BooksBarbecue
Back What You Did
Chapters (44)
  1. TITLE PAGE
  2. COPYRIGHT PAGE
  3. CONTENTS
  4. PROLOGUE
  5. Chapter One
  6. Chapter Two
  7. Chapter Three
  8. Chapter Four
  9. Chapter Five
  10. Chapter Six
  11. Chapter Seven
  12. Chapter Eight
  13. Chapter Nine
  14. Chapter Ten
  15. Chapter Eleven
  16. Chapter Twelve
  17. Chapter Thirteen
  18. Chapter Fourteen
  19. Chapter Fifteen
  20. Chapter Sixteen
  21. Chapter Seventeen
  22. Chapter Eighteen
  23. Chapter Nineteen
  24. Chapter Twenty
  25. Chapter Twenty-One
  26. Chapter Twenty-Two
  27. Chapter Twenty-Three
  28. Chapter Twenty-Four
  29. Chapter Twenty-Five
  30. Chapter Twenty-Six
  31. Chapter Twenty-Seven
  32. Chapter Twenty-Eight
  33. Chapter Twenty-Nine
  34. Chapter Thirty
  35. Chapter Thirty-One
  36. Chapter Thirty-Two
  37. Chapter Thirty-Three
  38. Chapter Thirty-Four
  39. Chapter Thirty-Five
  40. Chapter Thirty-Six
  41. Chapter Thirty-Seven
  42. Epilogue
  43. ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
  44. ABOUT THE AUTHOR

At that point, I could have cried or made a scene, sent some sympathetic girl to find Karen. But I managed to turn and walk away from him, and I’ve always been proud of that. Finding a little dignity, even with the sting of my father’s slap still on my skin.

I walked over the lawn, which usually we weren’t supposed to do, my heels catching in the grass. Impatiently I kicked them off, hooking them in one hand and letting my toes sink into the grass in relief. This was life. Screw Mike, he didn’t matter. I was barefoot on an Oxford quad, my hair tumbling down, silk around my legs, a drink melting in my hand, and a man in a tuxedo crossing the lawn to me. Bill. I saw right away it was Bill, from the height, from the hang of the old-fashioned tux that looked so cool on him. He was here. And I knew that, despite what he’d said, Mike was watching me across the lawn. I was tired of it, I realised. I was twenty-one and uni was over. In the real world I would have no more hold over Mike than anyone.

I walked to Bill, whose tuxedo had been his grandfather’s. It looked cool – hipster before such things were invented, the trousers loose in the hips and the shirt ruffled. And for the first time since I’d known him, I didn’t look back at Mike. And that was why I didn’t know exactly where he was when Martha Rasby died.

Chapter Twenty-Four

Chapter Twenty-Four

It’s funny how simple things, when you overthink them, turn into impossible tasks. I was sitting holding our landline phone, and I’d been in the same position for twenty minutes now and still not dialled the number. It wasn’t that I’d forgotten it. How could I, when it was the first one I’d ever memorised. It was just so hard to pick up the phone and call.

What were my choices? Mike was facing not only a rape charge, but also possibly one for the murder of Martha Rasby in June 1996. Adam Devine had explained it all to me, that not only were the CPS not dropping the rape charge, but that they were also going to reopen Martha’s case in the light of new evidence. No one had ever been caught for her killing. We’d all told ourselves it was some rando who got into the grounds, found her alone. Even though there was security, and brick walls topped with broken glass, to keep the poor people off our lush lawns.