Robert starts clearing the Get Well cards from the windowsill, and I pick up the framed photographs from the nightstand. The one of June and Gene and Hannah makes me pause, a bittersweet wave of sadness hitting me before I put the past behind me and drop the photo into the bag along with the others.
‘Everything OK?’ Hannah asks, putting her arm around my waist and resting her head on my shoulder. She notices the photo and pulls it out of the bag, tracing her fingers over it. ‘Look at the face June’s pulling.’
I start to smile but then it dies on my lips. I’m not looking at the face June is pulling. I’m looking at Hannah standing beside her. But not her face – at the sweater she’s wearing. I never noticed it before, even though it was staring at me all this time.
It’s a black sweater with a small red logo in the corner. A mountain lion.
I know that sweater. I recognize it. It’s Nate’s football sweater. He used to wear it all the time when we were dating. I even wore it on occasion, with a pride I now cringe at. I know it’s his because it’s the old Matilija High sweater from the ’90s, not the new one I see kids in town wearing. I stare at Hannah, who is still gazing at the photograph, and it’s as if someone has snatched the veil from in front of my eyes.
Fragments of memory hit me like a spray of bullets, each one impacting with a thud and threatening to knock me to the ground: Nate glancing at Hannah that fateful day at the county jail. Is this your daughter? The curious frown Hannah gave him when she shook his hand and said hello. How she questioned me about the timing of the break-up. Did she see it straight away? The similarity, the likeness? Did she recognize herself immediately in Nate? How could she not have noticed the fact they had the exact same cornflower-blue eyes? Is it why she’s been avoiding my calls and pulling away from me for the last year, being so secretive? Did Nate know too?
He must have. Why else would she be wearing his sweater? And that pink hair tie in his bathroom – oh my God – he said it was his daughter’s. That long strand of blonde hair. Was it Hannah’s? She was home then, not in New York. The timing works but even without hard evidence my gut screams ‘yes’. He did know. He knew all along.
I think I’m going to be sick. How long have they been in contact? Why did she never bring it up? Did Nate know the whole time he was trying to get me into bed? Was it a game to him? Was he angry and trying to destroy my marriage? Or was he genuinely trying to rekindle something? Given what he did next, I’m assuming he was angry. It would be just like him to include Hannah in his revenge.
More memories assault me. I remember how I found Hannah in June’s room – screaming over the dead hamster. Another veil is stripped away and the image I see is a Gorgon, making me want to throw my arm up and shield myself from the sight. What if Hannah was in June’s room looking for the money? Did she know it was there? Did June tell her? If Nate suspected the money was hidden somewhere in June’s room, did he ask Hannah to look for it?
Was Hannah part of Nate’s plan all along? It makes sense. If June told her about the money she’d stolen from Gene, did she tell Nate? It’s true Nate knew already that Gene was a drug dealer. They’d been watching him for months. He may have known that Gene was likely to have cash on the premises.
Maybe I’m clutching at straws. And yet . . .
Hannah had a motive. Isn’t it possible that her life-long jealousy of Gene led her to conspire with Nate to rob him? Or her anger at me for lying to her about Nate could have fueled her.
Would she really have done this though? How can I believe it? They abducted her, I remind myself angrily. I found her tied up in the basement of that house, terrified and sobbing. She’s the one who shot Nate. I’m losing my mind. It doesn’t make sense that she would be involved, that she could ever do something like this. She’s not a monster. She’s my daughter. I know her . . .
Don’t I?
I think back, desperately trying to remember something that will confirm that I’m wrong, that I’m jumping to conclusions, that I’m paranoid and delusional and crazy. But instead all I can dig up are things that further cement her complicity.
Hannah rang Robert the week before the break-in and reminded him about our anniversary, something she’s never done before. She encouraged him to book a restaurant and take me out. She called me that night, before I met up with Laurie and asked, oh so casually, what I was doing and where I was. I remember thinking at the time it was strange of her to call me, so unlike her to check in, and I was so happy to hear her voice. But she rang off quickly when I told her I was going out with Laurie and her dad was at home.
I stare at her, feeling like I’m on a fairground ride that is slowly gathering speed.
Are her grief and tears over June the normal reaction of a sibling in this situation, or is it guilt?
She would never have wanted June to get hurt, I know that. And there’s no way she would have gone along with any attempt to harm June either. Maybe that’s what she was fighting with them about, outside the hospital. She’s been lying – to me, to the cops, to everyone. She didn’t just happen to wander past and overhear them talking about June – the very coincidence of that seems unlikely, now I think about it.
What if they were fighting because Hannah was telling them to leave June alone? What if she threatened to tell the truth?
I think of all the times I saw her with Jonathan – how distraught she seemed – the red mark on her arm, the tears. I put it down to grief and stress, but what if they were arguing over how to handle the mess they’d made? What if he was threatening her to keep her quiet?
I remember the way she said his name in the cabin. ‘Nate.’ It sounded so familiar on her lips, jarring enough that I noticed it, even at the time. Nate – the way she said it with a warning tone.
Is that why they kidnapped her? Because they couldn’t keep her quiet any longer?
But would Nate really have harmed his own daughter to save his skin? Yes. Yes, he would. Of that I have no doubt. I think Nate was capable of anything.
I’m staring at Hannah with my mouth hanging open. All these thoughts have taken no longer than a few seconds to coalesce in my mind, and though I try to dismiss them, banish them, unthink them, I can’t. Because every single fiber of my body knows I’m right. Hannah played some part in this.
My own flesh and blood. I thought I knew her, and I didn’t know her at all.
‘Shall we go?’ Hannah asks, putting the photograph back in the bag and heading towards the door. She glances at Robert who is collecting the helium balloons banging against the ceiling. ‘Come on, Dad.’
Robert follows her, trailing the balloons like a pack of excited puppies. I open my mouth to say something. I need to stop them. I need to confront Hannah, demand to know the truth, tell Robert . . .
Robert reaches the door and glances back over his shoulder at me.
‘Ava?’ he asks with a faint smile. ‘You coming?’ He turns back and offers me his hand, pausing when he sees my expression. ‘Are you OK?’
I blink at him, swaying slightly, then shake my head.
He steps towards me, concerned. ‘What is it?’
I reach for the pin of the grenade. I ready myself for the blast.
Robert takes my hand, frowning.
‘Nothing,’ I say, shoving the pin back in, before following them out the door.
Acknowledgements
Huge thanks are due to my incredible agent Amanda, who opened the door to me writing adult thrillers, after spending the first eight years of my novelist career writing young adult fiction.
I’m also very lucky to have the support and talent of Ruth Tross, an editor with a magic touch, and the whole team at Mulholland, including Hannah, Melanie, Jasmine and Lydia, as well as Lewis who came up with the cover and Helen who was forced to fix my wonky grammar and bastardized spelling. After almost four years living in the US I still mix up wrenches and spanners and pavements and sidewalks.
I moved to Ojai (not a fictitious town!) in 2016 with my
husband John and daughter Alula – our third move across continents in as many years. I couldn’t continue to follow my dreams so determinedly without their love and support and I count my blessings every day that not only do I get to live in the most beautiful place on earth, I get to do so with the two best people in the world.
Thanks too must go to my dear friend and hiking partner Clarissa who listened to this story when it was just an idea in my head and whose support has meant a huge deal.
And of course, last but not least, thanks to my girlfriends – Nichola, Vic, Rachel, Lauren, Asa, Becky, Karthi, Sara, Clarissa and Theo – who lift me up, love me, laugh with me, inspire me and teach me, and who are the reason I started writing in the first place – encouraging me before I even had my very first book deal. Thanks for continuing to cheerlead me along through all the ups and downs of motherhood, writing novels and working in Hollywood. I honestly wouldn’t be here without you.
Did you love In Her Eyes?
Read on for an extract from Friends Like These by Sarah Alderson
Transcript of 999 call
Sunday, 10 December, 11.23 p.m.
Female Caller: She’s got a knife. Please hurry.
Operator: The police are on their way. Can you get out of the house?
Female Caller: No.
Operator: Is there somewhere you can hide, somewhere with a door that locks?
Female Caller: I’m in the bathroom . . . Downstairs. Please hurry. I can hear her coming.
Operator: Stay on the line with me.
[0:31:44 – unclear – indistinct crying]
Female Caller: [whispered] I think she’s outside the door . . . I can hear her. Oh god, please, hurry up.
Operator: The police will be there any minute. Stay on the line with me. Can you tell me what’s happening? Who is it that’s got the knife?
[0:44:16 – unclear – series of bangs – followed by a crash]
Female Caller: No!
Operator: Hello? Are you there?
[0:53:33 – screams]
Female Caller: No! Get off me . . . She’s going to kill me!
[1:05:33 – unclear – sounds of a struggle]
Operator: Hello? Are you there? Hello?
Female Caller: Hello?
Operator: Are you OK? What happened? The police are pulling up outside now.
Female Caller: She’s dead. I think she might be dead. Oh god. Oh god . . . please . . . oh my god. She’s not moving. There’s blood. A lot of blood.
Operator: Is she breathing?
Female Caller: I don’t know.
[2:04:16 – whimpering – panting]
Operator: Can you check for a pulse?
Female Caller: I . . . oh god . . . I don’t know. Please can you send an ambulance?
Operator: It’s on its way. You need to stay calm. Can you do that for me?
Female Caller: Yes. Yes, I think so . . . Oh my god.
Operator: What’s your name? Can you give me your name?
Female Caller: She came at me . . . with a knife. She just came out of nowhere. I think she’s dead . . . I think I’ve killed her.
Part One
Partial transcript of police interview with Miss Elizabeth Crawley, subsequent to filing of Missing Persons Report
PC Kandiah – Sunday, 10 December
Have you ever had one of those Facebook friends – more of an acquaintance really, like a colleague or an old school friend – who you accept a friendship request from and then wish to god you bloody hadn’t? We all have, right? You don’t want to unfriend them just in case they realise, even though they’ve got like seven hundred friends so the chances are they’d never know. But if you’re honest, you’re also a little bit intrigued by their life and sometimes, maybe after a couple of glasses of wine, when you’re tired of trawling through Netflix to find something to watch, you find yourself randomly Facebook-stalking them. Admit it, you’ve done it.
Next thing you know, you’re falling down a rabbit hole and feeling like a bit of a voyeur. It’s funny, isn’t it? The whole time you’re scouring their feed, you’re waiting for someone to tap you on the shoulder and shout Ha! Caught you! Even though you haven’t done anything wrong. I mean, they wouldn’t put it all out there unless they wanted you to read it.
You want an example of Becca’s social media posts? OK. She was one of those people who hashtagged every post with something like #gratitude or #blessed or #yolo. Oh, and also, #bestboyfriendever. That was her favourite. You know the kind of person I’m talking about. You’re smiling. You know someone just like it.
She was forever posting selfies of herself at the gym, you know the kind, complaining about having eaten too many pies and needing to work off the extra pounds, while at the same time showing off her abs. Or posting a thousand photos of herself on holiday in Ibiza – and every shot was taken from a lounger, framing the setting sun through her thigh gap. Or she’d take pictures of herself with a full face of make-up, hair blow-dried, and hashtag it #wokeuplikethis because yeah, sure you did, don’t we all? I know I do. Not.
Listen, I swear, you can ask anyone, almost every other post was about her boyfriend, James. About how amazing he was, how he’d arranged yet another romantic getaway to New York or the Cotswolds or Paris, how he was hashtag best boyfriend ever. Or she’d take a picture of him asleep, head under the pillows, stick a black and white filter on it and tag it #hotboyfriend and #luckiestgirlalive.
I guess, for want of another word, it came across as smug. I can see you laughing. You totally get it. And let’s face it, there’s something kind of suspicious about someone who’s always posting gushing updates about their other half. Think about it. All those celebrities who make huge public declarations of love, they all end up divorcing three weeks later.
A couple of people at work unfriended her, or at least unfollowed her because they found her so annoying. Not me though.
Were we jealous of her? No. Honestly. I can tell you don’t believe me but it’s true. I mean she was pretty, yes, sure, but we weren’t jealous. I think some people were a bit put out that she’d got the job of assistant to the CEO. There were others who’d been there longer and who thought they deserved it more, but that’s just how this industry is. And, besides, I work in the finance department, so it didn’t bother me in the same way as it did those who were trying to make the jump from assistants to agents.
If you met her by the water cooler and tried to make polite conversation, she’d just look at you like you were a lesser being and then walk off, like you weren’t worthy of her time or something. She was only really friendly to people she thought could help her get where she wanted to be. Where was that? At the top of the ladder, of course. She was . . . ambitious. And don’t get me wrong, there’s nothing bad about that. I’m all forMain Body Indented women climbing the ladder and shattering the glass ceiling. It’s past time, isn’t it? What’s that quote? There’s a special place in hell for women who don’t support other women? Something like that. Well, I agree. And the rest of us women in the office, we stuck together, we had each other’s backs – you have to in this industry – you have no idea . . . but Becca, she definitely didn’t get the memo on that one.
God, I sound like a bitch. And I’m not. I really am not. I hate talking ill of people. Especially people who are . . . Look, I don’t want to make it sound like I hated her. I didn’t hate her. I didn’t know her. I don’t know her. That’s my point.
Oh wait, I remembered something else. For Claire’s birthday a few years ago Flora made her a chocolate cake. She put it in the fridge at work. Well, when the time came to bring it out someone had helped themselves to a massive slice. I mean, these things happen at work all the time. People are always nicking bread or helping themselves to your cream cheese, even if you stick a Post-it note on it. I know some people who spit in their food and warn people that that’s what they’ve done to ward them off. Like holy water with vampires.
But this . . . this felt deliberate. W
hoever it was hadn’t used a knife and cut a slice of cake. They’d gouged it with what looked like their hands. A huge chunk of cake. It was completely ruined. Who does that? We had no idea. But as I’m comforting Flora in the kitchen, in walks Becca with a plate covered in chocolate crumbs. She saw us, froze, and then she just smiled and stuck her plate in the sink. We knew. She knew we knew. But what are you going to do? Of course, we didn’t confront her about it. She would only have denied it.
It was things like that. She lied a lot too. God, I feel awful, and I don’t even know if this is helpful in any way. Is it? Shouldn’t you be out there, looking for her or something? How is this helping find her? You want a picture of her, I get that, but I’m not the best person. I haven’t seen her in years. And I never really knew her to begin with. That’s my point. I keep telling you. No one knew her. Not the real her.
How did she lie? OK. Here’s an example: she’d always name-drop famous people she knew. Or that she said she knew. She told people she once dated Prince Harry after meeting him at Boujis, that nightclub in Kensington. Oh, and that her father invented LED lights. Ridiculous things. Unbelievable things. I mean . . . come on, if you’re going to lie, at least make the lies believable. It’s almost like she was playing a game, like she wanted us to call her out on it. But no one ever did.
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In Her Eyes Page 25