In the hallway the coat stand hosts five of Gregory’s jackets. I reach in the pocket of the first. Nothing. The second. Nothing. Then I reach in the blue jacket, the heavy one, the one he wears underneath his winter coat. My fingers slide around in the pocket until I feel the chill of the silver pendant. I pull out the necklace with the Triquetra knot on the bottom and I remember what it stood for. Three points. Father, Son, Holy Spirit. Mother, Crone, Maiden. Mind, Body, Spirit. And a circle for protection. A unity that can never be broken. I hear Stephen whisper that it is a unity that can never die. Not even in death. I feel Stephen’s hands on my neck as he fastens the chain. He wanted me. He begged for me. He held me and loved me, and I know now that he also gave me a child. I remember what those hands felt like, and why I craved them to hold me again. This is why Gregory took him from me. First the necklace, then the man. He knew I would remember. In taking it from me he gave the Triquetra a new meaning. Truth, Clarity, Sanity.
I leave the love heart necklace in the pocket of the jacket. I hear Gregory call to me from the drawing room. He asks, “Has she gone?”
“Yes,” I say. He thinks it is over.
“Good. That means that it is just us now. She left us some lunch in the oven. Shall I serve it?”
“Yes,” I say as I walk up the stairs.
I file the papers in my bedside table, behind the drawer. I leave the Triquetra with them. I place a small white and green capsule filled with lies next to the necklace and count number one and know that the time has come for me to be ready to start taking them on my own. There is still a red stain on the woodwork inside the drawer space, but I know now that this is not my blood. I abandon Gregory’s version of the truth, because I realise he knew mine all along.
I live in my world, not his. He has tried to shape and distort me behind my drugged and unseeing eyes for longer than I care for. I know my destiny now. Deep down, somewhere in the bottom of the lake which has called out to me in pain my whole life, I think I always have. Fear kept me here and it has nearly destroyed me. I close the drawer. No longer will his lies blur my vision.
And so we begin.
The .....
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
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www.michellemuckley.com
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Table of Contents
Dear Reader,
Chapter one
Chapter two
Chapter three
Chapter four
Chapter five
Chapter six
Chapter seven
Chapter eight
Chapter nine
Chapter ten
Chapter eleven
Chapter thirteen
Chapter fourteen
Chapter fifteen
Chapter sixteen
Chapter seventeen
Chapter eighteen
Chapter nineteen
Chapter twenty
Chapter twenty one
Chapter twenty two
Chapter twenty three
Chapter twenty four
Chapter twenty five
Chapter twenty six
Chapter twenty seven
Chapter twenty eight
Chapter twenty nine
Chapter thirty
Chapter thirty one
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
and before you go....