The world needs to hear your voice, my love. One day I will see your name in print. Never give up x
My chin dimples at Eddie’s message. The rejections Katherine’s received seem all the crueller when cast in this light. I set the note down with an unsteady hand, wondering how Katherine would react if she saw me prying like this. The thought has my heart pounding. Moving my focus away from the note, I scan the rest of the desk. A stack of papers sits in the centre, with an expectant fountain pen perched beside them.
Glancing at the door, I look for a sign of Katherine, but all I hear is silence. Relieved, I focus back on the papers. Before I can stress about how terrible it is to read someone’s work before they’re ready to share it, I pluck the first page from the pile and begin to read.
Alexa Clarke didn’t feel her skull splinter at first.
Even the shudder-inducing crack of the initial impact took a few seconds to register with her.
Alexa’s momentary ignorance could suggest how unexpected an act of violence was in her life. Maybe the hostile beauty of the late November morning had captured her attention. Maybe she suddenly remembered something – an appointment she had to attend or that she hadn’t turned the iron off.
I inhale sharply. For as long as I’ve known her, Katherine has been a romance writer. I’ve read samples of her work many times, but it’s never been like this. This is dark and unnerving.
My skin tingles as I wonder what made Katherine write such a twisted tale. Biting my lip, I glance at the door again, half expecting to see her standing there, alarmed at my intrusion, but I’m still alone.
I know I should put the manuscript down and leave, but a rush of adrenaline goads me to read on. Only a little. I skim to the end of the chapter, my hand rising to my mouth as it concludes with Alexa Clarke being struck over the head in a field behind her home.
A sinking feeling floods my limbs. Katherine’s fictional retelling echoes reality uncomfortably closely. The writing is so vivid, so realistic, it’s like I was there with Alexa when she was attacked.
Shuddering, I thumb the rest of the manuscript and skim read sections describing the horrific torture of Alexa Clarke, chained to a bed in a white room, and the heroic actions of a plucky young detective trying to find her. The time stamp at the top of each chapter makes my hands shake.
Forcing myself to breathe slowly, I drop the manuscript. I’ve been up here too long. Limping out of the room, my throat constricts at the rancid odour – it’s so much stronger out here. Whatever iscausing the stench must be behind one of the remaining three doors. As my gag reflex kicks into life, so does my brain.
You’ve smelt something like this before, it says.
That’s when it hits me.
While researching for my last book, I sat in on an autopsy. While I was interviewing the pathologist afterwards, a body arrived that had been found three weeks after the person died.
‘Do you want to know what death smells like?’ he asked.
‘What kind of thriller author would I be if I said no to that?’ I replied.
The answer was a far less nauseated one. The repulsive smell stayed in my nostrils for days, despite me only popping my head in the room where the body lay for a moment. Acrid and pungent, like rotting meat only ten times worse. I would never forget the smell of a decomposing corpse.
And somehow, Katherine’s house smells exactly like that.
It only registers with me why that could be a split second before something crashes into the side of my skull.
CHAPTER 50
I can’t move.
That’s my first thought when my head finally stops spinning enough for me to register that I am still alive.
Open your eyesis the second, but try as I might, they cling to the blackness of denial.
Behind me, Katherine grumbles. ‘Why did she insist on coming upstairs? I’m barely halfway through the book.’
I’m about to ask her what she means by that when I feel her hands wrap around my ankles. The injured one smarts, but Katherine doesn’t give me a second to protest before she starts dragging me across the carpet.
‘What are you doing?’ I cry.
Or at least, that’s what I try to cry. In reality, the only sound coming out of my mouth is a garbled moan.
‘You’re awake,’ Katherine says, yanking me harder. ‘Great. That will make this even more difficult.’
‘What are you—’ I croak, but I never get to finish my sentence because Katherine’s hands move to my waist and flip me over.The wound on my head roars as it presses against the carpet. The pain is so fierce, the shock of it forces my eyes to open.