The Breakdown by BA Paris (Book Summary)

Purchase The Breakdown by BA Paris via Amazon: https://amzn.to/3ITZa2r

Cass Anderson took the hard road one stormy night and saw a car parked beside the road. There was a woman inside. Cass pulled over but didn’t get out of the car because she feared it may just be a setup from some robbers. So she just stayed in the car for a while and waited for the other driver to signal that she needed help. But the other driver showed no signs of needing help, so she just drove off.

Cass heard the news the next day – a woman was murdered in the woods. The same woman that she saw last night, the woman that she didn’t help. Her conscience started bothering her.

She met with her best friend, Rachel. Cass found it very weird that she had forgotten the gift they had decided for Suzy. Rachel said that she was the one who thought of the facility and even collected the money so she could be the one to buy. She shamefully admitted to Rachel that she had forgotten about what the gift would be.

Cass became very distracted as she thought about the murder – especially when she discovered that she knew the woman. Her name is Jane, and she met her at a party Rachel took her to. After that, they decided to meet again for lunch. She also told no one that she saw Jane the night she was murdered because she’s afraid people will judge her for not helping.

She also became very anxious. Since Jane’s murderer is still at large, she’s afraid that the murderer will be after her since it’s possible that he saw her when she passed by Jane’s car that night. She started receiving calls from someone who didn’t say anything. The caller calls multiple times a day, and Cass has a powerful feeling that it is the murderer on the other line.

She decided to meet Rachel and talk to her about her worries. She also planned on telling her that she saw Jane that night – maybe it would lessen her anxiety. By then, she was already diagnosed with an early stage of dementia and decided to quit her work as a teacher.

Cass decided to be early at her dinner with Rachel, but she saw her already talking to John when she arrived. John is Cass’s colleague. Before Cass got married, John pursued her. She found it weird that Rachel and John were talking in a restaurant. Could they know something that Cass didn’t? She looked back at the events and realized that John could be the murderer. John knew Jane because of a sport. Once, while Cass was anxious and started driving away because she thought the murderer was roaming outside her house – she bumped into John along the road. There was also an instant when she received the usual silent call. She got fed up and yelled at the silent caller – but it turned out to be John on the other line inviting her for a get-together.

Cass didn’t show herself while Rachel and John talked since she had already grown suspicious. When she returned to the restaurant, John was already gone, so she approached her. Cass decided that she would confide nothing to Rachel because she was not sure that she could trust her. When Rachel asked her why Cass wanted to meet, she simply said she needed help choosing a gift for her husband, Matthew. Rachel gave a few suggestions and then went to the bathroom. When she came back, she was in a hurry to leave.

Cass stayed behind for a while after Rachel left. Suddenly, a french student who is another customer at the restaurant handed her a phone. The student said that it belonged to Rachel. His classmates made a dare and took the phone from Rachel’s bag without her noticing. Cass thanked the student and accepted the phone even though she was unsure if it was Rachel’s because it’s a very old model. She started going through the messages and confirmed that Rachel’s phone really was. To her surprise, most of the letters are about her.

She dialed the number and listened to the voice – it belonged to her husband, Matthew.

The truth: 

Rachel and Matthew are having an affair. Cass is not sure when it started, but it looks like it’s been going on for a long time based on their texts. The two of them set Cass up. Everything Cass thought she forgot was just something Rachel and Matthew planned. Cass’s mother was diagnosed with dementia, so it was easy to believe she had the same thing. Both Rachel and Matthew are also eyeing Cass’s inheritance from her mother. Rachel had been like a sister to Cass, so she thought it was right for her to have a portion of the money, but she was left with nothing.

Matthew is also the silent caller. He’s doing it to worsen Cass’s fear. He also added Cass’s medicine in her juice to have an overdose. When she had an overdose, it made her appear suicidal.

As for the events that Cass forgot, both Matthew and Rachel made it believable. For example, Rachel made it appear like Cass forgot about Suzy’s gift when they never talked about it. She told Cass that she had collected the money and when she got home, the money was in her drawer, but it was really Matthew who put it there.

As for John, he met with Rachel in the restaurant because Rachel wanted to tell him something. She told him about what happened to Cass, how unstable she was at the moment. John thought it wasn’t loyal of Rachel as a friend to disclose this information.

Cass was stunned and angry at what she discovered from the text messages. She acted like she didn’t know anything until she figured out a plan to make Rachel and Matthew pay. This is how she made them pay:

She called the police and told them that she had found the knife used to kill Jane in their garden. She saw the photo of the blade on the television. She saw the knife from one of Rachel and Matthew’s tricks. The knife was from Rachel. Matthew placed it in the kitchen to make Cass more anxious and then, later on, replaced it with a small knife to make Cass believe that she imagines things. The police started questioning Rachel and Matthew’s whereabouts while Cass pretended not to blame them. She just kept on providing information that would incriminate them. Rachel and Matthew became suspects, and then they were sent to jail. The truth is, Cass doesn’t know if either of them killed Jane. She only wants to teach both of them a lesson.

However, even though she didn’t really know who killed Jane, the detective paid her a visit the next day, thanking her for helping them solve the crime. The detective said someone made a confession – Rachel.

How Jane was killed: 

Rachel mentioned before that she had an argument with Jane over a parking space, but the truth was, it was not about the parking space. Jane saw Rachel and Matthew having sex. When Jane had lunch with Cass, she saw Matthew and recognized him. She threatened Rachel to tell Cass if she didn’t end her affair with Matthew. Rachel asked Jane to talk in the woods, to sort things out since she mentioned that she wasn’t ready to end it yet. Rachel ended up killing Jane.

When Cass passed by, Jane saw her but didn’t signal for her because she was actually waiting for Rachel – so Cass shouldn’t feel guilty about not getting out of the car that night.

The End of The Breakdown by BA Paris.

Purchase The Breakdown by BA Paris via Amazon: https://amzn.to/3ITZa2r