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    Watching You: A Novel
    Watching You: A Novel
    Watching You: A Novel
    Ebook408 pages6 hours

    Watching You: A Novel

    By Lisa Jewell

    4/5

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    About this ebook

    “Quickly and assuredly, Jewell builds an ecosystem of countervailing suspicions…Tricky, clever, unexpected.” —New York Times Book Review

    “Brace yourself as Jewell stacks up the secrets, then lights a long, slow fuse.” —People

    “A seize-you-by-the-throat thriller and a genuinely moving family drama.” —A.J. Finn, #1 New York Times bestselling author of The Woman in the Window

    The instant New York Times and #1 Sunday Times bestselling author of the None of This Is True delivers another suspenseful page-turner about a shocking murder in a picturesque and well-to-do English town, perfect “for fans of Gone Girl, The Girl on the Train, and Luckiest Girl Alive” (Library Journal).

    You’re back home after four years working abroad, new husband in tow. You’re keen to find a place of your own. But for now, you’re crashing in your big brother’s spare room.

    That’s when you meet the man next door. He’s the head teacher at the local school. Twice your age. Extraordinarily attractive.

    You find yourself watching him. All the time. But you never dreamed that your innocent crush might become a deadly obsession.

    Or that someone is watching you.

    In Lisa Jewell’s latest “bone-chilling suspense” (People), no one is who they seem—and everyone has something to hide. Perfect for fans of Gillian Flynn and Ruth Ware, Watching You will keep you guessing as “Jewell teases out her twisty plot at just the right pace” (Booklist, starred review) until the startling revelations on the very last page.
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherAtria Books
    Release dateDec 26, 2018
    ISBN9781501190094
    Author

    Lisa Jewell

    Lisa Jewell is the #1 New York Times bestselling author of twenty-three novels, including None of This Is True, The Family Upstairs, and Then She Was Gone, as well as Invisible Girl and Watching You. Her novels have sold over ten million copies internationally, and her work has also been translated into twenty-nine languages. Connect with her on X @LisaJewellUK, on Instagram @LisaJewellUK, and on Facebook @LisaJewellOfficial.

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    Reviews for Watching You

    4/5

    595 ratings47 reviews

    What our readers think

    Readers find this title to be a gripping and enjoyable read. The plot twists and suspense keep readers engaged, and the character development and multiple perspectives add to the entertainment value. While some found it a bit predictable, overall it is a page-turner with a satisfying ending. Fans of Lisa Jewell will not be disappointed, and it is recommended for book clubs as well. The writing style is praised for its seamless transitions and inclusion of diverse characters. Highly recommended for those who enjoy thrilling and suspenseful novels.

    What did you think?

    Tap to rate

    Review must be at least 10 words

    • 4/5
      I don’t usually enjoy psychological mysteries written by women, I often find you get far more on the emotion side of the equestrian than on the physical side, and so the stories become sanitized. Yes of course there are exceptions, one is of course Gillian Flynn, another exception is if the author is British, European, or Australian. These are truly general guidelines, but so far it has been true for me.
      Watching You by Lisa Jewell is a really good story set up the way a story like this should be with lots of very plausible suspects.
      I did however feel she gave too many clues too early in the book, regarding what was likely going to be the outcome.
      Still this would be a good beach read this summer.
    • 5/5
      I love the twisted plot of the story , it was interesting.
    • 4/5
      Have yet to be disappointed in one of Lisa Jewell's books, and this is no exception. Great characters and suspense. Total twist at the end. Well worth the read.
    • 5/5
      This is now the 3rd "thriller" novel from Lisa that I have read or listened to. I really enjoyed this. The character building and different points of view were entertaining. I love how it was written and everything came together at the end. Another novel that would make a great movie.
    • 4/5
      I WOULD LIKE TO SEE A SEQUEL. I really enjoyed it
    • 5/5
      I absolutely love Lisa Jewell as an author and this book is yet another to add to my list of 5 star publications. There was so much suspense, especially towards the end. Every time I thought I had an idea of what was coming next, there was another loop/turn that shocked me and took me down a different path. This was such an amazing book. I love it! Highly recommended!
    • 4/5
      Happy to finally clear this Lisa Jewell book from my backlist (one of only two books of hers I’ve not yet read). Definitely a page turner, with many red herrings thrown in to obfuscate who actually committed the murder that sets the opening scene for the book. There is a classic Lisa Jewell twist(s) at the end. This is a quick read and good fare for book clubs as there are enough confusing events and characters to generate fruitful discussions.
    • 4/5
      I love the way this is written! It seamlessly floats through time, from one perspective to another. The twist at the end was so unexpected until right before it happened. I loved the way that one of the main characters was written to include his Aspbergers. Excellent writing.
    • 5/5
      Very hard to put down. A great book to read.
    • 5/5
      I really enjoyed reading your book. I read enthusiastically and understood the story. ... If you have some great stories like this one, you can publish it on Novel Star, just submit your story to [email protected] or [email protected]
    • 5/5

      The plot is intriguing. It keeps you on the edge.. If you have some great stories like this one, you can publish it on Novel Star, just submit your story to [email protected] or [email protected]
    • 4/5
      He did it. She did it... no, he did... no, maybe it was her.
      I liked it.
    • 4/5
      Enjoyable read. A page turner.
    • 4/5
      really like the way she writes. all the hints are there and just as you are getting closer to the end the pieces jump into place. really liked it.
    • 4/5
      I've liked many of Lisa Jewell's books so far, but this one took quite a while for me to get hooked. I'd say about 75 pages in or so. It was a good twist in the plot though and an interesting story.
    • 4/5
      A little predictable but still a good read. Enjoyed it.
    • 3/5
      A nicely done suspense novel with a good plot. The cast of characters were the best part, all intriguing and each adding an element of possibility which kept the reader's interest. Good read.
    • 4/5
      A newlywed has a crush on her neighbor, who is a school headmaster that has some schoolgirl fans of his own. He also has some strange secrets in his past. The headmaster’s son is trying to figure out what lurks in his family’s history, what is causing his mother’s unhappiness, and why he can’t stop spying on the neighbors. The multiple storylines in this book weave together seamlessly, and it was impossible to put down.
    • 3/5
      I've loved other Lisa Jewell books, but this one fell short for me. It started slow, with a lot of characters introduced. None of the characters were particularly likable, especially Joey, who is the "main character" of the novel. Her infatuation with Tom, her neighbor, seemed odd and the whole story just seemed a little... off.

      I figured out the mystery about a third of the way through, which usually is disappointing for me. I didn't see the "twist" at the end, but I also felt it was kind of unnecessary. Everything was wrapped up at that point, and it just made me dislike certain characters more.

      Overall there is suspense, but the whole story was just not for me. 2.5 stars rounded up.
    • 4/5
      Excellent book. Not everything was a surprise. I liked the characters especially the children/adolescents. Will find more of her books
    • 5/5
      Melville Heights is in Bristol, England. It is the sort of place where everyone has a secret and everyone is watching you. Headmaster, Tom Fitzwilliam, is beloved by one and all. Joey Mullen, his new neighbor, develops an intense infatuation with him. Tom's teenaged son Freddie has witnessed Joey behaving strangely around his father. Twenty years earlier, a schoolgirl writes in her diary, charting her doomed obsession with a handsome young English teacher named Mr. Fitzwilliam. What does the schoolgirl's infatuation have to do with Joey Mullin's? Jewell teases out her twisty plot at just the right pace. You will be kept guessing until the startling revelation on the very last page. Can't wait to read more of her books as each one is masterfully written. Recommended to those who love suspense.
    • 5/5
      So far, I think this is my second time reading Ms. Jewell, and I was just as intrigued with this book as well! I was spot on to find the killer, and I raced rapidly through the pages.
    • 4/5
      I had been reading so many 4 and 5 star ratings for "Watching You" by Lisa Jewell that I was getting worried. I find that if my expectations are so high, that I am often disappointed. I need not to have worried. Lisa Jewell penned a very good psychological thriller that I had a hard time putting down. She develops her characters slowly, dropping tidbits about their lives so you get to know them as if you have met them. In this story, the area called Melville Heights is home to the various people who populate this story. From students and their families, neighbours who are a bit off and the headmaster, Tom, and his family there is quite a group of them and several of them are watching one another. Why are they watching? They have their reasons. At the centre of the story is Tom Fitzwilliam, the hot shot teacher who's come to town to clean up a troubled school. As he works on making the school good again, he is making the ladies swoon. For some reason his charm, wit and fairly run-of-the-mill dad looks appeal to everyone, making the females weak in the knees and the males wishing they were him. Everyone that is, except Jenna Tripp and her mother who know Tom Fitzwilliam is up to no good. Jenna’s best friend Bess however, is another story and obsession is putting her feelings towards Mr. Fitzwilliam lightly.

      I enjoyed this character driven psychological thriller. It was a quick, fun and fast-paced story. The story starts with a bang, a murder scene and then we weave through the lives of the characters until we find out who the murderer is. I enjoyed this plot, and loved how all of these characters in the neighborhood are linked together with invisible, twisty, threads. It's a slow build with just the exact amount of mystery to keep you turning the pages. I thought I had it all figured out based on the clever hints and clues dropped throughout the book and I was partially correct, but oh that final twist, I did not see that coming. Unfortunately, I have one niggle and that is the epilogue. It ties up all the loose ends in a "nice" way that I just didn't think was necessary. It felt very rushed to me. If it wasn't for that, this would have been a 5 star read for me. Every Lisa Jewell book I read, cements her higher on my list of favourite authors. The publisher, Atria Books, generously provided me with a copy of this book to read upon my request. The rating, opinions and ideas are my own.
    • 5/5
      Quick read; thoroughly enjoyed it and all the point of views we get.
    • 3/5
      So far least favorite Lisa Jewell book. Very long, drawn out, and tedious.
    • 5/5
      Absolutely a banger! Easy & quick reading, making you guess who the murderer is & why the killing was done. The ending is superb too, makes one re-think whether it was a suicide or murder. Highly recommended!

      1 person found this helpful

    • 5/5
      Ha ha this was nicely done. It was one of those books that made you think twice about assuming because you were always wrong. I totally expected it play out differently. I think this is one of Lisa Jewell’s best books yet.
    • 4/5
      Loved the book. Loved the audio. My third Lisa Jewell book and it read most suspenseful. This one played out much like a who done it. Read this story til the end and answer "would I have done the same, possibly?". In true fashion, Lisa leaves us a little tid bit in closing.
    • 4/5
      Watching You. Lisa Jewell. 2018. I glanced at this book thinking I’d add it to my TBR shelves but was hooked after a page or two. I’ve seen Liza Jewell’s name on book lists for several years but don’t think I’ve ever read a review of any of her books. If all of her plots are as twisty, creepy, and as surprising as this one is, I’ll read more of her books. We open with a police woman finding a red suede tassel at the scene of a bloody murder scene and go back from there. The victim is the wife of a principal of a local school who lives on a quiet street in a quiet neighborhood. Suspense builds slowly, but from the beginning we know all is not well on this street. Is it the husband who may be attracted to young students or is it the son who spies on everyone? Or could it be the unhappy sister of the heart surgeon who lives across the street and feels an immediate attraction to the principal. Maybe it is the vulnerable student who has a crush on the principal or her friend who realizes that she has seen the principal on a vacation in the Lake District? This one keeps you guessing with just a few clues until the end. Not for those with a weak stomach.
    • 5/5
      This is one of the only books I was able to read without having to force myself. The entire time I was genuinely intrigued and enjoyed every bit of it. I’m very upset it’s over now because it gave me something to look forward to after getting home in the evening.

      1 person found this helpful

    Book preview

    Watching You - Lisa Jewell

    Cover: Watching You, by Lisa Jewell

    #1 The New York Times bestselling author of Then She Was Gone

    Lisa Jewell

    A Novel

    Watching You

    Tricky, clever, unexpected. —The New York Times Book Review

    Praise for

    WATCHING YOU

    "Quickly and assuredly, Jewell builds an ecosystem of countervailing suspicions… Something funny happens about halfway through Watching You. Already an engaging thriller, it becomes a moving one as well… Watching You reaches both a tricky, clever, unexpected ending, and lands a final turn on a surprisingly affecting and sensitive revelation."

    —The New York Times Book Review

    A twisty British mystery… Brace yourself as Jewell stacks up the secrets, then lights a long, slow fuse.

    —People

    Page one intrigued me. Page three hooked me. By page five, I was consumed. This compulsive, propulsive novel is both a seize-you-by-the-throat thriller and a genuinely moving family drama. Stellar.

    —A. J. Finn, #1 New York Times bestselling author of The Woman in the Window

    "[A] spine-tingling thriller… Lisa Jewell’s gripping novel Watching You unravels a tangled web of rumors—and a shocking twist."

    —Real Simple

    "Watching You takes the idea of obsession to chilling heights."

    —PopSugar

    Eerie and bone-chilling… this page turner surprises and stuns.

    —Woman’s World

    A juicy new page-turner.

    —Brit+Co

    Stellar domestic drama… Expert misdirection keeps the reader guessing, and the rug-pulled-out-from-beneath-your-feet conclusion—coupled with one final, bonechilling revelation—is stunning. Best not to bet on anyone. A compulsive read guaranteed to please fans of A. J. Finn and Ruth Ware.

    —Booklist (starred review)

    Jewell weaves a taut multiperspective, domestic/community suspense story that is sure to please fans of Ruth Ware and A. J. Finn.

    —Library Journal (starred review)

    Jewell excels in creating complex characters, building tension and keeping readers in the dark yet riveted until the ‘Aha!’ moments… this thriller unfolds and concludes in a very satisfying way.

    —Shelf Awareness

    Jewell adeptly weaves together a complex array of characters in her latest thriller. The novel opens with the murder investigation and deftly maintains its intensity and brisk pace… Jewell’s use of third-person narration allows her to explore each family’s anxieties and sorrows, which ultimately makes this novel’s ending all the more unsettling. An engrossing and haunting psychological thriller.

    —Kirkus Reviews

    [A] crafty conundrum… the author smoothly juggles multiple story lines… prepare to be blindsided by the murder victim’s identity, not revealed until late in the game—and an even more stunning final surprise. Jewell does a masterly job of maintaining suspense.

    —Publishers Weekly

    A master at unspooling tightly told tales, Jewell specializes in perfectly-pitched thrillers without sacrificing a drop of her characters’ complexities, secrets, and desires, and this latest one is no exception.

    —The Seattle Review of Books

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    Watching You, by Lisa Jewell, Atria

    To Selina and Jonny.

    With love.

    My Diary

    September 20, 1996

    I don’t know what to think. I don’t know what to feel. Is this normal? He’s an adult. He’s twice my age. There’s no way… No. There’s no way. But OH GOD.

    I wish there was.

    Dear diary:

    I think I’m in love with my English teacher.

    PROLOGUE

    MARCH 24

    DC Rose Pelham kneels down; she can see something behind the kitchen door, just in front of the trash can. For a minute she thinks it’s a bloodstained twist of tissue, maybe, or an old bandage. Then she thinks perhaps it is a dead flower. But as she looks at it more closely she can see that it’s a tassel. A red suede tassel. The sort that might once have been attached to a handbag, or to a boot.

    It sits just on top of a small puddle of blood, strongly suggesting that it had fallen there in the aftermath of the murder. She photographs it in situ from many angles, and then, with her gloved fingers, she plucks the tassel from the floor and drops it into an evidence bag, which she seals.

    She stands up and turns to survey the scene of the crime: a scruffy kitchen, old-fashioned pine units, a green Aga piled with pots and pans, a large wooden table piled with table mats and exercise books and newspapers and folded washing, a small extension to the rear with a cheap timber glazed roof, double doors to the garden, a study area with a laptop, a printer, a shredder, a table lamp.

    It’s an innocuous room, bland even. A kitchen like a million other kitchens all across the country. A kitchen for drinking coffee in, for doing homework and eating breakfast and reading newspapers in. Not a kitchen for dark secrets or crimes of passion. Not a kitchen for murdering someone in.

    But there, on the floor, is a body, splayed facedown inside a large, vaguely kidney-shaped pool of blood. The knife that had been used is in the kitchen sink, thoroughly washed down with a soapy sponge. The attack on the victim had been frenzied: at least twenty knife wounds to the neck, back, and shoulders. But little in the way of blood has spread to other areas of the kitchen—no handprints, no smear, no spatters—leading Rose to the conclusion that the attack had been unexpected, fast, and efficient and that the victim had had little chance to put up a fight.

    Rose takes a marker pen from her jacket pocket and writes on the bag containing the red suede tassel.

    Description: Red suede/suedette tassel.

    Location: In front of fridge, just inside door from hallway.

    Date and time of collection: Friday, March 24, 2017, 11:48 p.m.

    It’s probably nothing, she muses, just a thing fallen from a fancy handbag. But nothing was often everything in forensics.

    Nothing could often be the answer to the whole bloody thing.

    PART ONE

    1

    JANUARY 2

    Joey Mullen laid the flowers against the gravestone and ran her fingertip across the words engraved into the pink-veined granite.

    SARAH JANE MULLEN

    1962–2016

    Beloved mother of Jack and Josephine

    Happy new year, Mum, she said. "I’m sorry I didn’t come to see you yesterday. Alfie and I had shocking hangovers. We went to a party over in Frenchay, at Candy’s new flat. Remember Candy? Candy Boyd? She was in my year at school; she had all that long blonde hair that she could sit on? You really liked her because she always said hello to you if she passed you on the street? Anyway, she’s doing really well; she’s a physiotherapist. Or… a chiropractor? Anyway, something like that. She cried when I told her you were dead. Everyone cries when I tell them. Everyone loved you so much, Mum. Everyone wished you were their mum. I was so lucky to have a mum like you. I wish I hadn’t stayed away for so long now. If I’d known what was going to happen, I would never have gone away at all. And I’m sorry you never got to meet Alfie. He’s adorable. He works at a wine bar in town right now, but he wants to be a painter-decorator. He’s at his mum’s now, actually, painting her kitchen. Or at least, he’s supposed to be! She’s probably made him sit down and watch TV with her, knowing her. And him. He’s a bit of a procrastinator. Takes him a while to get going. But you’d love him, Mum. He’s the cutest, sweetest, nicest guy and he’s so in love with me and he treats me so well and I know how much of a worry I was to you when I was younger. I know what I put you through and I’m so, so sorry. But I wish you could see me now. I’m growing up, Mum. I’m finally growing up!"

    She sighed.

    "Anyway, I’d better go now. It’ll be getting dark soon and then I’ll get really scared. I love you, Mum. I miss you. I wish you weren’t dead. I wish I could go to your house and have a cup of tea with you, have a good gossip, have a bitch about Jack and Rebecca. I could tell you about the gold taps. Or maybe I could tell you about the gold taps now? No, I’ll tell you about the gold taps next time. Give you something to look forward to.

    Sleep tight, Mum. I love you.

    Joey climbed the steep lane from Lower Melville to the parade of houses above. Even in the sodium gloom of a January afternoon, the houses of Melville Heights popped like a row of children’s building blocks: red, yellow, turquoise, purple, lime, sage, fuchsia, red again. They sat atop a terraced embankment looking down on the small streets of Lower Melville like guests at a private party that no one else was invited to.

    Iconic was the word that people used to describe this row of twenty-seven Victorian villas: the iconic painted houses of Melville Heights. Joey had seen them from a distance for most of her life. They were the sign that she was less than twenty minutes from home on long car journeys of her childhood. They followed her to work; they guided her home again. She’d been to a party once, in the pink house, when she was a student. Split crudely into flats and bedsits, smelling of damp and cooked mince, it hadn’t felt bright pink on the inside. But the views from up there were breathtaking: the River Avon pausing to arc picturesquely on its mile-long journey to the city, the patchwork fields beyond, the bulge of the landscape on the horizon into a plump hill crowned with trees that blossomed every spring into puffballs of hopeful green.

    She’d dreamed of living up here as a child, oscillated between which house would be hers: the lilac or the pink. And as she grew older, the sky blue or the sage. And now, at twenty-six, she found herself living in the cobalt-blue house. Number 14. Not a sign of a lifetime of hard work and rich rewards, but a fringe benefit of her older brother’s lifetime of hard work and rich rewards.

    Jack was ten years older than Joey and a consultant heart surgeon at Bristol General Hospital, one of the youngest in the county’s history. Two years ago he’d married a woman called Rebecca. Rebecca was nice, but brittle and rather humorless. Joey had always thought her lovely brother would end up with a fun-loving, no-nonsense nurse or maybe a jolly children’s doctor. But for some reason he’d chosen a strait-laced systems analyst from Staffordshire.

    They’d bought their cobalt house ten months ago, when Joey was still farting about in the Balearics hosting foam parties. She hadn’t even realized it was one of the painted houses until Jack had taken her to see it when she moved back to Bristol three months ago.

    You bought a painted house, she’d said, her hand against her heart. You bought a painted house and you didn’t tell me.

    You didn’t ask, he’d responded. And anyway, it wasn’t my idea. It was Rebecca’s. She virtually bribed the old lady who was living here to sell up. Said it was literally the only house in Bristol she wanted to live in.

    It’s beautiful, she’d said, her eyes roaming over the tasteful interior of taupe and teal and copper and gray. The most beautiful house I’ve ever seen.

    I’m glad you like it, Jack had said, because Rebecca and I were wondering if you two would like to live here for a while. Just until you get yourselves sorted out.

    Oh my God, she’d said, her hands at her mouth. Are you serious? Are you sure?

    Of course I’m sure, he’d replied, taking her by the hand. "Come and see the attic room. It’s completely self-contained—perfect for a pair of newlyweds." He’d nudged her and grinned at her.

    Joey had grinned back. No one was more surprised than she was that she had come back from Ibiza with a husband.

    His name was Alfie Butter and he was very good-looking. Far too good-looking for her. Or at least, so she’d thought in the aqua haze of Ibizan nights. In the gunmetal gloom of a Bristol winter the blue, blue eyes were just blue, the Titian hair was just red, the golden tan was just sun damage. Alfie was just a regular guy.

    They’d married barefoot on the beach. Joey had worn a pink chiffon slip dress and carried a posy of pink and peridot lantanas. Alfie had worn a white T-shirt and pink shorts, and white bougainvillea blossom in his hair. Their marriage had been witnessed by the managers of the hotel where they both worked. Afterward they’d had dinner on a terrace with a few friends, taken a few pills, danced until the sun came up, spent the next day in bed, and then and only then did they phone their families to tell them what they’d done.

    She would have had a proper wedding if her mother had still been alive. But she was dead and Joey’s dad was not really a wedding kind of a man, nor a flying-out-to-Ibiza kind of a man, and Joey’s parents had themselves married secretly at Gretna Green when her mum was four months pregnant with Jack.

    Ah, well, he’d said, with a note of relief. I suppose it’s a family tradition.

    Hi, she called out in the hallway, testing for the presence of her sister-in-law. Rebecca made a lot of noise about how delighted she was to be housing a pair of twentysomething lovebirds in her immaculate, brand-new guest suite—It’s just so brilliant that we had the space for you! Really, it’s just brilliant having you here. Totally brilliant!—but her demeanor told a different story. She hid from them. All the time. In fact, she was hiding from Joey right now, pretending to be arranging things in their huge walk-in pantry.

    Oh, hi! she said, turning disingenuously at Joey’s greeting, a jar of horseradish in her hand. I didn’t hear you come in!

    Joey smiled brightly. She’d totally heard her coming in. There was a mug of freshly made tea still steaming on the kitchen table, a newspaper half read, a half-eaten packet of supermarket sushi. Joey pictured Rebecca Mullen twitching at the sound of Joey’s key in the lock, looking for her escape, scurrying into the pantry, and randomly picking up a jar of horseradish.

    Sorry, I did shout out hello.

    It’s fine. It’s fine. I’m just… She waved the jar of horseradish in a vague arc around the pantry.

    Nest-building?

    Yes! said Rebecca. Yes. I am. Nest-building. Exactly.

    Both their eyes fell to Rebecca’s rounded stomach. Her first baby was due in four months. It was a girl baby who would, on or around May 1, become Joey’s niece. One of the reasons, Joey imagined, that Rebecca had agreed to let her and Alfie have their guest suite was that Joey was a trained nursery nurse. Not that she’d touched a baby since she was eighteen. But still, she had all the skills. She could, in theory, change a nappy in forty-eight seconds flat.

    There was a stained-glass window halfway up the oak staircase that ran up the front of the house. Joey often stopped here to press her nose to the clear parts of the design, enjoying being able to see out without anyone seeing in. It was early afternoon, almost dusk at this time of the year; the trees on the hills on the other side of the river were bare and slightly awkward.

    She watched a shiny black car turn from the main road in the village below and begin its ascent up the escarpment toward the terrace. The only cars that came up here were those of residents and visitors. She waited for a while longer to see who it might be. The car parked on the other side of the street and she watched a woman get out of the passenger side, a boyish, thirtysomething woman with jaw-length light-brown hair wearing a hoodie and jeans. She stood by the back door while a young boy climbed out, about fourteen years old, the spitting image of her. Then a rather handsome older man got out of the driver’s side, tall and leggy in a crumpled sky-blue polo shirt and dark jeans, short dark hair, white at the temples. He went to the boot of the car and pulled out two medium-sized suitcases, with a certain appealing effortlessness. He handed one to his son, passed a pile of coats and a carrier bag to his wife, and then they crossed the road and let themselves into the yellow house.

    Joey carried on up the stairs, the image of the attractive older man returning from his family Christmas break already fading from her consciousness.

    PART 1 OF RECORDED INTERVIEW

    Date: 03/25/2017

    Location: Trinity Road Police Station, Bristol BS2 0NW

    Conducted by: Officers from Avon & Somerset Police

    POLICE: This interview is being tape-recorded. I am Detective Inspector Rose Pelham and I’m based at Trinity Road Police Station. I work with the serious crime team. Could you please give us your full name?

    JM: Josephine Louise Mullen.

    POLICE: And your address?

    JM: 14 Melville Heights, Bristol BS12 2GG.

    POLICE: Thank you. And can you tell us about your relationship with Tom Fitzwilliam?

    JM: He lives two doors down. He gave me a lift into work sometimes. We chatted if we bumped into each other on the street. He knew my brother and my sister-in-law.

    POLICE: Thank you. And could you now tell us where you were last night between approximately 7 p.m. and 9 p.m.

    JM: I was at the Bristol Harbour Hotel.

    POLICE: And were you there alone?

    JM: Mostly.

    POLICE: Mostly? Who else was there with you?

    JM: [Silence.]

    POLICE: Ms. Mullen? Please could you tell us who else was there? At the Bristol Harbour Hotel?

    JM: But he was only there for a few minutes. Nothing happened. It was just…

    POLICE: Ms. Mullen. The name of this person. Please.

    JM: It was… it was Tom Fitzwilliam.

    2

    JANUARY 6

    Joey saw Tom Fitzwilliam again a few days later. This time it was in the village. He was coming out of the bookshop, wearing a suit and talking to someone on the phone. He said good-bye to the person on the phone, pressed his finger to the screen to end the call, and slid the phone into his jacket pocket. She saw his face as he turned left out of the shop. It held the residue of a smile. His upturned mouth made a different shape of his face. It turned up more on one side than the other. An eyebrow followed suit. A hand went to his silver-tipped hair as the wind blew it asunder. The smile turned to a grimace and made another shape of his face again. His jaw hardened. His forehead bunched. A slow blink of his eyes. And then he was walking toward his black car parked across the street, a blip blip of the locking system, a flash of lights, long legs folded away into the driver’s side. Gone.

    But a shadow of him lingered on in her consciousness.

    Alfie had been a crush. For months she’d watched him around the resort, made up stories about him based on tiny scraps of information she’d collected from people who’d interacted with him. No one knew where he was from. Someone thought he might have been a writer. Someone else said he was a vet. He’d had long hair then, dark red, tied back in a ponytail or sometimes a man-bun. He had a small red beard and a big fit body, a tattoo of a climbing rose all the way up his trunk, another of a pair of wings across his shoulders. He often had a guitar hanging from a strap around his chest. He rarely wore a top when he wasn’t working. He had a smile for everyone, a swagger and a cheek.

    In Joey’s imagination, Alfie Butter was kind of otherworldly; she ascribed to him a sort of supernatural persona, and tried to imagine what they would talk about if their paths were ever to cross. Then one day he’d stopped her at the back of the resort next to the laundry and his blue, blue eyes had locked onto hers and he’d smiled and said, Joey, right?

    She’d said yes, she was Joey.

    Someone tells me you’re a Bristol girl. Is that right?

    Yes, she’d said, yes, that was right.

    Whereabouts?

    Frenchay?

    He’d punched the air. I knew it! he’d said. "I just knew it! You know when you get that feeling in your gut, and someone said you were from Bristol and I just thought Frenchay girl. Got to be. And I was right! I’m a Frenchay boy!"

    Wow, she’d said, wow. It was a small, small world, she’d told him. Which school did you go to?

    And Alfie had turned out to be neither supernatural nor otherworldly, a vet nor a poet, nor even very good at playing the guitar, but spectacularly good in bed and a very good hugger. He’d had her name tattooed on his ankle two weeks after their first encounter. He said he’d never felt like this about anyone, in his life, ever. He slung his heavy arm across her shoulder whenever they walked together. He pulled her onto his lap whenever she walked past him. He said he’d follow her to the ends of the earth. Then, when her mother died and she said she wanted to come home, he said he’d follow her back to Bristol. He’d proposed to her after she returned from her mother’s funeral. They’d married two weeks after that.

    But what do you do with an unattainable crush once it’s yours to keep? What does it become? Should there perhaps be a word to describe it? Because that’s the thing with getting what you want: all that yearning and dreaming and fantasizing leaves a great big hole that can only be filled with more yearning and dreaming and fantasizing. And maybe that’s what lay at the root of Joey’s sudden and unexpected obsession with Tom Fitzwilliam. Maybe he arrived at the precise moment that the hole in Joey’s interior fantasy life needed filling.

    And if it hadn’t been him, maybe it would have been someone else instead.

    3

    JANUARY 23

    Tom Fitzwilliam was fifty-one and he was, according to Jack, a lovely, lovely man.

    Not that Joey had asked her brother for his opinion of their neighbor—it had been offered, spontaneously, apropos of an article in the local newspaper about an award that the local school had just won.

    Oh, look, he said, the paper spread open in front of him on the kitchen table. That’s our neighbor, lives two doors down. He tapped a photo with his forefinger. Tom Fitzwilliam. Lovely, lovely man.

    Joey peered over Jack’s shoulder, a half-washed saucepan in one hand, a washing-up sponge in the other. Oh, she said, I’ve seen him, I think. Black car?

    Yes, that’s right. He’s the headmaster of our local state school. A ‘superhead.’ He made quotes in the air with his fingers. Brought in after a bad Ofsted. His school just won something and now everyone loves him.

    That’s nice, said Joey. Do you know him, then?

    Yeah. Kind of. He and his wife were very helpful when we were having the building works done. They used to send us texts during the day to let us know what was happening and calmed down some other not-so-nice neighbors who were getting their knickers in a knot about dust and noise. Nice people.

    Joey shrugged. Jack thought everyone was nice.

    So. He closed the paper and folded it in half. How did the interview go?

    Joey slung the tea towel over the side of the sink. It was OK.

    She’d applied for a job at the Melville, the famous boutique hotel and bar in the village: front-of-house manager. The pleasant woman interviewing her could tell the moment she walked in that she was not fit for the purpose and Joey had made no effort to convince her otherwise.

    Glorified receptionist, she said now. "Plus four night shifts a week. No thank you."

    She didn’t look at Jack, didn’t want to witness his reaction to yet more evidence that his little sister was a total loser. She had quite wanted the job; the hotel was beautiful, the owner was nice, and the pay was good. The problem was that she couldn’t actually see herself in the job. The problem was… well, the problem was her. She was nearly twenty-seven. In three years’ time she would be thirty. She was a married woman. But yet, for some reason, she still felt like a child.

    Fair enough, he said, turning the pages of the newspaper mechanically. I’m sure something will come up, eventually.

    Bound to, she said, her heart not reaching her words.

    Then, Jack, are you OK about me and Alfie being here? Like, really?

    She watched her brother roll his eyes good-naturedly. Joey. For God’s sake. How many times do I have to tell you? I love having you here. And Alfie too. It’s a pleasure.

    What about Rebecca, though? Are you sure she’s not regretting it?

    She’s fine, Joey. We’re both fine. It’s all good.

    Do you promise?

    Yes, Joey. I promise.

    Joey got a job three days later. It was a terrible, terrible job, but it was a job. She was now a party coordinator at a notoriously rough soft-play center in the city called Whackadoo. The uniform was an acid-yellow polo shirt with red pull-on trousers. The pay was reasonable and the hours were fine. The manager was a big, butch woman with a crew cut called Dawn to whom Joey had taken an instant liking. It could all have been worse, of course it could. Anything could always be worse. But not much.

    All employees of Whackadoo were required to spend their first week on the floor. Nobody gets to sit in an office here until they’ve cleaned the toilets halfway through a party for thirty eight-year-old boys, Dawn had said, a grim twinkle in her eye.

    Can’t be any worse than cleaning vomit, coke, and Jägerbombs off the bar after a fourteen-hour stag party, Joey had replied.

    Probably not, Dawn had conceded. Probably not. Can you start tomorrow?

    Joey stopped in the village on her way home from the interview and ordered herself a large gin and tonic in the cozy bar of the Melville Hotel. It was early for gin and tonic. The man sitting two tables away was still having breakfast. She told herself it was celebratory, but in reality, she needed something to blunt the edges of her terror and self-loathing.

    Whackadoo.

    Windowless cavern of unthinkable noise and bad smells. Breeze-block hellhole of spilt drinks and tantrums, where a child shat in the ball

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