Page 87 of The Taskmaster
“Abigail, there’d better be a good explanation for why you’ve been out all night. We were worried sick. Your dad has had the on-duty officers trawling the streets looking for you,” my mum said, and I walked past them and headed to my bedroom, telling them I was fine. I’d gone out with some friends from school and lost track of time.
“Until four a.m.?” my dad had shouted, but Mum shushed him and said, “At least she’s home now. And she won’t ever do that again, will you, Abigail?” adding, “Consider yourself grounded for the next five years.”
“They grounded me for a month, and I didn’t care. I wanted to stay at home. I wanted to hide in my house and never go out again. I didn’t tell them the real reason I’d been out for all that time. I couldn’t bear to break their hearts. My heart was broken enough for the three of us. But I never forgot those names. Doris, Jilly, Penelope, Carrie, Angela, and Q.”
He stiffened as I said the names, and I glanced up at him through my tear-stained eyes.
Then I shifted back slightly and moved the jewellery box closer to me. I opened the lid and took out the gold locket.
“For years, those names were black marks, vile reminders that were branded into my brain. But I kept them there, locked up. A disgusting memory that wouldn’t fade, no matter how hard I tried. I hated what they did to me, what they’d done to Stacey. I knew there’d be more victims, and yet, at the age I was when I escaped, I was too frightened to tell anyone.
“As I got older, the memories festered inside me, like a virus I needed to cut out. And then my dad got cancer, and I was so fucking mad at the world. Why did we have to suffer when people like that were walking free?”
Isaiah nodded. He got it. I knew he would. And I hated that he’d seen me at my most vulnerable after having the flashback tonight, but maybe it needed to happen. I needed to cut my cancer out of me any way I could, and by telling him, I might just do that.
“I started to research the children’s home and the people who’d worked there. It’d closed down about a year after I’d escaped, but eventually, I tracked down Doris. Her name was Doris Phipps, she lived about seventy miles away, and I spent a fortune travelling to the area to scope out her home, stopping at local hotels so I could find out everything I could.
“One day, I visited her. I told her I was a nurse from the local hospital. I’d followed her to a pharmacy one day and overheard her telling the lady at the counter that she was a diabetic. I said I was there to assess her medication and discuss some new therapies we were trialling.
“She let me in. It wasn’t hard to gain her confidence. And when she went into the kitchen to make a cup of tea, I took every dose of insulin she had in the house, walked up behind her and stabbed the needles into her.”
I placed the gold locket on the bedspread.
“Doris died from an overdose of insulin. The papers reported it as accidental death because her family swore she wouldn’t commit suicide that way, and they refused to let the coroner rule that it was suicide. Either way, it wasn’t murder. And I walked away knowing one of them had got the ending they deserved. I took this locket to remind me of what I’d done. I know I shouldn’t have. It was evidence. But I couldn’t help myself.”
I took the ring out next, telling him, “This belonged to Jilly Brand. I baked her a meat pie laced with death cap mushrooms.”
I held up the sparkly cat brooch next. “This is Carrie Ealing’s brooch. I put cyanide in her tea. It felt easy by then to silencethem that way. Like I was putting down a rabid animal. It was better for everyone. No one wanted them here.”
Last was the silver tennis bracelet. “I made a cherry pie for Penelope York, and filled it with deadly nightshade. I’d put down four of the six on my list. I’d done it for me, for Stacey, for all the victims they’d destroyed over the years.” I peered up at Isaiah as he stared at my trinkets. “But my father can never know. No one can.”
“I would never tell anyone,” he assured me, and I nodded.
“I know. That’s why I’m telling you now. You saw what happened at Angela Maynard’s house. We’re in this together.”
I took a moment to compose myself, picking the trinkets up and placing them back into the jewellery box.
“It took a lot longer to find Angela,” I said. “I have a friend who’s been helping me track her down.”
“Someone else knows?” he asked, looking concerned.
“No. Not really. I found him on the dark web, and I hired him to find her and Q. He doesn’t ask questions, and I don’t tell him anything. But he called me to tell me her location. And when you walked in, my plan went to shit. I lost it. She was supposed to die from drinking my arsenic laced coffee. But I panicked.”
“And the poisoner found a new way to reap her revenge,” he said.
“I found out that poison carried less guilt, for me. They deserved to die. I didn’t deserve to carry the guilt of killing them. That had to die with them. But for Q, it will be different. I have other plans for him, but we can’t find him.”
Isaiah pulled me back into his arms, placing another gentle kiss on my head as he whispered, “You’ve done enough now, beautiful girl. Now, it’s my turn. I’m going to find Q, and when I do, I will tear him apart, limb from limb for what he did to you.” Another gentle kiss, and then he said, “No one will ever hurt you again. You have my word.”
I sniffed, holding back more tears as I said, “I’m sorry I lied to you the other night, when I had the nightmare. The story about the boy in the cupboard was true, but that isn’t what upset me, it was my own filthy mattress and dark cell. And it was his face I saw. Q. He’s the one that haunts my nightmares.”
“He won’t haunt you again. I promise,” Isaiah soothed, cuddling me so tightly, I never wanted him to let go.
“Will you stay with me?” I asked, and he nodded.
“I’ll stay. I’ll hold you until you fall asleep. And I’ll be here all night to watch over you. When you wake up, it’ll be with my arms around you.” He sighed and then added, “And when you wake up, I need to take you somewhere. I have something I need to show you. I think it’s time you learned who I really am, too.”
Chapter Forty-Four
