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Losing Juliet: A gripping psychological thriller with twists you won’t see coming
June Taylor
A twisty psychological drama about a friendship gone bad. Perfect for fans of Friend Request and I am Watching YouYou can’t escape the past…Juliet and Chrissy were best friends until one fateful summer forced them apart. Now, nearly twenty years later, Juliet wants to be back in Chrissy’s life.But Chrissy doesn’t want Juliet anywhere near her, or her teenage daughter Eloise. After all, Juliet is the only person who knows what happened that night – and her return threatens to destroy the life that Chrissy has so carefully built.Because when the past is reawakened, it can prove difficult to bury. And soon all three of them will realize how dangerous it can get once the truth is out there…
Losing Juliet
JUNE TAYLOR
A division of HarperCollinsPublishers
www.harpercollins.co.uk (http://www.harpercollins.co.uk)
Copyright (#u197843c6-89f3-5a57-94ae-7c0bfce3e436)
This is a work of fiction. Any references to real people, living or dead, real events, businesses, organizations and localities are intended only to give the fiction a sense of reality and authenticity. All names, characters, places and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and their resemblance, if any, to real-life counterparts is entirely coincidental.
Killer Reads
An imprint of HarperCollinsPublishers
1 London Bridge Street
London SE1 9GF
www.harpercollins.co.uk (http://www.harpercollins.co.uk)
First published by HarperCollinsPublishers 2016
Copyright © June Taylor 2016
June Taylor asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work
Cover design by Cherie Chapman © HarperCollinsPublishers 2016
Cover photograph © Shutterstock.com (http://Shutterstock.com)
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library
All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, down-loaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins e-books
Ebook Edition © NOVEMBER 2016 ISBN: 9780008215088
Version 2017-07-27
for Pearl
my big sister
The adventure is in the risk
Table of Contents
Cover (#u518058cd-9734-59f6-927a-96c67c72e2df)
Title Page (#u7e0d8de9-493c-5735-80ef-2be8f64f7fb8)
Copyright (#u80a69881-d858-5ec9-b194-e5a32f952c9f)
Dedication (#u7612375e-6fac-5f7b-ac7a-a2962c532cb2)
Epigraph (#ud20e23fb-6396-5981-944f-cb0e176e1e83)
Prologue (#ue5030c4b-7654-53bc-ac93-da47ff3a4408)
Part One (#u9493c2a9-e069-56b1-8cf9-5328e2d75e45)
Chapter 1 (#ud8a0c88d-34b1-5daa-84a7-1c6e7d55da72)
Chapter 2 (#ud4f8286f-fea8-511e-b36b-cedbccf79813)
Chapter 3 (#ufd79120b-8482-5144-9d35-b47a0dab928e)
Chapter 4 (#u2b3f609d-6543-5336-b91f-c1d2e2a58cfd)
Chapter 5 (#u6804c55c-5876-555e-9828-c66184c3ea0f)
Chapter 6 (#ub2658a9e-f717-5074-9844-2a62edb25c11)
Chapter 7 (#u46e761f3-7054-5b31-8a53-0f65eb82ca85)
Chapter 8 (#u4e023662-620e-5358-b789-5757551b2f3a)
Chapter 9 (#uf8350041-cc5a-5f59-9e7c-8435395bf32b)
Chapter 10 (#u467eb92f-1efb-5cde-acec-1bbfba818188)
Chapter 11 (#u43cba82e-7ba3-5040-bb4f-694feeb950b3)
Chapter 12 (#u26e965c9-5ab8-5a00-854d-2d16f80d7a47)
Chapter 13 (#u73f96c86-0e54-5457-b9c3-24baf4de93af)
Chapter 14 (#u74e6fc94-8804-5368-a8eb-f638efb6577d)
Chapter 15 (#u883d1f6c-09e3-5735-8694-8ad3ab2445d1)
Chapter 16 (#u828acc13-7434-59b3-be72-832551806c01)
Chapter 17 (#u78ea6e37-22ce-5fc7-94e4-95a153ab9576)
Chapter 18 (#u448e0649-7bdb-5ead-92d0-65f52ada413c)
Chapter 19 (#u15f5717d-8e87-5bfc-92f3-c66bbbed2986)
Chapter 20 (#u8db10c24-2bbc-59ce-a8ee-c8d5cb72e421)
Chapter 21 (#u1443e336-a8e3-57aa-87c5-e6b7cf7d450a)
Chapter 22 (#u27764580-a0cf-501c-8166-e3dc8e0364b3)
Part Two (#u8ddd7116-341c-5cd0-83bf-080f9d5d5a4a)
Chapter 23 (#uda5ecae0-119b-5f1e-b82f-e9f124522dff)
Chapter 24 (#u225ab585-daba-59ab-9813-49ade04c5187)
Chapter 25 (#u719b9837-82fb-5680-b4d7-f9db23521b68)
Chapter 26 (#u04864820-9681-5a41-b651-e4fc7e49ab43)
Chapter 27 (#u7e0e03e7-f3d2-5068-b7ab-ee2721a15ed2)
Chapter 28 (#u086da53d-ba19-5ff1-87c3-da8cfe55d063)
Chapter 29 (#u39e0e57d-2254-56d4-ab54-93bc6f9b36fc)
Chapter 30 (#u7466f3b8-c8d6-5f42-a213-fe6b4a383b48)
Chapter 31 (#u6088d189-09cc-5ff9-9143-30489a9f42bc)
Chapter 32 (#u2c2fe7c3-1beb-5617-b2cd-30329cf88a6a)
Chapter 33 (#u45601d14-4600-56ae-8ace-3b9b8dac1ecf)
Chapter 34 (#u2bc09582-c2ae-57e1-aa83-eaf72ce850de)
Chapter 35 (#ueb639726-5422-5e7f-8f5c-c5e38baac7e4)
Chapter 36 (#u69243917-fbb8-5fda-a280-d2bf101b8f16)
Chapter 37 (#u5c4a2987-c3c5-5902-a542-08ae4a8cab4b)
Chapter 38 (#u407d9d67-f3a2-50d7-97e3-c246cca1da98)
Chapter 39 (#ub2a7d0a8-6ea1-55f5-8818-00be26aeb2e7)
Chapter 40 (#u4b406799-2487-51d4-a473-69a446f4c4e9)
Epilogue (#ueb49f801-8afb-54d9-aefb-ed58ee8bdd58)
Acknowledgements (#u89450800-b0dc-5d2b-9bb6-086d6ca21784)
Keep Reading... (#uc95c1af7-442d-5b70-8c9a-c88b6ff0e5b9)
About the Author (#u1b58abd1-16c3-5deb-aa89-e88b5a5c9b50)
About the Publisher (#uc98d175d-ea98-5ddf-9560-537d34880a74)
PROLOGUE (#u197843c6-89f3-5a57-94ae-7c0bfce3e436)
The words sounded blurred and far away, as if someone had pushed her head underwater. She ran off into the rain and into the darkness. Her mother shouted her name but didn’t come after her. In any case she was too quick. She cast off her shoes, tossing them into the air, wishing they would explode into little pieces. She wanted to break something. Hit something.
The water running down her face was a mixture of rainwater and tears. She wasn’t cold but her dress was stuck to her skin, which was visible through the thin fabric. She didn’t know where she was heading and somehow found herself by the side of the lake. How different it felt to the last time she was here.
She removed her clothes, all of them, ripping her dress in the process. What did it matter? What did any of this matter?
The rocks tore at her feet. But what couldn’t be seen couldn’t hurt you. She knew that now. It’s what you could see. It’s what you did know. That’s what hurt the most.
The icy chill of the water seemed to take away some of her pain.
‘There is no better freedom,’ she wanted to say, but the words froze as soon as her lips tried to shape them. She swam to keep warm, soon becoming disorientated. Where was the shore and where was the middle of the lake? Impossible to tell with the darkness wrapped around her and the rain coming down again. The middle of the lake was too deep, she remembered. Soon she would be out of her depth and was already getting tired.
Did it matter? Did any of it matter?
Treading water she turned full circle on herself. The shadows and outlines all looked the same. Her knees scraped against rocks. Crawling over them she managed to stand up, the water to her waist, and she began to wade through it, pushing hard against the lake, feeling exhausted and numb with cold.
Gradually her steps became easier. Somehow she had reached the lakeshore and looked around, hugging her shoulders, searching for her dress swallowed up in the gloom. She ran. She must have, because suddenly she found herself at the tiny hut by the side of the tennis court where the racquets and balls were kept. The director’s chair was in the doorway, wet beneath her skin when she sank into it. Pressing her hands hard against her ears she slumped over her knees. If only Chrissy’s words would stop echoing inside her head.
She was shivering; naked, alone, and curled up like a foetus.
To think that only a few weeks ago she hadn’t known any of this. Was it better now that she knew the truth? She had wanted it so desperately.
PART ONE (#u197843c6-89f3-5a57-94ae-7c0bfce3e436)
CHAPTER 1 (#u197843c6-89f3-5a57-94ae-7c0bfce3e436)
Manchester: 2007
The phone rang. She picked up.
‘Hello,’ said a voice. ‘I wonder: can you tell me, does someone by the name of Chrissy live there?’
She tried to tune in to the sounds at the other end for clues. Music. Opera, was it? A clanking of cups, possibly in a café?
‘Erm, who wants to know?’
‘I’m Juliet, an old friend from uni. We were best friends.’
The voice had a late-night feel to it, deep and smoky; the sort you might want to get to know.
