What I Never Told you
Chapters (56)
Cover
Also by Dawn Goodwin
The Accident
The Pupil
Best Friends Forever
The Pact
WHAT I NEVER TOLD YOU
Dawn Goodwin
An Aries book
Copyright
First published in the United Kingdom in 2021 by Aria, an imprint of Head of Zeus Ltd
Copyright © Dawn Goodwin, 2021
The moral right of Dawn Goodwin to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act of 1988.
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without the prior permission of both the copyright owner and the above publisher of this book.
This is a work of fiction. All characters, organizations, and events portrayed in this novel are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.
A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.
ISBN PB: 9781800246171
ISBN E: 9781800242180
Cover design © Nick Venables
Aria
c/o Head of Zeus
First Floor East
5–8 Hardwick Street
London EC1R 4RG
Contents
Welcome Page
Copyright
Dedication
Prologue
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Chapter 31
Chapter 32
Chapter 33
Chapter 34
Chapter 35
Chapter 36
Chapter 37
Chapter 38
Chapter 39
Chapter 40
Chapter 41
Chapter 42
Chapter 43
Chapter 44
Chapter 45
Chapter 46
Acknowledgements
About the Author
An Invitation from the Publisher
Dedication
For my family
Prologue
“Tell your mother I saved your life.”
The words are like hailstones. Cold. Hard. Biting.
Hands shove against a zipped-up coat, quick as a flash. Feet slide in the dirt and sand, the soles of the worn trainers, smoothed by time, providing no traction.
Eyes widen as gravity pulls and awareness of what is happening taps on their shoulders.
Hands reach out again to grab onto something, anything. The coat, the zip, a sleeve. But the hands find only air. The coat is already out of reach, the body inside pulling it backwards over the cliff edge, gravity doing what it does best.
Mouths gape, but no sounds escape. Eyes plead. Seconds feel like hours.
Just the sounds of the sea far below and the raucous calling of the seagulls, like hysterical laughter. Then a guttural scream cuts through the bird call, raw and coarse, rising in urgency from below, followed by a thump, weighted, nauseating.
Silence.
There’s no need to lean over to see what is painfully true.
A twisted shape on the rocks below. Limbs at unnatural angles. A spreading pool of darkness, like spilled wine. Then the waves washing it clean, pulling at the splayed fingers, coaxing into the depths.
Two thin drag marks remain in the dirt where those feet lost their battle for grip.
A newer trainer, branded, the latest design, smooths over the dirt before walking away.
Nothing to see here.
1
NOW
The house was winking at her.