Trust Me - Sheryl Browne Page 0,108

to look tearfully at her.

‘I won’t be long, I promise,’ Emily assured her, giving her another firm squeeze then turning back to the door before her courage failed her.

She wasn’t sure where Jake had gone, but the cold fear in the pit of her stomach told her he might do something terrible, something completely out of character. Though perhaps in character when it came to protecting his children. Both of his children. He had never considered Ben to be anything but his son. Even when Ben had treated him abysmally, whether because of who he was or the age he was – Emily only wished she knew – Jake had been there for him. She couldn’t let this happen. She had to stop it. She had to protect her family, Millie, Ben, Jake – the people she would die for. She knew that she was the only one who could.

Deep down, she’d always known this day would come. I know you, Emily! I fucking love you! I’ll find you, I’m warning you. You belong to me! She heard his voice when they’d handed the sentence down. Saw his face contorted with rage, the intent in his unfocused eyes as he’d pinned her down, the night she’d foolishly gone to him. She’d fought him … until she’d been too frightened of what he might do. She’d fought the ghost of him ever since, just as she’d fought to rid herself of the ghost of her sister. He wasn’t going to go away – not unless she made him.

She stopped a short way from the house to grapple her phone from her bag and search for the text she’d tried so hard to convince herself wasn’t what she’d thought it was, the warning she’d tried steadfastly to ignore. How she wished now that she hadn’t. She could have put a stop to this earlier, prevented so much pain and heartache. Knowing what she now knew, that Paul Lewis had been using her daughter, hurting her to hurt her, to gain access to her, she had no doubt it was him who’d been drugging her. He who’d been responsible for what had happened to poor Zoe, to Natasha.

I’m watching you. She read the text over again, each word piercing her heart like an icicle, and then, nausea clenching her stomach, she switched to hands-free, called the number it had been sent from and drove on.

‘What do you want?’ she asked when he picked up.

He didn’t answer for a minute. Then, ‘You,’ he said simply.

Forty-Seven

Jake

Blind anger burning inside him, Jake struggled to concentrate on the road. He should call the police. The fact that this Paul Lewis had been stealing drugs from the surgery was enough to make sure he was investigated. But he couldn’t do that without implicating his daughter, something that piece of scum had undoubtedly factored in.

He slowed for a second, his breathing ragged, sweat beading his forehead. If he did inform the police, potentially risking Millie’s whole future, would it even be enough to put this animal back where he should be, behind bars? Lewis was obviously responsible for everything. Jake’s gut twisted as he pictured Natasha lying bleeding in the road. She could have died. Had it been him in Zoe’s flat? He obviously thought it was his right to abuse any woman he fancied. Would Edward have been a target too, a man who would have given his life to help other people, only to almost have it snatched away because he’d made a mistake? One single mistake. Jake felt sick to his soul imagining the pain he must have been in as he’d tortured himself with what he believed was his failure. And Jennifer Wheeler: the bastard had taken away everything she’d thought had made her life worth living.

This vermin, Paul Lewis, Louis – bile rose in his throat even thinking his name – had hurt his daughter. He’d hurt his wife, more than Jake could ever have contemplated. And he had contemplated it, many times over the years; he’d tried to understand why she’d seen another man after he and she were together. Why hadn’t she trusted him enough to tell him? How could she have thought that one day he wouldn’t find out about Ben? Ben didn’t look like him, and wasn’t anything like him in character. He’d watched Emily worry about it, been close so many times to asking her to be honest with him.

A simple blood test when Ben had had suspected appendicitis