Matilda Wren (23 page)

“Agree with what exactly? The murder, the arson or the complete lack of respect you just showed me. I’m not your employee Sean. I was doing you a favour. You should have told me.” Kenny was angry.

The quiet volume of his voice and the fact he had not sworn told Sean just how angry he was. It was when Kenny became really quiet he was at his most dangerous.

Sean leant forward from the arm chair. He stared at the floor for a few seconds and then looked straight at Kenny.

“You would have tried to stop me. Not part of the code.

Killing civi’s, is it Ken?”

“Not part of the code? What the fuck? Sean what you just did was a senseless murder. The press will have a field day when they get hold of this. You left the fucking body for fucks sake.”

“Course I left the fucking body. He couldn’t just disappear. Too many questions. A security guards body adds to the attempted robbery and arson don’t it? It was a botched job gone wrong. The guard died in the process.”

He puffed on his joint and leant back again into the chair.“I don’t tell you everything Ken, the same as you don’t tell me.”

Kenny shrugged in a defeated manner. He knew it was pointless pursuing it further with Sean. He walked over to the sofa and dumped himself down into it.

“I don’t get it. She had left him. She chose you. Why kill him now?”

Sean looked down into his drink. He swirled it around in the crystal glass and gave a half laugh, half snigger.

“I didn’t scare him.”

Kenny watched as Sean searched inside himself, for his reason for killing Greg. He had a faraway look in his eye and his stare moved from the glass to in front of him; although the glazed look told Kenny he wasn’t focusing on anything in particular.

“He looked at me like I was nothing, like he was so above me. There was no fear in his eyes. He would have got her back, eventually. I know he would. He’d chip away at her, ever so subtly, making her doubt her choice.”

Sean’s stare finally moved to Kenny. He suddenly looked vulnerable. Kenny hadn’t seen that look in him for a long time. It reminded him of the boy he used to know.

“I mean come on… how long is it before she discovers who I really am? How long do I really have? I just bought myself a little more time, that’s all.”

Kenny didn’t answer him. Once again, Rachel had made him lose control. This, Kenny began to think, was becoming a habit. It was bad enough when she wasn’t around, but being on the scene hadn’t improved anything.

Sean was getting worse and Kenny was convinced she was the contributor behind every evil deed Sean had ever carried out. She was going to be the man’s downfall; Kenny would lay money on it.

Chapter 14

September 2006

Sitting in her pyjama’s, at a small oak table in their kitchen, Jane wrote her signature on the pad in front of her. Mrs Jane Porter. Then she wrote it again. It looked strange but felt remarkable. Mrs Jane Porter. Mrs. Th at was something she thought would never happen to her. But here she was, six months after meeting him; married.

She didn’t think she would ever be this happy. She had a brand new name. There was nothing left to tie her to her old life. Th is was now her future; a new name and a new life, in a city a million miles from where she used to be. It was perfect. Everything was perfect.

It had been a whirlwind romance. She had fallen for him, James, her husband, almost straight away. He had been so shy and awkward around her, she had found it almost impossible not to warm to him. He was gawky and lumbering, which just endeared him to her even more.

She had begun to look forward to him popping into the pub where she worked more and more. The more she saw of him, the more she thought about him. It seems he felt the same way, considering he went down on one knee and proposed, during a very romantic moonlit walk along the Mersey.

Jane smiled at the memory. James clocked it as he walked into the room. The kitchen was a considerable size.

A burgundy island that housed a sink and draining board stood in the middle of the vast open plan room. There was almost a farmhouse feel to it that was disrupted with flashes of modernity.

Fitted chrome units slotted against the far side wall, giving way to a gap in the middle where a cream cast iron Aga cooker resided. The small oak table sat in front of two magnificent French patio doors that opened up on to a modest mass of green and shrubbery.

He flicked on the kettle and took two mugs from the draining board.

“What you smiling at?” He spooned heaped coffee into the mugs and grabbed the milk from the table.

“My name…” Jane answered, with a big grin. She lifted the pad to show him. He laughed and returned to making the hot drinks.

“It looks so weird. Mrs Jane Porter.”

“It doesn’t sound weird.” James responded. “It sounds perfect.”

“Yes it does. It sounds perfect and feels perfect and I am your wife! I am
a
wife!”

He laughed at her then, not in a cruel way but in a wholeheartedly kind way. It caused her to jump up from the kitchen table and throw her arms around him, nearly knocking him flying.

“You have made me the happiest woman alive, do you know that Mr Porter?

“Mrs Porter, the feeling is quite mutual.” He replied, leaning into her clinch.

Their embrace lasted for as long as Jane allowed it to.

When she pulled away, James knew that the moment had passed. She was very much in control of what affection and contact could be made between them.

She could be so loving towards him and then something seemed to switch in her head and it would be over; just like that. They could never just lay and cuddle for hours, she always stopped it.

She held back from him when it came to intimacy.

Sex was scheduled and routine, but still good. He was a man though and guessed he would think that; it was the impression she had always given him anyway. It was the closeness and proximity she pulled away from. James often wondered, what had happened to her to make her like that. He worried sometimes, when she would wake in the night screaming. She always told him she never remembered the nightmares. He knew it was a lie, just like when she drifted off to the place in her head daily and he asked her what she was thinking about; the answer would always be the same. That it was nothing, or she didn’t remember.

She would never talk about her childhood or her life before she met him. Wasn’t that strange, he thought. His parents had found the whole shot gun style wedding very peculiar. How Jane was insistent on getting married here in Liverpool and dead against going back to Essex. Then how she reacted, when he found her birth certificate while they were sorting through personal papers, to collect their marriage certificate; she had almost snatched it out of his hand. There was her reaction, to when he told her his parents thought she was pregnant and that’s why they were getting married so quickly. He had thought it hilarious but she hadn’t. She was insistent that he put them straight right away. The whole idea of having a baby seemed to horrify her. Again, for the zillionth time, he wondered what the hell had happened to her.

He had noticed that her name was Geraldine Fitzgerald.

It was quite a strange name he supposed. He assumed she was embarrassed and didn’t want him to know. She called herself Jane and it suited her. Sometimes she acted so aloof and he really didn’t have a clue as to why. His new wife intrigued him though.

He knew there was so much more to learn about her and, if he was really honest, he couldn’t wait. It had been a very long time coming for him to feel contentment and joy, like he did with Jane. He had been stuck in a mundane and ground hog day life, since he had come to Liverpool and Jane had put the rose tint glaze to it that he had needed; the excitement and anticipation of a new chapter in his life.

For Jane the memoires were all too fresh in her mind; the day she arrived in Liverpool, what had happened before she got there, what had happened after. She had been through such a harrowing experience, that she didn’t think there would ever be a time she could talk about it. She saw the way James looked at her sometimes; the confusion and perplexity that ran through his mind. She was sorry for this. Sorry that she couldn’t open up and tell him who she really was.

She was certain he wouldn’t understand; that he would stop loving her, if he knew what she had done. It was an appalling act that happened at her hands. Jane couldn’t comprehend that she herself was the victim in it all; that it wasn’t her fault, that she had had no control over it and that she was just a child herself. She wouldn’t allow herself the freedom from her own persecution. She only hoped James wouldn’t push to find out more.

Watching him make the coffee she forced the bad thoughts out of her head. She returned to the chair, sitting down with one leg bent underneath her. She wouldn’t let him win; the monster that had caused the devastation and desolation. He had taken enough and was still taking from her, all this time later.

It had been over five years ago. Why did it feel like yesterday? Would she ever have a day where it didn’t take over her mind at some point? Where she wasn’t transported back to the sickening episode?

James interrupted the daily introspection her brain was undertaking. He put the mug of hot coffee in front of her and kissed the top of her head gently.

“How about we go out for dinner tonight?”

The simplest act of trying to make her feel better was not lost on Jane and she loved him entirely for that. It was like he knew what to say to her to make her see what she had.

That everything was different now. It was worth a thousand I love you’s. He was not aware of just how much her saviour he was. But then, she was not aware of just what a saviour she was for him. Jane had no idea, that it was her that had enabled James to trust again; to let his heart love.

She made him see a future to look forward to, instead of just another day to get through. Destiny and fate are philosophical in nature. Something had caused these two to cross paths. James and Jane were each other’s allies. It was a supernatural power that had entwined their lives; only neither of them knew it just yet.

Fate will predetermine and order the course of events; defining events as inevitable and unavoidable. It implies no choice, no free will. It will happen, no matter how hard one tries to prevent it. For Jane and James they had no idea how much their fate was connected, or just what their destiny was waiting to bring.

She grabbed hold of his leg, as he turned to walk away from her; a yearning swirled around in those bright green eyes. The immense disappointment he felt, was because he knew it wasn’t the same yearning he had for her. Hers was a longing for understanding, without any explanation given.

Desperate for him to grasp the underlining reasons for her defences. His was a web of built up frustrations, from the constant barriers he had to encounter.

“Dinner would be good.” Her smile, although genuine, never quite met the edges of her face.

James felt the stirring sensation low down in his groin, the feeling intensifying the longer she kept her hand on his thigh; the thin cotton of his trousers offering no protection from the warmth of her skin. His body unblushingly throbbed in communication to her touch.

She noticed the shift in his eyes before his physical reaction to her. She felt the familiar dread wash over her, as she recognised the intimate gaze. As she tried to move her hand away, he clenched his fist around it, his grip pulling her closer. His other hand lifted her chin up, forcing her to look at him.

The way she looked right now, with her mass of red hair twirled and pinned on top of her head, loose wayward curls escaping from the clasps, her face fresh from paint and the pure innocent grace with which she sat, was putting James’ untamed desires onto overdrive.

He lent in to kiss her, resisting the urge to give in to the animalistic passion he was consumed with and adopting a gentler, loving touch. He felt her kiss him back, her lips responding in time with his. Pulling her up off the chair to her feet, he forced her mouth open wider with his and allowed his tongue to slowly explore the wetness she possessed.

This was when he felt the familiar resistance. He had been waiting for it for the last few minutes. He felt her push against him and try and free herself from his embrace. James held on to her tighter, his breathing jaggered.

“Shall I stop?” Whispering against her lips, he worked his tongue inside them once more. His hand had a firm lock on her jaw this time, not so much as a forceful grip but more of a guiding lead.

Jane shook her head and forced herself to relax. The guilt and self-reproach she experienced daily was once again manifesting itself inside her head. She felt shameful that she couldn’t give herself totally to her husband.

That he had to resort to asking her, for a piece of herself.

But every time he touched her she was transformed, back into that girl. The girl she had spent a long time leaving behind.

She felt his hand move down, from her face, to the buttons of her pyjama shirt. His fingers gauchely fumbled the plastic discs free. Fighting back her initial tangible reaction, she allowed his hands to roam over her shoulders and down to her small symmetrical breasts.