Harley admitted that she may have been using Shane as a distraction and told herself that a nice meal in a quaint pub wasn’t doing any harm. All they did was talk about her homelife that was getting her down more than ever, and work, or her dreams for the future, nothing flirty. He was a complete gentleman, made her laugh and feel important to him. He told her that things hadn’t been great at home for a couple of years, that he and Julia slept in separate rooms but they were seeing a counsellor in the hope they could get back on track. Harley believed it all.
Then one night as he dropped her by the woods on the lane near her house, he gave her a white envelope. Inside, enough money for a deposit and the first month’s rent on the house share she’d told him about.
‘I can’t take this, Shane. It’s too much and I don’t know when I’ll be able to pay you back.’ She couldn’t take her eyes off the wedge of money inside. She’d never seen so much and couldn’t believe he’d lend it to her.
Shane placed his hand on hers. ‘Who said anything about a loan? See it as a gift from me, a thank you for keeping me company these past few weeks when I’ve been at a low ebb. And anyway, you deserve a break and I’d like to help.’ Shane’s eyes shone, his smile lit up his face and he looked genuinely happy he was able to make one of her dreams come true.
Harley took the money. Moved into her house share and promised that once she’d bought some furniture for her bedroom because the stuff in there was a bit grim, she’d start paying him back. She was proud and didn’t want handouts. But it didn’t end there.
The following month, on her nineteenth birthday, he surprised her with another white envelope and this one contained a printout. Confirmation of payment for a course of ten driving lessons, his gift to her.
‘Oh my God, Shane… no, no I can’t let you do this, it’s too much and I’d feel cheeky accepting so please, will you cancelthem and get a refund?’ Harley tried to hand him back the envelope but he pushed it away.
‘Nope, no can do.’
‘But…’ Harley tried again and this time Shane unleashed emotional blackmail.
‘Harley, please take it, you don’t know how happy it makes me to treat you. I know what it’s like to struggle when you’re trying to make your way in the world. I had nobody to help me. My parents did their best but no way could they give me a leg up in life so I had to do things the hard way, taking crap jobs to scrape by. And let’s face it, Julia doesn’t need or appreciate anything I get her, she’s a millionaire, and the girls already have everything they need so this, this is my way of paying the universe back, by doing nice things for you.’
How could she refuse after that? Harley wished more than anything that she had.
Chapter Thirty-Nine
Molly had been able to imagine every single thing Harley had told her, yet was still finding it hard to take it all in. That the man she’d loved was proving to be a master at all this. Adept at sucking in women, girls even, who he’d identified as being insecure or at a turning point in their lives, in need of his fatherly presence or a bit of cold hard cash. God, he was clever. She also knew the answer to her next question would be hard to hear.
‘So when did he… move things along? Or did you start to fall for him? I won’t be annoyed, I swear. He’s a good-looking guy and has the gift of the gab and plenty of tricks up his sleeve so I’m not surprised he sucked you in. He sucked my mum in and look where that got her.’ Molly felt that familiar creep of embarrassment laced with an unhelpful dose of stupidity and was glad she could keep her own mistakes to herself.
‘It’s only been going on, inthatway, for a couple of months. I’d done well at work and proved myself so your mum told me that the directors had agreed to fund my uni course. I was over the moon because the last thing I wanted was to get into debt with tuition fees, so I applied and bagged myself a place on amanagement degree course at Bolton University, starting this September. Everyone was really chuffed for me at work. Then, about a week later, Shane turned up in a taxi at my house, drunk, saying he’d had a huge row with your mum and she’d kicked him out.’
Molly’s eyebrows furrowed. No way had that happened, not to her knowledge but she let Harley explain.
‘It was about 2am, so I let him in and told him to be quiet. Luckily there was only one other person in that night and they were asleep. I couldn’t let him stay on the sofa in case anyone recognised him so he had to stay in my room, in my bed.’ Harley blushed deeply and averted her eyes. ‘Let’s just say that one thing led to another and he seduced me and leave it there, okay.’
‘Did you feel you owed him? Because of the gifts, or did he make you feel sorry for him with a sob story?’ Molly more or less knew the answer before Harley spoke.
‘A bit of both, I suppose. It’s not like I had the ugliest guy in the village in my bed and I kept telling myself that him and Julia were more or less separated and it was a one-off.’
‘But it wasn’t.’ Molly heard the resignation in her own voice.
‘No, but not in the way you might think. The next two times he invited himself round and was acting like we were a couple, as though I’d silently agreed to something. It was weird. He’d park in the woods late at night and sneak round the back of the house and I’d let him in. It pissed me off that he thought he could text me and I’d be okay with him just turning up. Then on the third time I said no. That I was tired and he should go home. We had a bit of a text row, I’ve still got it on my phone, but I stood my ground and in the end he took the hint. I had no clue what I’d done, not until I got into work the next day.’
‘What happened?’
Harley sighed. ‘Long story short, he cornered me in the locker room and told me how unhappy he was and hoped thatI’d make it up to him. He was really close and threatening, not outright nasty, more the way he used his body as a silent weapon, towering over me, pushing me against the lockers. I was scared someone would come in so just to shut him up, I agreed to meet him that night. I panicked.’
‘Did you go?’
‘Yes, I bloody well had to because he must have sent about ten messages after that… oh, and that reminds me, he didn’t use his own phone, it was a cheat phone which told me I wasn’t the only person he was at it with.’
Molly prayed to God her face wasn’t giving herself away, knowing he’d used one to keep in touch with her, too. ‘That’s interesting, that he had another phone. So, go on, what happened then?’
‘Simple really. I met him in the woods and told him I wanted it to stop. No more coming round to mine. And then the threats, well, hints really, began.’ At this point Harley’s whole demeanour changed from being annoyed to on the verge of tears.
‘He reminded me about the money I owed him, for the deposit that he’d said he never wanted back, and that I also owed him for my driving lessons. I lost my shit at that point because he said it was a birthday present, and we had a huge row which ended when he grabbed my wrist, I mean really tightly and it hurt.’ Harley touched her wrist, as if remembering the moment and the pain.
‘Then he pulled me towards him. His face was inches from mine and that’s when I saw the real him. His eyes were cold and… and like they’d glazed over with anger and he told me that if I didn’t behave like a nice girl he’d make sure I lost my job. Then I’d not be able to pay my rent and I could kiss goodbye to my uni fees being paid, too.’
‘What did you say?’
