Stolen

by Lesley Pearse

  All the boatyards and marinas right along the south coast had been checked out. There had been fingertip searches of several deserted premises Lotte could’ve been held in, and raids on houses following information received. But as time went on with no new evidence, or Lotte regaining her memory about where she’d been and with whom, Bryan feared that her captor must have slipped out of the country.

  Dale wondered too how much longer Lotte would have to stay holed up in the flat. She was surprised she wasn’t going stir crazy, especially now the weather had turned so nice. But then, Lotte had always been much more patient than her.

  Dale intended to try to make Lotte forget it all for today. In her basket she had a lasagne the chef at Marchwood had made for her, a bottle of wine from Frankie and some chocolates from Michelle and Rosie. Even Marisa had unbent enough to send some nice hand cream and her good wishes.

  Bryan had asked Dale several times whether she thought Lotte had remembered being raped in South America but just hadn’t said anything. Dale thought it extremely unlikely, for though Lotte had never been one to talk about her own problems, the rape had been such a serious event that she surely would have said something.

  Dale got the idea Bryan hoped she’d prompt Lotte to remember it, and that way the rest of her memories might come back too. Dale couldn’t decide whether it was less horrific to be told about it, or to have the memory come back all on its own.

  ‘Quick! Get out here and follow her,’ Bill said, pulling over to the kerb in the centre of Brighton. The dark girl had just got off the bus and now she was crossing the road. Bill felt she was heading for the Lanes and he couldn’t follow her there in the van. ‘Stay close by wherever she goes in, then ring me. I’ll join you there.’

  ‘I ain’t got much credit on my phone,’ Alex said.

  ‘Text me then,’ Bill said irritably. ‘I’ll follow you as best I can, I won’t be far away.’

  Alex loped off after Dale, six feet two and skinny as a rake, with lank brown hair in need of a cut and a grubby, worn denim jacket and even more worn jeans. Bill hoped he wouldn’t make it so obvious he was following her that she’d sense it. He didn’t appear to be the sharpest knife in the box; he had been begging on the streets until he was recruited for this.

  Dale went through the routine of ringing the doorbell five times as Simon had insisted, then pulled a face at the CCTV camera for good measure.

  She heard Lotte giggling as she came down the hall. ‘Who goes there? Friend or foe?’ she called out.

  ‘Only me from over the sea, said Barnacle Bill the sailor,’ Dale sang back through the letterbox.

  ‘Scott used to sing that when he knocked on our cabin door!’ Lotte said jubilantly as she opened the door. She flung her arms around Dale’s neck. ‘It’s weird how memories come back just when you least expect them.’

  Dale stepped inside, and Lotte shut the door and bolted it. ‘The postman rang the bell this morning. I was fairly certain he was the real thing, I could see him clearly on the camera and his hands were full of mail. But I didn’t dare open the door, just in case. I felt really silly when he left a card to say he had a parcel for Adam, and now he’ll have to go and collect it from the depot.’

  ‘Better safe than sorry,’ Dale said. ‘Now, are you going to make me some coffee?’

  She was so relieved to see Lotte looking much like her old self again. She wore jeans cut off just below the knee, and a turquoise tee-shirt. She’d put on a couple of pounds since leaving hospital, the bruises and all the flakiness had gone from her face, her new short haircut suited her, and if she could only go out in the sun to get some colour in her cheeks again, no one would guess what she’d been through.

  ‘How are you doing? The true story,’ Dale asked as they went into the kitchen together.

  Lotte paused before putting the kettle on. ‘I’m good, well, I’m not sick or cracking up. But I’m finding it hard to deal with this blank chunk of my life. Imagining stuff is probably worse than facing reality, especially about the baby. I keep expecting to feel something inside me, something that will convince me I really did have one. But I suppose that won’t happen until I remember.’

  Dale hugged her silently. She had no idea what to say. She couldn’t even begin to imagine what it must be like to be in her friend’s shoes.

  *

  It was so good to be back together again without anyone else butting in. They sat cross-legged, facing each other at either end of the sofa, just the way they used to sit on one of the bunks in their cabin, and talked about the first couple of weeks on the cruise.

  ‘I thought you were a real airhead the first time I saw you,’ Dale admitted.

  ‘And I thought you were a conceited bully,’ Lotte retorted.

  ‘But I began to like you late on the first night when you handed me a glass of water as I got into the top bunk and said it would stop me having a hangover the next day. My mother used to do that and it felt really nice,’ Dale admitted.

  ‘And I began to like you when you said “Sweet dreams” in the dark. I didn’t feel quite so alone,’ Lotte said.

  ‘We were an unlikely partnership,’ Dale mused. ‘Me so untidy, flinging clothes about round the cabin, and you liking everything in its place.’

  ‘The other girls betted we wouldn’t last a week without a cat fight,’ Lotte laughed. ‘Yet we never did fall out, did we?’

  ‘Well, there was the time in Valparaiso when you fancied that sailor off another cruise ship,’ Dale reminded her. ‘You were legless and he was going to take you off to a hotel.’

  ‘Yeah, you stopped me going,’ Lotte said, putting on a mock wounded expression. ‘I was savage. I was sure he was going to be the love of my life.’

  ‘You slapped me round the face and said I was jealous,’ Dale reminded her. ‘If you’d met him when you were sober you wouldn’t have even looked at him. He was a medallion man, all cock and no brains, and fancied himself rotten. He accused me of being a lesbian.’

  Lotte giggled. ‘I have to admit I saw him again the next morning and you were right – he was awful. He swaggered like Popeye, he’d done so much weight training he couldn’t put his arms down to his sides, and he thought he was God’s gift to womankind.’

  Dale kept on reminding Lotte of different incidents, gradually working her way through the year towards Christmas. There were people and events Lotte didn’t remember, but then there were others she recalled which Dale had forgotten.

  They laughed so much, prompting each other with tales of difficult clients in the salon and some of their stranger workmates.

  ‘Remember that girl on the housekeeping team who stripped off in the bar when she was drunk?’ Lotte giggled. ‘She was so fat and hairy we all wanted to die with embarrassment. She must’ve wanted to top herself the next day when her friends told her what she’d done.’

  ‘She came to me for waxing a day or two after, but I didn’t remind her,’ Dale said with a smile. ‘God knows I’ve done my share of cringe-worthy things when I’ve been drunk. I wouldn’t want anyone reminding me of them.’

  They heated up the lasagne later and opened the bottle of wine. ‘I shall get sleepy,’ Lotte warned Dale. ‘It always makes me like that if I drink during the day.’

  ‘Well, that’s OK, I’ve got to get the bus back at four, there isn’t a later one,’ Dale said. ‘You are supposed to have a rest in the afternoon anyway.’

  Around half past two Lotte went off to the bathroom and came back a few minutes later looking worried. ‘Don’t suppose you’ve got any Tampax on you?’ she asked Dale. ‘I’ve just come on unexpectedly. I hadn’t thought about that happening so I’ve got nothing.’

  Dale looked in her bag and found one right at the bottom. ‘But you’ll need more,’ she said. ‘I’d better nip out and buy you some.’

  ‘You’re an angel,’ Lotte said. ‘I wouldn’t like to have to ask Simon to get them.’

  ‘It’s nothing, I need some deodorant anyway.’

/>   As soon as Dale was gone Lotte found she was a little unsteady on her feet, and realized she really shouldn’t have drunk wine on top of the pills she was taking. But she felt good, much less anxious about everything. It was great to have Dale around and to look back on all the fun they’d had together.

  When the five rings came at the door bell she went straight to the front door and opened it, forgetting to look first at the small CCTV screen.

  The moment she saw the two tough-looking men on the balcony she sensed they meant her harm and she tried to shut the door again. But she was too late – the older one had his hand on it, jamming it back.

  ‘You’re coming with us, sweetheart,’ he said. His voice was as rough as sandpaper. ‘We can do it the nice way or the nasty way, the choice is yours.’

  Chapter Eight

  The younger of the two men grabbed Lotte before she could even scream. He was holding her so tightly she couldn’t free her arms to fight him and he pushed a wad of cloth into her mouth. Then he spun her around and fastened her hands behind her back with what felt like a noose of thick string.

  ‘Right, down to the van now,’ the older man said.

  Lotte glanced up to where the camera was fixed on the wall above the door, and saw to her horror that they’d covered the lens with something. She wouldn’t even have the security of knowing the police could identify the men.

  ‘Hold her like she’s drunk,’ the older man ordered the younger one. ‘Keep her face against your shoulder. I’ll go ahead and open the van door.’

  Realizing these instructions were to prevent anyone passing though the lane becoming aware she was being taken against her will, Lotte was determined to make it as obvious as possible. Unfortunately the lane was a backwater; few people came through and as luck would have it there was absolutely no one about as the men took her down the spiral staircase. But she struggled anyway, pulling back on each step, butting her head against the man’s shoulder and kicking out at the banisters to make as much noise as she could.

  ‘Stop that or I’ll hurt you,’ her captor hissed at her, holding her even closer to his side and pinching her cheek hard. ‘I’ve got a knife and I’ll use it if I have to.’

  They reached the bottom of the stairs and the older man had the door of the blue van open in readiness. Just as Lotte was being bundled in, she heard Dale’s voice.

  ‘What are you doing? Let her go!’ she yelled and although Lotte couldn’t turn to see her, she could hear her friend running towards the van.

  Lotte wished she could yell out for her to take down the van number plate and run to ring the police, but she couldn’t speak with the cloth in her mouth. Sadly she realized that wouldn’t be Dale’s way anyway, she would fight to try to save her friend.

  Lotte had been shoved into the van face down, and although she could hear Dale screaming loud enough to alert everyone in the surrounding buildings, suddenly it went quiet.

  ‘Quick, Alex, gag her and tie her hands before she comes round,’ the rough-voiced older man said, proving he’d knocked Dale out. ‘And let’s get the hell out of here.’

  ‘But we can’t take her too,’ the younger one gasped out.

  ‘We’ve no choice, she saw us.’

  Lotte rolled over on to her side as the van door was slammed shut. The engine turned over and revved up but it was plain the driver was rattled for the van kangarooed forward in the wrong gear. It was dark in the back for there was a solid partition behind the driving seat and no windows in the back door, but there was just enough light coming through a ventilator in the roof for her to see Dale motionless beside her.

  Lotte’s first thought was that Dale might not be able to breathe properly with a gag in her mouth, so she rolled herself over, then wriggled until her secured hands were by Dale’s face and pulled the cloth out of her mouth.

  A low moan came from her, and Lotte wished she could get her gag out of her own mouth as apart from preventing her from speaking, it was making her feel sick.

  ‘Are you OK?’ Dale asked, her voice quavering through either pain or fear.

  Lotte made a grunting noise in her throat and drew up her knees to prod her friend with her feet, hoping that would make her realize she needed her gag taken out too. Dale didn’t react, so Lotte turned over again and wriggled close enough so she could pinch her friend with her tied fingers, hoping that would give her the idea.

  ‘I think he’s broken my jaw, it hurts like hell and a back tooth is loose,’ Dale whimpered. ‘I shouldn’t have gone out and left you.’

  Lotte grunted furiously, turning yet again so Dale could see her face.

  ‘Oh right, you’re gagged so you can’t answer me!’ Dale said.

  Lotte couldn’t understand why Dale didn’t seem to understand that she’d got to remove the gag. Lotte grunted again, shook her head and wriggled closer, and at last Dale caught on. But instead of turning over to remove it with her fingers, she put her face on Lotte’s and pulled the cotton material out with her teeth. Lotte breathed a sigh of relief.

  ‘That’s the closest I’m ever getting to snogging you,’ Dale whispered. She was terrified but she felt she’d got to try to lighten the mood.

  The two girls lay face to face with their hands tied behind their backs.

  ‘This van stinks of fish,’ Dale whispered.

  ‘Maybe it belongs to a fishmonger,’ Lotte said. ‘I wonder if it was these men who took me out to sea? Neither of them is the man who came to the hospital.’

  Dale couldn’t imagine what the men could possibly want Lotte for, but their desperate measures implied it was something very serious. ‘That means there’s quite a few people involved in this, so we should make a plan,’ she urged. ‘They thought they were only going to have you to cope with; two of us will make it harder. When they get to wherever it is we’re going, I think we should play dumb and dazed, that way they won’t be on their guard. I’ll keep falling over and stuff, and that might give you the chance to leg it.’

  ‘I’m not going without you!’ Lotte said.

  ‘Don’t be a drip. It’s unlikely we can both get away. But one stands a chance and can get help. It’s best it’s you that goes. That punch I got really hurt and the shock might make me useless at running.’

  ‘But I’ve got bare feet,’ Lotte said. ‘I won’t be able to run unless it’s sand or grass, so it’ll have to be you.’

  Dale sighed.

  ‘Besides, it’s me they really want, so they aren’t as likely to chase you,’ Lotte added.

  ‘Don’t be thick,’ Dale hissed. ‘I can identify them. They aren’t going to let either of us go easily. But you’re right, you can’t run with bare feet, so I guess it’ll have to be me. Hell, this must be something very serious for them to risk snatching us in broad daylight. I wonder how they knew where you were.’

  The van was tossing them about, and with their hands tied they couldn’t prevent it. Lotte was so scared she was finding it hard to catch her breath.

  ‘I’m sorry I got you into this,’ she whispered, tears filling her eyes. ‘Do you think they intend to kill us?’

  Dale didn’t answer immediately for she was weighing everything up. Although her heart was racing with fear, she felt the two men were just hired thugs, paid simply to capture Lotte. If that was the case they weren’t likely to be willing to kill, not unless they were offered more money. And that would take time for them to negotiate.

  Dale whispered what she was thinking to Lotte. The van was too noisy for the men to hear anything over it, but it was as well to be cautious. ‘We’ve wrongfooted them, and we must make the most of it. We can play the girlie card, dumb and tearful, but we must keep our wits about us, take in everything about our surroundings.’

  ‘Did you take your mobile with you when you left the flat?’ Lotte asked, her heart leaping with hope.

  ‘No, I left it there with you.’

  ‘Oh.’ Lotte sighed in disappointment. ‘I suppose that would’ve been too much to hope for.
’

  ‘Just a bit,’ Dale retorted. ‘What did they do with my bag? Is it in here with us? There might be something useful to us in it.’

  Lotte managed to sit up and looked around in the gloom. ‘I think that’s it,’ she whispered, nodding towards the doors. She shuffled over on her bottom, then grasped the bag with her feet and shuffled back to Dale. ‘Sit up, turn your back to me and rummage through it. You should know by the feel of the stuff what it is.’

  ‘There’s a pair of nail scissors,’ Dale whispered as she thrust her tied hands into her bag behind her back.

  ‘Great, lift them out,’ Lotte said. ‘We’ll have to hide them on me, but feel for anything else first.’

  A nail file was next, a pen, a small notepad and a lighter. Dale had a lot more things in there, including a bar of chocolate, the Tampax she’d gone to buy, even a condom, but none of this was stuff they felt the men would confiscate.

  The girls almost saw the funny side of it as Dale with her hands tied behind her back attempted to slide the scissors into Lotte’s bra. ‘Shit!’ she exclaimed. ‘This is worse than Pin the Tail on the Donkey.’

  The lighter went in her bra too, but the nail file, pen and notepad had to go in her jeans pocket for their shape made them impossible to hide anywhere else.

  ‘If we keep our mouths shut and don’t speak, they may not realize immediately that we’ve got the gags out,’ Lotte said as they tried to make themselves more comfortable by sitting up with their backs against the wooden partition. ‘Then if there’s anyone around we can yell our heads off.’

  ‘I wonder where we’re going,’ Dale mused. ‘In films people can work it out by the turns in the road, the steepness of the hills, but I haven’t got a clue.’

  ‘I feel we’ve gone west out of Brighton,’ Lotte said. ‘But that’s only because I was found near Chichester before. The fishy-smelling van suggests the coast, but that’s a needle-in-a- haystack scenario.’