by Susan Lewis
As tears welled up in her eyes, she got stiffly up from the bed and went to look in the mirror. She’d cried all her make-up off even before she’d got here, but she’d washed her face since anyway. She didn’t really know why, because she was so ugly and rank who cared if her face was clean? She hated her face because it belonged to her, so she punched it. Then she punched it again, because it was what her nasty face deserved. It wasn’t a good person’s face, it belonged to a disgusting, horrible, wicked person, so it was no wonder everyone hated her. She expected her mum did now, after what she’d done, so why not just keep punching herself until she made herself bleed and bleed and all her teeth fell out?
By the time Rusty came home from school she was downstairs, watching from behind the nets. He went straight past the little caravan parked next to his house and disappeared round the back. He didn’t come out again. He couldn’t, because his mum was there, so he’d have to wait until it got dark and his mum went out. He couldn’t ring either, because the battery had run out on her mobile, and anyway, it was too much of a risk. So she just stayed where she was, waiting for Rusty to come and telling herself not to think about anything any more, because if she did, she’d just have to start hitting herself again.
It was now Tuesday morning. Michelle was in the kitchen speaking on the phone to Laurie as Katie came down the stairs and stopped right next to her. Seeing her expression, Michelle immediately ended the call.
Before she could speak Katie said, ‘You have to tell them.’
An uneasy beat in Michelle’s heart belied her frown of confusion.
‘You know what I’m talking about,’ Katie said, her voice dangerously low, ‘you’ve got to tell them where Tom is, because I can’t go through another day of this.’
‘But Katie, it’s got nothing to do with Tom …’
‘It has everything to do with him, and you know it!’ Katie raged. ‘They’ve got her somewhere, they’re holding her to make him come forward, now you’ve got to tell them where he is, or so help me God, I will.’
Michelle put a hand to her head, trying to think how to handle this. ‘Look, if Tom thought for one minute that they had her,’ she said, ‘he’d have done something about it the instant he knew she was missing.’
‘No he wouldn’t. The story always comes first for someone like him.’
‘Katie, you don’t mean that …’
‘Stop stalling, Michelle, and make the call.’
As she handed her the receiver Michelle took it and put it back again. ‘Look, you know what Molly went through on Saturday night,’ she said, ‘what she’s been going through for months …’
‘I don’t need you to remind me of my own responsibility in this,’ Katie seethed, ‘but you have one too, Michelle, so pick up that phone now and tell him he has to give himself up.’
‘Even if I did, he won’t do it,’ Michelle responded, ‘because he knows as well as I do – as well as you do – that they don’t have her. Katie, this isn’t the way they operate.’
‘How can you say that?’ Katie demanded. ‘You of all people know what they’re capable of, so you surely can’t be standing there telling me that a fourteen-year-old girl means anything to them. They couldn’t give a damn about her, or me, because little people like us don’t count. Collateral damage, that’s what we are …’
‘Katie, you’re not being rational. I understand how you’re feeling, but …’
‘Don’t you dare say that!’ Katie yelled, slamming an empty cup against the wall. ‘You haven’t got the first idea how I’m feeling, because you have it in you to give your child up. As a mother I could never do that. Molly means everything to me. Everything. And I want her back, God damn you.’
Michelle’s face was ashen as she said, ‘We’ll find her.’
But Katie wasn’t listening. Rage and grief were pouring out of her with an unstoppable might, tearing words from her that she barely knew she was saying. ‘You make me sick, sick!’ she yelled. ‘I hate looking at you. I hate listening to you. You know they’ve got her, but all you care about is Tom, and the child you’re carrying, and the future you’re going to have together …’
‘Katie …’
‘You didn’t tell me about that baby, did you? No, you kept it to yourself, because you didn’t have the guts to tell me you’ve cheated me again. You said you were here for Molly …’
‘I am!’ Michelle shouted.
‘I want her back! I want her in my house, and I want you and your baby to go. I’ll find someone else for Molly, someone who’ll care about her and not let her be used the way you are now.’
‘How can you say I don’t care about her, when I gave up everything to be here for her – ’
‘You gave up nothing! You’re pregnant, you’re marrying him …’
‘I didn’t know it was going to turn out that way …’
‘But it always does for you! Everything works out in your world. It’s only in mine that it all goes wrong …’
‘Stop it! Just stop. You can’t go on resenting me for things I have no control over …’
‘But you have control over what’s happening to Molly, and I want her back. Do this, Michelle, and I’ll know that she means as much to you as she does to me. It’s all I ask. I have to know you’ll put her first.’
Michelle’s eyes closed in despair. ‘Katie, you can’t ask me to prove it like this,’ she said. ‘It doesn’t make any sense, and if you were able to think straight you’d know it. She’s with a friend somewhere, or maybe she’s gone off to London … I don’t know, but I do know she’s not being held to force Tom out of hiding.’
‘But how do you know?’ Katie demanded. ‘How can you be so damned sure, when the timing is perfect, the leverage could hardly …’
‘Please, Katie …’
‘No! I’ve had enough, Michelle. Do you honestly think she’d have stayed out there on her own all this time, just because she had a spat with her friends?’
‘It was more than that …’
‘But not enough to make her stay away from me all this time. I’m her mother, for God’s sake, I’m the one she comes to when things go wrong, only this time, she can’t, because they’ve got her and they won’t let her come back …’
‘Katie, stop! No!’ Michelle cried, as Katie began smashing every dish in sight. ‘This isn’t going to help …’
‘Make that phone call!’ Katie yelled, rounding on her. ‘Put someone else first for once!’
Michelle started to back off. ‘I’m not going to continue with this,’ she said, tears rolling down her cheeks. ‘I know you’re hurting, I understand that you’re afraid, but I will not force Tom into doing something that …’
‘Because he comes first!’ Katie cried savagely. ‘It’s always him, or you, or someone else. Never us … Never me …’
‘That is just not true!’ Michelle yelled. ‘You’ve got these things fixed in your head and they’re based on nothing! You say the most horrible things to me, you’re cruel and spiteful the way you throw Robbie in my face, and now you’re trying to make me choose between Tom and Molly to prove something that shouldn’t even be in doubt. Well, I won’t do it. For once I’m not going to give in to you, and not because he comes first, but because it won’t give you what you want.’
Katie’s eyes were wild. ‘Get out!’ she screamed, slamming a bowl to the floor. ‘Just get out of my house. I don’t ever want to see you again.’
Knowing there was no point trying to reason with her now, Michelle grabbed her bag and turned to the door. ‘My phone will be on if you need …’
‘I don’t need you!’ Katie sobbed. ‘I don’t need anyone, except my daughter.’
Closing the door behind her, Michelle paused for a moment, hating leaving her like this, but understanding that if she stayed she was only going to inflame her further.
Minutes later, Laurie drew up outside to drive them to the school.
‘She knows in her heart that she’s not ma
king any sense,’ Michelle said after recounting what had happened. ‘It’s fear that’s unhinging her, and even in the state she’s in she probably knows it. She just needed to release some of it, and it’s usually the nearest and dearest that gets it … Or so I’m told.’
Laurie threw her a glance, and realized, in spite of the dryness, that she was a lot more hurt by Katie’s attack than she was admitting. ‘Do you think she’ll make the call herself?’ she asked.
Michelle shook her head. ‘No. She just needed to shift the burden of guilt for a while, because she’s absolutely racked with it, so blaming someone else, whether it’s me, or Tom, or some invisible force in the United States was a way of easing some of the pressure. By now she’s probably already starting to calm down, and wishing to God she hadn’t said even half the things she did.’
However, at that very moment Katie was waiting to be connected to Stuart Fellowes’s office at the US Embassy in Grosvenor Square.
It was just after four in the morning, Washington time, when the phone next to Deborah Gough’s bed woke her. Blearily checking the clock, she turned on the light and grabbed the receiver on the second ring before it could wake her husband.
‘We’ve just had word of Tom Chambers’s location,’ the voice at the other end told her. ‘He’s in France, the Burgundy region, holed up in a house belonging to a French reporter.’
Deborah Gough swung her legs off the bed and stood up. ‘OK,’ she said, thinking fast. ‘Is a team on its way?’
‘Even as we speak.’
‘How long will it take them to get there?’
‘They’re being flown in from an RAF base in Suffolk. The French counter-terrorism people have been contacted to pick them up on the ground – I’d say we’re looking at three hours max.’
‘Good. Call Daniel Allbringer and give him the news. I’ll be at my office within the hour.’
Chapter Twenty-Four
‘I’VE JUST HAD a text from Elliot,’ Laurie said, as Michelle came to join her at the school gates. ‘He’s on his way back to London.’
Michelle’s face was pale. ‘But Tom’s staying put?’ she said.
‘I presume so. We’ll know more once Elliot gets here. How’s it going in there?’
‘Still no joy,’ Michelle responded, turning to look at the hundreds of students teeming around the school yard. ‘I’d forgotten how monosyllabic kids can be at that age. It’s like they’re brain-dead, half of them.’ Spotting Rusty Phillips lurking next to the iron grid fence about twenty yards away, she said, ‘Ah, he’s arrived. Apparently he’s been at the orthodontist this morning, getting his braces tightened.’
‘Well that should make him talk,’ Laurie responded dryly, ‘and he certainly seems to have something on his mind, the way he keeps looking over here. What do you say we help him along and go over there?’
But before either of them could move the boy suddenly lunged at a group of girls nearby and gave one of them such an almighty shove that it knocked her to the ground. Within seconds a major brawl had broken out with him at the centre, being kicked and thumped and berated so savagely that it took Michelle, Laurie and two teachers to pull the crowd off.
‘Fucking raping bastard,’ one of the girls spat, as she dusted herself down and started to walk away. Her progress was suddenly hastened as a teacher grabbed her ear and frogmarched her, howling, into the school building.
‘You’re mental. You ought to be locked up,’ another girl snarled, as Rusty began picking himself up.
‘Fucking look at you, you retard!’ someone else hissed.
He was indeed a sorry sight, with blood trickling from his nose, his glasses skewed across his face and his shirt hanging out front and back. He glanced at Michelle, then ducked his head and started walking away.
‘Rusty,’ she called after him.
He flinched, but didn’t stop.
‘Rusty,’ she repeated more firmly. ‘I’d like a word with you.’
He spun round. ‘I didn’t rape her,’ he cried. ‘They’re all making things up just because her top was found by my house, but I didn’t do anything.’
Michelle moved quickly towards him. ‘No-one’s saying you did, or none of us,’ she assured him. ‘It’s just girls – they can be pretty stupid sometimes, and say things they shouldn’t.’
‘They don’t know what they’re talking about,’ he growled, glaring angrily at the crowd that was still trailing away, ‘and the next person who says I cut her up in pieces is really going to get it.’
‘Oh yeah?’ a stroppy young blonde girl challenged. ‘Like you and whose army?’
‘Just you come here and say that!’
‘All right, that’s enough,’ Michelle barked, as the girl began closing in on him. ‘Just go away please, and you, Rusty, come with me.’
The girl wasn’t easily put off, so Laurie stepped swiftly in front of her, while Michelle marched Rusty over to the gates.
‘You know who I am, don’t you?’ Michelle said.
He nodded.
‘You were on your way to tell me something just now.’
He looked away.
‘Rusty, Molly’s mother is in a dreadful state. She’s very ill, so if you know where Molly is …’
‘I said she had to go home,’ he blurted defensively, ‘but she says everyone hates her, because she’s evil and nasty, so she doesn’t have a home to go to.’
‘Oh my God,’ Michelle murmured, glancing at Laurie as she joined them. ‘Where is she, Rusty?’ she urged. ‘Where was she when she said that to you?’
His head went down.
‘Rusty!’ she cried. ‘You have to tell me.’
‘She says you hate her,’ he shouted.
‘Oh Rusty, that isn’t true. She’s my niece. I love her very much, and I want to help her. Now please tell me where she is.’
He seemed to be withdrawing again, and flinched as she held onto him to prevent any attempt to take off. ‘She said she’d kill me if I told anyone where she was,’ he wailed.
‘Rusty …’
‘Come with me,’ Laurie interrupted, firmly taking his arm. ‘You can show us the way.’
‘But I’ve got to be back in class,’ he protested, trying to drag himself free, but Michelle was holding his other arm, helping to propel him towards the car.
‘We’ll make your excuses,’ Laurie assured him. ‘Or shall we call the police and let them know that you’re withholding information? That’s a serious offence and could land you in a lot of trouble.’
‘I told Molly that,’ he cried, ‘but she wouldn’t listen. Anyway, I don’t care. I just wanted to help her, because she was all unhappy and afraid … And now her face is all bashed up, and I don’t know how it got like that, because no-one’s seen her except me.’
After stuffing him in the passenger seat, Laurie whisked round to the driver’s side while Michelle leapt in the back.
‘What do you mean her face is bashed up?’ Michelle demanded, as they pulled away.
He kept his head down. ‘I didn’t do it,’ he mumbled. ‘I swear I didn’t.’
‘Which way?’ Laurie barked as they reached the end of the road.
‘Right, and up past the ambulance station.’
‘Where is she?’ Michelle asked. ‘Where exactly are we going?’
‘To my house. She was in our neighbour’s house before, but she didn’t like it there, so she’s in our caravan now.’
‘Is she all right?’ Michelle demanded. ‘What’s this about her face?’
‘I told you, I don’t know,’ he protested. ‘It was just like it yesterday. She won’t tell me how she got it, but I didn’t do it. I swear on my mum’s life, I never touched her, and it won’t be my fault if something’s happened to her now, because I was coming to tell you, before that stupid cow Kylie …’
‘What were you going to tell me?’ Michelle interrupted.
He hesitated a moment, seeming to think he’d said too much, but then he blundered on. ‘Sh
e went on this suicide web site to find out how to kill herself,’ he confessed. ‘She wanted me to do it too, but I don’t want to die. Anyway, I don’t think she’ll do it …’
Michelle’s head was spinning as Laurie’s foot went down. ‘When did you last see her?’ Michelle snapped.
‘This morning, after breakfast, while my mum popped down to the butcher.’
‘Oh my God, oh my God,’ Michelle murmured.
‘Where now?’ Laurie barked, as they hared past the ambulance station.
‘Go left after the pub, and then second right,’ he answered.
The tyres squealed as Laurie took the corner sharply, straightened up and sped on to the second turning.
‘I can’t believe this is happening,’ Michelle muttered. ‘Please God, we can’t be too late. We just can’t.’
Molly was slumped on the floor of the little caravan that filled up Rusty’s driveway, tucked into the U of the two sofa bunks with the flowery blue and yellow curtains drawn. Her eyes were staring blankly at the shiny nylon carpet, her hands lay loosely on the floor, not quite touching the scissors and razor abandoned beside her. She’d cut her wrist a bit, but it had hurt and she hated the blood, and anyway, Mrs Phillips was really proud of her caravan so it would be really mean to mess it up. It might have been different if Rusty would have done it with her, but he wouldn’t. She didn’t know why he was so keen to go on living, when he was such a muppet. Anyone would think he’d be glad to get away from how horrible everyone was to him, with his stupid hair and braces and all those blobby freckles that splodged around his face like great big ginger pancakes. He’d twitched a bit and told her she was mean and cruel when she’d said all that to him last night, and then he’d really gone off on one, trying to make her go home, saying she was just being childish and selfish hiding away like she was a criminal or something. He was so stupid, he didn’t realize she had nowhere to go, which had made her cry and straight away he’d said he was sorry. She was sorry too, because she didn’t mean to be horrible to him, she was just like that, because she was evil and nasty and didn’t deserve any friends anyway.