Love You Better (36 page)

‘Olly, don’t!’ she cried, trying to wriggle free, but his grip was so strong she could barely move. He was pressed up against her so tight that she couldn’t even lift her leg to knee him in the balls – the most basic self-protection manoeuvre there was.

‘Why are you being so difficult?’ he asked, shaking his head as if they were having a normal conversation. ‘Can’t you see how much I’ve missed you?’

Effie trembled, racked with fear as he buried his face into her hair and sniffed at her. She should scream. He’d said a neighbour had let him in – someone would hear her. But before she had a chance to, Oliver crushed his lips against hers. She tried to push him away, to get him off her, but his weight was too strong, and he didn’t budge.

She fought against him as he used his free hand to hold her chin in place, and she sobbed, trying to keep her mouth closed. Her stomach quivered as he pushed his rough lips against hers even harder than before, and he let out a moan.

Oh, god. No. Please don’t.

His moan sounded wrong. It sounded like there was an edge of sexuality to it, and she sobbed even harder as she realised that he wasn’t going to stop. She pushed her hands into his stomach,
trying
to drive him away. It was like pushing against a brick wall, but she had to do something – anything – to get him off her. He barely flinched as he continued trying to get her to kiss him back. Instinctively, she opened her mouth and bit down on his lip, feeling the flesh between her teeth as the tangy, iron-like taste of blood filled her mouth. Oliver yelped and dropped his arms, his hands flying straight to his mouth.

‘You fucking bitch. You bit me!’

He’d barely finished the sentence before Effie shot down the stairs. Tears streamed down her face, stinging her eyes and blurring her vision. She could hardly see as she gripped the handrail, taking the stairs two or three steps at a time, stumbling as she went. Her breath was ragged, her heart pounding, and she could hear Oliver’s footsteps, heavy and even as he followed after her. As she reached the bottom of the stairs, she saw the communal door at the end
of the
hallway. She just needed to get outside, and she’d be fine. There was no way he’d risk anything out in public.

She turned to look behind her and tripped over a bicycle
leaning
against the wall. She scrambled forward, pulling herself up off the floor, but Oliver grabbed the back of her neck and fell on top of her. The air whooshed out of her in one breath with the impact, and it didn’t come back as she tried to wriggle her way from underneath him. He grabbed her shoulder and turned her over before sitting right on her stomach with his hands gripping her neck.

Effie snatched a breath, but his weight was too heavy, and his thumbs were pressed too tightly into the hollow of her throat.

‘You fucking bitch. I should have turned the car around and finished the job.’

Spittle flew from his mouth, hitting her face, and her eyes
widened
. It had been Oliver who had run her over. Terror filled her as she thrashed beneath him, trying to scream, but nothing came out of her mouth as he dug his thumbs in harder. She stretched her arms out, trying to claw at his face, but she couldn’t reach.

Oliver looked down at her with a scornful smile, as if her efforts to free herself were amusing him. ‘You can’t just decide you don’t love someone and run off, Effie. We made vows. What was I supposed to do – just let you run away from me? How many times do I have to teach you that actions have consequences? ’

Her heart beat loudly in her ears, tears ran from her eyes and she cried silently, panicking at the pressure building in her head
and lu
ngs.

Her mum, Mickey, Lou – she saw their faces and struggled even harder, trying to reach Oliver’s face with her hands. She couldn’t let him take them away from her, but her vision was blurring and the edges of her sight were tinged with red. The floor was cold underneath her, and she was suddenly thrown back to that night, lying on the wet tarmac, looking at the tail lights of the car that had run her over. Only now, she knew it was Oliver behind the wheel – the man who’d sworn to protect her in front of family and friends. He was going to kill her. He’d tried once and
failed, and
now he was going to try again, and there was nothing and nobody to stop him.

Smith’s face filled her head. She saw his beautiful eyes and heard his hearty laugh. Smith, who loved her. She’d only just got him back. The pressure in her head reached tipping point, and she realised that she hadn’t told him she loved him back.

I love you, Smith. I love you, I love you, I love you.

If she could’ve said it out loud, she would have, just so that Oliver would know he hadn’t won. That she wasn’t his and never had been or would be, whether she was alive or not.

‘Effie?’

She heard Smith’s voice as her arms dropped to the floor. Despite Oliver’s thumbs pressing into her throat, a small smile flickered at her mouth. Nobody could ever say her name like him, and if she had to die, she wanted the memory of his voice to be the last thing she heard. She closed her eyes. She had no more fight left in her, and her lungs couldn’t take any more. She stopped resisting, and the pressure disappeared.

Was she dead?

She gasped, drawing in a breath so sharp it made her gag. She turned on her side, doubled over as her forehead pressed to the floor while she coughed and dragged in as much air as she could in turns. She was alive. Her throat was burning, and her brain felt like it was spinning in her head, but she was alive. She pulled herself up onto her elbows, shaking as she looked up, trying to work out what had happened, just in time to see Smith tussling with Oliver on the floor by the stairs.

‘Smith?’ she choked out. He was there. She hadn’t imagined it.

He didn’t hear her tiny voice as he punched Oliver in the face, right in the jaw. The sound of bone connecting with bone echoed loudly, and Effie tried to drag herself forward, but her body was too heavy and her ribs ached.

‘Smith, don’t.’

He landed three more blows to Oliver’s face as the communal door opened, and a young woman Effie recognised as one of the upstairs neighbours walked in. The woman stopped mid-stride, her face aghast at what was happening.

‘Call the police,’ Smith shouted, pinning Oliver down to the ground. ‘Now!’

The woman nodded and scrambled through her bag as Effie hauled herself up to sit against the wall. She coughed again, wincing at the raw burn in her throat as the neighbour frantically jabbed at her mobile phone and Smith turned his head.

‘Effie.’ He leapt up, leaving Oliver sprawled on the floor, and shot over to her, almost tripping over his feet. He fell to the floor next to her and pulled her into his arms, kissing her face over and over again. He looked at her, his eyes
darting
across her face and his hands in her hair as he checked her over. ‘I thought you were . . . Thank god, you’re okay.’

He pulled her back into him, his strong arms holding her close as she sobbed.

‘You came back.’

‘Of course I came back.’ He squeezed her and kissed the top of her head. ‘I wasn’t going to miss being with you just to take my bike back.’

The adrenalin pulsing through Effie’s body fought its way up through her throat in a shaky, misplaced laugh. If he’d carried on home, she would have died. The young woman looked at them, with the phone still pressed to her ear, as she gave the police their address, and when she hung up, she looked from Smith and Effie to Oliver, lying on the ground, and back again.

‘They’re on the way,’ she said as Oliver turned on his side to hawk and spit. ‘I’ll get some water.’

She raced up the stairs, and Oliver sat up, holding his nose. His light blue shirt was stained with blood.

‘If you even so much as
think
about moving . . .’ Smith snarled at him.

‘Smith, don’t,’ Effie said, squeezing his arm.

‘He tried to kill you.’

‘I know, but you can’t go at him again. I mean it, Smith. Please.’ Effie’s voice trembled.

Oliver wasn’t going anywhere, not with Smith blocking the way out. The police were on their way, but she knew that before the night was out, he’d have a top-drawer lawyer to represent him. She couldn’t let Smith do anything more that might see him land in prison. She could almost see the anger at Oliver pulsing from Smith’s body, but she held on to him tightly.

‘Please, Smith. Let the police deal with it.’

His jaws clenched as he turned to look at Oliver again, and Effie willed him not to go back and finish what he’d started. She could see the fire in his eyes as he looked at the man who had tried to kill her, but she interlocked her fingers with his. Smith looked back at her and nodded.

‘Fine, but I’m not taking my eyes off him.’

Just as he’d said he would, Smith glared at Oliver right up until the moment the police arrived. Effie stood next to Smith with an itchy wool blanket around her shoulders, watching as two officers read Oliver his rights and slapped the handcuffs on his wrists. She felt lighter with every breath she took. It was finally over.

‘You know I’ll probably get arrested too, right? I don’t want you to panic.’ Smith hooked his hand around the back of her head and kissed the top of her forehead.

‘Why? You didn’t do anything wrong.’

‘I’m sure he’ll have something different to say about that.’

Oliver threw her a look of pure disgust as he was led outside onto the street and into the shimmering blue lights of the police sirens. She held on to Smith tightly, praying the police wouldn’t come back for him. He’d only been defending her, but this was exactly what she’d been afraid of, what she’d been trying to protect him from.

‘Hey.’ Smith kissed her again and pulled her in for a hug. ‘We’ll be fine. I promise.’

The flickering of the lights lit up the hallway in an eerily calm glow. The neighbour was talking to an officer, telling him what she saw. Surely she’d say that Smith was the good guy in all this? Effie burrowed her head into his chest, sucking in the scent she’d thought she’d never smell again.

‘I know what I’d do if I only had forty-four minutes left to live now.’ She looked up at him, and he smiled.

‘A near-death experience will do that.’ He tucked her hair behind her ears. ‘So, what would you do?’

Effie reached up on her tiptoes and wrapped her arms around his neck, letting the blanket fall to her feet as she kissed him, her hands delving into his hair. He kissed her back, holding her close to him as the flashing blue lights lit up the space around them. She broke away from him and looked at his beautiful grey eyes. Even when she’d looked into them on her wedding day, she’d known, deep down, how she felt.

‘I love you.’

‘Took you long enough.’ Smith grinned. ‘Tell me something
I do
n’t know.’

He laughed and pulled her back in close to his chest, squeezing her in a hug as she wrapped her arms around his waist.

‘I love you too,’ he murmured.

Effie smiled, clinging on to him, and didn’t let go.

SIX MO
N
THS LATER

Effie sat in her seat and looked out of the rain-speckled cabin
window
, letting out a long breath. Why did it have to rain, today of all days? She turned to look at Smith as he put their hand luggage in the overhead locker, and she saw the taut strip of flesh on his abs as his T-shirt rode up. One look at the line of hair leading from his belly button to his jeans made her cheeks burn.

‘You okay?’ he asked, sitting next to her and taking her hand.

‘Yep. I just wish it wasn’t raining.’

He laughed and kissed her knuckles. ‘We’ll be fine. It’s
just rain
.’

‘Ladies and gentlemen, welcome onboard Air India Flight 9W121 from London to Delhi.’

Effie listened to the captain’s distorted voice through the
tannoy
and looked at Smith. ‘What’s the flight time again?’

‘About nine hours,’ Smith replied.

A flight attendant made her way up the aisle, checking that the overhead lockers were securely closed.

‘I hope I’ll be able to sleep.’

Smith leaned over and kissed the space right under her ear. ‘We could always try the mile-high thing. That might tire you out.’

She grinned and playfully whacked his arm. ‘Shush. People can hear you.’

‘So?’ He shrugged. ‘Once we’re up in the air, we’re free.’

Effie looked out of the window again at the bright lights of Heathrow’s terminal building. They were free, and she felt it too. Now she could see how much Oliver had manipulated her,
trying
to turn her into something she wasn’t, from the clothes he’d bought her to his suggestions about how she should wear her hair. She’d been trying to run away from herself for so long, ashamed at being abandoned by her mum and hurt by what had happened with Smith, that she had been an easy target. It had taken being beaten and almost killed to make her see what Smith, Lou and her mum had said all along. She was fine as she was.
Better
than fine, in fact.

She choked back the tears in her throat. Her heart had wrenched in her chest when they’d hugged Lou and Mickey goodbye by the security gate. After Oliver’s arrest, Lou hadn’t wanted to let Effie out of her sight, feeling guilty for having arranged to meet her instead of coming straight home from work. It was only because of Smith that she’d reluctantly let someone take over
babysitting
duty, not that Effie needed it. The minute her soon-to-be ex-husband had been led away in handcuffs, she’d felt freer than she had for a long time.

‘You’re worried about Lou, aren’t you?’ Smith asked, and she looked back at him with her chin wobbling and nodded. She always had been bad at goodbyes. She must have inherited that from Penny.

‘She’ll be fine. Besides, she’s got Mickey.’

Lou and Mickey getting back together was the one thing that had made leaving so much easier. When Smith had called to tell them what had happened, they’d both raced back to Lou’s and had been almost inseparable since.

‘I know. I’m just being silly.’

He tucked her hair behind her ear. ‘No, you’re just being you. And I love you for it.’

Effie smiled. No matter how many times he said it, the sheen never wore off. He loved her, just as she was. What they had now was completely different than it had been before. He’d been her rock for the last few months, holding her shaking hand when she’d been called in to give her statement to the Crown Prosecution
Service
against Oliver. His being a top barrister had meant nothing – not when there was photographic evidence of his violence. And since he’d confessed to running her over, his car had been forensically examined, uncovering proof of repairs made to the bodywork. He’d been formally charged and given conditional bail, and from what Effie had heard, things had gone south for him. The air of respectability he had carried around was shattered, and his clients were falling over themselves to take their business elsewhere. Izzy had left her voicemail after voicemail, telling her how horrified she was, how she’d never be able to forgive Oliver for hurting her. Effie hadn’t returned her calls. She wanted nothing more to do with Oliver, and if that meant breaking ties with his sister, then so be it. Not even the tiniest part of her felt sorry for him.

The captain announced the closure of the aircraft doors, and Effie buckled her seatbelt. Smith switched his phone to ‘Flight Mode’, and she took hers from her pocket to do the same. She smiled as she saw the text message on her screen.

Have a safe flight, Sweetpea. Can’t wait to see you both and will be waiting at Arrivals. And remember, when you get here, take a deep breath. Your first breath in India is
something
to be remembered. Love, Mum.

‘Should I be worried?’ She laughed, showing the message to Smith.

‘I’d be lying if I said I hadn’t been to some places with a funky smell.’ He grinned as she grimaced, and then went back to flicking through the guidebook he’d bought after checking in.

If anyone had told her she’d ever go to India, she’d have thought they were crazy. She’d seen it on the television and in films,
looking
at the pictures of extreme poverty, slum children and dirt, but Penny had always painted a very different view. After everything that had happened, Effie had wanted to get as far away from
London
as
possible
, and when Penny had invited them over, she’d accepted without hesitation. And if she didn’t like it, it didn’t matter. India was just a pit stop on the way to their final
destination
of Sydney – the place where Smith was supposed to have finished his year-long trip.

She leaned over and looked at the photograph of the Taj Mahal in his book. ‘Will we be able to see it, do you think?’

‘We can do whatever you want.’ He grinned and kissed the tip of her nose as the air bridge connecting the plane to the airport slowly retracted. ‘We’ve got nothing but time.’

THE END