‘Does she smoke?’ another nurse asks. ‘Perhaps she went outside.’
I shake my head vigorously. ‘Did you see anything?’ I snap at the nurse who has so far remained mute. Susan’s arm is around my shoulders, holding me steady, as if I’m ever so slightly mad.
‘Sorry, no. I was dealing with—’
‘Perhaps you’d like to wait in the relatives’ room, Mrs Forrester,’ the more senior nurse suggests. ‘I’ll contact security right away.’ She turns to go but stops in the doorway, blocking my exit. ‘Sometimes we get patients leave of their own accord,’ she says, less sternly. ‘I don’t condone it, of course, but when they’re consenting adults, there’s not much we can do except alert their GPs.’
‘But Hannah wouldn’t do that,’ I say, wanting to scream. ‘She’s not stupid. She knows she needs medical care.’ I stop, giving a compliant nod, and follow Susan. She sits beside me in the relatives’ room while the ward sister goes off in search of answers.
‘Why are people always disappearing from my life?’ I say in a high-pitched and shaky voice. Susan pours two cups of water from the dispenser.
‘It’s called having a family,’ she replies kindly. ‘And being a mother.’
‘But your family hasn’t disappeared.’
Susan is quiet for a moment. ‘No,’ she says, staring at her lap. ‘Not yet.’
The ward sister eventually comes back to the relatives’ room with flaming-red cheeks and a frown.
‘Mrs Forrester,’ she says breathlessly.
I stand up. Susan is beside me.
‘I just had a call from security. They’ve scanned the CCTV cameras. There’s some footage they want you to see.’
‘Oh God.’ I drop down into the chair again, covering my mouth. ‘Is it bad?’
The nurse glances at Susan.
‘Would you like me to go?’ Susan offers.
I nod. ‘Thank you.’
Susan walks off, following the sister, but I don’t want to be alone so I chase after them, keeping a distance behind.
Down one floor and along several corridors, the nurse leads Susan into a glass-partitioned office near a pair of external sliding doors. I hang back, watching as one of two security guards shows her a monitor that’s out of sight to me. I see Susan’s face clearly, lit up by the flickering reflected from whatever’s playing on the screen.
She stares at it blank-faced for thirty seconds. A couple of times, the guard reaches forward and clicks a mouse, perhaps changing cameras, maybe showing her different footage.
Susan watches intently.
Then she nods solemnly, her lips forming silent words. I see her teeth clench together and her eyes close for a beat too long. Her hand goes over her mouth. Slowly, she looks up and out through the glass wall, staring right at me. Her other hand beckons me in.
Once inside with the door shut, the hospital sounds fall away. The room is without feeling and airless. The nurse says something, but it’s as if she’s talking another language. I focus on Susan.
‘What is it?’ I say weakly, looking at the blank monitors. ‘Did you see anything? What’s happened?’
Susan swallows. She takes me by the shoulders and draws me close.
‘She’s been taken,’ she says, choked. ‘It looked as though she didn’t want to go.’
‘No . . .’ I feel faint. I grab the back of a chair. ‘Who? Did you see who took her?’
After a moment, Susan nods.
‘It was my husband,’ she replies, her voice barely working. ‘It was Phil who took Hannah.’
Gina
I didn’t look at the footage. I couldn’t look at the footage. In the car, Susan tells me how Hannah was being dragged and pulled by the arm, but when she collapsed Phil had carried her, hauling her over his shoulder. He’d chosen a back way out of the hospital to avoid detection. His brazen exit had incredibly not drawn any attention, with the guards admitting that constantly checking each camera simultaneously was impossible.
‘But Hannah wouldn’t go off with a stranger,’ I say, confused and terrified as Susan drives lethally through the traffic. Unless she was so drugged up she didn’t know what she was doing.
My knees are pressed together and my hands tucked under my thighs. I shouldn’t have got in the car with her, rather I should have stayed at the hospital and waited for the police. But Susan was so convincing. She told me she knew where he would be going, that she could sort it out. Stupidly I believed her.
‘You don’t know Phil,’ she replies with an inappropriate laugh. She shakes her head, as if she knows something I don’t. ‘He can be . . .’ She glances at me sideways, before changing up a couple of gears, pushing the car to full revs. ‘He can be very persuasive.’
‘I don’t understand why the nurses didn’t stop him. What’s wrong with the hospital security, for God’s sake!’ I bury my face in my hands, partly because I can’t stand the thought of Hannah being kidnapped, but also because of Susan’s driving.
We left the hospital twenty minutes ago, even though the ward sister wanted us to stay. She had to go back to her patients, but had left us with Bob, the head security officer. He’d already called the police.
Then Susan told him we were going outside for a cigarette. I followed, confused, and once we were out of sight she grabbed my arm, pulling me along. ‘The car park’s this way,’ she said, dragging me by the sleeve. I wondered if this was how Hannah had felt when Phil took her, but Susan was so insistent that I followed. But my trust was starting to waver.
I yanked free of her grip. ‘Susan, I need to stay and speak to the police.’
‘And what do you think they’ll do?’ she said when I refused to move. ‘We’ll be waiting hours while they make enquiries.’ She faced me square-on. ‘Do you want Hannah back or not? She needs medical care, Gina. Trust me, I think I know where Phil’s gone.’ She took me by the shoulders. ‘And I also know what he’s capable of.’
I had no choice but to follow.
Now, heading out east on the A40 towards Oxford, the words Trust me are playing over and over in my mind. Susan is a woman possessed as she speeds along, swerving as she overtakes on risky straights, pushing her Audi to its limits on the bends. Part of the route is dual carriageway, but mostly it’s a single lane, and right now we’re stuck behind a learner driver doing thirty miles per hour.
Susan honks her horn and flashes her lights. The driver doesn’t budge, maintaining her path.
‘Susan, no!’ I scream, dropping into the brace position, burying my face. I feel the car lurch one way then the other as she thrashes the Audi in a reckless manoeuvre, just managing to slip back on to our side of the road to the sound of a truck blaring its horn.
‘Have you got satnav on your phone?’ she asks calmly, as though nothing’s happened.
‘Yes.’
‘Put in an address. I want to check the quickest route.’ She doesn’t take her eyes off the road.
With shaking hands, I open the app. ‘What will Phil do to Hannah?’ I ask, terrified of the answer. I tap the ‘destination’ button. ‘What the hell does he want with her?’ Anger simmers inside me, but is tempered by fear. It leaves me stuck somewhere between the two. Something like a wreck.
Then I recall Hannah’s notebook, what she wrote about Jacob. It didn’t seem much more than a grieving sister looking for closure, but what if she was on to something? What if she discovered who killed my son? And what if that person found out?
Maybe Rick also discovered what Hannah knew, or she confided in him, and he was trying to protect her, getting himself killed in the process. If I’m correct, I’m even more fearful for Hannah’s safety, and now fearful for mine.
‘Drive faster,’ I order, looking across at Susan. We exchange a glance and I feel the car lurch forward.
‘Put in the postcode,’ she says, reciting it clearly. I hesitate as I type, my mind reeling and fuzzy as the screen finally resolves: 23 Evalina Street is only six minutes away.
‘
I . . . I don’t understand . . .’ I say, touching my temple. Susan and Phil have had dealings with Watkins & Lowe, but why is she heading to a property on our rental list?
‘You don’t need to understand,’ she says, hurling the car through a T-junction without stopping. ‘Is it a left here?’
‘No, next one,’ I say. ‘Why are we going to this house, Susan?’ I don’t mention I was there with Adrian just yesterday. It doesn’t make sense.
‘Because I think that’s where Phil has taken Hannah.’
She fixes on the road ahead, biting her bottom lip. Her cheeks are crested with red and her knuckles are white around the steering wheel. I have no idea if I can trust her, and if anything happens to me, then there’s no one left to save Hannah.
‘There’s a sharp bend up ahead,’ I say. ‘Then a right turn soon after. Go to the end of that street and turn left on to Evalina. Number twenty-three is a little way up.’
Susan nods, jamming on the brakes to halt behind a parked car as another vehicle passes. ‘Come on, come on . . .’
Then it’s a clear run to the house, with me repeating the directions as we draw near. She pulls the car into a space opposite number 23, bumping up on to the kerb, leaving it at an angle.
We both stare at the Range Rover parked across the road.
‘You were right,’ I say, unclipping my seat belt with shaking hands. ‘He’s here.’
‘I know my husband,’ she says, getting out, and I can’t help thinking that I wish I still knew mine. Somewhere deep inside, I feel Rick’s strength urging me on, giving me the courage I need to get Hannah back.
As we cross the street, my fingers curl round my phone in my pocket. I stop on the pavement outside.
‘Come on,’ Susan says, beckoning me on.
‘Tell me why Phil has brought her here first,’ I demand, refusing to move.
I scan the front windows, hoping for a glimpse of Hannah, remembering the time I thought I saw Rick at the upstairs window, how it was my imagination, how I felt crazy, seeing him everywhere in those early days. I never once thought the days and weeks would turn into months. Soon it will be years. With every hour that passes, he fades a little more from my mind.
‘Phil’s come here because we own it,’ Susan says impatiently. ‘He was meant to be fixing it up so we could rent it out . . .’ She walks towards the front door. ‘Will you come on, Gina,’ she says, looking concerned.
I look up at the house, then at her, trying to fathom if I trust her. Nothing makes sense except that my daughter is in there and I need to get her medical help.
I grip my phone tightly. ‘OK, I’m coming.’ I go cautiously with her up the front path.
‘This way,’ Susan says in a hushed voice, leading me through a metal gate to the side. We go down an alley and she turns back, putting her finger to her lips.
My heart thumps.
We go round to the back door and Susan turns the door handle slowly. It gives and opens, making a tiny creak. She stops – waiting, listening. Everything is quiet.
We step inside the utility room, and I’m thankful that I know the layout of the house at least. The kitchen lies beyond, which leads into a long hallway with the small dining room and a larger living room off to the left.
Then I hear a click. I spin round to see that Susan has locked the back door. She slips the key into her pocket.
‘What are you doing?’ I whisper, wondering if I should call the police. I feel dizzy from adrenalin.
‘Sshh,’ she says, scowling, her finger at her mouth.
‘Unlock the door,’ I insist, but she urges me towards the kitchen, shaking her head.
I take my phone from my pocket, swiping it open, but Susan’s hand levers it down again. ‘Don’t be stupid,’ she mouths quietly. ‘Not yet.’
We creep through into the grotty kitchen. There are dirty cups and plates piled around the sink, several empty microwave meal cartons littered about, and rubbish everywhere, as though the squatters have taken hold.
Susan moves past me, going out into the hall first. We both jump as an angry yell comes from upstairs, followed by heavy footsteps.
Neither of us dares move.
Phil is getting closer. Each tread getting louder.
Then I hear a female voice call out – begging, imploring, crying.
Hannah.
It takes all my strength not to call out to her.
Susan twists round to face me, taking each of my wrists in hers, pulling me close. Our faces are inches apart as she looks me directly in the eyes.
‘I am so sorry,’ she whispers earnestly. ‘Please, please, you have to trust me . . .’
I don’t know what she’s talking about, and I wonder if she’s about to hug me. Instead, she spins round again just as her husband comes into view. It’s only when I focus on him myself that I understand why she was apologising.
Gina
‘Rick!’
The hallway is spinning, so I reach out to steady myself against the wall. Susan comes to hold me up, but I shrug away from her grip.
I need to get to him.
‘Oh my God, Rick . . . Thank God! Oh Christ . . . Oh my God . . .’
I don’t know whether to laugh or cry so I do both.
Nothing is real. I stagger towards him, wondering if I’ve been drinking, if I’m dreaming.
‘You’re alive!’
I have never felt so happy, so relieved, so utterly, utterly thankful.
I lunge at him, my arms outstretched and all over the place, trying to make them wrap around my husband, though they don’t seem to quite fit anywhere.
He doesn’t move.
‘Rick . . .’
I hear Susan behind me, saying stuff I don’t understand, trying to get my attention, but for now I don’t need to listen. I just need to make myself actually believe that it’s really Rick standing there, not my imagination playing yet more tricks.
My husband is back. Everything is going to be fine . . .
I cast my eyes up and down him, looking him over, checking that he’s not been harmed. We need to act quickly, work together to save our daughter. That bastard’s had him locked up here all this time.
Dear God, let Hannah be OK . . .
We will take her back to the hospital together, join forces again. Strong, dependable Rick by my side.
My arms are finally around his shoulders, my face buried in his neck. He still doesn’t move, but I’m breathing in the scent of him, drinking him up – not quite the same as I remember.
But things are bound to have changed.
I pull back, hardly daring to hold him at arm’s length in case he disappears again.
His face is unshaven and his expression dour. He stares down at me.
‘Rick?’ I say. ‘Are you OK? What happened?’ Still he doesn’t say anything, as if a great trauma has seized his soul.
I turn to Susan, simmering, frothing with enough anger for both of us. I keep hold of Rick’s frozen hand.
‘Your husband did this to him . . . For some reason he wants to destroy my family, but I won’t let him! Where is he?’ I’m yelling, hysterical, too wild for tears.
Susan is shaking her head, opening her mouth. She doesn’t know what to say. The frown is agony on her face. She comes close, almost sandwiching me between her and Rick. I suddenly feel hemmed in, claustrophobic. Trapped.
I look up at Rick, imploring him to say something. ‘Is Hannah upstairs?’ Then I whisper, realising we could all be in danger. ‘Is Phil up there? What has he done to her?’ I go to hug him again, but he flinches away from me.
‘Look what your bastard’s done to him,’ I shriek at Susan. ‘He can’t even speak.’
My Rick is warm and loving. This man is robotic and cold. Nothing like the person who walked out of the house last November.
‘Gina, you have to listen to me,’ Susan says, taking hold of me.
My hand twitches in my pocket, wrapped around my phone. I still don’t know if I trust her
, but I feel a whole lot safer with Rick by my side.
She takes a deep breath. ‘This isn’t Rick.’ She pulls an agonised face. ‘I mean it is Rick, of course, but it’s also Phil. He’s my husband too, Gina. His name is Phillip Westwood.’
She pulls gently on my arm, forcing me to face her. I try to read her, searching for the truth.
‘You’re crazy. What are you talking about? That’s just not true . . .’
Rick is fixed somewhere beyond us, somewhere remote. He looks exhausted and broken. But I see something else about him, something so unfamiliar and painful, yet ridiculously obvious. As if a thousand-piece puzzle is exploding in front of my eyes.
‘But I saw a picture of Phil. You showed me,’ I say, almost laughing, desperate for Susan to take back what she’s said. ‘This is Rick. I . . . I don’t understand.’
Susan tunes in to a matter-of-fact voice. ‘I doubt you’ll ever understand,’ she says. ‘And the picture was just some random photo I printed from the internet.’
Rick makes a strange noise – somewhere between a growl and a sigh.
‘You knew?’
She nods.
‘How long?’
‘Since November,’ she replies.
‘Oh, for fuck’s sake, neither of you get it!’ Rick suddenly roars from behind us.
We both jump.
This isn’t happening. It’s just a nightmare . . . too much wine . . . I’ve hit my head . . .
‘Please do explain,’ Susan says with authority and sarcasm, even though she’s shaking. She’s had the benefit of time to absorb this.
‘Please, just let me get to Hannah,’ I say, trying not to antagonise either of them. ‘I need to get her back to the hospital.’ I don’t know how to deal with this new Rick. I have no idea how to break through to him.
‘She’ll be fine,’ he barks back. He’s standing between me and the stairs.
‘No, she needs medical help. She’s just had an operation, for God’s sake!’
In Too Deep Page 30