Milton Keynes man speaks out about how his controlling wife tried to hire hitmen to kill him

A Milton Keynes dad who narrowly missed being murdered by his wife has spoken out about the hell he went through.

Rob Parkes has written a book about the infamous ‘Black Widow’ case, which ended with Victoria Breeden being jailed in 2020 for soliciting his murder.

‘Married to the Black Widow’ is due to be published tomorrow (Thursday) and offers readers an shocking glimpse into the lies, deceit and coercive control of Rob’s marriage.

Now divorced, the couple met at university in 1999, married in 2004 and had one daughter, who was a teenage when the case erupted in 2019.

They had separated and Breedon, then 39, had a new partner while Rob had custody of their daughter.

She was determined to get the child back by having her ex-husband ‘wiped out’, and stashed away thousands of pounds to pay for a hitman.

And she roped in her new partner, who she had met on a dating site, to help her find one, telling him: “If you can’t do that, then you’re no use to me.”

But the partner became suspicious and went to work leaving his phone hidden in the house - set on record.

The phone picked up a chilling conversation between Breeden and a former drug dealer, where she asked if she could arrange to kill her ex-husband.

The pair discussed having Rob kicked to death, or luring him out of the house to smash him over the head with a brick.

Breeden’s shocked partner promptly took the 24-minute recording to police.

At his home in MK, Rob had no idea this was happening until police broke the news. The case was famously documented on Channel 4’s ‘24 Hours in Police Custody’ and it became their highest-rating episode. Rob’s shocked reaction was shown on the programme.

An investigation followed and police discovered that Breeden had tried to persuade three different men to murder Rob between 2014 and 2019.

In July 2020, she was found guilty of three counts of conspiracy to murder and jailed for nine and a half years.

Now, with her safely behind bars, Rob has penned his harrowing account of what happened.

The book is described by publisher Seven Dials as raw and real-life psychological thriller that gives “an unfiltered glimpse into the harrowing realities of a relationship corrupted by coercive control.”

Rob told the Citizen: “Not many people know how much their life is worth. I do. The value of my life, or more specifically the cost of ending it, can be measured on a sliding scale based on method, reliability and efficiency.

“Fifteen thousand pounds would buy you plausible deniability and a brick across the back of the head from a London-based professional hitman.”

He reveals in the book how Breeden’s psychological manipulation and emotional abuse left him shattered, isolated and stripped of his dignity over the years

“This is not just a story; it’s a battle cry against injustice, an ode to the indomitable power of love, and a chilling reminder that the line between reality and nightmare can be dangerously thin,” say the publishers.