Right Behind You

Diana Wilkinson

Description

I have no idea why he thinks I had anything to do with Danielle’s accident. My only crime was being in the vicinity when she fell down the stairs.

Being forced into therapy for stalking, though, is well over the top. But my therapist, Justine, is quite the character. I know what she wants to hear, and I’m also a master at playing the system.

When she twigs what’s really on my mind, she might not be so cool. I’m starting to enjoy watching her try to unravel my secrets. And make no mistake, there are plenty of dark corners to explore…..

From the bestselling author of 4 Riverside Close comes a dark and twisty thriller, with an anti-hero you can't help but love

Previously published as The Girl Who Turned A Blind Eye

Praise for Right Behind You from real readers:

‘I was hooked! I couldn't put it down!’ ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ reader review

‘I loved this book! … This was totally up my street - creepy, dark, atmospheric and chilling.’ ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ reader review

‘A cold and darkly menacing read … you never quite know what is going to happen next...’ ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ reader review

‘This book was a gift. Very different and gripping plot, and a very twisty ending that I didn’t see coming.’ ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ reader review

‘Loved this book … for anyone who likes twisty turny thrillers.’ ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ reader review

‘It really did have me gripped … I liked how unique the story is.’ ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ reader review

‘Another wonderful five star book from Diana Wilkinson that keeps you guessing to the end.’ ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ reader review

‘What a brilliant book. I need more from Diana.’ ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ reader review

Sujets

• Policier & Thriller
• Policier
• Thriller
• Mashups
• Psychological
• Women Sleuths
• Hard-Boiled
• Amateur Sleuth
• Thrillers
• Women
• Adventure (Guyana)
• Suspenso
• 21st century
• Psychological thriller
• Domestic
• Woman
• Psychology
• Stalking
• The Women
• Adventure
• Crime
• Suspense
• Noir
• Fiction

Informations

• Publié par: Boldwood Books
• Date de parution: 24 mars 2023
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9781837516438
• Langue: English

Extrait

RIGHT BEHIND YOU


DIANA WILKINSON
For Sofia Lyons-O’Sullivan… An angel at work
CONTENTS



Prologue

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

Chapter 14

Chapter 15

Chapter 16

Chapter 17

Chapter 18

Chapter 19

Chapter 20

Chapter 21

Chapter 22

Chapter 23

Chapter 24

Chapter 25

Chapter 26

Chapter 27

Chapter 28

Chapter 29

Chapter 30

Chapter 31

Chapter 32

Chapter 33

Chapter 34

Chapter 35

Chapter 36

Chapter 37

Chapter 38

Chapter 39

Chapter 40

Chapter 41

Chapter 42

Chapter 43

Chapter 44

Chapter 45

Chapter 46

Chapter 47

Chapter 48

Chapter 49

Chapter 50

Chapter 51

Chapter 52

Chapter 53

Chapter 54

Chapter 55

Chapter 56

Chapter 57

Chapter 58

Chapter 59

Chapter 60

Chapter 61

Chapter 62

Chapter 63

Chapter 64

Chapter 65

Chapter 66

Chapter 67


More from Diana Wilkinson

Acknowledgments

About the Author

Also by Diana Wilkinson

The Murder List

About Boldwood Books
PROLOGUE
THE GARDEN SHED

My outward appearance resembles that of a carefully mown and manicured Wimbledon lawn; pristine, clipped and ready for action. Not a weed in sight. Bring on the players. I perfect the look with an air of crisp efficiency. People imagine the foundations, the layers underneath my manufactured guise to be solid and hard-earned. A person of substance. How do I know? Because I’m treated with respect due from such summations. I read people well, but they have no idea who I really am or what lies beneath.
Below this surface mantle there are no soft silts and sands; no gentle porous foundations. My life has no rich varied layers of experience. Below the smell of freshly cut grass, a giant batholith lies embedded in my core. I was only ten when this black mass of spewing magma exploded through my being, killing off everything in its wake, and it slumbers dangerously close to the surface, threatening to expose itself at any time as life erodes its delicate casing.
Meanwhile, I pretend. I pretend all is right with the world. I keep the façade firmly in place to fool those around me. I know I mustn’t tell, but I can’t forget.
I remember. Every detail. It never goes away.
It’s the pendulous jowls and wet salivating lips. That’s what I see. The thin veneer of sweat coating the fat alabaster face is what I smell. The sweet cloying stench still hangs heavy in the air. It clung to my pores long after the scalding showers scorched my body and I’m still not clean, my nostrils thick with memories.
The garden shed was coloured a faded apple green. Flakes of paint rained to the ground when the door was yanked open.
‘Green snowflakes.’ He laughed. ‘Look.’ His eyes, shrivelled black raisins in a wobbly jelly, glanced briefly down at the ragged chips but he was too eager to get inside. There was no time to linger.
The inside was kitted out like a 1960s sitting room. A drop-leaf table was pushed tight against the damp rotting slats. It would be opened out once he’d caught his breath; crisps and custard creams blackmailing my silence. A two-seater sofa was wedged between the walls and bolstered up the flimsy structure. There was nowhere else to sit. I willed the walls to crumble, bury the shame.
Net curtains, stapled in place, sealed us off from the outside world. Thick dirt was so engrained it had solidified and ensured the flimsy material wouldn’t budge. The floral chipped teacups and sugar tongs teased with homeliness and I often wonder where he got his props. The room smelt of urine, sweat and old age; and death.
Cobwebs decorated the corners with neatly spun gossamer threads. That’s how they looked when I walked in the first time, having been enticed with sweets and treats. But the black hairy arachnids lay in wait; teasing with their silken perfection. That’s the way clever predators operate. They lure the unsuspecting with illusory delights. But the spiders didn’t hang about. They scuttled off, disseminating their pristine homes, when his blubbery white hide appeared and wobbled in excitement.
It wasn’t long until I began to change my route home from school. Left down Burton Avenue, right into Salisbury Road and third left into Park Lane. At the main road I would scamper across when the lights turned green. I tried not to look panicked in case anyone intervened. I measured my pace. He might be there, sitting on a bench, watching me. ‘Remember. It’s our little secret. You mustn’t tell.’ A waggling admonishing finger kept me quiet.
Then I would hurry on through the park, not daring to look back. My heart hammered in my chest, beating like a kettle drum. But there was no escape, no matter how fast I ran, or how hard.
Five more minutes and I’d be home. I counted the numbers backwards from three hundred. That was on a Monday. On Tuesday I took the direct route and avoided the park. Wednesday I spun a coin. Thursday was games afternoon so I got dropped off. On Fridays there was nowhere to run. He only worked a four-day week and would be waiting for me. ‘Fun Friday’ he called it and he was never late.
He became my stalker. I learnt the word later when it needed no explanation. My anxious alertness turned quickly to fear and then to terror. I became a prisoner in my own skin, the invisible walls impenetrable. He was everywhere, all day and all night; watching and waiting.
‘Boo. There you are. I wondered where you’d gone.’
The tree trunk wasn’t wide enough; I’d seen him but I wasn’t fast enough. Again it was too late when I walked in and he was chatting to the shopkeeper, soft candy grasped in fat sausage fingers.
‘Here, do you fancy some? My treat.’
But worst of all was the nightmarish anticipation of Fridays. There was one at the end of every week.
‘Hi, Snippet. Let me walk you home. I could do with the company.’ He called me Snippet. It was his pet name. It rhymed with whippet, his scrawny breed of dog. We were both thin and wiry and got patted on the head.
He’d come to school and chat merrily to a teacher, blocking the exit gates. His sweaty palm would grip mine tightly all the way back and he would only let go when he loosened his belt and unzipped his trousers. By then we’d be inside; the door locked behind us.
It was the stalking that left the scars, the deepest gullies. His death brought a joyous finality to the physical torture, a fleeting release. Outside, through the newly barred windows of the shed, his rheumy watery eyes glistened through a small rip in the curtains. They made a silent unblinking plea; easy to ignore. Instead I smiled back, waved my skinny fingers and skipped away. I was barely thirteen after all, not quite done with skipping.
But I still look over my shoulder. Sleep eludes me. When I try to eat, my food tastes of vomit mingled with a sticky sweetness. My senses are full; full of sounds, sights and tastes but without the pleasure. The joy of touch eludes me. The flaccid monster that grew and grew in my hand, ‘the big friendly giant’ saw to that.
I should have told. It was my own fault. Not his death, but the ‘not telling’. But I was only ten when it all began. Who would have listened? My age and innocence flew quickly by, but after his death I learnt to keep the illusion in place, skilfully, and for long enough so that no one would think me capable of murder. It never crossed their minds.
My stalker was Uncle Chuck Curry; ‘Chuckles’ to his friends; the big, fat, happy clown. He only lived two roads away and was my mother’s stepbrother; the perfect babysitter.
A wolf in sheep’s clothing. That was Uncle Chuck; the harmless cheerful buffoon. His appearance was his disguise. He nurtured the look with jam and cream doughnuts. What wasn’t to like? And then, of course, he warned me not to tell. If I did, he’d lock me in the shed and throw away the key.
1
6 MONTHS PREVIOUSLY

I feel as if I’m in an isolation bunker, the chill in the air quite deathly. The flesh along both arms is stippled with pimples. It’s as if the world has come to an end but with foresight, I’ve been clever enough to brick myself in.
The concrete stairwell is positively empty. I’m not surprised as I pinch my nose against the rank stench of urine. Yellow stains clog up the corners and remnants of rancid hamburger baps exude stale fumes. I shiver, fearful of breathing in the toxic mix. No one else is risking the fallout.
Tucked neatly behind the swing doors at the top, three flights up, my ears are primed against the slightest noise. Through the thick swing doors I pick up the faintest of buzzing. It’s the office workers moseying around the lifts, talking in hushed voices, waiting for the tin cubicles to ferry them back down to the car park and ground zero. Their laziness plays into my hands because no one bothers to descend on foot. They never do. If I’m right, she’ll be the only one to turn up.
It’s been roughly three months since I heard about her impending baby. Thinking about it still makes me mad, leaving me unable to unlock my jawline which is clenched, day and night. My fury is sealed within for the whole twenty-four hours of each day.
Suddenly the swing doors open slightly and my hand shoots out flat against the wall to steady myself, but they close again and no one appears. Retreating voices fade as the clatter of metal heralds the arrival of the lift. Fate has played into my hands as they must have decided against the exercise. My heart threatens to crack its confines and a few seconds pass before I manage a deep breath to slow its rhythm.
My watch shows it’s still only ten past five. I have six minutes left to wait. She’s that regular. At the end of the working day there are lots of random people who head purposefully towards the un