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Contents (57)
  1. Prologue
  2. One
  3. Two
  4. Three
  5. Four
  6. Five
  7. Six
  8. Seven
  9. Eight
  10. Nine
  11. Ten
  12. Eleven
  13. Twelve
  14. Thirteen
  15. Fourteen
  16. Fifteen
  17. Sixteen
  18. Seventeen
  19. Eighteen
  20. Nineteen
  21. Twenty
  22. Twenty-One
  23. Twenty-Two
  24. Twenty-Three
  25. Twenty-Four
  26. Twenty-Five
  27. Twenty-Six
  28. Twenty-Seven
  29. Twenty-Eight
  30. Twenty-Nine
  31. Thirty
  32. Thirty-One
  33. Thirty-Two
  34. Thirty-Three
  35. Thirty-Four
  36. Thirty-Five
  37. Thirty-Six
  38. Thirty-Seven
  39. Thirty-Eight
  40. Thirty-Nine
  41. Forty
  42. Forty-One
  43. Forty-Two
  44. Forty-Three
  45. Forty-Four
  46. Forty-Five
  47. Forty-Six
  48. Forty-Seven
  49. Forty-Eight
  50. Forty-Nine
  51. Fifty
  52. Fifty-One
  53. Fifty-Two
  54. Fifty-Three
  55. Acknowledgements
  56. About the Author
  57. Also by Sharon Gosling

Her husband hadn’t needed to try very hard to isolate her because she didn’t have any friends anyway. Rachel had turned eighteen, so the authorities no longer had a responsibility towards her. There was no one to notice when she dropped off the radar.

‘He didn’t want me to learn to drive. He didn’t want me to work,’ Rachel said. ‘At first I thought it was because he wanted to be the one to look after me. But he didn’t like me to read, either, because he didn’t like to read, so as far as he was concerned, it was a waste of time. “You’ve enough to do keeping the house,” was his reasoning. That’s when I argued, and that’s when he started to use his fists. “After everything I’ve done for you…” that kind of reasoning, you know. He didn’t let me have a phone and we didn’t have a landline. He didn’t introduce me to his friends or bring them home. I thought he was ashamed of me. After a while I gave up because he was right, wasn’t he? He had done everything for me. I was nothing. Without him I had nothing. I had no one else. I had no money, I had nowhere to go. What was I going to do?’

Eustace appeared and she bent down to lift the cat onto her lap, stroking him absently. Toby watched her, and wondered how their lives would correlate if each event were laid out side by side, like two reels of old filmstock unspooling in slow motion. Where had he been the first time Steven Harry had pulled up outside that school and seen Rachel leaving it? Why hadn’t Toby been there then, or later? What would he have done if he had been there – what could he have done? Nothing. Something.

‘Then this new couple moved in next door. I heard them talking to Steven one morning, but he didn’t introduce me. A few weeks later I was walking back in the rain from the supermarket with the shopping and the wife pulled up in her car to offer me a lift. She said, “Do you split your time with your mum and your dad?” and the look on her face when I said, “He’s not my dad”…’ Rachel shook her head. ‘Anyway, after that she used to pop round when he was at work. Her name was Amanda. She must have only been in her late twenties, but to me it seemed as if she knew everything in the world there was to know. She paid for me to learn to drive and arranged the lessons so Steven never knew. And then one day, after she’d come to say hello and seen me limping – he was always careful not to go near my face – she said, “I’ve got a camper van. It’s at my dad’s. It’s the most clapped-out thing you’ve ever seen, but it’s kitted out and it still goes. I want you to have it. I want you to get away, Rachel, before he kills you. Just go, and don’t come back.” It took her six months to persuade me. But I did it.’