Free What Goes Around: A chilling psychological thriller by Julie Corbin Page A

and is in her room when Tom comes home from work. I hand him a single malt in a crystal glass, two ice cubes clinking together in the base. ‘How was your day?’ I ask, leaning in for a kiss, my breasts brushing against his sleeve.
    ‘Productive. Getting to grips with the brief.’ He lets the whisky roll around in his mouth as he looks me up and down. ‘You’ve been gardening?’ He reaches forward and removes a petal of magnolia flower from my hair, a petal I had deliberately left there so that he could make just such a gesture.
    ‘Tidying up a little.’ I shrug it off as if it was nothing. ‘Alex helped too.’
    ‘Did he?’ He nods and has another swig of whisky. ‘That’s good.’
    Tom has yet to properly get to know Alex and that makes life, if not exactly difficult, then slightly tiresome; and so, if an opportunity arises, I like to spin the wheel in Alex’s favour.
    ‘Were you able to collect my suit?’
    ‘I was.’ I smile into his neck and weave sleepy kisses on the softness around his throat. ‘It was tricky getting parked but I managed it.’
    ‘What would I do without you?’ he says, sounding genuinely amazed, as if I’d just performed a feat that was well beyond the scope of the average human being. I don’t feel even remotely guilty lying to him. Most relationships are sustained, strengthened even, by tiny, insignificant lies that ensure one party feels loved while the other party gains control. As long as the power see-saws between the couple, always fluid, never stuck, then balance is maintained. (Ideally, of course, a couple should never see-saw. They should walk hand-in-hand, neither competitive nor combative, but since when has life ever been ideal?)
    I call Alex downstairs for supper, but just as we sit down, the doorbell sounds. ‘I’ll get it,’ Tom says, dropping his napkin on the table and heading for the front door.
    Alex’s eyes snap to mine when we hear the high-pitched voice of Mrs Patterson, our neighbour. I make out the words ‘cat’ and ‘wall’ and ‘soaking wet’. I pass Alex the pepper grinder. ‘Add a squeeze of lemon, too,’ I say. ‘Brings out the flavours.’
    I can’t hear what Tom is saying but his tone is polite and friendly and before long he has Mrs Patterson laughing. ‘I’m not sure what all that was about,’ he says when he returns to the table. ‘Apparently her cat arrived home drenched and terrified. Came over our wall.’
    ‘How strange,’ I say. I catch Alex’s eye and wink. He stifles a smile. Conspiracy makes us friends again.
    ‘So I hear you helped in the garden today, Alex?’ Tom says, pouring us both a glass of wine.
    ‘Just a bit,’ Alex mumbles.
    ‘Now, if you won’t blow your own trumpet, then I will,’ I say. I rest my free hand on Tom’s knee. ‘I wasn’t strong enough to wield the chainsaw so Alex helped me.’ I take a sip of wine – crisp, fruity Sauvignon Blanc that I swirl inside my mouth. ‘And he cleared up afterwards.’
    ‘Good for you,’ Tom says, smiling at Alex. He begins to tell him about his time as a fruit picker in East Anglia. ‘Paid my way through university. There’s something to be said for hard, physical work. Especially at your age when you have the strength and flexibility.’
    Alex manages not to look dismissive and Tom moves on to talking about his day. He’s working on a high-stakes case involving money laundering and multiple murders by the sort of gangsters most people believe exist only on TV dramas. Alex is genuinely gripped by what Tom is telling him. ‘But why don’t the police arrest them?’ he says. ‘If everyone knows they did it.’
    ‘Insufficient evidence,’ Tom says. ‘Let me tell you how it works.’
    It’s good to see my son relaxed and it’s good to see Tom acknowledging Alex’s opinion and chatting to him without the need for me as a mediator. But after a few minutes, I begin to feel uneasy and I steer the conversation onto sport, because Alex is just a bit