The Guilty Wife

by Elle Croft

  Maybe Calum had ordered them before he died. I shook my head. There were too many reasons why that wasn’t possible. Perhaps Alex had sent them, or Fran, and the florist just screwed up the order, monumentally. Or maybe they were for someone else entirely, a neighbour in a nearby flat. There was no address on the bouquet, no indication that they were really for me.

  The creepy delivery didn’t have to be sinister, just because I was scared. And neither did that tweet.

  The whole thing was so stupid, and so pointless that I threw the small green watering can onto the stone pavers in sheer frustration. When it didn’t break, I kicked it against the wall to stop myself from screaming. Still no damage. I brought my foot down hard, heard a crunch, and momentarily enjoyed the twisted satisfaction of destruction. It was a relief to feel control over something.

  I tried to compose myself. My violent outburst had taken me by surprise. I’d come outside to have a few moments of peace, but I felt worse now than when I’d been trapped inside with Jason. His weekly football match had been cancelled, and he’d been flitting around the flat incessantly for the past few hours. I’d been pretending to read, but every time my mind wandered to Calum, as it inevitably would, tears would appear and I had to blink them back before my husband caught me grieving.

  I thought the fresh air would help to remove the constant threat of breaking down, but now, with a bouquet of lifeless flowers in my hand, I wished I’d just stayed inside.

  As I shuffled the green plastic shards along the pavers with the toe of my slipper, my scalp began to prickle.

  Someone was watching me. I was sure of it.

  I swivelled slowly on my heel and heard the scrape of a sliver of watering can against the stone. Careful not to make any sudden movements, I peered around, my heart threatening to beat its way out of my chest. Our tiny front garden was empty. I looked left and right. No one.

  My eyes drifted up, towards the road and across. I followed the Diet Coke advert up to the top deck of a bus that had pulled into its stop. Someone was watching me.

  An old man was staring out of the window, clearly entertained by my outburst. His bushy grey eyebrows jolted in surprise as our eyes met, and I smiled and waved sarcastically, hoping to make him feel ashamed for being so nosy.

  He looked away quickly, clearly embarrassed by my acknowledgement of his presence, and I turned back to the house, stopping when I remembered what was in my hand.

  I needed to get rid of the bouquet. I walked quickly out of my front gate and to the nearest public bin, where I hurriedly dumped the whole thing. I just wanted to forget that I’d ever seen it.

  I had far bigger things to worry about, anyway.

  ‘I just folded the washing,’ called Jason from our bedroom as the front door closed behind me.

  ‘Thanks,’ I replied, checking my reflection in the hallway mirror to make sure I looked appropriately composed.

  ‘I was thinking, why don’t we get out of here?’ Jason said, rounding the corner. ‘Jump in the car, head out to the countryside somewhere, stay in a farmhouse or something, read books, drink pots of tea …’

  He trailed off, looking at me expectantly for a reaction.

  ‘Where did this come from?’ I asked suspiciously.

  ‘I just thought of it now, I guess, but that doesn’t mean it’s not a good idea.’

  I narrowed my eyes. He sounded strange. Nervous, almost.

  ‘C’mon, Bethany, don’t you remember what it was like when we used to be spontaneous? I miss that. I just think it’d do us some good to get away and spend some time together without the stress and craziness of the city. And with … well, with everything that’s happened over the past couple of days, I know you could use a break. Just for a long weekend. I can take Monday off.’

  I paused. I wasn’t sure that being in a small space with the man I was desperately trying to keep my secrets from was a great idea, but I would have done almost anything to get away from the constant reminders of Calum’s murder. I knew that my picture would be splashed all over the front pages of every paper this morning, and I didn’t want to have to face that. If the police did identify me, they had my phone number. I was too exhausted to think about what would happen if that call came. It was something I’d just have to deal with if it happened. Maybe a weekend away from London was exactly what I needed.

  Shrugging off thoughts of police and CCTV footage, I looked at my oddly pale husband.

  ‘OK.’

  ‘OK?’ he asked, his face brightening suddenly.

  ‘Yes. OK,’ I said impatiently.

  ‘Great!’ Jason said. ‘Start packing for both of us. I’ll sort out the accommodation.’

  As he bounced towards the lounge, I wondered how I would deal with an overly happy Jason for a whole weekend. I’d much rather go away alone, be allowed to grieve without having to worry if someone was watching and whether they suspected something. A little tingle of guilt crept into my thoughts. Jason had been nothing but wonderful to me since Calum had died, despite my inexplicable coldness. What must he think? I would need to make a conscious effort to be a bit nicer over the weekend. Jason had done nothing wrong.

  I pulled our overnight bags from the closet and stuffed them with clothes, not caring if anything matched. Then I stopped, pulling my phone from my pocket. I couldn’t shake the suspicion, unfounded as it was, that my uncharacteristic tweet felt so unlike me because it had been sent by someone else. Sitting on the edge of my bed, I opened the Twitter app and scrolled through my feed. I hadn’t tweeted anything since then, and there was no unusual activity. The last tweet I’d sent was months ago, a link to a new wildlife photography exhibition I’d been excited about.

  See? I scolded myself. Nothing to worry about.

  But just to be sure, I changed the password, using numbers and symbols so it wouldn’t be easy to guess. And then I deleted the app, feeling relieved. In control. I released the breath I didn’t realise I’d been holding in.

  By the time Jason came back from collecting a rental car, I’d showered and was applying the last few touches of make-up.

  ‘Entertainment!’ he declared, carrying an armful of board games to the car. I forced a thin smile. He moved in and out of the room, grabbing bags to take to the hallway, planning country walks and visits to pubs with real ale, proudly waving toothbrushes in the air to prove that he hadn’t forgotten them.

  It was too much. He was overcompensating and it took all of my strength not to scream at him to stop. It wasn’t his fault, I reminded myself. He was just trying to make me feel better. I realised that the exaggerated glee wouldn’t end until he felt like he’d completed his mission, so I took a few deep breaths, uncurled my fists and tried to plaster a realistic smile on my face.

  As I watched London slipping past us out of the car window, I wondered how I’d ended up in this impossible situation. How I’d cheated on a man who deserved nothing but loyalty.

  I recalled a time when, just after we’d got engaged, my then-boss had taken me out for a coffee. Carol had been divorced for about three years but the wound still seemed fresh. Her husband had committed the ultimate cliché of running off with his assistant, leaving his wife with two young kids. She was the man-hating kind of divorcée who blamed men for everything and seemed to quite enjoy holding onto her bitterness and rage, as though if she let go then it meant excusing her ex’s behaviour. I’d liked Carol despite her views on marriage. She was a nice lady, so long as you didn’t venture onto the topic of relationships. As I’d sipped my coffee that day, Carol had tried to warn me about the perils of tying the knot.

  ‘You don’t think it’s going to be you, Bethany. I didn’t think I’d ever get divorced. But you don’t know the person you’re marrying. You think you do, but you just don’t. You’re so young, you don’t want to write off all of your options now.’

  I’d faked gratitude for the advice, assuring her that I knew exactly what I was doing, thank you very much. I really believed that I did, but l
ooking back I recognise just how naive I’d been when I said my vows.

  Carol had been wrong, though. I had known Jason just as well as I thought I did. He was dependable. Solid as a rock. Devoted, loving, committed – all the things that a husband should be. It had been me that I didn’t really know. I never suspected that I’d be the one to break our vows.

  All women worry, on their wedding day, that they will be cheated on. Not because all men are scumbags, as Carol would have had me believe, but because we all know that novelty wears off, and temptation is everywhere. There’s a reason that wives like our husbands to wear wedding rings, why we give them framed photos of us in white dresses to keep in their office, why we hire ugly nannies.

  We like to mark our territory, but men don’t seem to have that same fear when it comes to their wives. Women wear their rings like a badge of honour to make other women jealous. Women, it seemed, weren’t naturally prone to cheating.

  Women, that is, apart from me.

  I couldn’t blame Jason for my affair, couldn’t point to a flaw and pretend it was his fault I’d strayed. He’d always been the model husband. We still laughed together, talked about everything – well, almost everything – and had a reasonably satisfying sex life. OK, so it wasn’t fireworks every night, but I never expected it would be after so long together.

  He was perfect.

  Except he was still alive, and Calum was dead.

  And I hated him for it.

  Chapter Fifteen

  I stayed awake for the drive home on Monday, apprehension building as the distance to London shrank. Our time away in the Cotswolds had been far more pleasant than I’d expected, in large part because the police hadn’t shown up on our doorstep demanding that I explain myself, that I come clean as the figure in the grainy footage. I’d been anticipating that very scenario the whole weekend, any unidentified noise making my mouth dehydrate like I’d just downed a bottle of red wine. But after surviving a whole weekend without a terrifying phone call or my name emblazoned in the headlines, I felt a spark of hope igniting. They didn’t know it was me.

  For now.

  Jason hadn’t been clingy, like I’d predicted he would be. If anything, he gave me the space I craved, and let me rest. He went out each morning to find food at the local farmer’s market for breakfast, and I was grateful that he was gone when I woke up from my fitful, terror-filled sleep, my whole body damp with sweat. I stared at the ornate ceiling rose above me, thankful for Jason’s absence. The shock I was feeling didn’t just come from the knowledge that Calum was gone, although my chest still throbbed every time I remembered. But once that had subsided, the memory of the CCTV footage would drift to the surface.

  I’d jump out of bed, determined not to panic, all the while trying to ignore the distressing thoughts that were repeating like a stuck record in my head.

  By the time Jason returned to our tiny cottage with fresh croissants and raspberries, the initial dread had been absorbed into my bloodstream again, thrumming through me like a low, pulsating pain. I could function with that. I didn’t have any choice. The bed would be perfectly made, clean rose-patterned sheets covering the site of my blinding panic.

  Using the excuse of catching up with client work that I’d neglected the previous few days, I spent most of the weekend shielded behind my laptop, ignoring Jason’s occasional pleas to get out and enjoy the countryside. He would give up after a while, and go walking alone.

  It was in these moments by myself that I took the only action I could think of.

  I sat in front of the glowing screen, fingers hovering over the keys, unsure what I was hoping to find.

  As I typed Kitty Palmer into the Google search bar, it occurred to me that what I was really looking for was confirmation that lying to the police had been the right choice.

  The most recent results were fairly predictable; quick recaps of the affair and Kitty’s assault followed by speculation – she declined to comment – as to how she was reacting to her ex-lover’s death. Until a few days ago, there were hardly any results about Kitty between the acid attack and now. She’d given one interview, an exclusive that was said to have paid for her plastic surgery bills, and had refused to speak to any media since. Despite Calum’s insistence on covering all of her costs, she’d wanted nothing more to do with him or his money, and had been determined to pay every last penny herself. That way, she owed him nothing.

  The older news stories were all from the time when her affair was still fresh and the gossip sites were smugly reporting every detail, from the brand of lingerie she supposedly preferred to stories from her friends about sordid encounters in nightclub bathrooms and the back seats of taxis. All fabricated, if Calum was to be believed. I never pressed him for details, despite my curiosity. It had suited me better to pretend that she’d never existed.

  But suddenly I wanted to know every detail.

  A few clicks later, I found the interview that she’d given.

  I inhaled sharply when the article’s photos loaded onto my screen, taking up the entire window.

  On the left was the Kitty who had won the attention of Calum Bradley – understandably so. Tall, slim, platinum blonde … she belonged on magazine covers for her looks alone, not a highly publicised scandal. But the photo on the right was far more eye-catching. It was also Kitty, but without the help of a caption I’d never have guessed. The acid had completely distorted her spectacular looks. Sections of her face had been damaged beyond repair, so they’d been surgically removed. The skin that remained was pink and shiny, marred by hundreds of raised marks and deep grooves. There was just one area, about the size and shape of a coaster on the left side of her forehead, that remained unchanged. The smooth, soft skin demonstrated a striking contrast.

  I wanted to click away, but I needed to know more.

  The media attention was insane, I read. Nothing could have prepared me for that. I lost my job, of course. They say that no publicity is bad publicity, but when you work for a PR agency and you sleep with the client, that’s certainly considered bad press. Not long after the affair ended, I started getting hate mail. People were so mad at me for getting between a marriage, and some just thought that I didn’t deserve Calum’s attention. There were death threats, rape threats … and the worst part about all that was the fact that these awful, malicious people knew where I lived. So I had to move, and get a post office box, and a new unlisted phone number. The measures I had to take for privacy were unbelievable. The consequences for people who have an affair with their boss are usually minimal in comparison. They might have to change jobs and they might have to live with some regrets, but this was just so public. It was hard, especially because I was only twenty-three at the time. I was naive, and I made some bad decisions, I’ll be the first to admit that, but I still can’t believe how many people took something that was nothing to do with them so personally.

  When asked about Calum, she flatly declined to comment, and the interviewer moved on to the exclusive, gruesome details of her attack.

  It was just a normal day, you know? I was walking home from the station after doing a bit of grocery shopping, and then all of a sudden I was drenched. I thought it was water. The details are so blurry because it happened so fast. It was a woman, that’s all I know, because she screamed at me. She called me a filthy whore, and then she ran off laughing. Within seconds I could feel the burning. It was a pain like nothing I’ve ever known. I can’t even begin to describe it to you. Luckily I passed out, but the next thing I knew I was waking up in hospital, and really, the nightmare was only just beginning.

  I couldn’t read another word. My insides churned as I processed the horror of what Kitty had endured. And all for crimes that had been far less serious than mine.

  It didn’t feel good to know that I’d made the right decision. But it wasn’t just the right decision; it was the only one I could have made. If anything, though, knowing this just made me feel worse. I couldn’t go to the police with the truth. No
t if that could be my punishment.

  Hoping to get the image of Kitty’s scarred face out of my mind, I began a new search.

  Claire Bradley, I typed, and 629,000 results stared back at me, starting with the latest news headlines.

  Heartbroken Bradley wife leaves apartment for the first time after days in mourning

  Bradley widow Claire can’t eat due to grief, reveals close friend

  Rare display of emotion from Claire Bradley masked by £799 sunglasses

  I tried to resist clicking on them, but the chance to see Claire looking anything short of immaculate was too good to miss, even in such awful circumstances. Except instead of feeling smug at the sight of her blotchy red face and tousled hair, I felt a stab of sympathy. She’d lost Calum, too.

  I tried to shake off the pity that was threatening to emerge, and navigated back to my search results, ignoring the sensational headlines and clicking Claire’s Wikipedia page instead.

  It didn’t tell me much; just that she was almost finished with her thirties and that she was the only child of an investment bank manager and his socialite wife. It didn’t tell me that she had a predilection for stabbing, or anything else that could lead me to believe that she was likely to have killed her husband.

  I wasn’t sure what even made me think she could have done it, other than the fact that the spouse always seemed to be the culprit. But I couldn’t think of a motive. Jealousy? Calum said that she didn’t know about us, didn’t want to know, but maybe she’d found out and flown into a jealous rage, followed us, killed him. But that didn’t seem likely. She was having affairs of her own. Or perhaps she just wanted all of his money. That seemed even more of a stretch – she had plenty of her own cash. Whatever I’d expected to find when I began my Googling, I certainly hadn’t unearthed it, and probably never would. I’d never met Claire, but she’d come up with Calum’s affair system, so the one thing I did know about her was that she knew how to keep the truth hidden.