Love Rat star on sinister ending: 'It was even a shock to me when I was reading'

"Don't you think it's a bit weird, going on holiday right now?" asked her daughter Susie (Imogen King).

"I thought it might help me get used to being on my own," she responded, matter-of-factly.

When Emma arrived, she wasn't quite sure what to do with herself, but after some thought she picked up her copy of Wuthering Heights, one of literature's great tales of love and revenge, and headed to the hotel bar, which is where she first noticed Niko (Gerald Kyd).

The pair locked eyes, but it wasn't until that evening, at the hotel restaurant, when they spoke, and when Emma also learned that he's a hotelier who owns the very property in which she's staying, or so he told her.

They spoke briefly but after bumping into one another again at breakfast, where they bonded over books, he offered to take her out on his boat and Emma, desperate to escape all thought of Pete and their divorce, accepted.

They grew close over the course of the day, speaking candidly about their lives, warts and all, before dancing the night away at a local club, which culminated in them spending the night together.

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From that moment on, Emma was all in on Niko – so much so that he enticed her to stay in Cyprus with him, where they'd live together in a luxury villa, and Emma would run her own beach bar. After her recent heartbreak, it was the perfect tonic.

But little did Emma know that she was the victim of a cruel scam.

She loaned him £190,000, her life-savings, to complete the purchase of their forever home – something she did of her own volition rather than Niko explicitly asking. But shortly after the payment had gone through, he disappeared without a trace and Emma was being led away in handcuffs following a meltdown at a bank.

But Niko was not the mastermind behind this plot, but one strand of a much-wider operation which was overseen by the nefarious George (Ramon Tikaram). He'd already targeted another woman, Annika, who had been killed as a result, but who knows how many others had been duped, or had lost their lives.

Thankfully, Emma managed to escape unscathed, physically at least. Her mental health, however, had severely deteriorated. After she was threatened with a box containing a bullet while still in Cyprus, she lived in fear of one of George's associates seeking her out in the UK as revenge for his death at the hands of Pete, and for trying to scupper their criminal enterprise.

But it wasn't Cypriot gangsters that Emma needed to be wary of. In a staggering twist, it emerged that her ex-husband, of all people, was behind the con.

"It was a once in a lifetime opportunity to invest, to buy a stake in a new cement plant," he explained. "Cement prices were going through the roof. It was a no-brainer. I just needed the seed money."

But Pete refused to take accountability for the harm he had caused.

"It was George's idea, he was drinking buddies with my business partner," he added. "I didn't take him seriously, but he said it was worth a shot. I didn't actually think you'd fall for it, but you've always loved a romance.

"And look, it worked. It's rolling in, we've done it."

But, as Morrissey identified, it wasn't Emma's love of romance novels that made her the perfect victim, but the demands Pete had placed on her throughout their marriage.

"Pete would play the blame game and hold Emma responsible for his failings," he said. "He would insist she re-mortgage the house, for example, out of duty to him to save a business deal. He'd claim the deal was sound and that it's not his fault things are falling apart.

"Over time he ground her down, so it's no wonder she's in such a vulnerable state when she meets Niko in Cyprus. She's an easy target because he makes her feel like a young woman again."

When Emma refused Pete's so-called justification and demanded that he tell his daughter "exactly who her father is", a struggle ensued, which resulted in him pushing Emma down the stairs. In a state of panic, he then went to ring an ambulance but swiftly changed his mind, instead deciding to destroy all of the evidence by setting fire to the property, with Emma inside.

But when he took his eyes off her for a moment, she slipped out of sight and rang the police, before reappearing for one final showdown. Just as he was about to drop a match and send them both up in flames, she grabbed a staple gun and squeezed the trigger.

Pete was caught in the throat, causing him to stumble backwards and become impaled on a metal pole, the injuries from which killed him.

"It was even a shock to me when I was reading," said Morrissey of how the series wrapped up. "That was a good reason right there to say 'yes' to this."

Lindsay also discussed why the betrayal Emma suffered in Love Rat is particularly cruel.

"It's one thing stealing your money, but stealing your heart is pretty unforgivable," she said. "The way it's filmed, it’s like a fantasy really, like a Shirley Valentine fantasy.

"This fantastic thing has happened to her... this lovely man, and he's loaded. But it's awful, the manipulation, because it's so real."

Love Rat is available to stream now on My5. Check out more of our Drama coverage or visit our TV Guide and Streaming Guide to find out what's on.

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