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Amelia kissed her cheek. ‘This’ll be over soon.’
It was like Mel hadn’t heard her, and was locked away inside her own mind. ‘All our life’s savings… Twenty-five years we’ve been married. Frank will be devastated when he realises what I’ve done.’
‘You’re in a loveless marriage, Mel. It’s time you found happiness.’ She kissed her on the lips passionately, tasting the sweetness of her mouth. When she withdrew, Mel was crying. ‘I’m your future now. You don’t have to fear what happens next.’
Mel pushed her away. ‘I don’t know if I can live a life on the run.’ She tried to wipe away her tears as quickly as they fell. ‘I love you, Amelia, but I don’t know if I’m strong enough to do this. I thought I was but I was wrong. How can this be right?’
Amelia shushed her as she drew her into her body, comforting her as a mother does a child. Mel let herself fall into the embrace and they lay back on the bed.
‘It’s right because God says it is,’ Amelia said. ‘He’ll forgive an act of true love, of true justice.’ She closed Mel’s eyes with her fingertips.
Mel sniffed back tears. ‘God doesn’t agree with us, what we are. What we do to each other.’ She reached out for Amelia’s body.
Amelia smiled as her lips brushed against Mel’s ear. ‘I wasn’t talking about us.’
Mel felt the change in Amelia’s body. When her eyes opened, Amelia had already retrieved the fragment of broken glass she’d concealed inside the mattress earlier.
Mel’s eyes narrowed in confusion then fear as Amelia brought it up to her left eye.
It was what remained of the Virgin Mary statue.
‘What’re you doing?’
Amelia pushed her weight against Mel’s chest and sat astride her, knees pinning Mel’s arms down hard against the bed.
‘I’m sorry I’ve had to smash this, Mel, after you took all the trouble to sneak it in, but how else was I going to do this?’
Mel felt bile rise in her throat as the realisation hit her. The last two years had been nothing but a lie.
‘God had a plan for me from the moment I was born. I’ve used my time to plan His dream and now it’s time for me to put all His words into practice.’
Mel’s eyes locked onto the Bible on the shelf but was too stunned to speak.
‘You must understand none of this is personal.’ Amelia leaned closer to look into Mel’s eyes. ‘He wants revenge and only I can do this.’
Mel felt her voice catching in her throat as she spoke. ‘Who wants revenge? Revenge for what?’
‘God…talks to me. But He’s stopped. There’s no more guidance He can give me unless I get out of here. Don’t deny the will of God, Mel. You were sent to help me. This was God’s plan for you. He sent you to me. Sacrifice yourself for me and there will be a place for you in Heaven despite the sins you’ve committed by lying with women and committing adultery.’
Amelia clamped her hand down over Mel’s mouth as she went to scream, drowning out the sound before she could call for help.
She brought the glass back to Mel’s eye, so close that her eyelashes flicked the glass tip each time she blinked.
‘I’ll give you something to really scream about if you don’t shut the fuck up, you stupid bitch,’ Amelia hissed, her mask slipping.
At that moment Mel saw just what really lurked underneath the beautiful face that she’d grown to love and her eyes circled the room, desperate for a way out.
She saw the panic button near the door and tried to throw Amelia from her but Amelia’s knees dug harder into her arms.
‘I want you to know that every touch, every kiss and every word was a lie. Every time I touched your body, every time I made you forget the sadness in your life meant nothing to me but a means to an end. Every time I made you cry out for me…all lies. Nothing was real.
‘Know this… I scrubbed myself until I bled after each and every time you touched my skin. I faked every cry of pleasure but now it’s my turn. I want to make you scream…for your life.’
Each and every moment Mel had shared with Amelia came into the forefront of her memory and it made her feel sick. The reality of Amelia’s words had taken hold of her body, but now the heartache was giving way to the adrenaline that now ran through her body.
The survival instinct began to kick in and Mel pushed all her emotional pain deep inside her body.
She blinked hard, tried to think clearly.
She was heavier than Amelia. She could use this to her advantage. With one surge forward she bucked her body forward, throwing Amelia from the bed.
The sound of Amelia’s head hitting the floor was sickening.
Mel scrambled from the bed.
She stood, her heart pounding, staring at Amelia’s limp body blocking the door. Her only hope of escape.
The glass was still in Amelia’s hand and she edged closer, bent down and snatched it away before jumping back.
She stared at Amelia’s body again until she was satisfied she was unconscious and edged towards the door. As she reached for the handle a leg rose up and kicked her hard in the ribs, knocking the wind from her.
She fell to the floor, doubled up in pain. Through her tears she saw Amelia pulling herself up from the floor and cradling her head.
Then Amelia stared down at her.
Mel swung the glass wildly, trying to fend her off, but Amelia was soon down on her like a lioness against its prey. She wrenched the glass from Mel’s hand and brought it down hard into her throat.
Mel’s eyes were wide as she spluttered, shots of blood gurgling from the wound.
Amelia stood above her, her eyes cold, looking down at Mel’s now outstretched arm.
She picked up the leather bag Mel had brought with her. Inside there were bundles of notes, £10,000 in cash, a brown wig, a purse and Mel’s security card that opened the hospital doors in the secure areas.
Amelia frowned. She cast her eyes back to Mel. ‘You didn’t pack my change of clothes?’
Mel’s eyes were beginning to look glassy, but still they twitched.
A silent ‘fuck you’.
Amelia reached down, grabbed a fistful of hair and yanked her head up. ‘You forgot them, didn’t you?’ Mel blinked hard and Amelia let her head drop back to the floor and kicked her hard in the gut. ‘You stupid cunt.’
Mel barely made a sound.
Realising she’d have to improvise, Amelia grabbed the sheet from the bed and wrapped it around Mel’s head, covering her face and neck. She then started to remove Mel’s clothes, careful not to get any more blood on them than there was already.
Soon Mel stopped moving and blood soaked through the white sheet.
Amelia stripped from her nightwear and put on Mel’s clothes: a thin purple jumper and black skinny jeans that hung off Amelia’s body. Not ideal but it was necessary.
She looked down at Mel’s body.
She knew there was a toilet across from her room which had a safety mirror in it. She dragged Mel’s body to the other side of the bed, so it was unseen from the window in the door.
She searched her trouser pockets and pulled out a five-pound note, a hair band, and a set of house keys. She removed Mel’s shoes and pulled them on. They were a size too big and they rubbed the backs of her heels as she walked to the door.
She switched off the light and slowly opened the door, checked the corridor was clear and ran into the toilet opposite her.
Inside the small toilet was a wash-basin and the safety mirror.
Amelia stared at her reflection. Her hair was tousled in a wilder mess than usual. She found the hair band and pulled her hair into a rough ponytail. She picked up the wig.
Mel had shoulder-length brown curly hair. She’d had a wig custom-made with a view to helping Amelia escape by posing as herself. At a quick glance, no one would’ve questioned her. But in Mel’s haste to please, she hadn’t quite thought about how she would’ve got out herself. There had never been a time when she’d doubted Amelia’s words.
A mistake that’d proved fatal.
Amelia pulled the wig over her ponytail, adjusted it, then stared back at her reflection.
Not bad.
Her eyes fell to the front of the jumper.
She used some water to dab off the spots of blood around the collar and shoulder. There was little she could do, and she gave up as the blood smudged to a dark-coloured stain. Against the purple fabric it wasn’t too noticeable and at this time of night, there would be few staff and security around to stop her. Government cuts had led to staff shortages, which worked nicely in her plan.
She took a deep breath and stepped out into the corridor, Mel’s bag slung over her shoulder, security pass swinging on the lanyard around her neck.
She walked quickly.
She kept her head down low as she passed each security camera mounted up high on the walls. It’d just be George manning them tonight and Mel had seen to him to buy his silence.
The bright white corridors seemed to wind on forever, but soon she came to the first set of security doors.
She held Mel’s pass over the sensor pad and breathed a sigh of relief as it beeped and the door clicked open. She navigated two more doors until she came to the side trade entrance Mel had used to enter the building.
There was no one there.
George had left his post.
Once outside, Amelia found herself in the visitors’ car park, partially lit in the darkness.
She still had Mel’s keys with her but taking her car was out of the question. She headed towards the security booth that would be the last barrier she had to pass before reaching the road ahead into Stokebrook village high street.
As she approached the booth, she saw it was occupied as expected.
She dipped her hand into her pocket and felt the tip of the shard of glass she’d retrieved from Mel. She pressed the edge against her fingertip.
The man in the booth watched as she approached the pedestrian walkway with some curiosity.
It was George.
***
Amelia had been free for half an hour, climbing over fences and running over farmland, George’s blood mixed with Mel’s on her jumper.
Stokebrook village was surrounded by farmland and a wood, and Amelia had passed at least two other sleepy hamlets in the last half hour. Despite the isolation, she’d been careful to keep to the fields that ran behind the hearts of the villages.
She paused for breath behind a wooden outbuilding on some farmland.
The night was silent with only the light of the moon to illuminate her surroundings. She was tired from running and needed somewhere to sleep. She peeked inside the unlocked outbuilding.
There was nothing but hay inside, and although it smelt musty she curled up in the middle of it, pulling it all around her so she was hidden.
Using Mel’s bag as a pillow, she rested her head and closed her eyes.
***
It was almost 7:00am when she awoke the next day to the sound of her stomach growling.
She was starving.
She rolled over and pulled out strands of hay that had caught in her hair. She sat up and pain surged through her skull. She grabbed the back of her head, rubbing it.
She inspected her fingers and saw dried flaky blood. She realised she’d cut her head when Mel had pushed her to the floor.
Ignoring the pain, she peeked outside and saw that morning dew had soaked the grass and a low mist still hung in the hills ahead of her. She was cold from the lack of food and proper clothes. She walked a few minutes down a small country lane to try and get her bearings.
She came across a small cottage with some clothes hanging on a washing line. She crept as quietly as she could and felt the fabric. Everything was damp from being left out overnight, but Amelia didn’t care.
She grabbed a child’s pink baseball cap, tracksuit bottoms, a top and zip-up fleece from the line. She ran behind some dense bushes and pulled off Mel’s now grass-and-mud stained clothes and changed into the stolen ones.
The elasticised tracksuit bottoms fitted her fairly well, but the top drowned her. She pulled the fleece on, which fitted more snugly, before pulling the cap down low, obscuring her face with the peak. It was too tight, but not noticeably so.
She stood quietly for a while and could hear traffic somewhere in the distance, and wondered whether to risk hitting the main roads or not.
The hunger in her stomach made the decision for her.
After walking for half a mile she saw the main road through the trees, the cars zipping past in a blur. She saw a road sign for a service station and followed through the fields that ran alongside the main road until she saw the Welcome Break services ahead.
She walked through the car park towards the main entrance. No one seemed to notice her dressed as she was, and she blended in with the crowds of people resting in the many eateries.
She could smell the strong scent of fast food, burgers, fried breakfasts and muffins. Her stomach growled as she made herself walk past and towards the small WHSmith ahead.
She couldn’t afford to be noticed by anyone. It would be less of a risk to blend in a fast-moving queue. She grabbed some water, crisps and a few chocolate bars and paid.
Soon she was ripping the wrappers from the chocolate and stuffing them into her mouth without really chewing, before washing it back with the water.
She was sitting in the picnic area away from most of the cars, gripping Mel’s bag tighter, thinking of the money inside that would help her on her journey for revenge.
She looked around and saw the pay phone.
She had less than a pound in coins, but didn’t want to risk going back into the services complex. She put all the coins in the slot and dialled the number she’d committed to memory, and waited.
‘Hello?’
Amelia almost cried at the sound of his voice. Her eyes shut tight.
‘It’s me…I need your help.’
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