I open my eyes. The scent of bleach is strong in my nostrils. I stare around the room taking it in. The tree lights flash brightly. The presents sit beneath it, still unwrapped. There is no sign of a crime – that’s what brought me to my knees before. Will isn’t here. Neither is the chair he was in, nor the rug his blood had leaked onto. Ethan has wiped the place clean. He must have come back here and bleached everything. He’s done a thorough job, from the eye-watering smell of things. Of course he has. He’s an expert in covering up his crimes.

Did he carry Will’s body out to his truck? I wonder. Did he wrap him in bin liners and dig a shallow grave somewhere in a wood, or pile him into another ditch, like he did me?

Earlier I thought about calling the police, I even picked up the phone, but then I put it down again. What good are the police to me? Will is dead. I know he is. I think he was dead when I ran. There was so much blood. If I called the police and told them what happened, then what? If they even catch Ethan and charge him it will go to trial. And even if they lock him away for twenty-five years for murder, all it will be is a temporary reprieve. Eventually he’ll get out and then he’ll come after me again and he’ll finish the job. And if they don’t catch him, but he finds out that they’re looking for him, he’ll know I’m still alive, and I’ll be looking over my shoulder for the rest of my life.

A strangled sob erupts out of me. Will. I let this happen to him. ‘I’m sorry,’ I wail. It’s then that I notice the engagement ring has gone from my hand. Where did it go? I look around in panic, but I know in my heart that Ethan will have taken it when I was lying in the ditch, unconscious. The bastard. White-hot hatred courses through my veins, filling up the spaces that were only yesterday filled with love.

I lie there on the ground for I don’t know how long, until I can’t physically cry any longer, and then I drift in and out for an endless time. I wonder if I can lie here forever, if maybe eventually I’ll die too. I think that’s I want, but then something slowly starts to stir inside me, awakening with the next day’s sunrise.

I sit up. I am not ready to die, I decide. I am not ready to let Ethan win.