The Girls Who Disappeared(6)

I’d FaceTimed Finn earlier and even though Gavin hovered in the background, he didn’t say hello to me or acknowledge me at all. He’s moved back in to look after Finn while I’m away and the sight of him in the house where he belongs brought a lump to my throat.

I take my tea and do what I’ve been dreading all evening: I turn off all the lights and head for bed.

The air smells musty, as though the cabin has been closed up for months, which it probably has. I doubt there are many requests for bookings in November. I shrug off my cardigan and climb between the crisp white sheets, the satin eiderdown heavy across my legs. I’m glad I’m wearing my fleecy pyjamas. The king-size bed feels huge with just me in it. The headboard is one of those with lights built in and I keep mine on but I’m too tired to read. My mind is full of all the things I need to do tomorrow. I’ve got until Friday to gather as much content and information as I can for the podcast. Just four days. Although, right now, that feels like a lifetime. I close my eyes, thinking of Finn’s little body snuggled up to mine. I know Finn will be missing me. Luckily Mum will be picking him up from school and looking after him until Gavin gets home from work, and I’ll see him on Friday evening. The thought of that will keep me going this week.

My mind turns to Brenda, the detective I’m meeting in the morning. And then I need to try to pay a visit to Olivia. I want to get her unawares, but who knows if she’ll talk to me? After the accident Olivia had been in hospital for months recovering from numerous operations on her leg to try to save it from amputation and had to have metal pins put into it. She’s never given any interviews.

I turn over, pressing my face into the pillow. I need to sleep. I’m just drifting off when I hear a high-pitched scream. It’s so loud and piercing that it rips right through my consciousness and I bolt upright in bed, my heart hammering, sweat breaking out all over my body.

What the fuck was that?

Another chilling scream, then silence, although I can hear the blood pounding in my ears. I climb out of bed and go to the window, pulling aside the curtains. Someone is standing just beyond my car, their hood pulled up so that it’s impossible to see the face clearly. I think it’s the same person I saw earlier with the dog. Should I call the police? I turn and grab my phone from the nightstand, but when I look back nobody is there.





4



Olivia


Olivia turns over in bed, blinking in the darkness, wondering what woke her. The room is cold, her mother rarely turns on the heating, and the single-paned window rattles in the wind. She can hear the far-off whinny and stamping of hoofs, which isn’t unusual in a storm. She reaches across to snuggle up to Wesley and finds his side of the bed empty. He must be in the loo as it’s still warm. She presses her face against the pillow and tries to go back to sleep. But she’s awake now and she knows she’ll continue to be so until Wesley returns. When the minutes tick by and he still hasn’t come back she realizes she’s going to have to find out where he’s gone.

Slowly she puts her feet to the floor, wincing as the pain travels up the ankle of her left leg and into the knee. She limps to the door. The corridor is dark and empty – she always found it spooky as a child with its shady corners and creaky floorboards. Her mother’s bedroom is at the other end of the landing, and between their rooms are two others, one a bathroom, the other unused, a place for junk. The bathroom door is ajar, and from where she stands she can see that Wesley isn’t there. Has he gone downstairs? Maybe he couldn’t sleep but, even so, he wouldn’t just wander around the house on his own: it’s not his home. He’s respectful like that, is Wesley. And as a result her mother loves him. Probably – she sometimes wonders – more than she does.

She eyes the stairs with a sense of dread. For nine months after the accident she’d slept in the dining room. But now, after years of physios and operations, she can live a normal life, most of the time. Physically at least, with the help of painkillers. But stairs, particularly at the end of a long day, can still play havoc with her knee. She’s got used to living with the chronic pain. The accident had damaged her muscles and nerves, but the emotional pain was harder to deal with.

Survivor’s guilt, her therapist had told her. She’d only managed five sessions before he’d started probing too deeply and she’d had to leave.

She peers down into the darkness. It doesn’t sound like Wesley is there. He must have gone home. Why? Why would he just abandon her in the middle of the night, to go back to his depressing one-bedroom flat above Madame Tovey’s, without even waking her up to say goodbye? He’s never done that before. She recalls their conversation. They’d talked in bed in low whispers for nearly an hour so as not to wake her mum. Did she say something to offend him? Is he now in one of his moods? She knows from experience they can last for a week. He didn’t seem angry or annoyed and she’d fallen asleep with his arms wrapped around her.

She turns and heads back to her room, slumping onto the edge of her bed. Wesley is such a force of nature, so in control. They’d only been together a little over a month at the time of the accident, and afterwards she’d handed herself over to him gratefully, amazed that this wonderful man still wanted to be with her. Wanted to look after her. She’d fancied him for years at school with his thick dark hair and intense blue eyes, his confident stance. She’d put him on a pedestal, really, but he hadn’t been interested in her then. It wasn’t until after they’d left school and all the business with Sally was finally over that he’d turned his attentions to her. Now, as he’s aged, she often thinks his confidence is more of the brash quality, the kind that, on occasion, makes her wince. But back then he was quirky, funny and popular at school, always hanging around in a large crowd, a lot of whom he’s still friends with. He was a year above her and never knew she existed. It was Sally who had first caught his eye. Sally with her big doe eyes, her clear skin and her long, swishy chocolate brown hair that never frizzed in the rain, like hers did. Sally … Olivia squeezes her eyes shut, trying to push the thought of her best friend from her mind. She can’t think of Sally now. Or teenage Wesley, or any of it. It’s too painful, even after all these years.