It took all my strength to walk out, all my strength to try to force Rachel to witness her dangerous
obsession with that manipulative bitch for what it really was. She hated me for it in that moment, but I
know that it was an act of pure love. And as for that girl she had in tow, that grubby follower: I think
Rachel was secretly grateful that I dispatched her. She seemed like the kind of character who would’ve
had a ratty old sle eping bag stowed in her rucksack, all ready to set up camp on the sofa for the next ten
years, not a penny paid in rent.
My composure dropped the second I got into the car. It was a stupid white SUV that Nick had bought
us, the driver’s seat high up off the road as if that somehow made us all powerful. I dropped my head to
the steering wheel and gave way to the sobs I’d been holding in for the past hour. The horn tooted as my
head hit it, and I had a weird solitary laugh at the unbridled tragedy of my life. I looked up at the yellow
glow of Rachel’s window, desperate to race back up the stairs and hold her in my arms, share the laugh
with the funniest of my children. But this was like the naughty st ep – a necessary evil. She needed to
feel the chill to come back into the warmth, once and for all. I hoped so, anyway.
The anguished twist of her face when I’d left her had torn at my heart. I had to do this. She was skirting
far too close to the truth. I wasn’t toxic, but our secret certainly was.