Trust Me - Sheryl Browne Page 0,110

parting memento from your daughter.’ His smile slipped, just for an instant, a flash of humiliation now in his eyes. ‘She’s as feisty as you are. She obviously inherited your genes. Come in.’ He nodded behind him.

To the bedroom, Emily gathered, having noted the living room to her side, the kitchenette beyond it.

‘I’m just packing a few things,’ he said, turning.

To make good his escape, presumably. With her? Or was it her fate to go the way of her sister? Her hand curling around the sharp boning knife in her pocket, she followed him, her heart squeezing painfully as her eyes fell on Millie’s pretty crystal hairclip on top of the chest of drawers, the only furniture in the room apart from the bed. Her heart turned to stone.

‘So, what now?’ he asked, collecting a handful of T-shirts from one of the open drawers and stuffing them into a holdall on top of the duvet. Stopping, he glanced at her. ‘You know we’re destined to be together?’

Emily said nothing, and tried very hard not to communicate her feelings through her facial expressions.

‘We share a secret, Emily,’ he went on casually. ‘One we’ll both take to the grave. We both know who really pushed Kara that day, don’t we?’

Liar! Emily seethed inwardly. He’d told her all those years ago that she’d killed her sister out of jealousy. Deeply shocked, grieving, not trusting her own memory, she’d believed him. Unbidden, scenes from that terrible day crashed into her mind. She wasn’t even supposed to be there. It was Kara that Lewis had agreed to meet on the canal bank that day, not her. But Kara had been angry. Emily saw her, her flaxen hair wild, her violet eyes full of fire, spitting fury, telling him what a vile bastard he was, that she would rather die than let him anywhere near her again. Emily hadn’t pushed her. He had.

‘Leave them alone,’ she said. ‘My family. Leave them alone and I’ll come with you.’

He studied her narrowly, for a long, bone-chilling moment. ‘Ben’s my son,’ he stated flatly, and went back to his packing.

He was insane. Surely he couldn’t hope to have anything to do with Ben after all that he’d done?

‘We can start afresh.’ She kept her voice even.

‘Right.’ He smiled cynically. ‘So you’ll give your family up to be with me? Your perfect husband with his big fat salary? You’re lying, Emily.’ His eyes flicked back to hers. ‘You’re blushing. Didn’t I tell you I know you?’

She didn’t flinch. ‘I’m not lying. I’m nervous. I’m bound to be after everything.’ She glanced down and back. He didn’t know her that well. Couldn’t see that it was white-hot rage burning her cheeks. ‘I’ve only ever wanted to be with you. I thought you didn’t want me.’

‘And that’s why you tried to push me away the last time we were together?’ He eyed her sceptically.

‘I was angry.’ Emily told him the lies he wanted to hear to salve his ego. ‘Because of Kara.’

He thought about it. ‘So you don’t love him then, the upstanding Dr Merriden, with his flashy car and his big house? You don’t love your nice lifestyle, your fine clothes,’ he looked her over, a hint of contempt in his eyes, ‘your fancy holidays. You love me.’

He was jealous. Emily couldn’t quite believe it. Of Jake. Of what she had with Jake. Was that what had driven him to do what he’d done, to destroy so many people’s lives? Pathetic creature. She would have given anything to tell him just how disgustingly contemptible she found him, but she kept her counsel and held his gaze instead. ‘I’ve never loved him,’ she said, the words almost choking her. ‘He’s looked after me, looked after Ben. I care about him, but I don’t love him.’

He swept his gaze over her. Her flesh crawled as she watched the incredulity in his eyes give way to lust. ‘Prove it,’ he said, nodding to the bed. Removing the holdall, he dropped it on the floor and then looked back at her, a challenge now in his eyes.

Emily’s insides lurched. Bile rising in her throat, it took her a second to find her courage, to make her legs move.

Walking across to him, she noted the stunned disbelief on his face as she snaked an arm around his neck, heard a groan deep in his throat as she pressed her mouth over his, her tongue seeking his, the taste of second-hand cigarette and cannabis smoke in her