“Alison isn’t so bad,” I murmur, not wanting to speak bad of the others, even if they are mean.
“No, but the other one makes Lucifer seem sane.”
I chuckle then turn to the girls. “This is Nora, Drew’s sister. Nora, these are my friends, Harriet and Olivia.” They exchange greetings and when they’re done, I ask, “What brings you two here?”
Harriet’s the one to answer. “I need some new books and was hoping to pick them up here while we were passing through.”
I beam. “Well, you are in the right place. Let me just sort Nora out.”
“We’ll come with you. You can tell us what we’ve missed.”
I snort. “Not much. The police still think I did it.”
I duck my head, sadness filling my chest. They don’t know me. Don’t know my character. And although PC Megan Brown believes me, she can’t go off that. They need proof. My alibi is solid. I was seen on CCTV outside the gym. I have my hospital records and the time of the phone call my mum and dad made before we left for the hospital. I just don’t have anything from before or anyone to witness I left him in my doorway alive. Anyone could have moved the body for me whilst I was being seen to.
It’s been hard having people accuse me of such a horrific thing. I meant what I said to Drew. I might have disliked him, but I would never wish harm upon him. I’m not sad that he’s dead, only sad for those who will mourn him.
Harriet rubs her hand down my arm and leans in, giving me her warmth. “They’ll find out who’s done it. And even if it goes to court, one look at you, and they’ll know you could never possibly be capable of it.”
“I can get angry though,” I whisper. “I was taken in, but never charged once, for being in an altercation.”
“The guy with the cousin?” Harriet asks.
Olivia’s lips twist. “Didn’t that involve a stoned muffin?”
I throw my hands up. “It never had a stone in. It was just… hard.”
Nora chuckles as we turn down another aisle of books. “I’m so glad my brother has you.”
“Charlotte,” Hayden screams.
I pause, all of us looking to where the sound came from. “What—” I stop, sniffing the air. “Hey, am I smelling things or can you guys smell petrol?”
“I can smell it,” Nora replies, warily scanning the area.
“Charlotte, where are you?” Madison cries out.
“Here,” I call out, racing for the front.
They meet us in one of the stacks, breathing heavily. Madison clutches the shelf for support as she points to me. It’s Hayden who recovers first. “We know who his wife is and we think she’s the one who has been sending you those notes and sending you the flowers,” she rushes out in one whoosh.
“Who?”
Her lips part, the name on the tip of her tongue, when Marlene’s yell has us all looking to the front of the library. “Hey, you can’t do—”
Her yelp and grunt of pain has everyone pushing to the front, but I can’t go, not yet. I don’t have a good feeling about this and the churning in my gut intensifies as my friends and family disappeared from view. I grab Nora’s arm as she rushes past me.
“What?” she whispers.
“Go and hide in the back. If you follow this as far back as you can, there are a hidden set of stairs behind some wheeled shelves. Use it and go up there.”
“I’m not hiding.”
“Yes, you are. Please. I don’t know who this is but I know they’re capable of hurting someone. I don’t want you in the middle of it.”
“Charlotte,” she pleads, her gaze shooting to where the others have run off to. I can hear Hayden yelling, Madison pleading.
“Please.”
She takes one more look at the front before nodding. “I’ll call Drew.”
I nod. “Go.”
She runs off in the direction I told her to, and I take a lungful of air before rushing after my friends and family. I don’t want anyone else getting hurt. They have already endured so much. They don’t need this.
But as I come to a staggering stop, where Hayden is being held back by a crying Madison, and where Harriet clings to Olivia, blood pouring down her cheek and arm, my entire world falls apart around me.
Standing, red-faced, a knife in one hand and a lighter in the other, is someone I called a friend.
Someone I shared my secrets with, my inner thoughts.
None of it makes sense.
I slowly turn to Hayden and Madison, my lip trembling.
“Who is his wife?” I ask, afraid of their answer.
Hayden, who is glaring holes at the intruder, slowly turns to me.
“Charlotte, meet Sophia, Scott Parish’s wife.”
I step back, folding my arms across my chest to ward off the chill that has soaked through to my bones.
Her smile is no longer warm, it’s cruel, the same with the shadows that lurk in her eyes and surround her. This isn’t the woman I have come to know.
I want her to deny it, to tell them they have it all wrong, that this has been some misunderstanding.
She steps forward, and I can feel her hatred like it has been slammed into me. “I guess that’s out of the bag.”
“Rose,” I breathe. “What have you done?”
CHAPTER FORTY-ONE
CHARLOTTE
The deadbolt has been locked on the library door, and from my peripheral vision, I can see the entrance leading into the café has also been locked.
The question is: is she keeping people out, or keeping us inside?
The latter worries me the most. Because it was definitely petrol I smelled back there in the stacks, and it’s petrol canisters which lay empty—aside from one that still has some dripping—near the door.
If she lights that lighter, we are as good as dead. We are surrounded by books and wood.
My hands shake so badly I can’t hide the tremor. We’re trapped in a death trap, and maybe we can get to the café door in time before the flames reach us, but would we escape the knife she wields in her hand? Our only hope of getting out of this is Nora getting through to Drew. He will come. The police will come. My family will come. I have no doubts about it.
It’s whether they come before she does something irreversible.
“Why?” I whisper, wondering if there are any remnants of the person I had come to know.
Everything, all our time spent together, hits me like a lightning bolt. We first met the day after I first bumped into Scott. She had been here, wandering the aisles, looking lost so I went up to her and helped her. We hit it off and not once did I get a bad vibe from her.
I think about all the personal questions she asked that I answered, mistaking it for her wanting to get to know me. It didn’t register until now that she never revealed anything about her life.
I think about the times she listened to family conversations by lurking around or being directly involved. It was all planned.
She knew who I was all along.
What he was doing behind her back.
And she did nothing.
There’s a roaring in my ears and I lose track of what everyone is doing for a moment, my focus on her.
Another person who fooled me.