Megan Henley - Who Are You?: With one click she found her perfect man. and he found his perfect victim. a true story of the ultimate deception.

Certain details in this story, including names, places and dates, have been changed to protect the familys privacy.

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First published by HarperElement 2016

FIRST EDITION

Megan Henley 2016

Cover layout design HarperCollinsPublishers Ltd 2016

Front cover photograph Rekha Garton/Arcangel Images (posed by model)

A catalogue record of this book is

available from the British Library

Megan Henley and Linda Watson Brown assert the

moral right to be identified as the authors of this work

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Source ISBN: 9780008144333

Ebook Edition January 2016 ISBN: 9780008144340

Version: 2016-03-08

For Wugsa and Weeves: you are all that matter x

T he message was clear. Horribly, terrifyingly clear.

You need to get out, Megan. Take the kids and run. Theyre watching you. If you dont listen to Vic, his dad will kill you and the girls. You know theyve been after you for a while, but he cant stop them anymore. He has tried his best he has fought for you and done things no man should ever have to even consider hes put himself on the line time and time again. But the time has come. Trust me Val x

Valerie had been on my side for so long. She was always there when I needed to chat online, always there with a supportive message, or like now words of warning. I was living in the middle of a nightmare. My partner, Vic, had taken on the anger of his entire family by continuing to have a relationship with me, and now it was coming to a head.

His whole family was violent, with his father the worst of the bunch. He had been brought up among Romany gypsies, his parents at the top of the hierarchy, always willing to do what they needed to stay in that position, never shy of dishing out violence and hatred when they saw fit. They were unpredictable and lawless. They wanted me dead, they wanted my babies dead. They had their own rules and no one could talk them out of what they planned to do to us.

Vic had broken away from it all and they despised him for it. He had been punished and threatened, stalked and beaten. He wanted nothing to do with it all, but he kept being drawn back in by family loyalty one way or another. He had lost too many friends and too many years.

But worse than anything, he was with me a gorja, a non-gypsy, a woman who was the lowest of the low. We had a child together, we wanted a life, a future free of the intimidation and terror that came from being a gypsy kings son who had turned his back on the privilege and horror that came with that role. It looked like we would never have it; it looked like this could be the end.

I knew, from all of the stories Vic had told me, that the gang now looking for me and my two little girls wouldnt hesitate to murder us, just as they had shown no hesitation when killing so many others. They operated outside the rules which governed normal society, beyond the reach of the law no one would touch them and they were on a mission to get us. They were contract killers, mercenaries, who wouldnt flinch from carrying out his fathers orders. I was nothing to them or to the gypsy king, my daughter wasnt seen as his blood we were scum, and he wanted us eradicated.

Vic had been away from the house for some time. Hed thought his absence would distract his dad, that if he was away we would be safer, but I wasnt so sure. I couldnt sleep, even though Id been assured that protection was in place. I knew that I was being followed everywhere I went and that the house was being watched the whole time, but the lines were blurred.

I wasnt sure who the good guys were any more.

In fact, I knew that the good guys did their share of killing anyway, so who could I trust?

Valerie.

I could trust her. She had been there for me from the start, she only had my best interests and the interests of my two little girls at heart. She was an honest, strong woman who knew Vics story and knew that this time, more than ever before, he simply had to win.

I started to pack, throwing a few things into bags, concentrating on what the kids would need, wondering where I could go with the dogs and cats in tow as well. Vic had been warning me for so long now that the girls were in danger, that they would be used to send a message. The rest of my family wasnt safe either. I was aware that if I went to my mums I could be leading the killers to her. Where could I go?

There was nowhere.

I stopped. I was shaking but I also knew that I couldnt really leave, despite Valeries words. Vic had told me to stay and there was a good reason behind him wanting me to do that. We couldnt go on like this. There had been so many threats, so many warnings.

It was us or them.

I could hardly believe that my life had come to this. I was an intelligent, successful woman when I met him, the mother of a beautiful daughter. I had a good education behind me and a thriving business ahead. How had I become part of this world? A world that spoke of murder as if it was nothing, of revenge killings and contracts and mutilation and torture? Id do anything to protect my girls, but I felt powerless. Everything was out of my control and Vic was the only one who could save us.

My mind was going at a million miles an hour, my heart was pounding. I just wanted to make sure we were all safe, I had to believe that we could be. I couldnt waste time wondering how Id got to this point, how awful it was, and how many threats were out there.

We just had to survive.

I couldnt bear to think of the alternative.

Childhood October 2008

I hadnt felt settled for a long time. Life hadnt been easy for a while, but I wasnt silly enough to ignore the fact that a lot of that was down to silly teenage decisions and the pigheadedness that sometimes took over. Taking responsibility for your actions is awfully grown-up, but I was starting to realise that it was something I needed to do. I wasnt a bad kid, but, in retrospect, I think I was a pretty frustrating one. Im sure my parents would have said it had all started with my period of teenage rebellion; a period in my life which had resulted in Ruby. While she was, without doubt, the best thing that had ever happened to me, falling pregnant to a man who would never settle down hadnt exactly been what I expected, or what was expected of me.

I was the second oldest of four children, and the only girl. We were lucky enough to grow up on a 500-acre farm near the village of Cowfold in Sussex, which had been in my fathers family for over a hundred years. It was an idyllic setting for a lovely childhood. The farm felt as if it was in my DNA; I knew every inch of the impressive six-bedroom farmhouse, and the land surrounding it. My childhood memories were gorgeous ones of times spent building dens out of hay bales and corrugated iron, playing Pooh sticks on the bridge over the river, and galloping at breakneck speeds across stubble fields on one of the many ponies that came and went. I loved animals and I loved being outdoors. Summers felt as if they would never end, and I remember those days as being full of laughter and freedom. My dad was a busy farmer, and not exactly hands on with us kids. Maybe things were more like that back then there were traditional ways to be for some men. His hardworking lifestyle meant that he rarely had time to sit around and play, and he wasnt an emotional sort of man, always checking up on how we felt. Mum was a local politician, a short, round, feisty woman of Irish descent, who suffered no fools. She was warmer to us, and the one we went to for support and cuddles, but she was also the sort of person who instilled hard rules and values in me and my brothers from an early age. She very much believed that you made your bed and that was where you lay. They had done well for themselves through hard work and strong beliefs we wanted for nothing really, and I dont think I knew how lucky I was.