to the sofa, crossed her arms and looked down her nose at him. ‘You’re a cheat and a thief, and you will never get custody of my daughter.’

  He stood, his face reddening with rage, spittle gathering at the corners of his mouth. Grabbing her by her arms, he shook her. ‘You stupid cow! You think any judge in his right mind would hand Emma into your care, with your history and your recent antics.’

  She felt his fingers bruise, refusing to let him see he was hurting her. ‘I’m a good mother,’ she almost snarled, lifting her eyes to meet his.

  ‘Really?’ he said, dragging out the single word in a sneer as he increased the pressure on her arms. ‘Not such a great mother to Emma’s sister, though, were you?’

  Forty-Four

  Diane’s eyes widened, and she stepped back as his hands fell away. ‘What?’ She watched as a fleeting look of regret crossed his face.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ he said, reaching for her again.

  Holding her hands up, she took a step away. The memory that had slipped away came back, with perfect clarity. I’m pregnant, she’d
said, bubbling with joy, expecting to see it reflected on his face.

  ‘That’s why you didn’t ask me for a divorce,’ she said, staring at him, with shock-widened eyes. ‘I was pregnant.’ She saw the truth in his eyes, the depth of his betrayal twisting her gut as her hands clasped her belly.

  The colour drained from her face as a wave of weakness swept over her. It sent her staggering backward into the wall. She leaned against it, eyes unfocused as she tried to make sense of it all; ragged glimpses of half-buried memories flickering like worn-out film tape.

  Then, on a sob, she closed her eyes and saw her, that first time when the midwife handed her over. With slicked-down hair and a crumpled baby face, Diane had taken one look and her heart had sung. ‘Jane,’ she said, the name bittersweet on her lips. ‘You told Emma she was an angel in heaven,’ she whispered. ‘I didn’t understand.’

  ‘That’s what the doctors advised me to say,’ he said wearily, sitting on the side of the coffee table. ‘I didn’t know what to do. You were in the clinic, I had to do the best I could. Pam wanted to help, but I didn’t want to confuse Emma by bringing another woman into the house. I just kept repeating that Jane was happy as an angel in heaven and then I spent a lot of money on new toys to try to distract her. After a couple of weeks, she didn’t ask about her any more.’ He frowned and looked at her. ‘You remember everything?’ She slid down the wall and wrapped her arms around her knees, her mouth opening to make a long, low keening cry that came from somewhere deep in her soul.

  She’d been so very tired. When Emma settled down for her afternoon nap, she’d brought Jane into the lounge, fed her and laid her on the sofa beside her. The way she always did. She remembered the sun was shining, and it was warm and cosy. She’d looked at her sleeping baby, smiled and rested her head back, closing tired eyes.

  Her body, exhausted, sought comfort, her head drifting to rest on one of the big turquoise cushions, her hand reaching to pull it into place. She’d slept until she heard the front door open, listening without opening her eyes as footsteps went into the family room and then returned. Paul had come home early. She opened her eyes to greet him as he came in.

  ‘Hello, darling,’ she’d said.

  ‘Hi,’ he’d said, but his voice was puzzled. ‘Where’s Jane?’

  She remembered laughing, thinking he was joking, because she was right there, safe, beside her. She pushed up from her awkward position, shaking the last of the sleepiness away as she heard him ask again, his voice sounding worried.

  ‘Diane, where’s Jane?’

  She’d seen the look of horror on his face before she’d looked down. The cushion. Somewhere in her exhausted sleep, it had fallen, or she had pulled it down. From the side of it, tiny bluish fingers curled onto a minute mottled palm.

  She remembered the sound of loud, agonised screams. And then a blank.

  Ragged-edged memories, some clearer than others, came trickling back as if his words had been the key she’d been searching for. The months of pregnancy, the easy labour, the beautiful baby. Jane. Her second child.

  ‘I fell asleep,’ she said, her voice low and trembling. ‘I remember.’

  Chewing his lower lip, he nodded reluctantly. ‘I’d been away overnight. A conference. You were only home from the hospital a few days, but you said you could manage. But I felt a little guilty so came home early the next day.’ He gulped and took a steadying breath. ‘I pushed you out of the way,’ he said, dropping his face into his hands as his voice broke. After a pause, he took his hands away. Tears were running down his face. ‘She was lying there, like a little doll, but when I touched her…’ He held his hands out. ‘Sometimes I can still feel her, that icy coldness that said there was nothing I could do.’ He wiped his face with his shirt sleeve. ‘You started to scream,’ he said, ‘and you didn’t stop, not even when the doctor came and gave you a sedative.’ He looked at her, shaking his head. ‘I’ve never heard such an awful sound. The doctor rang someone and very quickly an ambulance came and took you away. The consultant told me later that they had to give you an extraordinarily high dose of drugs to stop you screaming. You were hysterical, inconsolable.’ He paused again, taking a deep breath to steady himself. ‘When you eventually woke up, you’d blocked it all out. The pregnancy, Jane, the last day. Everything.’ He shrugged. ‘They said it was a coping mechanism. That your memories would eventually return.’

  ‘And they have been coming back for a while,’ she said. ‘I just didn’t realise what they were.’

  ‘It was so easy for you,’ he said, his voice bitter. ‘You were tucked away from all the grief and trauma. The police, the social workers, the endless questions I had to deal with on my own. And my own grief, and Emma’s. You left me with all of it. And,’ he shook his head, anger in his eyes, ‘I just couldn’t forgive you for Jane. I was just waiting until she was a little older to tell you I wanted a divorce. After her…’ he gulped, ‘…death. I wanted to tell you but when I mentioned it to the therapist in the clinic, he said it would jeopardise your recovery if I subjected you to more trauma. So…’

  She gave a sad smile. ‘But you got tired waiting, didn’t you?’

  He closed his eyes briefly. ‘Not me, it was Pam. I swear, I didn’t know anything about what she was doing until today. She won’t bother you again.’ Meeting her eyes, he bit his lip and said, ‘I love her, Diane.’ He stood. ‘I’ll move out, it’s not fair keeping her waiting any longer. She wants children of her own. We can come to some kind of amicable arrangement about custody of Emma.’ He looked away. ‘I’ll just pack a few things to take with me and arrange to get everything else in a few days.’

  She stayed seated while he went upstairs, listening to his heavy footsteps overhead as he packed to leave her. It was the end of their marriage; the sad thing was she didn’t care. All she could think of now, was Jane. There had to be pictures of her somewhere, the photograph of the scan. She remembered the excitement of seeing it. So many questions still to be answered. Had she been cremated? Buried?

  Grief curled inside her and the deep shock of loss and guilt at what she’d done. No wonder she had blacked it all out. How was she going to cope with the knowledge that she’d been responsible for Jane’s death? The shock was a jolt that seemed to reset her brain and the memories, those ragtag memories, started to form and firm. She gave a sad smile at the memory of Jane’s baby-soft skin and shook her head when she remembered frightening Emma. She’d been right, it hadn’t been that long ago.

  There were bits of that awful night that she would probably never remember. Trauma too horrendous for her brain to deal with. But other parts were coming back.

  She felt an uncontrollable anger bubble inside her. When the door opened, Paul stood there with a holdall in his hand and a conciliatory smile on his face. She stood and spat fire. ‘Pam rang me, Paul. The night before, did you know that? You’d said you were going to a conference,’ she laughed, the sound edging toward hysteria. ‘I remember reassuring you that we’d be fine and encouraging you to go.’ She stepped closer, raised a hand and, before he could move away, she slapped him across the face, hard enough to make him stagger from the force of it.

  ‘She rang me from the hotel where you’d gone for your sordid little tryst and told me you were just waiting until Jane was a few weeks older and then you were going to leave me for her.’

  He tried to step away as she took a step closer, but the wall was behind him. She grabbed his jacket in her two hands. ‘I didn’t sleep that night, Paul. I was devastated by your betrayal. Babies pick up on moods, did you know that? Jane cried all morning, nothing I did settled her.’ She clutched his jacket. ‘Her cry, it was piteous and pathetic. It’s that cry I’ve been hearing the last couple of weeks. A memory trying to break through. Do you know what it’s like to have that as one of the last memories I have of her?

  ‘It wasn’t until after lunch that she cried herself into an exhausted sleep.’ Still clutching his jacket, she dropped her head and wept. ‘I
put her down on the sofa beside me, and I fell asleep too.’ The words came thickly through the tears. ‘So, don’t you ever dare say again that you can’t forgive me, Paul, because some of the blame lies with you.’

  He looked down at her for a moment, then pulled her hands from his jacket, grabbed his keys from the counter and left without another word. She heard his footsteps on the stairs and, minutes later, the front door slamming.

  Long after the sound had faded into the silence of the night, she stood staring out into the hallway. Then, with slow steps, she moved to the lounge, opened the door and went inside.

  There was no terror now, just an ineffable sadness. Switching on the light, she looked at the sofa. That explained the missing cushion. Anne had been right. Something awful had happened in here.

  Sitting, she felt calmer than she had in a long time. Under the scab of the memory blackout, her mind had learned to cope. Now, laying her hand on the spot where she would have placed her baby, although sorrow and guilt still twisted her heart and she felt a deep, bottomless sense of loss, she knew she would get through it. She cried then, piteous, sad tears for Jane, for her marriage, for herself.

  After a few minutes, she snuffled and stood. She took a final look around, switched off the light and shut the door. What was it Paul had said? We can come to some kind of amicable arrangement about custody of Emma. He was lying, she could see it in his eyes. He’d present the court with all the ammunition she’d kindly provided him with. It was enough to cast doubts on her sanity, certainly enough to damage her credibility as a mother. She had lost one child, she’d no intention of losing another.

  She hadn’t looked at the documents she’d photographed in detail. She did now, her brow furrowing. He’d managed to embezzle a large amount of money. Over a million pounds. A thought struck her. Wouldn’t keeping such a vast amount of money in a UK bank account give rise to questions he wouldn’t want to answer? He’d have had to transfer it abroad somehow. He was an accountant; he’d know how to do this.