‘Nathan Stone?’
‘That’s right.’
‘Lorie Taylor?’
The girl nodded and snivelled and said nothing.
‘Can you explain to us how you came to be here tonight?’
‘Free us from these gates first, please.’ Nathan Stone was assertive. ‘Lorie is freezing and I’ve been awake for the last thirty-odd hours. I’ve barely slept for the last two weeks and I have to tell you, I’m starting to hallucinate. I’m in no condition to be answering questions right now when I want to go to bed.’ He was looking directly at Kerry Marshall now. His sentence finished with you inside her head.
Marshall felt her cheeks burning and was grateful that the nearest lamppost was several metres away. Be professional, idiot. So she fixed her eyes on Shearing and then on the handcuffs holding the pair to the gates.
Shearing fiddled with his hat. A sure sign of nerves. ‘Who cuffed you to these gates tonight?’
‘A guy called Leon Chambers.’
Shearing took a pad and pen from his pocket and scribbled a brief note. ‘You know him?’
‘Vaguely.’
Shearing looked at Marshall and rubbed his forehead.
Nathan Stone said, ‘The key to the handcuffs is somewhere by the car.’
‘Can you be more specific?’ Shearing asked.
‘I’m afraid not,’ Nathan Stone replied. ‘Lorie needs to get indoors. Could you hurry please?’
Glad to have a purpose, Marshall took the initiative and returned to the car and after spilling light on the ground and circling it once, found a small key close to the front left tyre. She held it up then proceeded back with it, one purposeful stride after another. The closer she got to Nathan Stone, the lighter her step became. She was conscious of him watching her.
Shearing didn’t want to take the key off her. Marshall sensed his reluctance, so she said, ‘We’d like you to come down to the police station to answer some questions relating to the recent disappearance of Naomi Hamilton.’
‘Naomi Stone,’ Nathan said, loading those eyes on her again. ‘She’s my wife.’
Marshall looked at the handcuffs for somewhere to look. ‘We know.’
‘Is this an arrest or an invitation?’ Nathan asked.
He’s not stupid. He was searching Marshall’s eyes again.
She made an effort to look sure of herself, which felt contrived. ‘Think of it as an invitation.’
‘OK. I don’t mind invitations,’ he said, ‘but right now, I need to go to bed.’ With you was there again. As he blinked, his eyelashes were slow to drag themselves off his eyelids. He was hot. One hundred percent. And suddenly, she felt warmer and slightly giddy. Stop it.
Shearing stepped forward. ‘We’re under no obligation to use that key,’ he said, pausing. Nathan Stone flicked his attention onto Shearing. ‘Let’s go through it one more time. We’d like you to answer some questions at the station.’
‘Or?’
Shearing tilted his head slightly and his lips pressed together and stared. His expression said, You work it out, sunshine.
Nathan Stone looked at Lorie Taylor then back at Shearing. ‘You’re making a mistake here.’
Shearing seemed to think he’d been challenged to a duel or something. He squared up to Nathan Stone, but he was several inches shorter. Slightly comical. ‘Is that a threat?’
Nathan Stone weighed up Shearing for several tense seconds. ‘Why do you feel threatened, officer?’ His voice had lowered. Shearing said nothing. Nathan added, ‘It wasn’t a threat, just a fact.’ More silence. The wind picked up. Lorie Taylor’s teeth bashed together. ‘Is there a bed at the station? Forgive the ignorance, but I’ve never been in a police station.’
‘In the cells, yes.’
‘In that case, we’ll agree to come with you and offer a statement in the morning.’
‘Good.’
Stone looked at Shearing and then at Kerry Marshall where his eyes lingered. ‘Do you know what I’ve just discovered?’ he asked her, and his eyes welled up. He pressed his lips together then opened his mouth and drew breath while his lower lip quivered. ‘My wife is alive.’ A long pause. Marshall flashed a glance Shearing’s way. ‘Do you really think I care where I sleep tonight?’
Lorie Taylor stood upright and wiped her eyes. The wind blew in gusts. Crowds of leaves skidded along the road. Shearing took the key off Marshall and nodded his head, her cue to body-search Lorie Taylor and then Nathan Stone. She loved her job sometimes. Professional. Idiot. She found nothing on Lorie Taylor except tense, unyielding muscles.
Nathan Stone presented himself willingly to Kerry Marshall by inching forward and raising his free hand. Help yourself, he seemed to say. Her pulse stirred a little. His body was hard but relaxed when she felt her way top to bottom.
‘Satisfied?’ he asked when she stood up and looked at him.
More than, she replied in her head. But she nodded her head once, like the diligent, efficient, professional police officer she was.
Shearing moved towards the handcuffs with the small key, his hand trembling ever so slightly.
4
Naomi was alone in her room. The familiarity should have wrapped her in security, but darkness always snatched her peace. She lay still, wrestling with uneasy feelings which had her reaching for the lamp beside her bed. She fumbled for the switch with shaky fingers, and pressed. The bulb blew. She hung still, her body damp and cold, and rigid. She listened hard, grappling to make sense of things, heart fluttering restlessly.
A sound broke through her consciousness – the low-pitched buzz of the toothbrush charger from the en-suite bathroom. Relentless and intrusive, it seemed to grow now she’d fastened her attention on it. The bedroom furniture looked like menacing black shapes ready to pounce. Something had pulled Naomi from shallow sleep. Too troubled to keep still, she stumbled out of bed and edged cautiously forward, feet sinking into the plush carpet. Her steps were slow and faltering; her legs unsteady. She made it to the door and ran her hands over the wall in search of the light switch, until a sharp and sudden noise slashed the silence and froze her limbs.
It was a single note on the piano downstairs, as if something had landed accidentally on a key. Her perfect pitch told her it was A. The note still rang in her head. She stifled a scream. Panic held her still. Maybe the noise had roused her parents. Nothing moved. If she could just make it to Annabel’s room…
Another search and she found the door handle. She dragged the handle down slowly, equally anxious to get to Annabel as to do it without attracting attention. She pulled the door open and scanned the landing frantically. More dark shapes and shadows, none of them living or breathing or moving. Annabel’s room was next-door-but-one. Heart thudding and short of breath, she couldn’t resist the pull to creep to the bannister and check the hall. Four paces forward and she took hold of a cold wooden rail. Two black figures were shifting in the hall; a third was splashing dull light around her piano room from the doorway. She gasped with the shock and couldn’t pull back in time.
The light-source flipped and found her half a second later. Stunned and blinded by it, she staggered in reverse and backed into the wall. She swayed a little, then lurched sideways, desperate to raise the alarm.
Before she made it to Annabel’s door, she heard noises on the stairs, a dull and terrible creaking.
‘No,’ she whimpered, glancing over her shoulder.
A figure was steaming silently up the stairs two at a time. It made no sense, but she was too afraid to yell. She lunged at Annabel’s door and flung it open and blundered forward to find that Annabel’s bed was empty.
Fresh panic seized her now. Had they got Annabel?
Her hand scrambled across the bedding and landed on something hard and square which lit up as she touched it. She headed for the bathroom with Annabel’s phone just as someone entered the room. No time to look behind. She hurled herself into the bathroom and closed and locked the door. Her hands were trembling as she
stood and watched the handle until it began to move – up and down, up and down.
Teeth bashing together, she held the phone in both hands and brought up a keypad. Her thumb struggled to press nine three times.
The door handle continued to twitch and then there was scratching, metal on metal. Someone was using a tool to disable the lock. She stumbled backwards.
‘You’re through to emergency services. Which service do you require?’
She panted heavily, striving to produce words. Had it ever felt more difficult? Her tongue was too thick, her throat too dry.
She was anxious to keep her voice low, even though she knew that he knew she was in there, with nowhere to run. She didn’t want him to hear the fear in her voice. ‘There’s………a……..m….man……..’ breathing was becoming difficult now. She was soaked with perspiration and shaking with cold.
‘Hello…..can you hear me? Which service do you require?’
She was trying to draw breath, but oxygen was leaking from the room. ‘There’s……a…..’
The door opened, not suddenly, but patiently.
‘N…….no….’
She couldn’t suck enough air to speak.
‘Which service do you require?’ The voice was calm, unconcerned, robotic. She could not respond to it.
He stood in the doorway, unmoving. Light trickled in through the window, throwing random patterns on the floor, allowing a clear view of him. He was dressed in black, head to foot, with openings for his eyes and mouth. His easy breathing produced small billowy vapours, which he exhaled slowly, allowing her time to scream and get help. But she was helpless. She backed into the wall and dropped the phone and tried to breathe. The wall was wet. Legs not strong enough to support her weight, she slid down it and held her throat and gasped.
He raised one arm. There was a long knife in his hand, which was wide at one end, and tapered to a dramatic point.
It didn’t matter. She’d die of asphyxiation before he reached her.
‘Naomi.’
He knew her name. It wasn’t a surprise; the scene was so familiar. She’d been here before and had near-misses. This time, he’d trapped her. She slumped on the floor, a desperate, helpless heap, scrapping for air.
‘Naomi.’ She hadn’t noticed his advance. He had hold of her arm now and was squeezing and speaking in her ear. His breath moistened the side of her face. The knife was moving slowly across her field of vision. In a rush, her airways cleared and she found she could breathe again. She heard shouting and voices and confusion.
Consciousness dawned. She was hearing her own voice.
‘Naomi,’ Annabel said firmly, looking down on her. ‘It’s OK.’
Naomi sat up in bed. Her back turned cold as the air met it. She was wet. Her sheet was damp all over.
‘Are you with it?’ Annabel said in a calmer tone. Naomi looked at her, eyes wide, and Annabel pulled her into a hug.
‘He was here.’
‘Who was here?’
‘I don’t know. A man. You were gone.’
Annabel rubbed Naomi’s back up and down. ‘No one’s here. You’re safe, OK?’
Naomi looked about the room. The fear subsided, replaced by sickness. Her mouth was dry. Her heart was galloping at a pace.
‘Why did you wake up?’
‘We’re twins, remember? I can kind of tell when you’re distressed.’ Annabel went still. ‘Plus I’m a light sleeper.’
‘Since when?’
‘Since you went missing. I hardly slept at all. I actually wished I could go to sleep and never wake up.’
Naomi’s breathing was slowing to normal. ‘I’m sorry I put you through that.’
‘It isn’t your fault.’ Annabel sighed. ‘Every day, I’m just relieved you’re here.’
‘This is the second night in a row I’ve woken up like this.’
Annabel said into her hair, ‘I know.’ Then she stood and walked over to a suitcase slouched on the floor that Naomi hadn’t unpacked. She pulled something out and returned to the bed and started to pull Naomi’s nightdress off, which was trapped beneath her. Naomi didn’t resist. She shuffled forward and raised her arms like a child. Annabel peeled the nightdress away and gently replaced it with a cold T-shirt.
‘Are you ever going to unpack your things?’
‘I don’t know.’
Annabel stood up.
Naomi couldn’t find the words to detain her. Her head was too scrambled. So she said nothing, just sat feeling empty, wanting to put the light on and hang on to consciousness until the sun was born.
Annabel took Naomi by the hand and tugged.
‘Come on.’
Naomi stood and, still clinging to Annabel’s hand, followed her through the bedroom and into Annabel’s room. Annabel tore the duvet back and directed Naomi to get into the bed. She did, and found it warm and comforting. Annabel settled the bedding around her, then circled the bed and got in the other side.
Naomi felt a cool hand on her arm. ‘You’ll be fine now, OK? Just sleep.’
‘It was awful, Annie. So real.’
‘Tell me about it in the morning.’
‘Why hasn’t Dan called me?’
‘I’m sure he will.’
‘Why isn’t he answering his phone or replying to my messages?’
‘Maybe he can’t.’
Naomi ran that though her mind. ‘It doesn’t make sense. Maybe I should drive to his flat tomorrow to see what’s going on.’
Annabel sighed. ‘Not a good idea.’
‘Why not?’
‘You’re in no state to drive. Look, Dan’s been through a bad time too. Maybe he needs some time.’
Naomi thought about that and could find no response.
‘Let’s talk in the morning,’ Annabel said. She rubbed Naomi’s arm and turned over. ‘We need some sleep.’
It didn’t occur to Naomi to answer. An illogical part of her still hadn’t accepted that she was safe. As Annabel’s breathing slowed and became noisier, Naomi lay rigid, chained by thoughts, until a haunting melody broke into her mind which enticed her peacefully towards the possibility of sleep.
<><><>
After a dreamless few hours, Naomi came round to the phone ringing persistently. She had no idea what time it was. The morning, grey and misty, offered a feeble greeting from the window. Annabel’s window. Annabel’s bed, empty on one side. The memories crowded in, closely followed by the feelings. She braced herself for the pain. It was like this every day now – a few confused moments before the truth, stark and brutal, rushed at her and rammed her like a truck, reminding her why she was home.
Her husband, Nathan, had plotted to have her murdered on their wedding night. Dan, Nathan’s brother, should have killed her and buried her in a Manchester cemetery. Instead, he’d hidden her away and saved her life. Naomi’s best friend, Lorie, was Nathan’s accomplice. The two had gone away on honeymoon together – Lorie posing as Naomi – to fake Naomi’s death in the Caribbean, neither knowing she wasn’t dead. The news of her disappearance had spread around the world. And then she’d turned up in England alive and unharmed.
So the truth hit her every morning. The truth was the situation. The way things were now. It was the unwelcome companion, the intruder, the deathly feeling she carried around that sometimes had a voice like a narrator in her head spewing tiresome words: failure, betrayed, unlovable, gullible, stupid, weak, worthless.
And on and on.
It took a few seconds to establish that it was Wednesday. Checking the day of the week as soon as she woke up had become a habit. It had been three days since Dan had dropped her home. A public announcement had followed on national news on Monday after the police had visited to take a detailed statement. It had been unpleasant; raked up everything, helped to bury nothing. Shortly afterwards, the press were desperate to interview her. They were falling over themselves for a piece of … her. It felt that personal. Camilla, Naomi’s mum, had dealt with the calls and vehemently r
efused every request. So reporters circled the gates of the house like a pack of wild dogs, contesting for scraps of information.
On Tuesday, another piece of bizarre news had broken, very unexpectedly. Simon Wilde, Lorie’s ex-boyfriend, had disappeared. Just like that. Naomi couldn’t process that news so she’d promptly let it go. Her mind was clogged already.
The phone kept nagging. Her head pulsed with pain when she pulled herself into a sitting position. The weight of reality was heavy, the cost of consciousness too much. Her thoughts turned to Dan. How much she wanted and needed him. How confused she was that he hadn’t called when he’d promised, how it was contributing to her stress. Maybe Dan was on the other end of the relentless ringing. Hope sprouted a little shoot somewhere, enough for her to stick one leg out of the bed.
Her three days at home had been crowned by endless nights infused with the kind of trauma she hadn’t experienced at the cottage with Dan. Not like this. The scenes at the cemetery two weeks apart played in her head. On a circuit, round and round. She could still feel cold metal of the gun against her temple and remember the resignation that life was finished. Her time in captivity had brought death up close, or the idea of it at least. She’d fought like a dragon for one reason. She was loved. Who wouldn’t battle to get back to a new husband, a best friend, a family, college friends all missing her, all willing her to escape and survive and make it back to her old life and start living it again?
It was an illusion, all of it, a battle fought for nothing. The truth was black. She felt soiled by it, stained and filthy. To think that she’d been battling the wrong enemy... The danger had never been at the cottage, but had lurked for years within the security of home. And every minute spent there now was a reminder.
The Darkness Visible Page 3