ITV Emmerdale’s Tom King’s vile plan against Belle ‘rumbled’ as abuse plot escalates

Emmerdale teased Tom King had secretly targeted wife Belle Dingle yet again on Friday, amid a sad abuse storyline on the ITV soap.

The latest episode saw the character make an upsetting discovery just as she finally landed herself a huge job opportunity with Suzy Merton. Viewers know that Tom is coercively controlling and manipulating his new wife, and while she’s sensed his dark behaviour she is yet to realise what he is doing.

Tom can’t stand not being in control of Belle, and he has been playing mind games with her and doing things to upset her or worry her, as a means of getting control. Recently he made it seem as though she was incapable of putting a wash on, while he also tried to discourage her from joining forces with Suzy and her event planning.

That’s backfired, and now Tom is doing everything he can it seems to stop Belle living her life and having freedom with work, keen for her to rely on him. From nasty comments about her family and other digs, viewers have seen his vile actions and believe he is trying to isolate Belle.

In the latest episode, she and Tom offered to look after his young cousins even though Belle had to get a work proposal done for a new client. Tom kept trying to distract her, and when she went to work elsewhere he guilt-tripped her into staying at home.

But after Belle popped out, she returned and made a worrying discovery that would impact the work she had been doing all afternoon. Her laptop was broken and was covered in milkshake, seemingly by one of the boys while she was out.

Belle panicked and shouted out as she tried to fix the laptop and save the proposal, but seemed unable to do so after hours of work. As her hopes of getting it done on time diminished, she was clearly frustrated over the mishap.

But scenes may have suggested the sabotage was intentional and not a mistake, given the milkshake covered laptop was hidden by other bits of work. Someone must have put the paperwork over the mess to cover it up, meaning someone knew it was damaged and said nothing.

Tom would also likely have seen the moment happen if it was the kids given he was looking after them, yet he too said nothing when Belle returned. So had Tom deliberately broken Belle’s laptop and lost her her work just as she needed to complete it, and is this a sign of his control and cruel antics escalating in a bid to ruin Belle’s career and reputation amid the storyline continuing?

Emmerdale airs weeknights at 7:30pm on ITV1 and ITVX, with an hour-long episode on Thursdays.