‘My waters,’ Sally began nervously, ‘they’ve just broken.’ Her pyjama bottoms were wet and a look of fear warped her face.
‘But you’re not due for another fortnight?’ Nick replied.
‘Try telling the baby that.’
Chapter 90
ELLIE
Ellie was suffocating. She felt as if someone was kneeling on her chest, restricting each breath and refusing to allow fresh air into her lungs. Each of her body’s ten pulse points vibrated like the woofers in a stereo speaker. But the only noise in her office was the echo of Matthew’s confession.
Pull yourself together, Ellie, she told herself. He’s lying.
‘What does it feel like, knowing you’ve been duped?’ Matthew asked softly, like a therapist would to his patient. He arranged his fingers in a steeple-like formation in front of his mouth to add to the fake sincerity of his question. ‘How does the puppet master feel having her strings pulled by someone else?’
‘I wouldn’t know,’ Ellie replied, ‘because nobody pulls my strings. Everything you’ve said is bullshit.’
‘How can you be so sure of that?’
‘My IT department will prove it.’ She reached for her phone but there was no signal. She grabbed the telephone on the table but could hear no dial tone. She glared at Matthew. ‘What have you done?’
‘A signal blocker and two phone jammers. Like a modern-day Faraday cage.’
‘What do you want from me?’
‘Believe it or not, absolutely nothing. Not a single penny, not an apology, not an explanation. I’ll get enough gratification over the next few days when this becomes public and the world will begin to doubt whether the person on the other side of their bed really is the one who’s supposed to be there.’
Something inside Ellie suddenly snapped. Her self-preservation instinct, built from so many years as a woman in a male-dominated corporate world, kicked in with glaring a speed. She rose to her feet with such force, it took Matthew by surprise.
‘I’ll deny your claims. Who’s going to believe you?’ she snarled. ‘My press department is built for damage limitation and we’ll spin this so you come across as a desperate, two-bit systems analyst who wasn’t qualified enough to get a job here. Then we will find everything there is to know about you to discredit what you have to say. I’ll savage what’s left of your dead mother’s reputation by dragging her and her paedophile boyfriend’s name through the mud, alongside any friend or acquaintance you may have. The Sunday League football team you play for? None of them will have jobs by the end of the week, I guarantee you. Then I’ll tie you up in court with so much litigation and private prosecutions that you won’t be able to afford a bed to sleep in. By the time you have left this building, we’ll have found whatever wormhole you claim to have discovered and seal it up so there will be no proof you ever broke into our system.’
‘I’m your fiancé,’ Matthew said confidently. ‘That’ll give me a lot more credibility. Especially when I tell everyone that the woman who’s amassed a personal fortune out of predetermined love is willing to hide the fact there are 2 million people out there who have been Matched incorrectly. There’ll be an investigation at the very least. There is no way out of this for you, Ells.’
‘They won’t believe you.’
‘Ah, well, I hate to disappoint you, but I think they might. I have everything I’ve done saved on back-up hard drives and memory sticks hidden across the city, all waiting to be sent to WikiLeaks who’ll expose the story. They love a whistle-blower, especially when it’s about corporate misconduct.’
‘I am not going to lose everything I have built because of you,’ Ellie spat.
Matthew smirked as he rose to his feet, straightened his tie and winked at Ellie. ‘Let’s see about that, shall we, Ells? For the rest of your life, people will be queuing the length of the Thames to sue you for your flawed results and their failed relationships. Then, when everything you have cherished has been taken away from you, you’ll know how my mother and countless others felt because of what you did. You, my love, are fucked.’
It was the clear, crisp way in which Matthew delivered his final statement that convinced Ellie everything he’d told her was true. In an instant, she saw all she’d accomplished being yanked from under her feet. She’d survived a decade of abuse and criticism, and sacrificed her family, friendships and lovers, all for nothing because of a man who’d duped his way into her life.
It was the straw that broke the camel’s back.
As Matthew made his way towards the door, he turned his head to look at Ellie one last time. But he couldn’t have anticipated what Ellie was about to do.
Without thinking, she picked up the lead crystal decanter from the table and hurled it at him. The weight of it collided with his temple and knocked him to his knees.
Ellie’s shadow loomed over Matthew where he cowered helplessly on the floor. For the briefest of moments she saw the Tim of old in his eyes, the man who had brought out a side to her that had lain dormant for so long. But allowing her warm, loving side to shine through her thick skin had made her vulnerable. All that she had forfeited for her discovery would not be for nothing, she vowed. She would not allow the feeble creature before her to take anything away.
Matthew’s eyes rolled as he struggled to focus, then he glared at her in disbelief, clutching the side of his head. He watched, helpless and disorientated, as she coolly and calmly picked up the decanter and swung it for a second time with great force, hitting him squarely in the same part of his head.
She could almost feel his skull split as the decanter shattered, spraying fragments of bone, glass and whisky across the floor.
Ellie stood motionless as she watched Matthew’s body convulse and his blood seep into the rug. His eyes opened wide and her mis-Match was suddenly erased.
Chapter 91
MANDY
Mandy stood rigidly at the foot of the drive of the home where she’d lived with Pat for five months.
‘The door’s unlocked, you can go in,’ urged Lorraine, her police liaison officer. ‘Just take your time.’
Mandy hesitated and glanced over her shoulder to check her sister Paula was still in the police car they’d both arrived in. Paula had offered to go inside with her for support, but Mandy was too embarrassed to show her the home of the family she had chosen above her own.
Lorraine went inside first, and Mandy followed apprehensively. Together they paused in the hallway and Mandy’s eyes shot to the bottom of the staircase where she’d fallen some five weeks earlier.
She looked at the open doors leading to the rooms off the hallway and took a deep breath, covering her stomach with her arms. Where a baby bump had once protruded, there was now just loose skin, and Mandy felt her caesarean stitches tug sharply each time she made a sudden movement. Yet she cherished the horizontal scar above her bikini line – it was the only physical proof she had that she and her baby boy had ever been together. He’d been removed from her unconscious body and then stolen by her twisted in-laws before she’d had the opportunity to even catch sight of him. Every morning after showering, she wiped the steam from the full-length bathroom mirror and traced the red, raised scar tissue with her finger, imagining what her son might look like.
It had been a very difficult few weeks. She regularly pumped her breasts to keep them lactating in preparation for the time she would be reunited with her boy. She cursed the breast pump for not being her child clamping upon her nipple. She hated that they were losing this precious bonding time, and she prayed that the police would find a lead to his whereabouts.