Someone Who Isn't Me by Danuta Kot (romance novel chinese novels .TXT) 📕

Andy… the one she shared stupid jokes with, the one who texted her while she was working behind the bar, making her laugh, the one whose face always seemed to light up when he saw her. His slow smile. And the way he had looked at her as her hair tumbled down round her shoulders. He’d talked to her like he cared. I don’t want to make more bad things happen in your life.

But he had.

He’d been married all the time and he had a kid. A wife and a child he’d never thought to mention. What other lies had he told her? She couldn’t bear the thought that he’d been just another lying creep, but what else was she supposed to think?

Baggers can’t be choosers.

Last night, after she’d walked out on Curwen, she’d gone inside and sat in the big armchair in her room and struggled not to cry. She kept telling herself Curwen was a pig creep, he should leave her alone, he should… But all of that sounded old. If she cried, it wouldn’t be because of him, it would be for Andy. And what was there to cry about? She would be crying for the Andy she thought she’d known.

And he had never existed.

And now she couldn’t even ask him why he’d lied to her. Maybe he’d split up with his wife. How would Curwen know? Maybe he’d hadn’t mentioned his child because… because…

Who was she trying to kid? He had lied because he was a creep, just like all the rest, and that was the end of it.

At least Curwen had been straight with her. And there was one thing he’d told her that she couldn’t get out of her head. The people he was after were pushing drugs to kids.

She knew all about that. She’d seen it, the kids with no one who gave a shit about them, apart from the dealers, and the dealers were just using them. Even kids who had someone to care about them – like Jade’s Lewis – could get drawn in. Lewis was starting to hang out with the gangs, Jade had said as much, and Becca had not liked the look of the people she’d seen him with. She’d seen the flashy clothes, the fancy bike. Lewis was in trouble. He was a little shit, but Jade was her mate, and you don’t let your mates down.

She could do something. Curwen wanted to know what was in those bags that Carl had stored in the cellar. She didn’t have the key, but was Curwen right? Could she get it? Carl usually kept his keys clipped to his belt, but when he was in the back doing the books, or whatever it was he did in there, he left his keys on the table, and sometimes, when he was working in the pub, he left his keys behind the bar. Maybe…

When it was her break, she headed straight outside for a cigarette. Jade was there, leaning against the wall, her own cigarette already lit. She smiled a bit wearily when she saw Becca. Becca’s face must have shown something of how she was feeling, because Jade asked, ‘What’s up love? Boyfriend dumped you?’

Becca shook her head. ‘No boyfriend.’ That was true enough, wasn’t it? Andy had never been her boyfriend, not really. He belonged to someone else.

‘Well, that’s your problem then, isn’t it?’

‘What is?’

‘No boyfriend. You need a good seeing to. That’ll make you feel better.’

Becca found herself laughing. That was what she liked about Jade – she had a tough life with no money, two kids, an ex who gave her nothing but hassle and the same shit job that Becca had, but she kept her head up, kept on going.

She couldn’t get those pictures for Curwen. There was no way she could get those keys. Curwen had talked about drugs. Andy had talked about dodgy money stuff. Who was it he worked for? She fished out the business card he had given her, but all it gave was his name, Andy Yeatson, and Financial Enquiries.

Another worm of doubt started eating away at her. If he’d really been doing what he said, wouldn’t the name of the firm he worked for be on his card? Anyone could get a business card printed. If he’d lied about one thing…

She took out her phone and looked at the last message, remembering the way it had made her feel relieved at first that Andy hadn’t dropped her, and then how it had seemed all wrong. She should get rid of it. She should get rid of all the texts he’d sent, and the card, and just stop thinking about him, just remember he’d been a creep all along and she should have known better.

She really should.

She was about to press the delete key, when a cold realisation washed over her.

The last text had been sent on the night Curwen had first come into the pub, the night she’d sent pictures, the night she had spent the whole evening waiting for Andy to come back. Like he’d promised.

Only he couldn’t. The paper, the one she’d read in the supermarket. It said Andy had been attacked on Tuesday night.

When that text was sent, Great, A x, Andy had been dead three days.

Chapter 22

It sometimes felt to Dinah that no matter where she was moved to in Humberside Police, her job always reset to traffic. Her first time on a murder team as a DC, and here she was checking CCTV and traffic cameras, trying to find the route Andy took down the coast.

It required real concentration but it was also deadly boring. She had to keep stopping to refocus herself as her mind started drifting away from the task.

At least it had been made easier by the advice Curwen had given her: ‘The car you want drove right down into Sunk Island, right? There are only about three turnings off the main road that