Page 6 of The Psychopath Next Door

She hesitated, and I felt something that had hit me often recently – especially during the last year, since her move to secondary school. Rose was still a child, only just twelve, but she was changing.I’m not a babywas a phrase we heard a lot these days, and with it, this new tension between her and Emma, who took the brunt of Rose’s occasional moody outbursts.

But Rose was still a kid, really.

‘Chocolate pudding?’ She thought about it. ‘Okay.’

She might not be a baby, but she was still very much my little girl.

3

Fiona got out of the shower and wrapped a towel around herself. She had been living here for a few days now, and free for nearly two years, but she was still able to appreciate the luxury of being on her own, of having her own stuff. Not having to look at or be looked at by anyone else. That had been one of the worst things about prison: the lack of privacy. The guards, the other women. Inside, there was always someone eyeing you up.

At least until you taught them better. Like that woman in the first place they’d sent her, the one who’d given Fiona loads of shit her first day, calling her a skinny bitch, trying to act tough. She hadn’t been so tough afterwards, screaming that Fiona had blinded her, stupid bloody drama queen.

Wrapping the towel tighter, Fiona turned towards the mirrored cabinet above the sink. It was coated with condensation so her reflection was nothing but a blur, a ghost formed of water droplets.

She reached out with a finger and, in the condensation, wrote three names.

First.

Second.

Last.

Her list.

She concentrated on the names for half a minute, then rubbed them out with her palm, knowing she would do the same tomorrow, until she was satisfied that all three of them had paid for what they’d done.

She left the steamy bathroom and went into her bedroom. As she dressed, she stood behind the curtain, looking down at next door’s back garden. It had been raining all morning, just as it had rained every day since she’d moved in. Almost twenty years on, she still couldn’t believe the British had the audacity to call this season summer.

Now, as she watched, the teenage boy – Dylan, that was his name – entered the garden with the dog. He threw a ball, the cockapoo ran after it and brought it back. Both boy and dog seemed bored by this game, as was Fiona. But as she finished dressing, the rain stopped and the clouds parted to reveal a patch of blue sky.

And Rose appeared in the garden.

It was the first time Fiona had seen the girl since she’d escorted her home last Friday. Her mother, Emma, had been round to introduce herself and to thank her. Fiona had also exchanged pleasantries with Ethan when they’d passed on the street. But she’d been so busy – moving in, unpacking, familiarising herself with the area and, most importantly, plotting – that she’d hardly had time to think about Rose and that little tingle she’d felt when she’d first seen her.

That peculiar sense of familiarity.

The girl and her brother were talking. They were too far away for Fiona to read their lips, but Dylan went inside and came out with a dog lead, which he clipped to the dog’s collar. As Fiona watched, they went out through the back gate and began to walk towards the recreation ground, a large grassy area that was mostly used for dog walking and ball games, which everyone here called ‘the fields’.

Fiona made a quick decision.

She went downstairs and slipped her trainers on, then left the house. Not wanting it to be obvious she was following them, she took the longer route towards the fields, out through the gap in the high wooden fence that formed the estate’s northern border, then along the footpath.

It was wet underfoot, squelchy and muddy. The alternating rain and sunshine had supercharged nature, turning the country lush and verdant – the country that Maisie had described to her all those years ago, so different to the desert expanses of Western Australia. Her dad’s parents had been ten-pound poms, part of that wave of British emigrants who took cheap passage down under, arriving on a ship in Fremantle in the fifties. ‘Why don’t you come home?’ Maisie had said, and eventually, Fiona had thought,Why not, indeed?In England, she would make her fortune, and she and Maisie would live like queens.

It hadn’t quite worked out like that, had it?

She stopped because she could hear voices up ahead. Kids’ voices, Dylan and Rose, and a dog yapping. She peered through the trees and there they were, throwing a ball, using one of those long plastic sticks to propel it a great distance. Lola went charging off through the overgrown grass, tongue lolling, and Fiona was about to climb over the stile so she could say hello when she heard a loud buzz coming from across the other side of the field.

It was a small motorbike. A dirt bike, Fiona believed it was called. Stripes of lime green and black. Fiona recognised the teenage boy riding it as one of the brothers who’d been hassling Rose last week. What were their names? Rose had told her when Fiona escorted her home. Albie and Eric, that was it. Albie, who was on the bike, was the older one. His younger brother hurried along beside him, with two huge German shepherds on leads.

Through the trees, Fiona saw Rose and Dylan stiffen. Dylan immediately called Lola to them, urgency in his voice, but she was too busy searching for the ball in the grass.

Fiona watched as Eric unleashed both his dogs, and the two shaggy beasts charged towards Lola like greyhounds let out of the traps. Lola, who was about fifty feet away from her owners, looked up, saw the bigger dogs coming and belatedly obeyed Dylan’s command to ‘Come’. But she was too slow. The German shepherds reached Lola and charged at her, teeth bared, barking and growling.

They’re going to kill her, Fiona thought, and she climbed the gate hurriedly. Dylan was sprinting towards Lola, who was running in circles, the bigger dogs surrounding her.

‘Call them off!’ Dylan yelled. ‘Call your stupid dogs off now.’

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