Page 67 of My Husband's Wife
‘It was here.’ Madison lets go of Nicole and passes the dog lead to her.
That’s when Nicole knows they won’t be getting into a nice warm van to go to the police station because Theo has taken it.
Madison falls to her knees and pounds the ground with her fists. ‘I hate you,’ she yells, her tears mingling with the rain.
Nicole leads the dog to the roadside where she stands. She’ll stand here until someone passes or until she falls over, which could happen soon. Madison joins her and lays her head on Nicole’s shoulders. They sit on the kerb. It’s too far to walk either way. Madison is limping and Nicole knows she can’t go any further.
Madison sighs. ‘So, tell me everything from the beginning, not missing anything out.’
How to begin? Nicole settles on this line. ‘The man you were about to marry is Hugo. I had sex with him in a car almost eleven years ago.’
Fifty-Eight
Eva
He’s tied me to the passenger seat; and we haven’t come across a single car for ages. These roads are quiet and I don’t know where he’s taking me, but I can tell we’re on the coastal path heading towards Combe Martin. I’m shaking. He’s going to kill me. It’s the only way he gets to keep his secret. It’s obvious to me now. Theo is Hugo.
‘Caiden needs me,’ I blurt out in a teary mess. I think of Caiden and that day I left him in the car, and only now can I see what happened. As I reframe the events of my past, it’s like a light has been switched on. The window wipers swish back and forth as the rain buckets down.
‘And all you had to do was to be a fucking mother and forget about me,’ he yells.
My heart judders. I thought he was going to reach over and hit me. His knuckles are white as they grip the wheel of Nicole’s van. I try to focus on the raven toy that he’s stuck to the dashboard. ‘I have been a good mother. I love Caiden more than anything in the whole world, and he’ll be missing me. He needs me. He’s already lost you.’ I have to play this well or he could drive us both off a cliff edge. If anyone is unhinged right now, it’s him. I pause and wonder if I should ask my next question, but I don’t think I have much to lose right now. ‘How did you do it, Hugo? The DNA of the body in the car matched yours.’
He swerves into a car park, making my stomach sink as he pulls right up to a cliff edge. ‘This time I’ll do a better job.’
I think of my son but I can’t beg this man for my life. I hate what he’s put me through. I don’t want to sit here and do nothing but cry. If we’re going to die, I want the truth. ‘How did you do it? I actually think I know but I want to hear it from you.’
‘You’re so stupid, Eva. You always were. You couldn’t possibly know anything.’
That hurts. Trusting maybe. Loving, definitely, but stupid – that was cruel. Then again, anyone that could do what Hugo has done is cruel so why would I expect anything less? I keep thinking over our years together and the night my psychosis came out to play, a totally unexpected event but it happened nonetheless. Or did it? DNA is unique, the police kept telling me. My mother said the same thing but I’ve been researching and my theory makes sense. I had plenty of time to think things through in that box. ‘I broke into your office and found photos of Caiden and Emily. At least, I thought the babies in the photo were Caiden and Emily, but one of those babies was you, wasn’t it? You had a twin brother, didn’t you, Hugo? His name was Theo. That night I came downstairs and saw a body on our living room floor, it was him, not you. This is where I had to really think.’
‘You, think? Don’t make me laugh.’
I ignore his swipe at me. ‘He wasn’t dead, was he? You kept him against his will… let me guess… in our shed, and just before I came back with Mum after our theatre trip, you killed him, then you sent the car through that flimsy excuse of a wall and made it look like suicide before vanishing into your new life, the life you’d prepared with the savings I thought we had. You couldn’t have killed him when he was unconscious on our living room floor because the police would have known by the state of his body that he hadn’t just died. Anyway, if we’re going to die, I just wanted to tell you that I figured it out.’ I pause. ‘And you were happy for me to think I was crazy.’
‘You think you know it all.’
I shake my head while trying to subtly untie my binds. I need to keep him talking but I’m fast giving up hope of getting any purchase in this knotted mess. ‘I spoke to your mum.’
He slams a fist into the steering wheel.
‘She told me how she and your dad adopted you, wanted to give you the best life ever and take you away from your violent past. Theo had kept running away from various homes to be with your real mother. I don’t know why you never told me you were adopted, but I guess you’d have to reveal the real you. Cynthia told me how you startled her daughter’s horse and caused her accident. She told me how you called her to tell her I was mad too. You made me out to be crazy when you told her about me thinking you were dead one minute and alive the next. Poor woman was scared of us all but most of all, she was scared of you, Hugo, and the threats to her life should she ever try to expose you. She was mean to me because she thought it best that I drop it when I called her to tell her you were here. You’d been out of her life for five whole years and she wanted to keep it that way but me, I needed the truth. I heard the fear in her voice, Hugo.’
‘That bitch doesn’t fear anyone.’
I inhale, wondering whether to continue but for the first time in my life, I feel my anxiety melting away. I’ve never felt this sense of being unburdened and the consequences don’t even matter. I just want the noise in my head to leave and talking to Hugo is helping. I had a hard time at university. I struggled as a new mother but I am not as bad as he caused me to be. It’s taken this situation to make me realise how strong I really am. ‘She told me everything. You said that if she kept going on saying that her daughter’s tragic accident was down to you, she’d have a tragic accident too. You warned her to stay away from me and Caiden, and at the same time, you told me how cruel they were in not wanting to have anything to do with you or us. You made me hate Cynthia because of what you said.’ I pause, not knowing what to say next. None of this was planned. ‘Madison told me she’d met your mother. Did she even know if you were Theo or Hugo? I bet she didn’t.’
‘My mother doesn’t deserve to know. She chose a life of drugs and abusive men over me and Theo.’
There’s a sadness in his eyes and, for a moment, I see the Hugo I used to love. He removes the glasses he doesn’t need. It’s my Hugo and my heart almost bursts on seeing him. I still love the man he was but I hate the man he is now. I spent all those years in counselling, missing him. I moved on and managed to love again. Confusion fills my heart. ‘It really is you, Hugo.’
He doesn’t reply.
Something changes within me. I’m back in the understairs cupboard and Hugo is looking at me in that exact way. It’s only now I see the extent of his lies. He was the architect of my downfall because I’d shared the tiniest bit of my past with him. Granted, he never got the details but he knew about my breakdown at uni.
‘I never left Caiden in that blistering hot car that day, did I? You told me I’d left him in the car and I believed you because I was ill.’ I’m shaking. All these years I’ve lived with that guilt and I hated myself so much.
‘That’s not true. I covered for you, Eva. We both know I did. Come away with me. Let’s get Caiden and leave right now. I didn’t abandon you but you have to understand, I had to leave. Theo was threatening to expose me over something we did as kids. It was an accident. I didn’t mean to hurt anyone but things went too far and there was no going back. I couldn’t go to prison. Think of how much worse things would have been for you and Caiden if I had.’
