by Susan Lewis
The telephone suddenly shrilled into the silence and Cristos jerked himself up to answer it with what he already knew to be a futile hope hammering in his chest. It was Phillip.
‘No. No news this end,’ Cristos said in answer to Phillip’s question. ‘What about you? Where are you?’
‘At the hospital. They’re discharging Annalise later today.’
‘That’s good,’ Cristos said, so numb he couldn’t even tell if he meant it. ‘Did you tell her about Corrie yet?’
‘About half an hour ago. She didn’t take it too well. The police are with her now, I know what she’s going to tell them, which is why I’ve come outside to call you.’
‘Go on.’
‘She’s confirmed that Luke was outside her flat around midday on Monday, trying to get in, which I’m afraid coincides with when Corrie went missing. So unless the man can be in two places at once …’
For a moment Cristos felt such an overpowering rage that only with superhuman effort did he stop himself hurling the phone across the room. He didn’t know how Fitzpatrick had done it, but the bastard had Corrie and nothing anyone said was going to convince Cristos otherwise. What he might have done to Corrie Cristos still couldn’t allow himself to think about, but he knew, had there not been detectives dogging every move Fitzpatrick made, then he, Cristos, would likely be up on a murder charge by now. ‘Are you sure Annalise isn’t just covering for him?’ he snapped.
‘No, I’m not sure. But I don’t think she is. She still won’t tell anyone why she took the overdose, but between you and me, I’m fairly certain it’s because she found out about her mother’s affair with Luke. She’s refusing to see either of them. She won’t even come home to Chelsea this afternoon – I have to take her to her own flat.’
‘Could I talk to her?’ Cristos asked. ‘Like today. I got to fly to Nice tonight …’
‘If she’s up to it. I’ll ask her to call you later.’
At eight o’clock that night, having got no further with Annalise than anyone else had, Cristos was on his way to Nice. He’d left his number in Cannes with Radcliffe, Paula, Annalise and Phillip, making them all swear they’d contact him the minute they heard anything. But the terrible sense of betrayal he felt at leaving was only surpassed by the panic, which had long since taken hold of his fear and incarcerated it in terror.
Exhaustion was etched in every line of Corrie’s face. Her body, now propped against the wall, was a weighted mass of agony, and her mind was reaching yearningly towards the elusive haven of sleep. But the bitter cold was biting bone deep arresting her at the brink. Her hands, now unbound, lay uselessly in her lap, her fingers too frozen even to link each other for warmth.
In the moments when Luke had first sliced through her bonds she had been so near to passing out that it had been a while before she’d realized he wasn’t going to kill her. Then, as he lit a candle beside her and her eyes had slowly adjusted to the dusty shadows, what she had seen had instilled such indescribable terror in her that her mind had plunged into darkness. Luke had coaxed her back to her senses by spooning water between her cracked lips.
Now he was sitting at the centre of the floor, his legs crossed, his elbows resting on his knees, staring sightlessly into the space between them. Beside him the candle was still flickering a timid glow into the gloom, but its light was strong enough for Corrie to see the wall behind him, to register with her own eyes the reality of what until now had only been a nightmare. He had killed the prostitutes, and he had done it right here in this garage – the evidence was encrusted in the clotted brown stains of dried blood all over the walls and floor. She couldn’t allow herself to think of the savagery he must have employed for the blood to have spurted to such a height, if she did she knew her own sanity would be annihilated completely.
A few moments ago she had tried to scream, but just like in a nightmare, no sound had come. Then Luke had told her that it would do no good, no one would hear her.
‘Luke,’ she said now, her voice so parched the sound barely reached her own ears. ‘Luke, you must know that someone will come looking for me …’
‘They already are,’ he said bleakly.
Relief pushed tears into Corrie’s eyes – surely someone would speak to Paula and Paula would tell them about Luke. It could only be a matter of time then … He was speaking again, but through the turbulence of emotion inside her head Corrie couldn’t hear him. She struggled to clear her mind, opening her lips and inhaling the foul stench of the place through mouth and nose.
‘… so they think I’m in my flat all the time,’ he was saying. ‘That’s why I never stay long with you, in case they knock on the door. I leave the shower running while I’m gone, you see. Or the TV. But don’t worry, Corrie, I’ll keep coming, I won’t leave you here alone any longer than I have to.’ He laughed dryly and rubbed his fingers over his eyes. ‘I never would have thought it would be so easy,’ he said, ‘but they make it easy. I just leave through the studio at the back, walk along the lane and get into the old car I used to pick up the prostitutes.’
These words were like a bludgeon on Corrie’s already battered senses. But there was worse to come.
‘They suspect me, of course,’ he said, ‘of abducting you, I mean. But Annalise has told them that it couldn’t be me.’ He sighed, heavily, as though trying to shift the burden of his sadness. ‘You see, I was at her house when you went missing. She wouldn’t let me in, I knew she wouldn’t … But I had to be there when you disappeared. And the point is, no one really knows the exact time you did disappear. All they know is that you didn’t take the taxi, and you didn’t get onto the plane. So after I …’ his eyes suddenly came up to meet hers. ‘I didn’t want to hit you, Corrie, I just didn’t have any choice. I couldn’t take you in the car to Annalise’s with me, someone might have seen you, so I had to leave you at your studio. I came back for you, though, once it was dark. I knew I had all that time – the flight to Los Angeles is a long one, it gave me plenty of time.’
‘But my father was meeting me …’ Corrie whispered.
‘Yes, you told me that when I came round. But he was late. If he hadn’t been … Well, he was, so everything turned out all right.’
They sat in silence for a while then. Corrie knew, because there was no sunlight creeping through the cracks around the door that it was night. Did that mean he would be staying longer? Crazy as it seemed she didn’t want him to go, she didn’t want to be left alone here with the ghosts of the women who had died so violently.
‘Why wouldn’t Annalise let you in?’ she asked, her voice still so hoarse that it scraped on her throat.
‘She’s angry with me.’
Corrie waited for him to elaborate, but when he didn’t she said, ‘Because of Octavia? Did she find out about Octavia?’
His head jerked up, then he laughed, suddenly. It was brittle, high-pitched, almost a snigger. ‘Yes, you could say that,’ he answered. Then suddenly he was on his feet. ‘I have to go,’ he said, and Corrie saw him slide her blindfold, gag and fresh rope out of his pocket.
‘No!’ she cried, as he came towards her. ‘Please, Luke, no!’
‘I’m sorry,’ he soothed, ‘but I have to.’
‘No! I’m begging you, Luke, please don’t leave me here. Please, Luke, I’ll do anything … No!’ she screamed as he pushed her face down on the floor. The clasp of her handbag, which was still strapped across her body, dug painfully into her hip. In her mounting hysteria Corrie thought it was the knife, thought that it was beginning, that now was the moment he was going to do the same to her as he had to the prostitutes.
‘Luke stop! Please, please, no!’ Her voice was still barely more than a croak. ‘Luke, don’t do it, please!’ she begged, as he wrenched her arms behind her.
She realized then that he was using both hands, that whatever it was digging into her wasn’t a knife. ‘My bag,’ she sobbed, ‘oh my God, my bag!’
‘What this?’ Luke said, turning her onto her s
ide and lifting it up. ‘Is it hurting you?’
‘Yes,’ Corrie gasped, unable to see him through her tears.
‘There,’ he said, laying it on the floor in front of her, ‘is that better?’
Dumbly Corrie nodded, but began to sob again as he retied her blindfold. ‘I don’t want to stay here, Luke,’ she choked, ‘please don’t leave me here.’
‘It won’t be for much longer,’ he said softly. ‘I promise you, it won’t be long now.’
‘Oh Luke, please, please, stop this.’
‘Sssh! Sssh!’ he said, lifting her head to wrap the gag around behind her. ‘I have to deal with Annalise first. I have to make her understand. If I’d lost you, you see, I’d have had to kill her. But this way … You’re going to help us, Corrie. You’re going to help me, and be with me, because I do need help, Corrie. I know that.’
When he had gone Corrie lay on the ground her body shuddering and shivering as the demons of terror swooped through the impenetrable darkness he had left her in. Tears rolled from her eyes, saliva dripped from her mouth and the biting cold spiked every pore of her skin.
The sound of his car had long receded into the distance and she had said many prayers by the time she realized that she had stretched out her legs. Even then the significance of what she had done took some time to register – and when it did the euphoria was so sudden that she could barely sit herself up she was shaking, laughing and crying so hard. He hadn’t attached her wrists to her ankles.
She winced, even groaned with the pain as the rope dug into her wrists as she pressed her hands down under buttocks, gingerly pulling herself backwards through the loop of her arms. But her hips were through, and then so too were her legs. Her hands were in front of her!
Fumbling with the edge of her blindfold it was a while before she managed to push it up to her forehead. Then she hooked her deadened fingers into the gag and using her tongue and lips as well, eventually succeeded in freeing her mouth. But when she put the knots on her wrists between her teeth and felt the taut knobbling of the rope she started to cry again.
It took the entire night to loosen the knots, by which time her hands and her face were smeared with blood. But she did free them, and then she set about unfastening her ankles. It seemed to take an eternity. Her fingers were so numbed by the cold she had to keep warming them in her armpits, but eventually she got there, and on unsteady legs she pulled herself up and stumbled towards the door.
For some time now she had been aware of daylight coming through the cracks in the door, and knew that somehow she had to get out of there before Luke came back. But as she confronted the metal barrier between her and freedom, the hopelessness of her situation sucked the feverish adrenalin from her blood and she collapsed sobbing against it. Her knees gave way beneath her and as she slid down the door an incoherent babble of words was bubbling from her lips.
It was only when she felt the jet of chill wind streaming across her legs that she noticed the decayed wooden panel in the upright of the door. Wiping the back of her hand across her eyes she crawled towards it, then taking her bag she smashed it into the rotten wood. It gave out almost immediately. But the space was nowhere near wide enough for her to crawl through, and the panel beside it showed no signs of decay. But she was going to get out, she told herself fiercely, she had to, and a renewed surge of adrenalin flowed through her lending her the strength to kick, hammer, push and pull until the panel was torn from its roots.
Petrified now that Luke would return, she squeezed her shivering, frozen body through the jagged gap out into the rain soaked alley.
As she started to run through the drizzle, stumbling on the cobbles and slipping in the grime of the gutter, she had no conception of the fact that shock had propelled her mind back in time to the point before her ordeal had begun. All she knew was that she was on her way to Cristos. That she was going to tell him she loved him. Which was why, when she finally came to a main road and ran out in front of a taxi to stop it, she told the driver to take her to Heathrow. That’s where she’d been heading before all this started, so that’s where she must go now, then it would be like it had never happened.
But as she looked down at her battered fingers her eyes suddenly opened wide. Annalise! What was it he had said about Annalise? She couldn’t remember, but she knew with a strangely panicked clarity that she couldn’t go without Annalise. ‘Driver!’ she called out, but as she was on the point of giving him Annalise’s address it suddenly occurred to her that Luke might be there. She swallowed hard on a fresh onslaught of panic, at last realizing with a frustration bordering on desperation, that she couldn’t go to Cristos, at least not yet, she had to go to the police first.
Fifteen minutes later she ran on unsteady legs into Chelsea Police Station. The officer on duty was busily filling in forms and despite the sound of her breathlessness didn’t look up straight away.
‘What can I do for you?’ he asked, distractedly.
‘DI Radcliffe,’ Corrie gasped. ‘Please, I have to see DI Radcliffe.’
The young officer raised his head and his eyes dilated with shock when he recognized the ghostly face looking back at him.
‘Inspector!’ he yelled, pressing the buzzer to release the security door. ‘Inspector, get out here fast! Are you all right?’ he said, putting his arms about Corrie to support her. ‘Jeez, what happened to you? Where have you been? God, is Radcliffe going to be glad to see you.’
Corrie tried to answer, but relief was coursing so savagely through her veins that she all but collapsed against him. She was safe! She was here at the police station and safe!
Within minutes Radcliffe was down the stairs, followed by DC Archer. ‘Mother of God!’ Radcliffe gasped when he saw her. ‘Get her to the surgeon’s room,’ he barked to the young PC.
‘No! No, I’m all right,’ Corrie insisted. ‘I have to talk to you. Please!’ she added, when she saw him about to argue.
‘All right,’ he said, taking her from the officer and leading her gently into the inner realms of the station. ‘Get the surgeon on stand by,’ he added to Archer over his shoulder.
It didn’t take Corrie long to tell him what had happened and even before she’d finished a fleet of police cars, sirens blaring, lights flashing, was tearing through the streets of London heading for the TW offices and Luke’s apartment. Twice during the interview though Corrie had to be taken out by DC Archer to vomit, but now she was lying on the surgeon’s bed, her panic subsided and tears sliding unchecked from her eyes as she thought of Cristos and how desperately she wanted to see him.
‘Please!’ she begged Radcliffe. ‘Please, just let me call him. You see, he was expecting me, in Los Angeles, and he won’t know why I didn’t come … I have to speak …’
‘He knows why you didn’t get there,’ Radcliffe soothed her. ‘He’s been over here himself looking for you.’
‘He’s been here?’ Corrie choked through the constricting emotion in her chest. ‘Oh, please, let me go to him. I’ve told you everything I can …’
‘I can’t let you go, I’m afraid,’ Radcliffe smiled. ‘But he’s in Cannes now getting that movie of his ready for the festival. I’ve got his number. You just wait here and I’ll get it for you. Your father’s on his way over, by the way.’
At last Corrie was alone in an office, her hair still damp from the shower, her fingers heavily bandaged from the cuts and bruises she had received during her escape. Dialling was difficult, but after the third attempt she got through to the Majestic Hotel in Cannes.
‘Cristos?’ she whispered when she heard his voice at the other end.
‘Corrie?’ he said tentatively. ‘Is that you?’
‘Cristos! Oh, Cristos!’ And suddenly sobs were shuddering so harshly through her body she couldn’t speak.
‘Corrie!’ he cried. ‘Oh my God! Are you all right? Where are you?’
‘I’m … I’m … Oh, Cristos …’
‘Come on, come on,’ he said urgently, ‘Just
tell me where you are, I’ll come get you.’
‘I’m at the police station. I’ve told them everything, they’re looking for Luke now. Oh Cristos, I want to see you so badly.’
‘I’ll be right there,’ he said. ‘I’ll get the next flight out.’
‘No, you can’t do that. The festival is …’
‘Fuck the festival, Corrie. I’m coming over.’
‘No, Cristos, please. Let me come to you. I want to get away from here. I don’t want to be anywhere near him now. Let me come, Cristos, please let me …’
‘But the police are going to need you there, sweetheart.’
‘Not now. I can’t tell them any more. I’ll talk to them, Cristos, I’ll make them let me come. Even if it’s only for a day. I have to see you.’
‘I have to see you too. Oh Corrie! I’ve been half out of my mind. Are you all right? What did he do to you?’
‘I’m all right,’ Corrie answered. ‘It wasn’t so bad really. It was just … It was …’
‘Corrie …’
‘I was so afraid I’d never see you again.’
‘I’m coming over there now,’ he declared.
‘But the film …’
‘It’s ready.’
‘You’re lying,’ she cried. ‘I can tell. I’m not going to let this spoil things for you, Cristos. I’m coming to you.’
‘Jeez, but you’re stubborn,’ he growled. ‘Now will you just listen …’
‘No, you listen. As soon I can get them to let me go I’m coming over there, do you hear me?’
‘They’re not going to let you go, Corrie,’ he argued.
‘They will! And I want to be there when you win, Cristos. I want to be with you when you pick up that Palme d’Or.’
‘Oh, Corrie,’ he groaned. ‘I love you, do you know that?’
‘Yes, I know that. And Cristos …’ But as she was about to tell him she loved him too there was a knock on the door and Corrie screamed.
‘For Christ’s sake! What is it?’ Cristos cried.
‘Nothing,’ Corrie laughed shakily, as the door opened and Phillip and Annalise were shown in by Archer. ‘My nerves are still on edge, that’s all.’ Annalise was at her side now, her arms wrapped around Corrie.