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Trust Me: A gripping debut psychological thriller with a shocking twist!
Gemma Metcalfe
‘A brilliant debut, this tense and original story deserves to be read!’ B A Paris best-selling author of Behind Closed Doors‘Gemma Metcalfe turns the screw until the tension is almost unbearable. A fast-paced debut with a twist that made me gasp.’ Mark Edwards best-selling author of The Devil’s WorkOne phone call. Two lives. Their darkest secrets.Lana needs to sell a holiday, fast. Stuck in Tenerife, in a dead end job, she never expected a response quite like Liam’s.Thousands of miles away a phone rings. Liam never intended to pick up, he’s too busy choosing the quickest way to die. But at least someone should know the truth before he goes, even if that someone is a stranger.As time runs out both are drawn to the other, expressing thoughts they never imagined they would share.When you’re about to die will your secrets even matter? ‘Trust Me is a brilliantly fast paced read, with a unique premise…add to that a spectacular twist, and I couldn't turn the pages fast enough.’Lisa Hall, author of Between You and Me“It's a well written thriller that had me hooked from the gripping prologue and gasping out loud when I read a jaw dropping, unexpected twist towards the end.” Nicki Richards“I couldn't stop reading, because I just needed to see what secrets will be spilled next!!! I loved the way the story jumped between the present and the past, it was done seamlessly, and added extra juice to the storyline. It was a great read and highly recommended.” Tanya Brough
One phone call. Two lives. Their darkest secrets.
Lana needs to sell a holiday, fast. Stuck in Tenerife, in a dead-end job, she never expected a response quite like Liam’s.
Hundreds of miles away, a phone rings. Liam never intended to pick up – he’s too busy choosing the quickest way to die. But at least someone should know the truth before he goes, even if that someone is a stranger.
As time runs out, each is drawn to the other, expressing thoughts they never thought they would share.
When you’re about to die, will your secrets even matter?
Trust Me
Gemma Metcalfe
GEMMA METCALFE
is a Manchester-born author who now lives in sunny Tenerife with her husband, Danny, and two crazy rescue dogs, Dora and Diego. By day, Gemma can be found working as a primary-school teacher, but as the sun sets, she ditches the glitter and glue and becomes a writer of psychological thrillers. An established drama queen, she admits to having a rather warped imagination, and loves writing original plots with shocking twists. The plot for her debut novel, Trust Me, is loosely based on her experiences as a call-centre operative, where she was never quite sure who would answer the phone!
For Auntie Kath – who always loved to read.
Contents
Cover (#u029228f6-cb56-589c-9878-590571a07e43)
Blurb (#ufbb7f8e6-03f9-59da-9d2b-f456b89c0b6a)
Title Page (#u427621bb-1910-50c5-afa2-71b94bc72b83)
Author Bio (#ua58ec4d1-4cdc-556f-8626-5d1e72255992)
Dedication (#ub6795608-a7a2-5817-805c-f1e9fb7bc87f)
Prologue (#ulink_9fc3a2ab-0317-552b-8009-f2ea77570ede)
Chapter One (#ulink_ccc0803c-f570-5328-8305-fb32cd72d4fb)
Chapter Two (#ulink_6f478465-1a9a-5fb3-b821-3dee44136f1f)
Chapter Three (#ulink_52eaf0d5-1cfa-5e7f-9c79-68825a3da492)
Chapter Four (#ulink_fc904631-111e-5c9a-a771-dab797f040e6)
Chapter Five (#ulink_36d61b92-2fef-5b57-893f-7320163d5fb0)
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Seventeen
Chapter Eighteen
Chapter Nineteen
Chapter Twenty
Chapter Twenty-One
Chapter Twenty-Two
Chapter Twenty-Three
Chapter Twenty-Four
Chapter Twenty-Five
Chapter Twenty-Six
Chapter Twenty-Seven
Chapter Twenty-Eight
Chapter Twenty-Nine
Chapter Thirty
Chapter Thirty-One
Chapter Thirty-Two
Epilogue
Author's Mailing List (#u960e887a-9d4f-50a4-ba32-1ab8254e4e60)
Acknowledgements
Endpages (#ueb7e1731-103a-5f2d-9885-f0bd26b63c4b)
Copyright
PROLOGUE (#ulink_8061851c-cd79-5cab-8549-4c61c55af486)
As she stepped through the door, her first thought was how deadly silent it was.
Especially given the circumstances.
‘Hello, where is everyone?’
The long, narrow hallway was encased in darkness, thanks to the bulb blowing a few days previously. She fumbled around in the dark with the toggles of her coat in an attempt to take it off, her fingers stiff with cold thanks to the buckets of icy rain which had pissed all over her on the journey home. Finally freeing herself, she attempted to hang the coat on the rail, but the lack of light meant it fell to the floor with a thud.
‘Hello?’ she shouted again into the darkness, her voice catching in her throat for a reason she couldn’t quite put her finger on. ‘Anyone in?’
Nobody answered.
Gripping hold of the banister rail, she gingerly made her way upstairs and towards the bathroom. Opening the door, her teeth chattered hard as she flicked on the light with her elbow, too scared to use her hands in case she got an electric shock. Leaning over the bathtub, she wrung out her heavy, soaked, blonde hair, while sniffing up loudly in an attempt to stop her nose dripping like a tap.
It was then that she heard a noise.
Opening the bathroom door, she let the light seep out, illuminating the stairs and hallway.
What happened next would change her life for ever.
Running into the living room, she saw him – curled up in a ball, a pool of blood by his side. Perhaps due to the shock, or her hysterical screaming, she didn’t notice the mobile phone; nor did she hear the pleading voice on the other end of the line.
CHAPTER ONE (#ulink_79ff013f-0164-5757-8979-5681f344957d)
PRESENT DAY
Lana, Tenerife, 9.30 am
‘What is the first rule of sales?’ asks my manager, Damien, a pathetic, bald-headed, little Scouser who has a surprisingly large forehead and an even larger ego.
‘Well?’ he demands when nobody speaks, a manic grin plastered on his face thanks to the bag of cocaine he’s no doubt just shoved up his hooter. He cracks his knuckles twice, looks around the room for an answer. We stare ahead uninterested, dodging eye contact.
Through the window of the office – a characterless, white, walled box packed to the brim with computers and sweaty bodies – I catch a glimpse of paradise. Tenerife looks especially beautiful this morning: pale-gold sand meets crystal-blue sea, blending effortlessly into a cloudless sky; lazy morning sun beats down on half-naked bodies like warm honey; couples arm in arm, forgetting for at least one week about the damp, cold weather and depressing recession, which are destined to greet them off the plane home. I swivel around in my chair ninety degrees and can just about make out the harbour in the distance: rich people’s yachts bobbing up and down with the fresh morning breeze; excited babies being rocked on their mothers’ knees, their chubby faces covered in bubble-gum ice cream. Damien says I have the best desk in the office, next to this window. He calls it ‘the window of opportunity’. He likes his play on words does Damien – that’s one of the many reasons why I think he’s a prat!
‘Lana!’ he often barks, while looming over my desk with his Armani tie swinging in my face and his beer breath wafting up my nostrils. ‘If looking through that window doesn’t inspire you to sell holidays, you might as well go and look in the job-centre window, instead.’ Then he laughs hysterically before giving way to a smoke-induced coughing fit, like the wit he possesses needs to splutter out before he spontaneously combusts.
So, anyway, the first rule of sales is to not believe a word the client on the other end of the telephone says. Obviously, I know this but I wouldn’t give Damien the satisfaction by answering. He is right, though: they all lie to you from the second you say, ‘Hello.’ One lady, a Mrs Chilton, aged seventy-two, from Brighton, once told me she couldn’t possibly take up my offer of a beautiful, luxurious holiday because her parrot had separation anxiety. Apparently, he had taken to pulling out his own feathers and hanging upside down while singing Lionel Richie songs whenever she left the house. Perhaps this one was true – either that or Mrs Chilton is an absolute legend!
‘The first rule of sales is to never believe the client,’ declares my colleague Terry, smugly, like Jeremy Kyle revealing his lie-detector results. Damien almost whoops, ecstatic that somebody has actually paid attention. He then screeches a decibel louder than is necessary.
‘Listen up! I’m going to announce the Star of the Week.’
He breathes in deeply, psyching himself up for the grand revelation, as if we were finalists on The X Factor.
I look around to see if anyone’s actually listening. Over in the far corner, next to the fire extinguisher and overflowing bin, I see Louise playing on her iPhone. Next to her, Max is looking intensely at what looks like a piece of chewing gum on the floor, and Holly is giving the wanker sign to Martin. Mel, who is sitting next to me, seems to be concentrating extremely hard on not vomiting all over her new flip-flops.
‘Are you all right?’ I whisper into her ear, careful to keep my voice low so that Damien doesn’t acknowledge my existence.
As she responds with a dry heave, I can’t help but smile at the slightly faded admission stamp on her hand, which advertises ‘a free shot with every drink’.
The people who work with me are all British expats. They’re a harmless mismatch of eighteen-year-old party animals, bored housewives and young suits who fancy themselves as the next Wolf of Wall Street.
Well, I’m definitely no Jordan Belfort! Five months I’ve been working here and I haven’t sold one single holiday. I’m that skint I can’t even afford mayonnaise to mix in with my dry tuna pasta, which is currently sitting in a Tupperware container on my desk, sweating in the sticky morning heat.
But now things have become serious. Damien pulled me to one side yesterday and placed his skinny, moist palm on my arm. I dodged the spittle flying at me as he spoke in his whiny Scouse accent.
‘No sale tomorrow and you gotta go… sorry, girl.’
Speaking of Damien, I see he’s finally sat down. Who won Star of the Week? I half wonder. Oh, well, I suppose it’s time to pick up the telephone and annoy some people. A huge poster looms above me: ‘smile while you dial’.
‘Are you listening to me, Lana? I said, do you want a brew?’ Mel nudges me on my arm, her Katie Price perfume billowing above our heads like a cloud of lemon sherbet.
‘If you can manage it without puking.’ I wink at her, letting her know my banter is well intended. She sticks her fingers up at me in classic Mel fashion, before turning on her heel and sauntering off.
As I fire up my computer, I, unfortunately, catch my reflection in the monitor. God! I desperately need a good night’s sleep and a bit of TLC. I’m twenty-six and I look about forty: dark-brown circles have started to form under my eyes and unruly, coarse eyebrow hair is sprouting out in all directions like the chits on an old potato. My limp, blonde hair is pulled back lazily into a ponytail with Amber’s butterfly clip shoved in as an afterthought. Oh, yeah, I have a daughter, by the way: Amber. She’s six. It’s because of her I had to leave our home in Manchester.
It’s because of her I’m on the run.
CHAPTER TWO (#ulink_108660c5-a054-526f-b0a6-f2d54b29dc81)
PRESENT DAY
Liam, Manchester, 1.45 pm
Don’t mistake my relief for happiness. It’s vital that you understand the difference.
I suffer with asthma, but when I was younger it literally consumed me; probably down to my father’s forty-a-day habit and the fact we lived right next to the Mancunian Way. When an attack took hold, I felt like fifteen rugby players were in a scrum around my windpipe. You never get used to that crushing feeling; desperately trying to drag in air that evaporates the moment it reaches your lips. Then my foster mum would appear, as if by magic, with a reassuring smile and an inhaler tucked inside her pinny.
‘You’re always losing them, Liam,’ she would say soothingly. A quick press of the nozzle and the deadly grip loosened. For a blissful moment I felt free… but definitely not happy. How could I be happy when I knew all too well that the feeling would return… and the next time it could be fatal?
Today I have pressed down the nozzle, figuratively speaking, of course. I’ve struggled through the denial, fought against the sadness, given into the anger. But I know the relief will soon evaporate, leaving cold droplets of fear in its place… it always does.
I sit down tentatively in my easy chair, light up an Embassy No 1 and draw in deeply. I need a minute to think. I know I shouldn’t be smoking, by the way, so you don’t need to lecture me. I close my eyes lightly, inhale the finality of the situation along with the tar. It is there that I see her, floating just behind my eyelids, her face just slightly out of reach: Alice, my beautiful, darling Alice.
Snapping my eyes wide open, I cast them onto the front-room door, just slightly ajar, my heart hammering so fast I feel almost giddy. I look and wait, not daring to take another breath. But Alice isn’t there. Of course she isn’t.
