‘They won’t believe you.’
‘Ah, well, I hate to disappoint you, but I think they might. I have everything I’ve done saved on back-up hard drives and memory sticks hidden across the city, all waiting to be sent to WikiLeaks who’ll expose the story. They love a whistle-blower, especially when it’s about corporate misconduct.’
‘I am not going to lose everything I have built because of you,’ Ellie spat.
Matthew smirked as he rose to his feet, straightened his tie and winked at Ellie. ‘Let’s see about that, shall we, Ells? For the rest of your life, people will be queuing the length of the Thames to sue you for your flawed results and their failed relationships. Then, when everything you have cherished has been taken away from you, you’ll know how my mother and countless others felt because of what you did. You, my love, are fucked.’
It was the clear, crisp way in which Matthew delivered his final statement that convinced Ellie everything he’d told her was true. In an instant, she saw all she’d accomplished being yanked from under her feet. She’d survived a decade of abuse and criticism, and sacrificed her family, friendships and lovers, all for nothing because of a man who’d duped his way into her life.
It was the straw that broke the camel’s back.
As Matthew made his way towards the door, he turned his head to look at Ellie one last time. But he couldn’t have anticipated what Ellie was about to do.
Without thinking, she picked up the lead crystal decanter from the table and hurled it at him. The weight of it collided with his temple and knocked him to his knees.
Ellie’s shadow loomed over Matthew where he cowered helplessly on the floor. For the briefest of moments she saw the Tim of old in his eyes, the man who had brought out a side to her that had lain dormant for so long. But allowing her warm, loving side to shine through her thick skin had made her vulnerable. All that she had forfeited for her discovery would not be for nothing, she vowed. She would not allow the feeble creature before her to take anything away.
Matthew’s eyes rolled as he struggled to focus, then he glared at her in disbelief, clutching the side of his head. He watched, helpless and disorientated, as she coolly and calmly picked up the decanter and swung it for a second time with great force, hitting him squarely in the same part of his head.
She could almost feel his skull split as the decanter shattered, spraying fragments of bone, glass and whisky across the floor.
Ellie stood motionless as she watched Matthew’s body convulse and his blood seep into the rug. His eyes opened wide and her mis-Match was suddenly erased.
Chapter 91
MANDY
Mandy stood rigidly at the foot of the drive of the home where she’d lived with Pat for five months.
‘The door’s unlocked, you can go in,’ urged Lorraine, her police liaison officer. ‘Just take your time.’
Mandy hesitated and glanced over her shoulder to check her sister Paula was still in the police car they’d both arrived in. Paula had offered to go inside with her for support, but Mandy was too embarrassed to show her the home of the family she had chosen above her own.
Lorraine went inside first, and Mandy followed apprehensively. Together they paused in the hallway and Mandy’s eyes shot to the bottom of the staircase where she’d fallen some five weeks earlier.
She looked at the open doors leading to the rooms off the hallway and took a deep breath, covering her stomach with her arms. Where a baby bump had once protruded, there was now just loose skin, and Mandy felt her caesarean stitches tug sharply each time she made a sudden movement. Yet she cherished the horizontal scar above her bikini line – it was the only physical proof she had that she and her baby boy had ever been together. He’d been removed from her unconscious body and then stolen by her twisted in-laws before she’d had the opportunity to even catch sight of him. Every morning after showering, she wiped the steam from the full-length bathroom mirror and traced the red, raised scar tissue with her finger, imagining what her son might look like.
It had been a very difficult few weeks. She regularly pumped her breasts to keep them lactating in preparation for the time she would be reunited with her boy. She cursed the breast pump for not being her child clamping upon her nipple. She hated that they were losing this precious bonding time, and she prayed that the police would find a lead to his whereabouts.
Pat’s house hadn’t been aired in the best part of a month and it was beginning to smell stale. Mandy gave the lounge, kitchen and dining room a cursory glance before following Lorraine up the staircase. She liked Lorraine; her softly spoken approach was at odds with her masculine appearance, and under different circumstances she’d have tried to match-make her with Kirstin.
Once Mandy had alerted the hospital staff to her missing child, they had contacted the police. A warrant had been issued to search Pat’s home, where they’d found that everything but her clothes and gifts she’d purchased for the baby had been left. Chloe’s house was in a similar state, and their bank accounts had been emptied. Along with the baby, they had vanished into thin air.
Mandy’s worried family insisted she return to stay with them. The tragedy had rebuilt their bridges without need of a word of apology from either side, and they supported her as she anxiously awaited police updates. Together they prayed that Pat or Chloe might develop a conscience and return the baby, but in the month following their disappearance there had been no contact whatsoever. There had been some potential sightings following her appeal in the national newspapers and a televised press conference, but they’d turned out to be false leads.
Mandy had run the full gamut of emotions: from anger towards the hospital for allowing her son to be placed into the hands of those who had no business touching her child, to frustration at the police for failing to develop any fresh leads, to herself for her post-op body not allowing her to become more physically proactive in the search. Her still-tender wound and limited mobility gave her too much time to dwell on the guilt she felt for failing to do the one thing a parent must do – protect their child. No matter how many times her family, Lorraine or doctors tried to convince her she was blameless, Mandy refused to believe them. It was her fault because she’d tried to chase the impossible – the love of a man who could never love her in return – and she’d lost her baby because of it.
‘I want to go to back to her house and look around,’ Mandy had informed Lorraine after much internal deliberation. She wasn’t sure why, but it was something she felt compelled to do. Lorraine wasn’t convinced of the benefits of this to Mandy’s healing, but she had persisted, threatening to go alone if necessary.
Mandy stood in the doorway of Pat’s bedroom. It wasn’t very different to how it’d always been, with the exception of the empty drawers and clothes rails inside her open wardrobe. She made her way into Richard’s room where she’d spent much of her time. Like Pat’s, it had been ransacked by the police who had been hunting for clues. For a moment, it saddened her that her sanctuary had been soiled as part of a criminal investigation.
Stay strong, Mandy told herself, and balled her fists.
Her eyes made their way across the collage of photographs spread across Richard’s wall. Each snapshot of his life had once made her wish they’d found each other earlier. But from what his ex-girlfriend had revealed shortly before Mandy’s accident, Richard wasn’t the man of her dreams. He wasn’t the monogamous type and he had little desire to settle down and have a family of his own. He was a human being, and he was flawed, not a fantasy, and she could see that now.
‘Ah, well, I hate to disappoint you, but I think they might. I have everything I’ve done saved on back-up hard drives and memory sticks hidden across the city, all waiting to be sent to WikiLeaks who’ll expose the story. They love a whistle-blower, especially when it’s about corporate misconduct.’
‘I am not going to lose everything I have built because of you,’ Ellie spat.
Matthew smirked as he rose to his feet, straightened his tie and winked at Ellie. ‘Let’s see about that, shall we, Ells? For the rest of your life, people will be queuing the length of the Thames to sue you for your flawed results and their failed relationships. Then, when everything you have cherished has been taken away from you, you’ll know how my mother and countless others felt because of what you did. You, my love, are fucked.’
It was the clear, crisp way in which Matthew delivered his final statement that convinced Ellie everything he’d told her was true. In an instant, she saw all she’d accomplished being yanked from under her feet. She’d survived a decade of abuse and criticism, and sacrificed her family, friendships and lovers, all for nothing because of a man who’d duped his way into her life.
It was the straw that broke the camel’s back.
As Matthew made his way towards the door, he turned his head to look at Ellie one last time. But he couldn’t have anticipated what Ellie was about to do.
Without thinking, she picked up the lead crystal decanter from the table and hurled it at him. The weight of it collided with his temple and knocked him to his knees.
Ellie’s shadow loomed over Matthew where he cowered helplessly on the floor. For the briefest of moments she saw the Tim of old in his eyes, the man who had brought out a side to her that had lain dormant for so long. But allowing her warm, loving side to shine through her thick skin had made her vulnerable. All that she had forfeited for her discovery would not be for nothing, she vowed. She would not allow the feeble creature before her to take anything away.
Matthew’s eyes rolled as he struggled to focus, then he glared at her in disbelief, clutching the side of his head. He watched, helpless and disorientated, as she coolly and calmly picked up the decanter and swung it for a second time with great force, hitting him squarely in the same part of his head.
She could almost feel his skull split as the decanter shattered, spraying fragments of bone, glass and whisky across the floor.
Ellie stood motionless as she watched Matthew’s body convulse and his blood seep into the rug. His eyes opened wide and her mis-Match was suddenly erased.
Chapter 91
MANDY
Mandy stood rigidly at the foot of the drive of the home where she’d lived with Pat for five months.
‘The door’s unlocked, you can go in,’ urged Lorraine, her police liaison officer. ‘Just take your time.’
Mandy hesitated and glanced over her shoulder to check her sister Paula was still in the police car they’d both arrived in. Paula had offered to go inside with her for support, but Mandy was too embarrassed to show her the home of the family she had chosen above her own.
Lorraine went inside first, and Mandy followed apprehensively. Together they paused in the hallway and Mandy’s eyes shot to the bottom of the staircase where she’d fallen some five weeks earlier.
She looked at the open doors leading to the rooms off the hallway and took a deep breath, covering her stomach with her arms. Where a baby bump had once protruded, there was now just loose skin, and Mandy felt her caesarean stitches tug sharply each time she made a sudden movement. Yet she cherished the horizontal scar above her bikini line – it was the only physical proof she had that she and her baby boy had ever been together. He’d been removed from her unconscious body and then stolen by her twisted in-laws before she’d had the opportunity to even catch sight of him. Every morning after showering, she wiped the steam from the full-length bathroom mirror and traced the red, raised scar tissue with her finger, imagining what her son might look like.
It had been a very difficult few weeks. She regularly pumped her breasts to keep them lactating in preparation for the time she would be reunited with her boy. She cursed the breast pump for not being her child clamping upon her nipple. She hated that they were losing this precious bonding time, and she prayed that the police would find a lead to his whereabouts.
Pat’s house hadn’t been aired in the best part of a month and it was beginning to smell stale. Mandy gave the lounge, kitchen and dining room a cursory glance before following Lorraine up the staircase. She liked Lorraine; her softly spoken approach was at odds with her masculine appearance, and under different circumstances she’d have tried to match-make her with Kirstin.
Once Mandy had alerted the hospital staff to her missing child, they had contacted the police. A warrant had been issued to search Pat’s home, where they’d found that everything but her clothes and gifts she’d purchased for the baby had been left. Chloe’s house was in a similar state, and their bank accounts had been emptied. Along with the baby, they had vanished into thin air.
Mandy’s worried family insisted she return to stay with them. The tragedy had rebuilt their bridges without need of a word of apology from either side, and they supported her as she anxiously awaited police updates. Together they prayed that Pat or Chloe might develop a conscience and return the baby, but in the month following their disappearance there had been no contact whatsoever. There had been some potential sightings following her appeal in the national newspapers and a televised press conference, but they’d turned out to be false leads.
Mandy had run the full gamut of emotions: from anger towards the hospital for allowing her son to be placed into the hands of those who had no business touching her child, to frustration at the police for failing to develop any fresh leads, to herself for her post-op body not allowing her to become more physically proactive in the search. Her still-tender wound and limited mobility gave her too much time to dwell on the guilt she felt for failing to do the one thing a parent must do – protect their child. No matter how many times her family, Lorraine or doctors tried to convince her she was blameless, Mandy refused to believe them. It was her fault because she’d tried to chase the impossible – the love of a man who could never love her in return – and she’d lost her baby because of it.
‘I want to go to back to her house and look around,’ Mandy had informed Lorraine after much internal deliberation. She wasn’t sure why, but it was something she felt compelled to do. Lorraine wasn’t convinced of the benefits of this to Mandy’s healing, but she had persisted, threatening to go alone if necessary.
Mandy stood in the doorway of Pat’s bedroom. It wasn’t very different to how it’d always been, with the exception of the empty drawers and clothes rails inside her open wardrobe. She made her way into Richard’s room where she’d spent much of her time. Like Pat’s, it had been ransacked by the police who had been hunting for clues. For a moment, it saddened her that her sanctuary had been soiled as part of a criminal investigation.
Stay strong, Mandy told herself, and balled her fists.
Her eyes made their way across the collage of photographs spread across Richard’s wall. Each snapshot of his life had once made her wish they’d found each other earlier. But from what his ex-girlfriend had revealed shortly before Mandy’s accident, Richard wasn’t the man of her dreams. He wasn’t the monogamous type and he had little desire to settle down and have a family of his own. He was a human being, and he was flawed, not a fantasy, and she could see that now.
