Before I Let You In (27 page)

I’d also sent him a phone number, and he texted that night:
Hey, my name’s David. Your friend gave me your number – I hope you don’t mind?

I sent an edited version of the message to Bea. Bea responded, and before long I was communicating with the pair of them, keeping the messages as true to the originals as possible, though making the ones to David flirtier and more suggestive, and the ones to Bea wittier and closer to what I was sure her version of the ideal man would be. This was easier than I’d imagined when I’d first come up with the idea; it might just work.

When David’s text messages started to take on a more ominous sexual edge, I very nearly put an end to the whole thing. I had to remind myself more than once why I was doing all this, and once I’d pushed it to the back of my mind, I barely remembered my brief guilty conscience.

After only a few days it became exhausting. Playing piggy-in-the-middle between the two of them, making sure neither one suspected they weren’t talking directly to the other, took up time I didn’t have.

Now the phone bleeped again and I shoved it under one of the sofa cushions without glancing at it. All I felt was irritation. My legs were restless but I didn’t have the energy to go anywhere or see anyone. I knew the feeling would pass, but it had been happening more and more recently, the feeling of dread in the pit of my stomach without even knowing what I was dreading, the weight of my body almost impossible to move. There were so many things I needed to do, so much of my plan still to put in place, but I was exhausted. If only I could rest, just for one day. Forget everything that was going on, go back to trying to live my normal life.

I closed my eyes and imagined a huge white duvet, thick, soft and bouncy, pulled up high around my shoulders with only my face peering out from beneath. I could almost feel the warmth seeping over me. A lie-down wouldn’t kill me. Just until I felt better. Just until I could open my eyes again. It was all so exhausting.

62

Bea

Bea resisted the urge to glance in the mirror for the fifteenth time before leaving the flat, double-checking the door was locked behind her. Considering she hadn’t even wanted to be set up when Karen had first mentioned it, she’d spent a ridiculous amount of time getting ready. Trying to choose the right outfit had been a real ball ache: not too much on show (don’t want to give the wrong impression) but enough to impress. She’d settled on a dark red fitted dress with a relatively high neck and a silk scarf. No cleavage, but form-fitting enough to make her hours in the gym worth it. Hopefully David from IT would be worth it too. The only thing dampening her excitement now was that she couldn’t talk to Karen about it, pump her for information the way she would have done before. Damn Eleanor and her principles. After tonight she was going to contact Karen herself, try to play mediator and work out some way of making this Michael situation okay.

She’d been exchanging text messages with this guy for just over a week now and was surprised at how funny and charming he seemed. Karen wasn’t known for setting her up with the most charismatic of guys; she seemed to think Bea would do better staying away from the charming, good-looking types. But she was more than ready to be proved wrong with this one, and she’d made a real effort just in case. After everything that had happened over the last few weeks, she felt like it might finally be time to give a guy a real chance. Why should she be content to watch everyone around her settle down happily while she punished herself for something that had happened so many years ago? It was time to stop being afraid.

She had done everything by the Just In Case He’s A Psychopath Handbook For Girls. They had arranged to meet at a bar in town, a busy place where Bea would be safe and surrounded by people. She’d set up a signal with Eleanor: she would one-bell her if she needed her to call with a fake emergency, although she was pretty sure he would see straight through that one. Not that she was bothered about hurting his feelings. If she disliked him enough to invoke an emergency call, then she wasn’t going to be too worried about seeing him again. She cringed when she imagined the lecture she was in for from Karen if this blind date ended the same way as the last one – with her popping to the toilet and leaving through the smoking exit, jumping straight in a taxi to Karen’s to cordially request she stay out of her love life. Then she remembered the scene in the café, the wounded look on her friend’s face as Eleanor had launched into her vicious tirade and Bea had said nothing to defend her. There wouldn’t be any lecture this time – Karen might never speak to her again.

The taxi was late and she fired off a text to David to tell him it wasn’t that she’d seen him and left without introducing herself. Her phone beeped its reply.

LOL! Thank God for that, I was beginning to regret wearing my Freddy Krueger outfit as a laugh.

Bea smiled. It was possible that tonight wasn’t going to be all that bad after all.

‘You look great, and not like Freddy Krueger at all.’ Bea had to raise her voice over the bar’s music and lean in close for David to hear her. She hoped she still smelled as good as when she’d left the house.

He couldn’t have heard her properly, because his eyes narrowed slightly in confusion, but he smiled in that way people do when they know it’s expected of them. They had chosen the worst first date spot ever; Bea had been so concerned with being safe that she hadn’t thought about simple things like being able to hear one another. Not to mention that she was starving – she’d been so nervous about choosing what to wear that she’d forgotten to eat, and now she couldn’t risk bar snacks with her skin-tight dress. Her stomach gurgled unattractively; maybe it was a good job the music was loud.

‘Look, do you wanna go for a walk? It’s really loud in here.’

Bea hesitated. She’d promised Eleanor she would stay at the bar for her own safety, but this guy was Karen’s friend. Plenty of people knew who she was with, and it was unlikely he was going to abduct and kill her then return to work with Karen tomorrow. And Bea often walked home from the clubs around here gone midnight, even though she knew she shouldn’t, and nothing had ever happened to her. She knew how to handle herself.

‘Sure, yeah.’

The evening air was milder than when she’d left the house, or maybe the alcohol had taken the chill off the evening, which was lucky because she’d left her coat behind. David nodded towards the river – it was opposite the pubs and clubs, across a busy main road, but hardly off the beaten track. Plenty of people walked along the path and it wasn’t even nine o’clock.

‘Sorry about that place,’ she apologised. ‘Nightmare trying to have a conversation.’ She paused and then added wistfully, ‘Food’s good, though.’

‘Don’t worry about it.’ He shook his head impatiently and reached out to touch her elbow. ‘Look, I booked us a room at the Bellstone. Why don’t we just go straight there?’

At first his words didn’t completely register. She assumed he meant a booth, like the ones you could book at a couple of the nightclubs that thought they were classy because they had VIP areas. It didn’t seem to make much difference to the people of Shrewsbury that the VIP areas were just a corner with some rope around that absolutely anyone could put their name down for for a tenner deposit. Although the Bellstone didn’t have a VIP area, or even booths. It was one of those places that was classier because it didn’t pretend it was a celebrity hangout. With sickening clarity it dawned on her what he actually meant. What the Bellstone did have was rooms upstairs.

‘I’m sorry, you mean for a drink, right? At the bar.’

He smiled and shrugged. ‘I’m sure they do room service.’

Bea felt the heat rise in her cheeks. Sure she’d dressed up, but she still didn’t think she looked like the type of person who would send someone a few text messages and go straight to bed with them. Was that the impression she’d given him? She couldn’t think of anything witty or clever to say to defuse the awkwardness; her mind was too busy running through the texts, looking for where she might have given him the impression she was just meeting him for sex.

‘Um, David, I’m sorry if I let you think that I was just here for … well, that a room would be necessary …’

‘Oh God, no.’ He had the good grace to look embarrassed. ‘I’m not saying we have to jump straight into bed. We can have a drink downstairs in the bar first; it’s much quieter than the place we were just in. But it makes sense to be closer to the hotel, right? Are you okay? Did I say something wrong?’

‘I just, I don’t … I don’t feel comfortable with the assumption that we’re going to have sex on our first date.’ She stepped away from him in the hope that physical distance would make her point.
This can be salvaged. If he just apologises, we can laugh about it and maybe get some food. It’ll be a running joke: ‘Remember that time you tried to get me into bed ten minutes after meeting me?’

‘Well come on. I mean, I came all this way …’

‘What, and that means I owe you a shag?’ Bea could hear her voice getting louder, but she wasn’t aware of raising it. ‘Because you paid for a train ticket?’

‘There’s no point in getting mardy now,’ he hissed. ‘Karen told me what you’re like.’

‘Oh yes? And what exactly did Karen say?’ There was a lump forming in her chest, and her cheeks were burning. She couldn’t imagine Karen telling this man anything terrible about her, but suddenly she was afraid to hear what he was about to say. It was as though the person she had been speaking to for the last week had disappeared completely, replaced by a complete stranger. He leaned in closer than was comfortable, and for the first time her embarrassment gave way to panic.

‘She said you were up for a good time. I know what she meant.’

Bea drew in a sharp breath. Had she really said that? Was that what Karen thought about her?
Well isn’t that what you wanted her to think? Because you’d rather she thought you a slag than frigid and terrified.
And that was the only reason he was here, not because they’d had a connection, or clicked, but because her best friend had told him she was an easy lay.

Hot tears stung at the corner of her eyes. They’d always joked about her single life, and yes, she did exaggerate her sexual appetite to her friends, but she’d never realised she’d caused Karen to have such a low opinion of her. In reality, there had been so few men in her life since university she could name them on one hand. Part of her was hurt, shocked, disappointed. The other part was furious.

‘Karen had no right to say that, and you can tell her so from me, next time you have one of your cosy little chats in the canteen.’

David looked confused, then confusion gave way to a sneer. ‘She told you we worked together? Ha, I think you’re the one who needs to have a chat with your “best mate”. We met online. On a dating website.’

She’d only had two glasses of wine in the bar, but now Bea’s head was starting to pound, right behind her eyes. A dating website? ‘Karen has a boyfriend. She doesn’t use dating websites.’

‘I know, that’s what she told me when I contacted her. She said it was an old profile and that she wasn’t looking for anyone. But she had a friend who was and she gave me your number. Told me all about you, how you’ve been single for years. Told me to text you and make sure I told you Karen gave me your number.’

How dare she! Encouraging her to go on a date with someone she’d never even met; telling an absolute stranger she was desperate and a sure thing. And this guy was vile. Seriously, who took a train journey to meet someone just for sex? And didn’t even offer to buy them a bloody meal first!

There wasn’t much else she could say to David, but a whole lot more she wanted to say to Karen. Karen, whose perfect relationship was with a man who wasn’t even completely hers, calling her easy! The whole thing would be laughable if it weren’t so horrific.

‘I’m really sorry that there has been a misunderstanding, but I think it’s time I went home. Karen should never have said those things; she should never have set this up in the first place.’

David’s face darkened, his eyes narrowed and he stepped closer again, so close that Bea could smell stale smoke on his breath from his last cigarette.

‘You must be fucking joking. I came all this way to meet you. I paid eighty quid for a decent hotel room. You’re not going anywhere.’

Reaching out, he grabbed hold of her wrist before she had a chance to move backwards, and squeezed so tightly she thought it might break. ‘Let go of me or I’ll scream,’ she said, sounding more confident than she felt. Pain shot through her wrist as he pinned it to her side and twisted slightly, guiding her through the gate in the railings that led to the river, his mouth close to her ear.

‘You won’t scream.’ His voice reverberated through her head. ‘Because if anyone comes near us, I’ll tell them you came on to me and then cried rape. And it won’t be the first time, will it, Bea?’

Bea’s chest tightened at his words. There were only two people who knew about what had happened sixteen years ago, and they were her best friends. There was no way either of them would tell a complete stranger. Was there? Karen had already said more to this man than Bea ever would have imagined she would.

He yanked at her arm, dragging her down the bank to the riverside. It was deserted down there, but in the lights from the theatre on the other side of the river she could see his face, contorted by anger and set determinedly. He shoved her against the bank so hard it knocked the air from her lungs and grabbed at the hem of her dress.

They were perfectly visible from the other side of the river, but as Bea was fast learning, visible didn’t equate to safe any more. If someone saw them, would they realise she was in trouble? Or would she be just another slag giving a bloke a good time on a Friday night?

Like you always do
, a voice in her head whispered. Karen’s voice.
Haven’t you learned your lesson after what happened? What’s the difference between him and any of the other guys you’ve been with?

It isn’t like that
, her own voice insisted back, the imaginary argument with her former best friend blocking out David’s hand on her thigh, his other hand trying to grope for her nipple through her dress.
I know what I’ve said, I know the person I’ve pretended to be, but I’m not her. I’m scared and I’m broken.