Destroy Me by Karen Cole (red queen ebook .txt) 📕

When I enter the dark hallway, I’m assailed by a strong sense that something is wrong. For a start, I’m met by a gust of cold air as soon as I open the door. And when I pop the keys in the pot on the dresser, I get the distinct feeling that something is out of place. It takes me a few moments to work out what it is. It’s the photo of Dylan in blue wellingtons. It’s not where it should be. It should be on the other side, next to the bronze elephant statue that Theo bought in India. It’s a small detail, but all the same it nags at me. Has someone moved it? Has Theo let himself in again? Damn him. I knew I should have changed the locks.

‘Theo?’ I call out tentatively, and my voice sounds small and timid in the darkness. I switch on the light, trying to control my nerves. I flood the house with light, looking in the living room and upstairs in the bedrooms, but there’s no sign of Theo. And that’s another thing: where’s Delilah? Normally, she would be under my feet, reminding me with her silent, reproachful presence that it’s way past her dinner time.

Delilah isn’t in the kitchen, but I discover the source of the cold air. The French doors leading on to the garden are wide open. How? Why? I stare out into the darkness, feeling increasingly bemused and scared. Of course, I reassure myself, there’s a simple explanation. I must have forgotten to close them. I was so preoccupied when I left the house. And Delilah will be fine. She’s probably just wandered out into the garden.

I open a tin of dog food and empty the contents into her metal bowl, tapping it with a spoon. If Delilah doesn’t hear this, she’s sure to smell the meat and come running. I wait impatiently by the door for the sound of her nails clicking on the patio and the rattle of the ID tag on her collar, but she doesn’t appear. Where the hell is she? I have to find her. I need to make sure she hasn’t escaped from the house somehow and got lost. It’s happened before. Once, when she was barely more than a puppy, she went missing for two days. We’d given her up for dead when she turned up again perfectly healthy and well. We never did find out where she’d been. But she was lucky to be unharmed. I can’t risk that happening again. So, even though I’m feeling increasingly spooked, and all I really want to do is lock the door and barricade myself in, I switch on the flashlight on my phone and step out into the darkness.

‘Delilah!’ I call softly.

No answer.

‘Where are you, Delilah? Bloody stupid dog,’ I mutter. ‘As if I haven’t got enough to worry about.’ I pick my way carefully down the garden path, shining the light into the flower beds and under the shrubbery. I look in her favourite spot under the hydrangeas. Maybe she’s fallen asleep. Sometimes she likes to dig a little hollow in the earth and make a sort of nest for herself. But she’s not there.

The wind hisses in the branches of the old oak tree and the garden seems alien in the torchlight, sapped of all colour. My legs grow heavy as I approach the shed and the darker area at the back of the garden, but I force myself on. On the patio around the shed I notice a couple of piles of grassy vomit and I almost step in a fresh pile of watery dog shit.

‘Delilah, baby, where are you? Are you sick?’ I say, peering in the gap between the fence and the shed.

And there she is.

For a few disorienting seconds, I think that she must be asleep. She’s lying on her side, her legs outstretched, one ear splayed out over the ground, as if she’s flying, the other flopping over her eye.

‘Delilah, wake up.’ I prod her gently.

Then I notice the quality of her stillness – the way she is not moving at all.

She’s not breathing.

Twenty-seven

‘Poison,’ the vet pronounces grimly.

It’s ten o’clock in the morning. At Pet Stop Veterinarian Clinic. As soon as I woke up this morning, I dragged Delilah out from behind the shed, wrapped her in a blanket and laid her on the back seat of the car. Then I drove her straight here. Now she’s laid out unceremoniously on the cold, metal examination table, her tongue lolling, eyes glassy, her ear flopping over the edge of the table.

‘We’d have to do a post-mortem to discover exactly what the poison was,’ he adds. ‘Did you leave any medications lying around? A surprising number of medications that are harmless to humans can be fatal to dogs.’

I think about the Xanax I took yesterday. But I left the packet on the sink, didn’t I? There’s no way Delilah could have got to them and even if she had, how would she have got into the packet?

‘Yes, I know, but I don’t think I left anything where she could reach it.’ I voice a fear that’s been preying on my mind ever since I found her. ‘Do you think she could have been deliberately poisoned?’

He gives me an odd look. ‘It’s possible, but unlikely. More likely she ate something that someone had put down for another purpose. Rat poison, for example. People really should be more careful.’

I nod. I am thinking about the open patio door. The more I think about it, the more I’m sure I didn’t leave it open. It’s possible I might not have locked it, but I’m certain I wouldn’t have left it wide open like that. A cold unease clutches me. What if the vet is wrong and someone broke into our house and poisoned Delilah?

‘Are you all right, Mrs Bayntun?’ The vet’s voice comes from far away.

‘Oh yes, sorry. What did you say?’

‘It’s quite all