Page 73 of The Psychopath Next Door

‘What kind of a big secret?’

‘How am I supposed to know? I just think ...’

I waited.

‘You always tell us to be wary of strangers. To not talk to people online or share our address or accept gifts. You taught us to be vigilant when it comes to people we don’t know. But with Fiona, it’s like all that went out the window.’

‘We do know her, though. She’s our neighbour.’

‘For, like, five minutes!’

He put his headphones back on, signalling the end of the conversation. I left his room, feeling discombobulated. All this stuff about her face going blank when no one was looking was bizarre – and, frankly, hard to believe. I hadn’t seen that side of her at all – had I? I racked my brain for any signs that she was anything other than completely nice and normal. All I could think of was that she hadn’t told us about Rose seeing a man die in the park, and she’d let Rose watch a horror movie. There was Tommy’s weird conviction that she’d had something to do with his son’s accident, but I was sure that was nonsense.

You like her because she flirts with you, flatters you, said a little voice in my head.You can’t see beyond her pretty face and her body.

But Emma liked her too. Trusted her enough to let her look after our daughter.

Dylan had to be imagining it. Misreading Fiona. He was only fifteen, after all, and he spent half his life in imaginary worlds where at least half the people you encountered wanted to kill you.

But even as I tried to reassure myself that Rose’s character hadn’t changed, I couldn’t shake the sensation of unease – and the root cause of that was obvious. My discomfort whenever Fiona was mentioned. My guilt.

Playing laser tag with Emma earlier, being a team, having fun outside our domestic environment – it had brought it home to me how much I not only loved her but liked her. She was not just my wife and the mother of my children. She was my favourite person. She was cool and capable and game for a laugh. She was compassionate and clever. Fiona was nothing compared to Emma.

And I was in terrible danger of losing her.

I took a deep breath and steeled myself. It was time we talked.

I found her sitting at the table outside, looking out at the lake, or pond – whatever it was. She had a bottle of wine in front of her, her glass half full. She poured one for me and pushed it in my direction as I sat down.

‘Do you ever wish we still smoked?’ she asked. We had both quit when she got pregnant with Dylan. ‘I was just thinking how delicious a cigarette would be right now.’

‘I could go and buy some if you like.’

‘Ha.’

‘I need to talk to you,’ I said, at the same time that she said, ‘We need to talk.’

I made a zipping motion across my lips and nodded for Emma to go ahead, a little dagger of dread pressing into my heart. Wasthis the conversation where she told me she was leaving me, that she was in love with someone else?

She took a deep breath.

‘I saw Mike,’ she said.

This of course delivered an electric charge, but I retained enough presence of mind to weigh my options: tell her that I knew this, that I’d seen them, or act surprised. In the end, my reaction was somewhere in between. I waited, heart thumping, bracing myself for what came next.

‘It was the other day, before Iris gave you that money and you booked this holiday. I ... It’s hard to explain, and I need you to listen without interrupting or getting angry or upset, okay?’

I nodded. My insides had gone cold.

‘Last year, when you found out about my friendship with him and forced me to end it, I knew it was the right thing to do because I valued our marriage and our family above everything else. I loved and love you, and didn’t and don’t want to be with anyone else.’

I could sense a ‘but’ coming.

‘But ... and please don’t freak out, let me finish ... I was a little bit in love with him. That infatuated, new-person kind of “in love”, when you meet someone that you feel you have a connection with. Do you understand?’

I nodded. My mouth was too dry for me to speak.

‘Nothing physical happened between Mike and me. I’ve told the truth about that. I never kissed him. We never touched each other. We didn’t talk about sex or exchange sexual messages or anything like that.’

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