Out of the Shadows ✔️ [Completed] [Book One]

Chapter 40

He crumples onto the settee and fiercely wipes the tears from his eyes. "Oh God, Lizzie." He practically shouts as he covers his face. He lets out a sound that is somewhere between a sob and a scream. "Everything you've been through... fuck... I knew it was bad, but... I can't... what he did to you... to you."

I rush to him and take him in my arms. He grips me desperately to him, his head against my chest. I rock backwards and forwards, stroking his hair.

Questions whirl through my mind - Have I said too much? Should I have told him about the baby?

What if he leaves me?

I need to show him that I'm strong enough for the both of us. That Ed is behind me. I need to show him that I'm still me and not Ed's victim.

He lets me hold him for a while before sitting back on the settee so I can cuddle up against him. I must fall asleep in his arms because when I open my eyes I can hear Caroline and Daniel talking in the kitchen. Their voices are hushed, so I creep over to be closer and hear what is being said.

"You should have told me."

"How could I? She's my best friend. She begged me not to; she said it would change how you saw her. I tried hinting about it all. But how could I break her confidence after everything that bastard put her through?"

There is a silence and then I hear Daniel sigh. Caroline clears her throat before continuing. "She's ashamed of herself, of the person she was, of what she let him do to her."

I hear Caroline crying and it breaks my heart to hear the impact that my choices have had on her. "She's a completely different person now. At uni even though Ed wasn't there every day, it was like he was always standing over her. We would hear her on the phone always apologising... God knows what for, she never did anything! But then when he would stay with us he really was the life and soul of the party, you couldn't wish to meet a nicer guy. He was so handsome and charming. You would never think for a second that he would be capable of hurting her, they looked so in love. He was so attentive to her." She laughs bitterly. "We tried to confront her a few times, but she would always deny it. We saw the marks every now and then, but she was always ready with an excuse like she fell down or some bullshit like that. It wasn't until our last term of uni and he showed up unexpectedly to stop her from going to our graduation ball. We came back early to check on her and he had her pinned against the wall screaming at her that she was his. Sarah pulled him off and told him to get out, but she still defended him saying it was her fault. After that we begged her to come to London with us and she was really thinking about it, started to look for jobs and everything."

She pauses and I think I hear Daniel comfort her before I hear the kettle being filled up and switched on. "Two days after Ed found out about London, he proposed and his dad offered her a job in his business in Manchester. We tried to talk her out of it, but Ed had promised her that he'd changed, that things would be different once they were married." She lets out a huge sigh. "He promised her it would never happen again. I think things did calm down once they were married because Lizzie tried to always behave the way he wanted her to. We moved to London, but we kept in touch all the time and visited whenever we could, which he hated."

I hear her let our a sob and then blow her nose. "When we found out she was pregnant I was so worried, but she swore he had changed. We visited and they looked like teenagers together again. He told me he was a better man and that he had grown up, was ready to be a father. I'm ashamed to say he fooled me... again. Around six months before she left him I got a phone call from her mom saying that she had been involved in an accident at her house and she was in hospital. We knew the truth straightaway. We drove straight up there. She was unconscious for a few days. The whole time Ed was with her... the doting husband."