Date Night: An Absolutely Gripping Psychological Thriller With a Jaw-Dropping Twist

by Samantha Hayes

  Libby got up and poured herself another gin and tonic, looking out of the rear window above the sink just as the Land Rover’s lights arced around the backyard, illuminating the barn for a few seconds before dazzling her as she sipped. She wanted to smile, to feel warm inside – relieved that Sean was home – but, because he was so late and hadn’t called (nor indeed answered her calls or texts) – she felt sick.

  All because of the note.

  ‘God, I need one of those,’ Sean said as he came in from the boot room, dumping down his stuff and eyeing Libby’s drink. He shrugged off his coat and came over to kiss her.

  ‘Sure, I’ll make you one,’ she said, quickly ducking aside before his lips met hers. He stood motionless for a second or two, before going back to hang up his jacket. He returned, hand outstretched to take the drink, but she put it down on the kitchen table instead.

  ‘Good day?’ he asked, pulling out a chair and sitting down.

  It was written all over his face that he’d had a bad one – or at least a bad afternoon. Libby knew the signs – a frown set deep between his thick eyebrows, lips pursed in puzzlement as though he’d not been able to help an animal, perhaps ending in euthanasia, and his big fingers pressing against his temples to fend off the growing headache. But today, she felt something was different. Did he appear so stressed because he was guilty?

  ‘Do you have to do that every time?’ she said, glaring at him as she sat back on the window seat. It was one of her favourite places to sit – usually with a cup of tea and a book, glancing up to wave as people passed by in the lane. But now, the little seat served as a way to not sit too close to Sean.

  ‘Do what?’

  ‘Scrape the chair. Every time you sit down, you drag it instead of lifting it out. It makes a terrible noise.’

  ‘I didn’t even notice,’ Sean said slowly, his frown deepening. ‘I’m sorry.’

  Libby looked away, staring out of the window at the silver Honda that was parked across the road on the edge of The Green, shuddering as she remembered the stories she’d read on an Internet forum earlier, written by betrayed wives. Some were heartbroken, some consumed with anger, some wanting revenge, while others were intent on forgiveness and reconciliation at any cost – even if the price was their own self-respect. Libby wasn’t sure which camp she’d fall into if the unthinkable happened to her. Or was happening to her. Probably all of those emotions, she’d decided, before shutting down her computer and snapping the lid closed. She couldn’t bear to read any more posts.

  ‘Have you eaten?’ Sean asked, pulling Libby out of her thoughts.

  ‘Oh, no, not yet…’ She was about to add I wanted to wait and eat with you, but instead she said, ‘I’m not hungry,’ and looked away again.

  Suddenly, there was a hand on her shoulder. She tensed.

  ‘What’s wrong, love? You seem… upset?’

  Libby shrugged and sipped her drink.

  ‘Talk to me,’ Sean said, crouching down beside her. ‘Did something happen?’

  Libby got a faint waft of his body wash, a trace of aftershave as well as the usual farm smells that often accompanied him home. A good sign, she thought, if he’d really been to the Drakes’ place. But why did he take so long, and what did he do between leaving the surgery and calling her?

  ‘Nothing’s wrong,’ she said, finally looking at him. If she went too silent, too moody, then she’d never get answers. She remembered what Fran had said – act normal.

  Libby stood up, slipping past Sean as he reached out to embrace her. She turned on the oven to heat up the lasagne again, taking some lettuce from the fridge. Making a quick green salad would distract her.

  ‘Well, you could have fooled me,’ Sean said, sitting down at the table again. When Libby glanced up, she saw he had his phone in his hand and was scrolling through something as he sipped his drink. She knew he disliked social media and wasn’t one for texting much either. Occasionally, the vets took turns to post on the practice’s Facebook page about interesting cases or uplifting stories, as well as different topics relating to pet welfare and care. But that was as deep as Sean’s interest in Facebook went. As far as she knew.

  ‘Everything OK at the Drakes’ place?’ Libby asked, glancing up. He was engrossed in whatever was on his phone, the flicker of a small smile on his face. He didn’t reply. Libby hacked at the romaine lettuce more forcefully than was required.

  ‘Sorry – what, love?’ he said, putting his phone down on the table face up. But then he changed his mind and slipped it into his pocket.

  ‘I asked how it went at the Drakes’. The call-out. Remember?’ She couldn’t help pulling a tight smile.

  ‘Laminitis on a rescue mare. She was in a bad way. It took longer than I thought.’

  ‘Oh. I see.’

  ‘I had to wait for the farrier to come and he was held up. There was no way I could leave before we’d got a wooden clog on.’

  ‘OK.’

  ‘Then Sally Drake made me a cup of tea and insisted on me trying the cake she’d made and…’ Sean trailed off when he saw Libby’s face. She’d stopped chopping the lettuce and was staring at him, the knife held above the wooden board, its tip pointing in his direction. ‘Libby, for God’s sake, tell me what’s wrong. You’re upset about something and I don’t like it. Maybe I can help.’

  Sean got up and went over to his wife, removing the knife from her hand and wrapping his strong arms around her. He was a big man – tall and well built, though not overweight. And while his size commanded attention in any room, his easy manner often drawing people to him, Libby was now wondering who else he had attracted.

  He kissed her neck, sweeping aside her hair as his lips brushed over her skin. She closed her eyes, torn between wanting to turn around and kiss him back, and pushing him away.

  ‘Sean…’ she said, knowing her body was tense, not melting into his shape as she would normally.

  He stopped, holding her around the waist still, breathing in her scent. ‘What, love?’

  ‘Something happened yesterday morning. Something… unsettling.’

  Libby held her breath, instantly wishing she’d kept quiet. Before Sean could even ask what she was talking about, she slid out of his embrace and took one of her many cookbooks down from the shelf. She flipped through the pages, the book falling open where she’d tucked in the note. She took it out, her hands shaking as she placed it on the worktop.

  She said nothing. Just stared at him as he glanced at the folded paper, then up at her again. Eventually he picked it up and opened it, biting his lip as he read the five words that had haunted Libby since she’d found it.

  ‘What the hell…?’ he said, turning it over. His chest puffed out, his shoulders drawing up into an overstated shrug. ‘Well this is ridiculous,’ he said calmly, reassuringly. He laughed then, flicking the note back onto the worktop with disdain. ‘Is this why you’re being so… odd?’ Sean popped the stopper from the sloe gin bottle and sloshed some more into his glass. ‘For heaven’s sake, Libby,’ he added when she said nothing.

  ‘Well, how would you feel if my name was on there instead?’ she replied, fighting back the tears. She returned to the salad, tossing the leaves into a glass bowl before throwing in some cress.

  ‘Where did it come from?’ Sean asked, casting another dismissive look over it.

  ‘I found it stuck under my car windscreen wiper when I was taking Alice to your mum’s yesterday morning.’

  ‘Yesterday morning?’ he said thoughtfully, glancing out of the front window. He paused a moment. ‘Kids, most likely,’ he said, rolling his eyes and going over to the bin, lifting the lid to throw it away.

  ‘No,’ Libby said, snatching it from him. ‘Don’t.’ Their eyes locked as they each held on to the paper, the upsetting words sitting between their fingers. Sean let go before it tore, then Libby slipped it in her back pocket. ‘Is it true?’ she said, still staring at him, her face deadpan. She wanted to see his reaction, read every flicker of hi
s eyes, every unconscious movement, gauge every nervous twitch. Did he touch his nose? Run his fingers through his hair? Look away or instantly deny everything?

  Sean held Libby’s gaze, his eyes drawing her in. His face radiated a blend of hurt, compassion and a deep need to reassure his wife. ‘Oh, love,’ he said, drawing her close again, overriding her resistance. ‘Do I even need to answer that?’

  ‘Yes. Yes, you do,’ Libby replied, hating how frosty she sounded, hating that she’d actually confronted him. But she couldn’t help it.

  Sean looked her in the eye, everything about him reasonable and concerned. ‘No,’ he replied softly. ‘It’s not true. And while I don’t like that you even had to ask, I do understand,’ he said, kissing her forehead softly. ‘In fact, I almost like it that you had to question me, that you got upset.’

  ‘How come?’ Libby said, feeling the first wave of reassurance and relief wash through her.

  ‘Because it means you care,’ Sean added, pulling her close. ‘I’d be more worried if you didn’t.’ And this time when he hugged her, Libby allowed her body to meld into the shape of him.

  Six

  Now

  Detective Inspector Doug Jones drops down through the gears, slowing the car. He turns left at a junction just south of the city centre onto a narrow cut-through before pulling out onto a wider road in front of the police station. I’m not familiar with the area – though on the way here we passed several places where Sean and I have spent many happy Sundays, browsing quaint boutiques, antique shops and second-hand bookshops before a lazy meal at our favourite French place. Since Alice came along we still sometimes visit the city, of course, but our mission is very different – usually centring around entertaining our daughter, hopping between parks, toy shops and public toilets.

  I stare out of the window, up at the police building – the facade made of soft, sand-coloured stone, austere in appearance yet somehow filled with a resigned wisdom, as if the building has seen it all over the years, looking as if it might heave a sigh at any moment, rolling any one of its many window-eyes in exasperation as it squarely faces the grand building opposite. My heart thumps as I catch sight of ‘Crown Court’ set into the portico across the road from the police station, my neck straining so I can see it as we turn slowly down a ramp taking us into an underground area, disappearing into the darkness. When my eyes grow accustomed to it, I see we’re in a secure parking area.

  The car pulls up by a door, and the detective stops the engine. He gets out and comes around to my side of the car, shrugging into his jacket. Only when he’s blocking my way does the female officer get out and join him, each of them flanking me as I ease my body out of the vehicle. My legs feel like jelly, barely able to hold my weight.

  ‘Mind your head,’ the detective says, lightly taking hold of my cuff-bound wrists.

  ‘Will I be able to call my husband?’ I ask as I’m led through a heavy steel door. My voice doesn’t sound like me. It’s shaking and about an octave higher – nothing like the happy, content woman I was three weeks ago. Several other officers are waiting inside, closing around me as if they’re expecting a kickboxer to be brought in, not an eight-and-a-half-stone mum from Great Lyne wearing Crocs and an old sweatshirt with cooking stains down the front.

  ‘Custody sergeant will sort all that out,’ someone says, though I’m not sure who. I’m feeling light-headed as I’m taken along a series of white corridors, the shiny grey lino flooring making it seem as if I’m walking on water, with some kind of shimmery blue lighting running the length of the wall as we pass. I could be in a fairy grotto or… or… on my way to hell. That seems more likely. My entire body aches from fear and stress.

  I’ve done nothing wrong…

  ‘You’ll have to wait here in the holding cell until the sarge is available,’ the female officer says, standing in the doorway – one of many leading off the corridor.

  Cell, I think, staring into the small, blank room beyond. Yes. The same as hell.

  I feel numb as I go inside. The officer’s face is deadpan, even when I pass by her, imploring her with my eyes as I stand in the middle of the cell, searching for some kind of female connection, trying to ground myself. Have you got kids? I want to ask. Maybe a daughter, like Alice? Out of her uniform, she could be any other mum at the nursery, perhaps someone I’d get chatting to at the park. My eyes beg her, trying to ignite a spark of solidarity – woman to woman – that, surely, they must know they’ve got it wrong. Horribly, horribly wrong.

  But her expression remains blank.

  Nervously, I look about, taking in my new surroundings. It’s about the same size as the small box bedroom at Chestnut Cottage, though without any of the homely touches – the little desk I picked up at a flea market, sanded and covered in white chalk paint before waxing. The watercolour paintings of the local countryside, the handwoven rug part-covering the wide oak boards, the way the door lintel dips down at one side, with the middle part gnarly from old woodworm. No, this is nothing like Chestnut Cottage. It’s the antithesis, in fact. There’s a low, single bunk built into one wall with a bright-blue plastic mattress on top, a grey blanket folded at one end, and nothing else apart from a stainless-steel toilet bowl plumbed into the corner and a built-in hand washer and dryer beside it. The walls are painted a white brighter than any white I’ve seen – with a patch of grubby hand marks around the bunk – and the ceiling is higher than normal, presumably so no one can hang themselves. As I gaze up, I spot the black circle of a CCTV camera looming down. Watching. Judging.

  Guilty or not?

  Then that giddy feeling again, with a rising sickness. I can’t take it all in. What it all means. The gravity of my situation. I know Sean will be here soon to take me home, to tell them they’ve made a terrible mistake. I’ll fall into his arms and he’ll make everything OK, as he always does. As he has done since that terrible night.

  I turn and stare at the officers.

  I am arresting you on suspicion of the murder of Sasha Long. You do not have to say anything…

  ‘You can sit down if you like. I don’t know how long you’ll have to wait,’ the woman says, glancing at her watch.

  I nod, going over to the narrow bunk, tentatively lowering myself onto it. The plastic mattress wheezes out a sigh. If I don’t speak, then what can they do? I’m not admitting to something I haven’t done.

  The smell of microwaved food winds its way down the corridor and into the cell through the open door. The officers block the exit, the detective inspector leaning on the frame, glancing at his watch, peering down the corridor to see what’s going on. The other officer stands slightly closer, looking bored, her arms folded, occasionally glancing down at me. They make some brief joke between them, talking in almost-code, like they perhaps would on the radios clamped to their shoulders. The sudden smile on the female officer’s face make her seem human for a moment, as if she has a life like me – a home, a family. Though whereas she knows she will see hers at the end of her shift, I can’t be sure I’ll ever see mine again. My mouth is so dry. Parched. My tongue sticking to the roof. Perhaps I should bite it off. Then I can’t say a word.

  ‘I’m thirsty,’ I whisper.

  ‘We’ll get you booked in. Then you can have water, something to eat if you’re hungry.’

  The smell of reheated food hits my nose again, conjuring up some kind of bland sauce with lumps of meat floating in it. I’m reminded of my kitchen, the food I was forcing myself to prepare for the function I’d reluctantly agreed to do tonight. I shudder as I think how I’ll be letting down my clients, how word will soon spread about why I didn’t turn up.

  ‘You need to get back to normal, Lib,’ Sean had said, telling me I couldn’t carry on like this forever. ‘Apart from anything, you’ve let yourself go. People will talk.’ While he knew I’d taken it hard – as had everyone in the area – he was getting impatient with me and, rightly, he just wanted our lives to get back on track. He was affected too – of course he wa
s – and those first few days he was gripped by shock just as much as me. It happened on our watch. The guilt was unbearable.

  I am arresting you on suspicion of the murder of Sasha Long…

  She must be dead, then, I’d thought as I’d heard the word murder, screwed up my eyes, wondering if they’d finally found a body. Updates have been scarce the last week or so, almost as if the search has been scaled down, abandoned. As if Sasha had never existed.

  A shiver runs through me as I put my fingers to my nose, hoping to breathe in the scent of garlic from when I was chopping it earlier, or maybe the heady rush of rosemary or thyme, or even the bleach I used to scrub out the washing-up sink. Anything to remind myself of normality. But all I can smell is the rusty stench of blood under my nails.

  ‘It’s your lucky day,’ DI Jones finally says from the doorway, beckoning me with his head. ‘Follow me.’

  Slowly I stand up, holding his gaze. When I falter, nearly stumbling back down onto the bunk, the female officer takes my arm, guiding me towards the cell door.

  ‘Watch your step,’ she says, leading me out of the cell and down a corridor, eventually reaching a wider area with a counter to one side, screened off by a glass partition. There’s a man standing behind it, watching as we approach – his look pitying, as if he knows what I’ve got coming when I don’t.