Good Girls Lie(105)

But without the money Ashlyn gives me to make Damien Carr’s life a living hell, and a real influx of cash, I’m stuck. Forever stuck.

Ashlyn takes the table by the window. I bring her a pot of tea and a scone, clotted cream and jam on the side. Ashlyn smiles charmingly, showing the empty spot on the back left where she lost a molar a couple of weeks back, courtesy of her father’s incredible temper.

“Sit down. Take a load off.”

“I don’t have time today, Ash. Mum’s not feeling well, I’m running the shift alone.”

“Don’t worry, I don’t want you to do anything. I need to talk to you.”

Her eyes are wild, bloodshot, but happy. There’s such an edge of insanity in this girl. I’ve seen it in her from the start, from the first day I was aware of her. Little Johnny’s funeral will always be imprinted on my mind; it was the day my mother told me the whole story, the truth about our lives.

You can’t ever speak a word of this. But if something ever happens to me, Alexandria, you go to them. Tell them to test your blood. They will take care of you.

I hadn’t fully understood, not then. Not until I was much older, and my mother had lost herself in drugs and memories of the life she could have had if only she’d been born to the right sort of people.

The resemblance between us is remarkable, considering. How Ashlyn’s never seen it as more than a fluke of nature, I will never know. But why would she? I am the daughter of a junkie. I work in a tea and chip shop. She is the daughter of wealth and privilege.

Never the twain shall meet, unless the former is serving the latter.

I remember, at the funeral, watching Ashlyn edging around the somber people, staring at the grave, laughing at the wrong times, putting her little hand into open pockets, working the crowd. Even then, inappropriate actions were her mandate.

Now, after extensive research, I know Ashlyn probably has a serious untreated borderline personality disorder. But unpredictable as she is, Ashlyn is the closest thing to a friend I have. And when she’s being pleasant, watch out. She can charm the larks from the sky.

“Where’s your mum?”

“In bed. I think.” Or out for a score, but I don’t add this. She’s been high more often than not these past few months.

“When’s the shift end?”

“Sully is coming in at five.”

“Then I’ll meet you at five. Don’t look so scared, hen. Trust me. I’m about to give you the answer to your dreams. Now scoot. Customers are waiting.”

The answer to my dreams. Oh, God, what has Ashlyn cooked up now?



81

THE SWITCH

“They’re forcing me to go to this school in America, and I don’t want to. You keep saying you want an education. It’s perfect. You become me, I become you. We both get what we want most.”

I shake my head, eyes wide. “No. No way. I couldn’t.”

“You most certainly could. You look enough like me to pull it off. You’re brilliant, you sent that photo to Downing Street and no one was the wiser. You can alter whatever you need to in the databases. Our mothers won’t care—I hate to point it out but Gertie is beyond help.

“I have all the money I’ve been saving, you can have half of it to keep you afloat until I get my inheritance. He’s made this provision about the degree just to piss me off, I know he has. He hates me. Making me get a college degree before I can have the inheritance, it’s completely unfair. But it’s been done, too late to undo it. Though who knows. He might leave you something. He seems to have a soft spot for your mother.”

This is said with an accusatory, inquiring glance—maybe she’s been ferreting out the truth at last. As much as I hate him, I still feel a tiny squirm of pleasure at the thought but I push it aside. I want nothing from Damien Carr that he can give. All I want is what he can’t possibly manage. Acknowledgment is the least of it. Love. The love of a man who punishes my sister because I am not her.

“I can’t, Ashlyn. It’s wrong. I could never pull it off.”

“You can. Think of me as your fairy godmother. You’ll get everything you’ve been dreaming about. An education. A life away from this hellhole. You are Cinderella now.”

I look around the flat. Ashlyn isn’t wrong, it is a dump. I have no prospects. Aside from finding myself a rich husband, I will be stuck in this life. And I don’t want a rich husband. I want to learn things. Create things. I want to go to school so badly it makes my teeth hurt.

And now Ashlyn is offering me my dream.

I have to say, I don’t trust her.

“But to take your identity... What does this do for you, Ashlyn?”

She spins in a ridiculous Mary Poppins–like circle. “Freedom. All the freedom I could ever want. I become Alexandria Pine, anonymous café worker, able to go wherever I please. No more bullshit schooling, no more bullshit attacks from Damien. You become Ashlyn Carr, beloved daughter of a scion, going away to school in America.”

“There’s no way we can pull this off.”

“Yes, we can. My photo hasn’t been in the press since Johnny died. No one will have any idea what I grew up to look like. Mother has done her damnedest to keep me hidden away. Around here, maybe, though he lost it and fired Dorsey, did I tell you? Thought she was stealing from him, though it was me who nicked the silver. But no one in America will have any idea you’re not me.”