What Lies Between Us(84)

She rises to her feet and my body draws in on itself, preparing to cower. Except this time, I stop myself. The realisation is sudden – I will not spend the rest of my life, however brief the rest of it might be, recoiling in her shadow. A strength that I didn’t know I possessed rises to the surface. I no longer fear the monster I made.

‘I fucking dare,’ I growl, and now I’m on my feet too.

‘You have taken everything away from me,’ she shouts, spit flying from her mouth like tiny bullets. ‘You should be on your hands and knees praying to God for forgiveness for what you’ve done to your child!’

‘I’ve been forced to make decisions that have torn me apart, but they were only because you left me with no choice.’

Suddenly, Nina shoves me hard against the wall. I lose my balance and drop to the floor. Then I watch as she reaches for the bread knife on the table and stands over me, her knuckles whitening with the force of her grip.

I see it in her. The Nina with no control over her actions has returned. Her eyes have glazed over and right then and there, I know that she is unreachable. The darkness has descended and she isn’t my daughter any more. Whatever happens next won’t be down to the will of the girl I gave birth to, but as a result of the actions of her father, the man who robbed her of her childhood and set the wheels in motion for all that’s followed.

Nina raises the knife above her head but I don’t try and protect myself. If I am to die in this moment, then so be it. She will need to look her mother in the eye as she extinguishes the light from behind it.

Without warning, we hear it together.

A voice takes us both by surprise. We turn our heads sharply towards the doorway from where it came.

A man is standing there, a horrified expression across his face. ‘Nina?’ he asks. ‘What are you doing?’





CHAPTER 71





MAGGIE


Nina and I are frozen in the moment, unable to move. I remain on the floor and she looms above me with the knife in her hand. The voice is enough to snap her from her psychosis, something I’ve never been able to do.

We gawp at the unexplained visitor who has come crashing into our twisted world. My daughter aside, he is the first person I have come face to face with since she locked me up. I stare at the slim young man with his dark hair and pale complexion and wonder if my desperate brain is playing tricks on me. I give serious consideration as to whether she’s already stabbed me and I’m in the last throes of death and imagining him. Then something clicks. His frame is familiar; he’s Nina’s friend, and the man I’ve seen from a distance through my bedroom window. He is the reason I’ve been carving out a hole in the wall to alert him to my existence. But now that he’s standing in front of me, I am inert.

The silence is interrupted by the sound of metal on wood as Nina places the knife back on the table. Then she takes a step away from me as if this might alter her friend’s perception of the chaos he’s witnessing. I remain where I am. He looks confused and scared.

‘What are you doing here?’ she asks, the wind taken from her sails.

‘You messaged me threatening to kill yourself if I didn’t respond.’ She cocks her head to stare at him as if she can’t recall doing that. ‘Lucky your front door was unlocked. What’s going on?’ he continues.

His piercing grey eyes look at her, then me, and back at her again. I attempt to rise to my feet but my whole body is shaking like a leaf, making it difficult to stand unaided. I shuffle forward on my bottom like an infant, then use my hands to grip a chair and pull myself up. He moves towards me and places his hand under my arm until I’m on my feet. My legs are still threatening to falter so I steady myself against the tabletop. The noise of the chain draws his attention. He can’t seem to comprehend why it’s attached to my ankle.

‘Dylan,’ Nina begins, her voice quavering. ‘You came.’

I freeze. What did she just say? ‘Dylan?’ I repeat, and look to her and then at her friend. And for a split second, I don’t see him, I see Jon Hunter. I gasp and throw my hands over my mouth as I recognise him as the baby I last saw being carried from the basement in the hope that I might save him from this madness.

‘You’re . . . you’re my grandson!’ I whisper.

My words appear to be frightening him further and he turns to Nina. ‘I have grandparents? You told me they were all dead!’

Somehow, I’m able to put my thoughts in order. ‘She’s been keeping me a prisoner for two years,’ I spit. ‘Please, you have to help me.’

‘Nina?’ Dylan replies. ‘Is this true?’

‘She’s poorly,’ Nina retaliates. ‘She has dementia and she doesn’t know what she’s saying. I’m her carer. I look after her.’

‘I have no such thing,’ I hit back. ‘I’ve been locked upstairs against my will. Look.’

Dylan’s eyes follow mine to the cuff and the chain that leads along the corridor and back up the stairs to my floor. ‘Why do you have her chained up?’ he asks.

‘For when I’m at work . . . It’s for her own safety. It’s not as bad as it looks. She’s a danger to herself when she’s alone – she goes wandering off. And I can’t afford to put her in a care home.’