Читать книгу Killer Couples - Tammy Cohen - Страница 7

STEPHEN MARSH AND REBECCA HARRIS

Red marks were appearing on her inner wrists where the cord tying her to the bedposts rubbed against her pale, exposed skin, but Rebecca Harris hardly noticed. Besides, with the blindfold obscuring her vision, she couldn’t see anything anyway.

Lying in the darkness, Rebecca felt her whole body tense. The anticipation was unbearable.

‘Here it comes. You know you like it.’ The voice was hoarse, teasing.

Rebecca took a deep breath, her ribcage rising sharply under the tight, black corset. And then she felt it. Sharp and cold against her goose-pimpled flesh, the blade of the knife was stroking her thigh, gently at first and then with increasing pressure. Her breath escaped in a low moan of excitement mixed with something else: fear.

‘You love that, don’t you?’ Now he was running the blade along her arm and she could feel a trickle of blood running down towards her elbow. Then another sensation: soft, moist. His tongue was languorously licking it up.

‘We could be together all the time like this, if you’d just do as I ask,’ his voice, with its gentle South Wales accent, was gentle, but insistent.

‘I’d do anything for you, you know that,’ her words came out in a high-pitched rush, and she hated the note of desperation in her voice. Of course, he picked up on that right away.

‘So why won’t you do this one thing?’ he was wheedling now. ‘We could be together forever. Wouldn’t you like that?’

Of course she would. Ever since she’d started her affair with Stephen Marsh eight months before, Rebecca Harris had wanted nothing else but to spend every moment with him. She’d done whatever he’d asked her, even going along with the cutting, the bondage, the whips… enjoying it for his sake because this was what he wanted. But this was something else. And yet, if she didn’t do it, he might leave her. He’d had other lovers before her, and she knew he’d have no problem finding someone else to replace her. He was so good-looking, so charismatic… She didn’t know what she’d do without him.

As if he was reading her thoughts, he stepped up the pressure.

‘I love you, you know that. I just want us to be together all the time, the way we’re meant to be.’

He was saying all the right things, all the things she longed to hear.

‘And we could be – if only you’d do this one thing for me. If only you’d kill my wife…’

Of course he was married. The good-looking ones always were, Rebecca thought, eyeing up Stephen Marsh at the Swansea Directory Enquiries call centre where the pair were working. Youthful-looking for his 36 years, with dark hair and blue eyes that, when he fixed them on you, made you feel as if you were the only person that mattered… All the women had a soft spot for Stephen. Anyway, rumour had it that he took his marriage vows with a large pinch of salt, enjoying a series of girlfriends on the side.

Well, good on him! That’s what Rebecca thought. Married herself for nearly five years to a man forty years her senior, she had had plenty of time to dwell on the drawbacks of monogamy. Looking back on it, she couldn’t imagine what had possessed her to agree to marry Ronald Harris, who’d been 65 when they walked down the aisle. With the bride just 25, he’d been old enough to be her grandfather.

Of course, the security had been a big factor, particularly once she’d got pregnant with their 5-year-old son – Ron had been a reasonably successful businessman and the couple led a comfortable life. But the age gap was always going to be a problem, and as the marriage went on, Rebecca found herself more and more resentful of her OAP husband and flying into increasingly violent rages. Their frequent rows were bitter and full of venom and vitriol; she was left shaking with anger. No, marriage was not an institution Rebecca Harris held in high regard.

‘You’re gorgeous, do you know that?’ Stephen Marsh’s twinkling blue eyes locked onto hers and, to her annoyance, she could feel herself blushing.

‘Fancy coming for a drink with me after work?’

Rebecca could hardly bring herself to meet his gaze. She’d heard the expression ‘undressing you with his eyes’ before, but she’d never actually known what that meant. At least until now.

‘I’m married,’ she muttered, the fingers of her right hand furiously twisting the wedding ring she’d come to despise.

‘That’s all right,’ he grinned. ‘So am I!’

Over that night and the weeks and months that followed, Rebecca got to know all about Stephen Marsh. She knew he’d been married for 13 years to a Sikh woman called Jaspal that he’d met while working for the Ministry of Defence in London. Jaspal’s strictly religious family had never approved of him, he’d told her. Neither had they liked the fact that the couple left the MoD to run pubs. That’s why they’d ended up coming back to Swansea, Stephen’s home town.

Of course, when he was telling this story to Rebecca, Stephen left out the part about Jaspal being fed up with him flirting with all the female customers and the girls working behind the bar. And how being around alcohol all the time caused his drinking, always prodigious, to get completely out of control. But then, as Rebecca would learn for herself, Stephen Marsh was very proficient at manipulating the truth when it suited him.

At first when they’d made love, Stephen had been a caring and affectionate lover. Invariably it had happened at the smart house he shared with Jaspal on an executive housing estate in Gorseinon, West Swansea, on the site of an old colliery. Understandably, Rebecca had been nervous at the beginning. Even though Jaspal had a demanding job at an insurance company in the city centre which kept her out of the house for long hours, the place still bore another woman’s stamp. When the Marsh’s old dog, Bwbach, gazed up at her, Rebecca couldn’t help detecting a touch of reproach in her big brown eyes. No wonder she had found it hard to relax, jumping every time she heard a car door slam outside. But Stephen was so sexy and so full of confidence that nothing would go wrong that Rebecca soon lost her initial nerves and began to enjoy their sessions.

It felt so good to have a younger lover again, someone whose lithe, taut body and sexual stamina more than matched her own. She loved looking at him naked, devouring him with her eyes so that she could recreate every detail in her fantasies when she was once again back home with Ron.

But rapidly, Stephen’s sexual demands began to change. He became rougher in bed, less focused on her and more on his own pleasure. He started calling her a whore and asking her to dress up in fetishistic clothing. Sometimes he’d even slap her about. But then in the next breath, he’d be so loving, so tender that Rebecca would feel as if her insides were melting. Anyway, by that stage, she was in love and determined to do everything she could to keep her man and make him happy.

So she bought a whole selection of black fetishist-style underwear, which she’d cram into a bag and bring into work on the days when she knew she was meeting up with Stephen. And she repeated back the words he wanted to hear. ‘I’m a whore,’ she’d groan, knowing how it turned him on.

At first, though, when he’d brought up the subject of using a knife during sex, she refused to listen.

‘You want me to do what?’ she’d shrieked, unable to believe what she’d just heard.

‘I want you to cut me. Just a little bit,’ he’d repeated. ‘Then you lick up the blood. Don’t worry, it’s nice,’ he’d assured her, seeing her disgusted expression. ‘It’s a real turn-on, you’ll see.’

‘No way!’ had been her initial response. But, as with so many things, when he’d persevered enough, she’d eventually given in. There was just something about Stephen that made women want to do what he said, even when it went against everything they’d previously thought about themselves. He was that kind of guy.

To her surprise, Rebecca found herself not only using the knife on Stephen, but letting him do it to her as well. The first time she’d been terrified, and then angry. He’d promised only to cut her once, but then he’d launched into a kind of frenzy, slicing the blade across her skin, again and again.

‘I’m not doing that again!’ she fumed. But of course she had – she never could deny him anything for long. And he was right. It was a turn-on. Well, it was a turn-on for her to see how turned-on he was getting! Bizarrely, considering she was trussed up and it was her own blood that was trickling down her thighs, it gave her a feeling of power to witness his mounting excitement and to know that it was all because of her. It was just more proof, she decided, of how much they loved each other. If only they could be together all the time; if only they didn’t both have to go home to other people at the end of the day, she thought.

‘We could always bump them off,’ joked Stephen, after another discussion about their respective spouses and how wonderful it would be if they didn’t exist. But when he started to bring the subject up again and again, Rebecca began to wonder whether he really was joking after all. Sometimes it was so hard to tell with Stephen.

‘We’ll kill Ron,’ he’d tell her, enthusiastically outlining some plan for doing away with her ageing husband. ‘Then I’ll divorce Jaz and we’ll be together.’

But the next time she saw him he’d have changed his mind about getting divorced. Why should he give up his flash home and yuppy lifestyle? No, they’d kill Jaspal instead.

Rebecca’s answer was always the same. ‘Stop messing about, Steve,’ she’d say, annoyed that he was wasting the precious time they had together with more of his ridiculous plans. But increasingly, Stephen wouldn’t be put off.

‘I thought you loved me,’ he’d snap at her, his eyes suddenly cold and devoid of any affection.

‘I do,’ Rebecca would stammer, desperate to see the tenderness return to his now-icy gaze.

In the pub after work, or in the car driving home, the conversation would inevitably turn back towards the same subject. Now he’d dropped the talk of killing Ron and his focus was entirely on Jaspal – and how good life could be if she was out of the picture.

‘I just want us to be together,’ Stephen would say, giving her the full force of that ‘special’ look that made her forget about everything else in the world.

Things became so intense that Rebecca would almost dread being alone with him, although, paradoxically, this was also what she most craved. Their embraces were still passionate, burning with the heat of the emotions both were having to suppress at home, but now there was an undercurrent of tension that hadn’t been there before. During their brief, but fiery relationship, Rebecca had denied Stephen nothing, but now she was holding out against him. And it was driving them apart.

Rebecca grew desperate. By now she’d realised her marriage was over. She could never go back to being satisfied with Ron after she’d been with someone as wild and exciting as Stephen. By now, her marriage was beyond saving; she’d well and truly burned her bridges at home – and if she lost Stephen as well she’d be left with nothing. She’d only known him a few short months, but already life without him was becoming unthinkable. She had to keep his interest.

Their love life became even more extreme. Now Stephen would slap her during sex, shoving her around roughly, and she readily went along with it, even when he filmed everything on his mobile phone. But now it wasn’t enough. Rebecca could feel Stephen slipping away.

‘OK, I’ll do it!’

The words came tumbling out before she had time to register she’d said them. And it was worth it for the look on his face. Suddenly the adoration of those early days was back. He was so happy with her again, so in love. Besides, she told herself, it wasn’t as if they’d actually go through with it. Lots of people kidded around about killing off husbands or wives, but it didn’t make them murderers. Probably Stephen would forget all about it now that he’d got her to agree. He was drinking so heavily by this stage, it was hard to tell how much of what he said was coming straight from the heart and what was straight from the bottle. Maybe all along this had been some sort of test to see how much she loved him.

But Stephen was like the proverbial dog with a bone. Now that Rebecca had said she’d help him kill his wife, he wanted to talk about details. What was the best way to do it? When? Where?

Early on, he ruled himself out of the actual murder. They always suspect the husband first – anyone who’d ever watched a TV police drama knew that. No, he’d have to find himself a foolproof alibi out of the house while Rebecca took care of Jaspal. No one would ever link her to the killing – she’d never even met Jaspal.

‘We’ll set it up to appear like a burglary that went wrong,’ he explained, excitedly.

With a growing sense of unease, Rebecca listened to his plans unfolding. Now that she’d said she’d do it, she couldn’t back out – well, not without losing Stephen anyway. But then neither could she go through with killing someone. It was preposterous. All she could do was hope that Stephen tired of the whole thing before she had to break it to him that she was pulling out.

Jaspal Marsh glanced up from the TV at her watch: 10.30 and Stephen was still not home. No doubt he’d have another excuse ready – that he’d met up with friends, had to work late… she’d heard them all a million times before. He must think she was really stupid. She cursed herself for not having listened to her family all those years before. They’d known he was no good for her, but she’d been so blindly in love that she hadn’t listened to them. And look at the price she’d paid – thirteen years of watching her husband drink himself silly and flirt with other women, and who knows what more besides behind her back.

‘I’m going to leave him,’ she’d stormed to friends just a few months before. ‘I know he’s having an affair.’

But of course Stephen always denied it. ‘Don’t be silly. You know I love you, Jaz,’ he’d tell her whenever she brought anything up.

And, to be honest, with them both working such long hours away from home, they were practically living separate lives anyway, so she’d never carried through her threat. But she knew who Rebecca Harris was. She even had her number logged in her phone. It was under ‘B’ for ‘bitch’.

The knot of tension in Rebecca Harris’ stomach was physical, palpable. It weighed her down, sapping her strength, getting in the way of eating and sleeping. Stephen was still not giving up on this murder plan; it was all he ever talked about these days. It was as if he’d casually pushed a cannonball over the top of a hill and now it was thundering down, gaining momentum all the time, and she had no idea how she could stop it.

‘It’s OK,’ she kept telling herself. ‘He’ll change his mind at the last minute. And even if he doesn’t, I’ll just tell him I’m not doing it. There’s still plenty of time to get out of this.’

If only she could just shift that knot in her stomach, so that she could get a proper night’s sleep for once.

‘It’s all sorted. Everything’s set up.’ Stephen’s eyes were unnaturally bright, his body practically crackling with nervous energy.

Rebecca felt a dull thud of fear somewhere deep inside her. ‘What do you mean?’ she whispered.

Stephen could hardly contain himself. It was as though someone or something else had taken him over. ‘July 28th. It’s a Friday night and I know Jaz is going to be at home. We’ve both got that work do and then I’m going to make sure I’ve got an alibi straight afterwards. I’ll get Jas to leave the door open. You go into the bedroom and stab her in her sleep. It’ll be so straightforward – you won’t even see her.’

Now the mass in Rebecca’s stomach had expanded until it filled her head, pressing down on her brain.

‘I can’t, Steve,’ she faltered.

But then he was clutching her hands tight, his eyes boring into hers. ‘Don’t you love me, babe?’ he was saying. ‘Think of our future, you and me together. Do it for us! Don’t you want us to be together?’

Of course she did. It was what she wanted more than anything else in the world. He was the first thing she thought about when she woke up and the last thing on her mind before she dropped off to sleep. But how could he ask her to do that, to risk everything?

But Stephen could tell she was wavering and so he stepped up the pressure, barraging her with calls and texts, painting a picture of the fantastic future they’d have once she was divorced from Ron and Jaspal was gone for good. He knew where Rebecca’s weakness was – her little boy, and he shamelessly played on that.

‘I’d bring him up like he was my own,’ he told her, in a phone call. ‘We’d be a proper family.’

For Rebecca Harris, who dreamed of starting afresh, this time with a match made for love, rather than for security, this was exactly what she’d been hoping for. They’d be together, all three of them, and her son would have the kind of lifestyle she’d never be able to give him on her own, or if Stephen divorced his wife.

And if she had any lingering thoughts about telling Stephen she’d changed her mind, his next statement soon chased them out of her head. ‘If you don’t do this, I’ll know you don’t really love me,’ he warned her. ‘Then we’re finished.’

Rebecca didn’t know if she’d want to go on living without Stephen in her life. It was as though he’d got into her skin, as if he ran in her very blood. She’d be a non-person without him, the walking dead.

‘I’ll do anything for you,’ she told him, wretchedly.

28 July 2006 was a Friday and also payday, and the staff at the 118 118 call centre were in a celebratory mood as they gathered after work in a city centre bar. Well, all except Stephen Marsh and Rebecca Harris.

The couple were standing away from the rest of the group and talking animatedly in low voices. By now, the other employees were all used to seeing Stephen and Rebecca whispering together. They were both married to other people but you didn’t need to be Sherlock Holmes to work out what was going on between them. Usually there was a lot of flirtatious banter with those two, but tonight both seemed preoccupied with something. Stephen was doing a lot of talking, and Rebecca looked paler than normal, as if she hadn’t been sleeping well.

‘I can’t believe she let me down!’ Stephen was ranting about his former mistress, Natalie Yemm. He’d asked her if he could stay the night at her place and at first she’d said yes. Even though he’d ended their relationship the previous October when he started seeing Rebecca, they’d stayed friendly – but now she was saying she’d had second thoughts, just when he needed her most.

‘Pick up the phone, for God’s sake!’ he muttered under his breath as he dialled her mobile yet again, trying to persuade her to change her mind. But there was no reply. Nor was she responding to any of his texts.

For the first time, Rebecca allowed herself a small surge of hope. Without an alibi for Stephen, they’d have to abort the whole plan. Sure, he’d be angry for a bit, but after a few drinks here with all their mates, he’d calm down. Maybe he’d even have reconsidered the whole thing by the next morning.

But even now he was scrolling through the contacts book on his mobile phone. Next on his list of potential alibis was Julie Owens, yet another ex-lover. And when that also proved fruitless, he approached a male friend of his. Bingo!

‘We’re on!’ he told Rebecca, excitedly.

The leaden mass in her stomach swelled until it was everywhere, pressing down on every part of her, leaving her unable to think, unable to breathe.

‘There’s still time to change my mind,’ she told herself. ‘I can still pull out any time I like.’

As their co-workers began to disperse, Stephen and Rebecca found themselves outside the bar.

‘Just do this, and tomorrow we could be starting a new life together,’ Stephen urged, pressing his mistress’s hand tightly.

Rebecca could hardly speak. Now, the feeling of nausea that had been slowly building over the evening was threatening to overwhelm her and something strange was happening to her brain. It was as though she could register what Stephen was saying to her but it wasn’t quite going in. She felt removed from reality; as though she was sitting apart from herself, but watching herself go through the motions of living and breathing.

Settling in behind the steering wheel of her Mazda, she could see her hand turn the ignition key, and she dutifully looked in the mirror before pulling out, but it still felt like someone else was doing all those things, someone separate. And it was that same separate person who turned the car away from her normal route home to Clos Rhedyn in Cwmrhydyceirw, Morriston, and towards Gorseinon. She was just going to drive past the house, she told herself; she wasn’t actually going to do anything.

In the Potters Wheel Pub in Swansea, Stephen’s friend Andy was getting fed up. Why had Stephen made such a big fuss about meeting up tonight and asked to stay over if all he was going to do was sit there, sending text messages? He’d already sent several to one number.

Right now he was sending one to his wife. As his fingers punched the letters on his keypad, Stephen’s face bore an expression of intense concentration mixed with something else. Excitement? Anticipation? Dread?

He was having a drink with a friend, he told her, but would be home later. ‘Just leave the front door open and I’ll get a lift home. Love you. xxx’.

Of course, what she didn’t know was that by failing to lock the front door from the inside as she normally did, Jaspal was effectively signing her own death warrant.

Rebecca Harris swung the Mazda into Howard’s Way, Gorseinon. Such a classy neighbourhood, so peaceful and orderly – it would be a great place for a child to grow up, the streets quiet enough to ride bikes or play football safely. Even now, well after midnight, it didn’t feel threatening at all. You just couldn’t imagine anything bad happening in a place like this.

As she parked outside number 25, Rebecca’s phone beeped. Another text from Stephen, promising her that the front door would be open, and that everything would be straightforward. ‘You can do it,’ he urged. ‘You are strong enough.’

But Rebecca wasn’t feeling especially strong now. Her heart was thudding so hard that it felt like her ribcage might shatter under the pressure, but her mind was still disassociated, observing her own actions as if watching a character on TV.

Of course she wasn’t actually going to go through with it. She was still just play-acting, getting an idea of how it would feel to approach Stephen’s home, to really be about to kill someone…

Thud, thud, thud… Rebecca watched her own hand close around the door handle. Click. The door was unlocked, just as Stephen had promised. Silently, she let herself into the hall, starting as something came towards her through the darkness.

For a split second, she froze, every muscle tensed, each nerve tingling. Then she relaxed, releasing the breath she hadn’t even been aware she was holding. It was only Bwbach. The old dog, recognising her from previous visits, ambled forwards to greet her, tail wagging, delighted to have some company in the quiet of the night.

As the dog nuzzled her hand, for a few seconds Rebecca stood motionless, listening for any noises from upstairs. Nothing.

Softly, she edged down the hall, remembering all those other times she’d been there before with Stephen, barely managing to get through the front door before ripping one another’s clothes off, desire getting the better of caution in this Neighbourhood Watch community. How different it all felt tonight, alone in the unfamiliar darkness, an intruder rather than a guest.

Creeping into the kitchen, she made her way to the knife block on the counter. Even though it was pitch black, she knew exactly where to find it, of course. She’d watched Stephen numerous times as he ran his fingers over the knife handles, weighing up which one to choose before pulling out the knife he’d want them to use in bed. This time too he’d made the selection for her, sending her a text with instructions to pick out the biggest knife, the one with the 8-inch blade they’d used so many times before during sex. The knife felt familiar as Rebecca held it loosely in her hand. Better the devil you know, and all that, she thought…

Jaspal Marsh tossed fitfully in the double bed she shared with her husband. Though it was late, she just couldn’t sleep. That evening, she’d tried her best to relax, talking to a relative on the phone, vegging out on the sofa in front of Big Brother, but still she couldn’t shake off a vague sense of unease.

It wasn’t to do with being alone in the house. Really, Stephen was out so much these days, she ought to be used to being on her own by now. And if the two of them were ever to split up, this was something she was going to have to accustom herself to.

Thinking she might have heard something downstairs, Jaspal lay very still, listening intently. Then she relaxed as she recognised the rhythmic thud of Bwbach’s tail hitting the wall. The old dog must be dreaming of chasing rabbits or something. She’d been worried for a moment, though. Honestly, the next time Stephen told her to leave the door unlocked, she was just going to refuse. It just put her on edge and it wasn’t fair. Why should she be the one to lose sleep just because he was out enjoying himself? Next time she’d lock it and he could just sleep outside on the doorstep for all she cared.

Thud, thud, thud! Rebecca’s heart sounded so loudly in her ears, she was sure Stephen’s wife would be able to hear it. She still couldn’t quite believe it was her, creeping up the stairs in someone else’s house, knife in hand. Surely it was a scene out of a low-budget horror film, not real life – certainly not her life. Soon, any second now, she’d wake up from whatever trance she was in and stop what she was doing, horrified at how far she’d gone. She imagined the relief of finding herself outside that house, not caught red-handed breaking into someone else’s home, not a potential murderess, just plain Rebecca Harris who’d almost let things get out of hand but had come to her senses just in time.

All of a sudden, the mobile phone she’d been carrying along with the knife lit up. A message: from Stephen, of course.

‘Do it. Just do it!’ read the text.

She had her instructions.

This time Jaspal was sure there had been a noise but she didn’t have time to think about it before the door to the bedroom inched open. If she had been expecting a balaclava-clad burglar then she was very wrong. The person peering uncertainly into the dark bedroom was a young woman. She had something in her hand, something long and thin that glinted where it caught the shaft of moonlight seeping in through the drawn curtains.

Jaspal knew she didn’t have much time. If she stayed where she was, she’d be attacked in bed. All she had going for her now was the element of surprise.

‘Aaaaaargh!’

Jumping up from the bed, she flew at the intruder, screaming at the top of her lungs.

Rebecca was terrified. She’d been expecting to find a sleeping victim, but instead here was this shrieking banshee tearing at her skin and clothes, pushing her backwards against the chest of drawers. Without pausing to think, she lunged forward with the knife, again and again and again…

‘It’s not me,’ she kept thinking to herself as she felt the other woman grow weaker and then slump to the ground, the knife still buried up to its hilt in her chest. ‘This isn’t me doing this, it’s someone else. This nightmare is happening to someone else.’

She just caught a glimpse of Jaspal Marsh’s glassy, staring eyes before she raced headlong down the stairs, thoughts of her son and Stephen jostling through her head.

Flinging open the front door, she ignored Bwbach’s reproachful whine as she fled without a goodbye pat, gulping in the fresh night air. Back in the car and speeding away from the house, she felt a mixture of dread and fear and exhilaration. At one level she knew she’d done something so monumental that her life would never be the same again, but on another level, she was just so glad to be free of that house, with its suffocating darkness, where spectres came flying out of nowhere, scratching at your clothes and pulling at your hair.

Her fingers were still trembling from the adrenaline and the fear when she typed out a message to her lover, using their pre-agreed code to let him know it was all done.

‘She screamed and fought – I’m shaking so much.’

Rebecca wanted reassurance. She wanted to know Stephen was pleased with her, that all she’d been through and all she’d risked had been worth it because it had won her his approval and his love. She wasn’t disappointed.

From his friend’s house, where he’d sat up playing computer games after coming back from the pub, making sure his alibi stuck, Stephen Marsh sent her a congratulatory text message: ‘You’re a star,’ he wrote. ‘I love you.’

In the master bedroom at 25 Howard’s Way, where Jaspal Marsh lay immobile in a pool of blood on the floor, her mobile phone beeped unheard. There was a message coming in, adding to the already crowded inbox.

‘Can’t believe you haven’t called me,’ Stephen Marsh had written. ‘Love you.’

The following morning, Rebecca was still shaking, although in her mind, she was already distancing herself from what she’d done. Up by six in the morning, she’d completed three loads of washing by the time her husband woke up, but she still couldn’t shake off the feeling of being unclean, soiled.

‘Everything will be OK now,’ she told herself firmly, lighting yet another cigarette, although normally she rarely smoked. ‘Stephen and I will be together. I’ve done everything he asked; I’ve proved myself to him.’

She kept thinking of the message he’d sent her. He’d be so proud of her for putting their future first. She couldn’t wait to see him. Everything would fall into place as soon as they were together again.

But when she drove to pick him up for work as they’d arranged, it was a different story. Rather than throwing his arms around her and comforting her, as she’d hoped he would, Stephen was standoffish, distant even. Rebecca couldn’t understand it. He’d come straight from his friend’s house without going home so it wasn’t as if he was in shock from seeing his wife’s body. She just didn’t get why he was being so cold – after all she’d done, all she’d been through… Of course she wasn’t expecting them to be together right away. She knew there’d be a difficult period while he arranged the funeral and everything. All she wanted was a bit of warmth and understanding to wipe the image of Jaspal Marsh’s glazed, unseeing eyes from her head.

‘What’s wrong?’ she asked, miserably, as her passenger sat staring at the road ahead, his hands in his lap.

Stephen shrugged unresponsively, refusing to meet her gaze.

‘Talk to me,’ she begged.

But he wasn’t in the mood for talking. Nor did he return the pressure when she tried to hold his hand, or lean over to kiss her deeply as he’d always done before. When he finally did turn to face her, it was as if someone had switched off the love in his eyes, leaving them shuttered and illegible.

‘I’ll see you later then,’ he said. And then he was gone.

Once again, Rebecca Harris was left alone with her thoughts and her memories, and the glassy-eyed ghost she was trying so hard to keep at bay. This wasn’t how it was supposed to be.

That whole day, she tried to concentrate on her work, but she was like an automaton as she answered calls. She was OK as long as she concentrated on the caller and the question, but every now and then a wave of shock would come over her as she remembered what she’d done. Looking round her, she wondered how it could possibly be real. Everything else was so normal – the staff, the phones, even the potted plants. How could the world just potter on as if it were just an ordinary day when something so earth shattering had happened? Wouldn’t it all be different? Wouldn’t you be able to tell?

‘How are you feeling?’ she asked Stephen, when he got in the car at the end of the day, ready for a lift home. Again, he wouldn’t meet her eyes; again, he just brushed off the question, unwilling to enter into conversation.

He was just in shock, like she was, she told herself. And he was probably steeling himself for what would happen when he went home.

Driving towards Gorseinon, Rebecca’s hands clutched the steering wheel tightly. These were the same roads she’d driven down just the night before, and yet it seemed like a lifetime ago. Now the woman who’d sat behind the wheel while her lover bombarded her with texts, who’d had the option to pull out any time she liked and hadn’t appreciated what a luxury that was, seemed like a different person.

Rebecca was fast realising just how much she’d lost. Dropping Stephen off near his home, she felt an overwhelming urge to grab onto him and not let go. She would force him to tell her he still loved her, to reassure her that everything was going to be just as he’d promised. She couldn’t bear the blankness in his expression. He was looking at her as though she was nothing to him, as if she was worse than nothing. Didn’t he realise how much she’d done for him, for them?

As she watched him walk away from the car in the direction of his home, once again Rebecca felt that crushing weight in her stomach as an agonising thought occurred to her. Might this be the last time she’d ever see him? Had it all been for nothing?

Back home with Ron and her little boy, Rebecca was taciturn and even more irritable than normal. She didn’t want to talk to her husband; she didn’t want to play at being a fun, happy mummy. All she wanted to do was sit with her mobile phone in her hand, waiting for news from Stephen.

Would the police have fallen for his story about a burglary gone wrong? Had she been seen leaving the house? She wanted to call him so badly, but she didn’t dare in case the police were there with him.

By now it was starting to sink in just how huge a thing she’d just done. Sure, she’d made mistakes in her life before – marrying Ron had been one of them – but never any that she couldn’t put right again. Slowly she was beginning to realise that this weight she’d been carrying around inside her for the last few weeks, and the panic washing over her in waves since the previous night were now with her for life.

What the hell had she done?

By the next morning, she was a nervous wreck. When the police rang the door bell, wanting to talk to her about the mysterious death of her lover’s wife she hardly had the energy to act surprised.

‘I went straight home after the work party,’ she told them, weakly. ‘I’ve no idea what happened to her.’

But the police, unsurprisingly, simply weren’t buying it, particularly when they scrutinised CCTV footage from Friday night in Swansea City Centre and saw Rebecca’s car heading in the opposite direction to the one she’d described.

When they came back to Rebecca’s house on the Monday after the murder, it was with a warrant for her arrest.

On 2 April 2007, after just two and a half hours, the jury of eight women and four men announced to a packed Swansea Crown Court that they had reached a unanimous verdict in the case of Stephen Marsh.

Over the past seventeen days, the twelve jurors had heard evidence from Rebecca Harris describing how she’d murdered Jaspal Marsh while acting on direct instructions from the victim’s husband. They’d heard from police who had a record of the large volume of texts between Rebecca and Stephen on the night of the murder. They’d heard from Stephen’s girlfriends, one of whom claimed to have talked to him about murdering his wife. And they’d viewed shocking footage from Stephen’s mobile phone of Rebecca Harris writhing on a bed while being sliced with a knife.

On the other hand, they’d also heard Stephen express his deep, abiding love for murdered Jaspal. ‘She was going to be my wife forever,’ he’d told the court, assembling his handsome features into an appropriate expression for a grieving widower. He’d always managed to get women to agree to anything he asked. Now, with a jury where women outnumbered men two to one, he was putting his charm to the ultimate test.

Rebecca Harris and the other women had been silly mistakes, he confessed, holding his hands up like a naughty boy caught smoking behind the bike shed. They hadn’t meant anything. In fact, he had ‘no opinion’ of Rebecca now and was trying to block her out of his mind.

The jury also heard Stephen blame alcohol for the ‘catastrophic memory loss’ that caused him to blank out the texts he’d received from Rebecca Harris on the night of the murder. As for those he’d sent her, well, she’d just misinterpreted them.

Stephen Marsh held up his hands to being an alcoholic, he admitted being a womaniser with a penchant for very rough sex, but he flat-out denied being a murderer.

Whatever way the verdict went, it was all over for Rebecca Harris. Already she had confessed to murdering Jaspal and she knew she was going to prison for a very long time. She’d done it all for love, only to have the man of her dreams throw her to the lions in the most public and humiliating way.

She wanted revenge. And when the jury returned its verdict on Stephen Marsh, she got it.

‘Guilty!’

In May 2007, Rebecca Harris and Stephen Marsh were back in court to be sentenced for the murder of Jaspal Marsh. Stephen Marsh, who’d tried so hard to wriggle out of any blame, was sentenced to eighteen years in prison for masterminding the murder, while Rebecca Harris received twelve years for carrying it out.

Anyone in court during that trial would be left with one abiding, haunting image - of a woman, tied to a bed while a knife sliced through her flesh.

A relationship rooted in power and in pain carries within it from the start the seed of its own self-destruction. Unfortunately, in the case of Stephen Marsh and Rebecca Harris, it was someone else who would eventually pay the ultimate price for a twisted desire, gone out of control.