Keep Your Friends Close: A gripping psychological thriller full of shocking twists you won’t see coming. June Taylor

squalid act with Louie was working its way out of her body, Karin was even more convinced about her feelings for Aaron. No one else. She didn’t want anyone else.

      ‘Have you changed your mind though?’ she asked, tentatively.

      Aaron pulled the bathrobe down over her shoulders and moved his body into hers. She really didn’t want to do this right now, it was too close to the time with Louie, but she owed it to Aaron as proof of her commitment. She loved him too much to allow Louie to destroy their future together. But she couldn’t deny that she was scared. She had escaped from Louie once. Now it seemed she might have to do it all over again.

      Karin felt her body going through the motions while her mind raked over the broken fragments of her past: conversations, accusations, Louie, her mother, father, so-called stepfather. And before she could do anything about it, an icy blast of pain shot through her head and she knew what was coming next.

      Birgitta’s screams. Legs swinging side to side. A human pendulum. The sound of the rope grating against the beam, the smell of sweat hanging in the air.

      The steps lying on their side.

      Karin tried tossing pebbles into the sea one by one in her mind but as fast as she threw them they came right back, refusing to disappear. She just wanted tonight to be over as soon as possible. Her cries and moans sounded like a convincing orgasm, despite where they really came from.

      This special night. The night Aaron proposed to her.

       13

       Karin

      The next morning unravelled itself slowly, creeping out of the darkness between short bursts of sleep. Karin had inherited Birgitta’s sleepless gene. The difference was that her mother claimed it was a waste of time anyway: ‘For losers, Karin,’ she would say. Sometimes, when ghosts and monsters got the better of Karin, she would creep into her parents’ room, distressed and frightened. ‘Silly child,’ was her mother’s only comfort. ‘Either go back to bed, or else get up and do something useful.’ So Karin would return to bed, muffling her cries until the morning made her feel safe again.

      The only way to get Karin to be more independent was to send her away to boarding school, where she would develop the powers of ‘thinking for herself’. Karin was never officially told this was the reason, just snippets of conversations wafting upstairs or through doors left slightly ajar. But once Karin did develop the powers of ‘thinking for herself’, she worked out that there must be other factors involved in this decision. Birgitta’s career was beginning to take off. Furniture design and quirky household products. Later, log cabins and trendy alternative living spaces. Her work was revered the world over, in magazines and trade press. But the name Svendsen was a curse as far as Karin was concerned. She got rid of it as soon as she could.