The Girl I Used to Be(92)

“I wish you’d told me you were going there. I wish I could have helped you.”

“But we weren’t expecting him to turn up,” I said. “I was just going to be with her to pick up some documents. She didn’t want him to find them.”

“Even so,” he said. “I hate to think of you going through that.” We were quiet for a while, then he said, “So what’s happened to him now?”

“I’m not sure. Apparently he was coming to just as the police arrived. They carted him off to hospital and he’s under guard now.” I winced. “We hit him pretty hard.”

Joe shrugged. “Shame. But when the police got there and found him unconscious and locked in a room, did they just believe what you said? You both clearly had something to do with it.”

“We were taken to the police station.” We’d been glad to go. We asked to go. At least we were safe there. “And I gave them my shirt.”

“What? Why did you do that?”

“That night at the hotel in London, David was recording me while we had a meal. He’d planned it all, known what he wanted to do.”

“Recorded you with his phone? Didn’t you notice?”

“No, he had a video camera that was in a button that Rachel sewed onto his shirt,” I said.

“A button?”

“I know. I couldn’t believe it. Rachel told me about it; she sent me a link to it just the other day. I thought that two could play at that game, so I sent off for a shirt with buttons and I ordered the same recorder he’d bought, and I sewed the buttons on before I went out. Everything that happened in her house last night was recorded.”

He looked at me as if I’d grown another head. “Sound as well?”

I nodded. “It was clear as a bell. You could hear that we broke a bone when we hit him.” I swallowed hard, remembering also the clarity of the video he’d made of me criticizing Joe. That was the only thing I hadn’t told him. I hoped he’d never hear about it.

He winced. “But why were you wearing the shirt? You thought you were just going to help Rachel, didn’t you?”

“I was testing it,” I said. “I knew that Rachel would have seen the buttons before, on David’s shirt; she’d sewn them on. I wanted to see if she noticed them. If she didn’t, I figured he wouldn’t, either. Before I had a chance to tell her, he’d turned up. The police wouldn’t touch the button as it was evidence, but I gave them the login to the website where the footage was stored and they could see everything.”

He sat quietly, holding me to him. I knew it was going to take a long time for him to grasp just what had been happening over the last couple of months. “I just don’t understand why you didn’t go to the police straightaway, as soon as you saw him going into Rachel’s apartment.”

“I wanted to talk to her first,” I said. “I was worried about her. I knew that if I told the police before speaking to her, I’d never get the chance to talk to her about why she was with him. And then when I spoke to her she asked me not to go just yet. At first she said she wanted us to confront him together, but we were too scared to do that. We were going to go to the police tomorrow—today, now—and make a statement. And then he preempted us.”

“What do you think she’ll do now?”

“She’ll probably go abroad. She needs to get away.” We were quiet for a while; Joe’s hands gripped mine as if he’d never let me go.

When he spoke next, he sounded so sad and confused. “I just wish you’d told me, right from the beginning. When you came back from London, if you’d told me then, none of this would have happened.”

“I think it would, just in a different way. She was still determined to get revenge, and of course he loved having the chance to do whatever he wanted. And how could I have said to you, weeks later, ‘Oh, you remember that conference I went to a month ago? Remember I said I’d had dinner in my room and went to sleep early? Well, I didn’t. I lied about that. And remember I texted you to say I was in bed, about to go to sleep? I wasn’t. I was in a restaurant having dinner with a client instead and we got drunk and then I think he kissed me, but I don’t remember. Nothing else happened, though. I don’t remember but I know nothing happened.’”

He grimaced. “I wouldn’t have believed you. I know it. And it’s my fault, too. You looked awful when I picked you up off the London train and I still went out. I knew you wanted me to stay home, but I didn’t. I’m so sorry, Gem.” He gave me a tentative look. “Do you think him being arrested will help bring some peace to you now?”

I thought for a while about all that had happened and how Rachel and I had united to overcome him. “I think so,” I said. “I hope so. Rachel will have a bigger problem, though. She’s lost everything.”

“Not quite everything,” Joe said quietly. “You’ve been a really good friend to her.”

“And she has to me, too.”

We sat in silence for a while, and then he said, “About your job. How do you fancy taking on someone new?”

I closed my eyes, exhausted. “I’ve already advertised. I told you.”

“No,” he said. “How do you fancy if I come in with you? I could train up for Brian’s job and take over the lettings when he retires. We could work it so that one of us was always at home with Rory.”