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e babe. I’m here,” he whispers. “I’m not going anywhere.”
I smile sadly into the darkness. Oh Nicholas, I love you. I wish desperately that I was your first and only love… like you are mine.
Natasha
I lie in bed as I watch Joshua and me making love. I could watch it all day. In fact I have been doing just that. We are making slow gentle love. He is on his widespread knees, one forearm is holding his bodyweight off me and the other hand is on my behind as he holds me how his body wants me. God I miss him, I miss his smell, his touch, his love. I can’t live like this, without him. I’m like a plant starved of the sun. I’m suffocating even though I have air because the air that I’m breathing is polluted with hate. Help me. Somebody, please help me. On the other screen I see Joshua walk into our bedroom and I grab the remote and point it to the television. I smile a sad smile as I watch him. He lies down on the bed and starts scrolling through his phone. He smiles softly when he gets to an image. I can’t see the image but I know it’s of me. He has been reading my diaries word for word and I have seen that smile many times over the last fortnight. He sits slowly up and frowns—what’s he doing? He stands and goes to the wardrobe and from the back of the door takes off my wedding dress in its black velvet bag and holds it up to look at it. Tears instantly overflow from my eyes. I’m supposed to be planning our wedding right now. He hangs the hanger back over the door and slowly unzips the bag as my heart breaks. This isn’t how he is supposed to be seeing this dress. He takes it out and holds it out for his gaze and then turns it and looks at the back. The lump in my throat is big and hurts so much as I try and deal with watching him do this. He then lays it up against his body and puts his cheek down to rest on it as it drapes over his shoulder. Dear god. He starts to sway as if dancing, oh no. He is dancing our wedding song alone. He thinks I’m dead. I watch a tear roll down his cheek. The full extent of the horror we are living overwhelms me and the scariest thing of all is soon I might be dead—there is every possibility that death is just around the corner for me. I will be a distant memory in the lives of the ones I love. How do I turn this around?
Dad, please help me. Help me think of a plan to get out of here. I need to get out of here.
I flop back to lie on the bed and then something comes up on the news channel that I haven’t seen before so I flick the remote to turn up the volume.
In breaking news, Joshua Stanton has just been arrested for the murder of his wife Natasha Marx. Evidence has been found in his place of residences that is a direct link to her murder.
I screw up my face, what? He didn’t do this. Why would they think he would do this? Oh my god, oh my god. My heart starts to race and I am instantly filled with fear. The door opens and Carl walks in carrying a tray of food.
My furious eyes turn to him. “Who are you working for Carl?” I snap.
“Why do you think I’m working for someone?” he asks.
“Because I can pay you ten million dollars tonight if you let me go.”
His eyes hold mine.
“Twenty,” I reply as I up the ante.
“You’re lying,” he sneers.
“No, I’m not. I can pay you more money that you ever dreamt of.”
The television story continues about the evidence they found in Willowvale and my eyes flick to the screen.
Carl smiles broadly and I glare at him in disgust. “Not long now.” He smiles.
I frown. “What does that mean?” I ask. “Not long now till what?” I ask panicked. Oh shit, are they going to kill me tonight?
“He will be dead very soon,” he sneers sadistically.
I frown. “Who, who will be dead?” I ask.
“Your pretty boy. He won’t last in prison. I give it a week and he will get himself killed.”
Horror dawns.
That is totally true—Joshua won’t last in prison. He will get himself killed.
“Is that what this is about? You want Joshua to get himself killed?” I whisper, mortified.
“You can’t be punished for a crime you didn’t commit. Nobody has to kill Joshua Stanton. He will do it for us,” he whispers. “There are no bodyguards in prison, Natasha.” He laughs sadistically and my blood runs cold.
My eyes widen. “Please name your price. Carl, I beg of you, we will pay you everything we have to let me go,” I beg.
“Liar!” he screams as he backhands me hard across the face and I fall to the floor. I curl into a ball instinctively as I know the kick is following and sure enough it does, but in my hip and I close my eyes against the pain.
“Keep your lying mouth shut!” he yells before disappearing out the door.
I lie on the floor, broken and hurt. They are going to kill him. My eyes close in pain at the thought of what they might do to him before they kill him. Is he being beaten right now? I sit up and put my head in my hands. What do I do? My eyes flick back up to the television and I notice a date on one of the reports and I frown. That’s the wrong date. I count on my fingers the number of days I have been in here and that doesn’t add up. I stand and frown. What the hell is going on? Shit. They are manipulating the vision in here, they are repeating old vision. Why? I walk into the bathroom and throw up. I can’t deal with this shit any longer. This is too much!
Twenty minutes later I walk back out and sit next to the window deep in thought. They are trying to mess with my head. You know what, I’m not buying into it. No fucking way. I grab a blanket from the bed and stand on the chair and drape it over the televisions.
