Run Away With Me : A fast-paced psychological thriller by Daniel Hurst (ebook reader ink txt) 📕

not sure I believe him, but he’s too stubborn to let me know if he regrets it. Either way, at least he is back in the cottage with me. I’ve spent enough time in here on my own today.

I’m sitting on the sofa twiddling my thumbs and waiting for him to come downstairs so we can talk about what we are going to do next. There is plenty to discuss. It’s a good thing that there are no reports of the hit and run in the news yet, although I’m not quite sure how that is possible if everything Adam has told me about the incident is correct. A body lying in the middle of the lane would have been found by somebody, and then the police would have got involved.

How could that not have ended up in the news by now, especially where we live?

Carlisle is the kind of place where anything makes the paper. I remember one time a cricket ball went through the windscreen of a parked car sitting outside the local clubhouse, and it made the front page. The front page. The article wasn’t even about how dangerous the event could have been but rather was just a chance to use several puns about cricket. If a story like that can make it onto the prominent pages of our local rag then how the hell does a dead body and a hit and run scandal not feature?

I hear the shower turn off upstairs and listen as Adam unlocks the bathroom door and trots across the landing to the bedroom. It’s annoying having to wait for him to come down so we can talk, but I don’t want to risk another argument until he is ready, so I will wait. Instead, I head over to the fridge and take out the carton of cranberry juice inside. It’s the one Adam got for me when he went on his expedition to the village that seemed to take forever. I’ve been craving this drink more and more lately, but I’m trying not to have too much if I can help it. I don’t want to be going to the toilet any more than I already am. But as pregnancy cravings go, I guess it could be worse. I’ve heard about women who craved much unhealthier things like doughnuts, chocolate or ice cream. I even read about a person in America who craved chalk.

Actual pieces of chalk.

I pour myself a glass of juice and return the carton to the fridge before re-taking my seat on the sofa, just in time for Adam to join me downstairs. He looks better now that he has showered. He seems calmer. That’s good. I guess the walk in the rain was worth it, after all.

‘Would you like a cup of tea?’ he asks me as he switches the kettle on and rummages around in the cupboard for a cup.

‘I’m fine, thanks,’ I reply as I watch him take out a mug emblazoned with the face of a Disney character. I assume it belongs to one of his sister’s daughters. Adam’s nieces are aged six and three, and they are cute as buttons, if a little annoying after a while. I can handle being around them in short bursts which is why we haven’t really babysat overnight for them before, but I don’t feel too guilty about that, nor do I worry about what it will be like when I’ve got my own child to look after that I can’t just walk away from when they give me a headache. It’s different when it’s your own offspring. It’s worth all the drama, noise and mess then. It’s chaos in Kat’s house, and the decibel levels when the girls get going are off the charts. Maybe I’ll be able to stand being around them more when Samuel comes along, but I guess asking Adam’s sister to babysit for us all the time is out of the question if we have barely done it for her.

I should have thought that through more.

It’s only then that I catch myself and remember that all these innocent thoughts of my future life when Samuel is born are no longer on the table. We’re on the run. Adam is a criminal. We’re staying in this cottage secretly. Adam’s sister doesn’t know we are here. Nobody does. Life is not the same as it was.

Forget babysitting and visiting Adam’s nieces.

We may never see them again.

Adam eventually finishes making his cup of tea and then joins me on the sofa where I allow him a couple of sips of his hot drink before I broach the elephant in the room again. I wish we could sit here in peaceful silence, but we can’t. We need to discuss the next part of our plan.

‘Do you think you can check the TV aerial after that?’ I ask as Adam sips his tea. ‘We need to keep an eye on the news, and it’s easier than you having to go out into the village every time to check it.’

Adam nods. ‘I’ll get right to it,’ he says, going to get up.

‘Finish your drink first,’ I remind him, feeling bad that he has only just sat down and I’m making him get up again. But the TV really does need fixing. I want to check the news channels for myself. It’s not that I don’t believe Adam when he tells me that there are no reports of the hit and run anywhere. It’s just that I need to see something of the outside world and TV is my only way of doing that.

‘How are you feeling?’ Adam asks me as he settles back onto the sofa.

‘I’m fine,’ I reply, which isn’t really true.

‘How’s Samuel been today?’

‘No kicking yet.’

‘That’s good.’

‘Yeah.’

The conversation dries up there, not because either of us has nothing to say but because we are both too busy worrying about the only topic that we should be talking about right now.

‘I love you,’