The Babysitter: A gripping psychological thriller with edge-of-your-seat suspense

by Sheryl Browne

  Twelve

  MARK

  ‘I wasn’t drinking on my own in the small hours,’ Mark assured Melissa, as he towelled his hair with one hand and checked a text from Lisa Moyes with his other. ‘We were out of coke in the fridge so I—’

  Reading the text, Mark stopped:

  Forensics back. Stain on stairs confirmed blood. DNA match to Daisy.

  Shit! Cursing silently, Mark tossed the towel aside. He was pulling on his clothes when he heard a distressed mewl and frenzied barking from the garden. Heading fast for the window, Mel close behind him, he looked out to see the cat scaling a tree as if its tail were on fire. Mark waited a second, expecting Hercules to come belting after it. More frantic barking but no sign of the dog. There followed a brief silence, followed by a sudden heart-flipping, high-pitched yelping that meant she was in trouble. Serious trouble, Mark realised, sensing the dog’s escalating panic.

  Turning, he raced to the landing, while Mel grabbed up her dressing gown, tugging it on and stuffing her feet into flip-flops to follow him.

  ‘I’ll go,’ Mark said, nodding towards the nursery. He was probably being neurotic, but his inclination right now wasn’t to leave the children on their own, and out of hearing distance.

  Once in the kitchen, Mark stopped to search for the workshop key, but it wasn’t hanging from its usual hook.

  Dammit! ‘Mel, the key!’ he shouted, and headed out to the garden, where the dog’s cries were growing more urgent by the second. What the hell had happened? All became clear as he neared the workshop and saw that the window – which he’d added to his mental to-do list but hadn’t yet fixed – was missing. The cat must have gone in, chased by Hercules, who was now stuck inside the workshop.

  ‘Stay, Hercules,’ he said, calmly but firmly, as he approached the empty frame. ‘It’s okay, girl.’ Mark peered in, and swallowed, hard. ‘Okay, girl, stay. I’m coming.’

  ‘Mark?’ Evie in her arms, Mel was behind him as he hitched himself up to climb through after the dog. ‘Where’s the key?’ she asked, as he was poised to drop the other side.

  ‘Missing,’ Mark replied tersely, noting Hercules had sunk to her haunches and was emitting no noise now but a low, pathetic whine.

  ‘What’s happened? Is she all right?’ Mel called urgently, as he dropped carefully down to crouch beside the dog, talking softly to her and trying to coax her to turn so he could reach to apply pressure to the wound.

  No, Mark thought. She’s very much not all right. How in God’s name was he going to get her out without injuring her further? ‘She’s bleeding,’ he said, as calmly as he could. He didn’t want to panic the dog, or Mel. ‘Badly. Front leg. We need the key, Mel. Can you remember where you left it?’

  ‘It’s on the hook. I’m sure I hung it… Oh God.’ Evie clutched close to her, Mel peered into the garage after him, clearly shocked when she saw the fountain of rich red blood Mark was trying to stem with his fingers.

  ‘Ring the vet,’ Mark instructed. ‘See if they can send someone urgently. I’ll have to try and lift her back through—’

  ‘Melissa!’ It was Jade, shouting from the other end of the garden. ‘What is it? What’s wrong?’

  ‘Hercules!’ Mel shouted. ‘She’s injured. I’ve lost the key. We can’t—’

  ‘It’s on the hall table,’ Jade cut in. ‘I’m sure that’s where you put it. Hold on. I’ll go and look.’

  Thank Christ for that. Mark thought, relief surging through him. The girl’s timing was impeccable. From the amount of blood she’d lost, there was no doubt in Mark’s mind the dog was going into shock. Lifting her back through the window would probably kill her. He should try to elevate the leg, he was aware, which would slow the bleeding. But how was he supposed to do that without an extra pair of hands?

  Had Mel called the vet yet? Or the fire brigade, who could at least break the door down? A neighbour? Anybody would do. Where was the damn key? Frustrated, and trying hard to suppress his own panic, Mark leaned down to wipe the blood from his face against his shoulder. With combustible and toxic substances stored in here, the place was an accident zone. They’d discussed it. Agreed to keep the key on the hook, should it be required at short notice, and well out of Poppy’s reach.

  Yes, and he’d agreed to get the damn window fixed ASAP. If anyone was at fault here, he was. Mel had a million things on her mind with Poppy and Evie’s needs to attend to alongside her work. Mark doubted he could perform the juggling act she did on a daily basis half as successfully.

  ‘Hold on, girl,’ he said softly. ‘You’re not called Hercules for nothing, you know.’ Praying silently, he glanced upwards, and then snapped his gaze to the door as it opened.

  ‘Mel’s rung the vet,’ Jade said, coming in and dropping down beside him. ‘He said to keep pressure on the wound and take her straight there. Mel’s just popping Evie back in her cot. What can I do?’

  Mark nodded. ‘I’ll carry her. I’ll need you to stay with me and take over the pressure bit. You’ll need two hands, here and here.’ He indicated where his own hands were placed. ‘Are you okay with that?’

  Jade immediately jumped to her feet. ‘I’m right by your side,’ she said determinedly.

  * * *

  Mark’s mind was still on Hercules as he finally arrived at the station. And Mel, who was obviously blaming herself for what had happened. He shouldn’t have been so short. He’d meant to apologise, but then he’d received another text from Lisa, informing him that DCI Edwards wasn’t impressed by his absence, and Mel had slipped back to the workshop while he’d been replying.

  At least it looked as if Hercules was going to be okay. Thank God for Jade, who’d certainly gone above and beyond her babysitting duties, even offering to pick the dog up from the vet’s later while Mel tried to rescue what was left of her workshop and organise a glazier. Jade had only been with them ten minutes and already Mark was beginning to wonder how Mel had managed to keep all the balls in the air without her. She had though, allowing him to get on and do what he had to do. And by way of appreciation, he’d acted like a dickhead as soon as there was a blip on the domestic front, as if it was a major inconvenience to his work agenda. He’d left her in the workshop, plucking pieces of smashed sculpture from a pool of coagulating blood. She’d said it didn’t matter when he’d asked her about it, but she hadn’t looked him in the eye. She’d dragged her hair from her face, and kept her gaze fixed firmly on her task. Not sure what to do, what he could do, and running desperately late by then, he’d brushed her cheek perfunctorily with a kiss and said he had to go. No doubt Mel would quite like the freedom to sail out and leave someone else to pick up the pieces sometimes too. He really was going to have to apologise.

  Pushing through the security door into the main office, Mark realised he needed to change the dressing on his hand. At first, he hadn’t even realised he’d cut it while he’d been tending to the dog. But then, there’d been so much blood he’d have been hard pushed to identify any of it as his own.

  ‘Crisis on the home front again?’ DCI Edwards asked drolly as Mark headed past his open office door to the incident room.

  That one was wearing a bit thin. Sighing inwardly, Mark offered an apology. He’d definitely been juggling crises on the home front at one point. With Mel ill, and everything falling apart around them, he’d taken to self-medicating, the odd nightcap growing into one too many. Mel had known it, which is why she was wary of him drinking late at night now. And Edwards had known it, reprimanding him on several occasions. He’d been right to – Mark’s mind hadn’t been on the job.

  He’d lost sleep after messing up on a case, failing to notice one of his team hadn’t followed the chain of custody, meaning evidence could have been contaminated. The vicious little shit who’d walked free had offended again, inevitably, kicking an old man almost to death because he’d refused to part with his phone. The old man had passed away a week later. Mark would never forgive himself for that. And Edwards, it seemed, would
never let him forget it – which Mark couldn’t blame him for, but he didn’t need it, just as he didn’t need Cummings constantly winding him up.

  He hadn’t lost too much sleep over his confrontation with Cummings. The man openly harassed women. He was a kerb-crawler. If anyone was a disgrace to the uniform, Cummings was. Mark couldn’t prove it – yet – but he suspected Cummings had recently pocketed proceeds of a drugs bust he’d thought wouldn’t be missed. The package he’d seen him passing to a sex worker had looked suspiciously like crack cocaine, which basically meant Cummings was fuelling the woman’s addiction. Whether in exchange for sexual favours or information, Mark wasn’t sure. Either way, the man was pond scum, end of.

  Mark noted the cretin looking him interestedly over as he walked by his desk. He would swear the man was trying to goad him into losing it. Mark’s guess was that Cummings knew he was on to him, and was trying to provoke Mark’s ‘emotional volatility’, thereby making any accusations he made against him questionable. Mark’s only real hope of nailing Cummings was to get enough evidence to make sure he was at least suspended pending investigation.

  ‘Blimey, hope it wasn’t a domestic,’ Cummings commented behind him.

  Shaking his head, Mark smiled sardonically. With supreme effort, he ignored Cummings and walked on. He had more important things to do right now than waste time on that prat.

  ‘What have we got?’ he asked, once in the incident room.

  ‘The blood is definitely Daisy’s,’ said one of the team, confirming what Lisa had already texted him. ‘She had an appendectomy about a year ago, so we were able to get a match from the hospital. I’m thinking we’ll need to call the forensic experts back in.’

  That wasn’t going to be news the parents would welcome. Mark sighed disconsolately. ‘Do the parents have an explanation for the stain?’

  ‘She cut her foot in the kitchen a couple of weeks back, according to the mother,’ said Lisa. ‘The husband corroborates her story. We’re still gathering information from possible witnesses, relatives and friends.’

  ‘Thanks, Lisa.’ Mark smiled wearily. ‘Anything on the garage CCTV footage?’ he asked, ignoring Cummings, who’d wandered in with nil sense of urgency and was now slouching on the edge of a desk.

  Cummings, though, wasn’t going to be ignored. ‘Funny you should ask that,’ he cut in.

  Kneading a temple, Mark glanced towards him. ‘Would you like to enlighten me?’ he asked patiently.

  ‘I’ve just been checking it,’ Cummings said. ‘I noted a car cruising past in the direction of the house.’

  Lisa was obviously as impressed as Mark at that really useful piece of information. ‘It’s a road, Cummings,’ she retorted acerbically. ‘It’s what cars travel on.’

  Cummings glanced at her indifferently and then looked back to Mark. ‘At four o’clock in the morning or thereabouts,’ he went on leisurely. ‘On three separate occasions over three consecutive weeks prior to the girl’s disappearance.’

  ‘And?’ Growing more irritated by the second, Mark urged him on.

  ‘And it looked familiar,’ Cummings said, holding Mark’s gaze.

  ‘Oh, for fuck’s sake, hurry it up, Cummings,’ Lisa snapped. ‘We haven’t got all day.’

  Cummings’ mouth curved into a slow smile. ‘It’s a silver Audi Q5,’ he said, and let it hang. ‘Registered to one DI Mark Cain.’

  Thirteen

  MELISSA

  ‘She’s fast asleep,’ Jade said, coming into the workshop. ‘Do you need a hand with anything here?’

  Mel glanced up from where she was mopping the last of the blood from the floor. It seemed to have been smeared everywhere. Mark had been saturated in it. Some of it, Mel had realised when he got back from the vets, was his own. She’d fetched him a bandage and tried to help him wrap his hand, but he was rushing. Late. Keen to be gone. Mel couldn’t blame him.

  He hadn’t said much about her sculpture, which had been smashed to smithereens. But then, that was understandable. He’d hardly have been taking stock of the damage while desperately trying to stem the flow of blood from the dog. The sculpture didn’t matter. It was important, to her, and it being irretrievably broken before she’d had time to make a cast was obviously upsetting. It was the statue the Garden & Homes store were considering stocking nationwide. But it was insignificant in the great scheme of things. Poor Hercules.

  More upsetting, though, was that Mark had been so obviously annoyed about her forgetting to put the key back. She’d felt like crying when he dashed off, giving her no more than a peck on the cheek after all that they’d done together the first time he’d showered.

  It was the shock, she supposed, catching up with her. Plus, she was still so damn tired. The fuzziness, like damp cotton wool in her head, just wouldn’t clear. She needed to go for a brisk walk or something, get a grip. Mark was bound to have been frantic, and she was being oversensitive, her hormones playing havoc, more than likely. Thank God Jade had been there. Things could have been so much worse if not for her presence of mind.

  ‘Mel,’ Jade prompted. ‘Do you need a hand?’

  ‘No. Thanks, Jade.’ Mustering up a smile, Mel attempted to pull herself together. ‘You’ve been an absolute rock, I honestly don’t know what I’d have done without you, but it’s all pretty much cleaned up here now.’

  ‘I’m so sorry about your lovely sculpture.’ Sighing sadly, Jade walked across to where the remnants lay on the bench. ‘It’s such a terrible shame.’

  Mel raked her hair from her face, which was a bedraggled mess. ‘It’s not the end of the world.’ She shrugged. ‘But it could have been, if not for you. I’ll just have to start over.’

  ‘Well, you just shout when you need some space to work,’ Jade suggested. ‘I feel so awful about it all. I’ll obviously be more than happy to look after Poppy and Angel for as long as you need me to.’

  ‘Angel?’ Mel looked at her curiously.

  ‘Sorry – Evie.’ Jade shook her head apologetically. ‘I minded a baby about the same age until her parents moved away.’

  ‘Ah.’ Mel nodded. ‘Pretty name.’

  ‘Yes.’ Jade smiled. ‘She was a beautiful little girl. A lot like Evie.’

  Mel smiled at that. Evie was beautiful. The prettiest baby in the hospital ward, Mel had thought. But then, she had been the teeniest bit biased, she supposed. ‘Look, Jade, there’s no need for you to feel bad about any of this,’ she assured her, leaning over to the bench and retrieving the key, which she would make sure to hang in its proper place. ‘It’s hardly your fault.’

  ‘It is a bit. Felix was the cause of it,’ Jade reminded her, following Mel to help her out with the dustbin full of debris. ‘Hercules would hardly have hurled herself through the window if she hadn’t been chasing the cat.’

  ‘True, I suppose.’ Mel took some small comfort from that. Glancing around, she satisfied herself that all that could be done was done for now, and pulled the door to.

  ‘It’s no wonder Mark was so snappy,’ Jade said, with another heartfelt sigh.

  Mel glanced at her, as she helped carry the bin towards the designated rubbish and recycling area. ‘You noticed then?’ she asked, her heart sinking.

  ‘A bit,’ Jade admitted reluctantly. ‘But then, with everything that was going on and that woman constantly texting him…’

  ‘Woman?’ Mel arched an eyebrow as Jade trailed off.

  ‘Lisa, I think I heard him call her from the bedroom when he went to get changed, before he left for work. I was passing, and I couldn’t help overhearing,’ she clarified quickly, as Mel shot her a questioning glance.

  Realising who she meant, Mel smiled amusedly. ‘She’s a work colleague,’ she explained. God forbid Jade should think Mark was in the habit of ringing women from the bedroom. She’d be wondering what kind of household she’d agreed to work for at this rate.

  ‘Ah, I gathered it must be something like that.’ Jade nodded. ‘She’s a bit keen though, isn’t she?’<
br />
  Is she? Mel hadn’t noticed. Then again, she didn’t really give his many texts and calls much thought, other than that they were work-related and therefore necessary.

  ‘I’d better get back to Evie,’ Jade said, stepping back to leave Mel to manoeuvre the bin into place. ‘Unless you’d rather…?’ She nodded towards the house.

  Mel followed her gaze. She’d like nothing more than to retreat to the nursery, truth be told, to breathe in the reassuring smell of her little one and close her eyes for five minutes. Unfortunately, there was still the matter of the gaping hole where once was a rotting window.

  ‘No.’ Smiling wearily, Mel ran a hand over her aching neck. ‘That would be great, Jade, if you wouldn’t mind. I’ve still got to ring the glazier and I suppose I should tape something over the window until he can get here.’

  ‘No problem.’ Jade beamed her a smile back and turned to hurry back towards the house. ‘Oh, I wouldn’t worry too much about covering the window,’ she called back. ‘I’ve got rid of the cat.’

  Got… What? Mel stared after her. ‘Got rid of it how?’ she shouted, but Jade was already disappearing through the back door.

  Fourteen

  MARK

  He wasn’t serious? Was he? Looking from Cummings, who was slouching against the window ledge, to DCI Edwards, who sat stony-faced at his desk, Mark laughed incredulously. ‘You have to be joking,’ he said, bewildered that his DCI would imagine he’d be doing anything in the area but driving by.

  ‘Doesn’t look very amused, does he?’ Cummings observed wittily.

  ‘Sit down, please, DI Cain,’ Edwards instructed, casting a scathing glance in Cummings’ direction, which was at least something.

  Dragging a hand through his hair, Mark stayed where he was, his emotions swinging from disbelief to anger.