Seven Days

by Alex Lake

  By building this hidden room that no one could ever find.

  And keeping her here forever. If she hadn’t known it before she did now – this was forever.

  She had to do something, and soon. She looked at Max, her son who would be three in five days.

  Five days.

  She had to do something now. And she had – she thought – the first glimmerings of an idea.

  ‘So,’ Max said, oblivious to the tragedy of his surroundings and the fact that, in five days, even this would be taken from him. ‘Are you ready to come on the light beam, Mummy?’

  ‘Yes,’ she said. ‘I am.’

  But her mind was elsewhere. It was on what she was going to do.

  2

  The man stood in the door, a tray in his hand. When he was leaving food or water or cleaning supplies he never came into the room. He put them on the carpet, picked up anything Maggie had left for him – nappies, plates, cleaning supplies – and left. It was only when he was in his blue bathrobe that he locked the door behind him, secured the key on a chain around his wrist, and entered the room properly.

  It was the morning, so there was no bathrobe. He lowered the tray to the floor and stood up. There were two paper plates, each covered with creased tinfoil. He liked the tinfoil to be folded and placed back on the tray; Maggie assumed he re-used it.

  He was that kind of person. Neat, particular, fastidious. She pictured his house as a museum, the rooms fixed and unchanging, almost unlived in, with patterned wallpaper on the walls and lace curtains filtering the daylight. It was a sham, a face to the world. His life was down here.

  The thought made her shudder.

  When he walked out she noticed a stiffness in the way he moved. She’d seen brown spots on his hands, the skin loose and sallow. He was still strong but there was a growing unsteadiness in him. He was getting older.

  Weaker. More vulnerable. One day she would be able to overpower him.

  Today, maybe.

  Today she might get out of here. She pictured the newspapers: MISSING GIRL FOUND DECADES LATER. She’d be reunited with her parents. In her mind they were the same as when she had been abducted, but, like the man, they’d be older too. Fifty-three now. She tried to imagine what they looked like. Would Dad be bald? Mum grey? Were they still together?

  Still alive?

  And James would be twenty-six. He might have kids. She wondered what music he listened to, what books he read, what job he did. He’d have cast his first vote, lost his virginity, gone to university, all of it a mystery to her. She didn’t even know who the prime minister was. Was it still Blair? Surely not. Probably someone from a whole new generation of politicians. Maybe the country was at war; maybe it had adopted the euro. She knew nothing.

  She closed her eyes. She’d missed so much. It was weird, though: without the man there’d have been no Seb, Leo or Max, and she couldn’t imagine life without them. Especially without Max.

  She looked at him. He was sleeping on the mattress, his mouth parted. She picked up the calendar, took her pencil and crossed out another day.

  S

  Su

  M

  Tu

  W

  Th

  F

  1

  2

  3

  4

  5

  6

  7

  8

  9

  10

  11

  12

  13

  14

  15

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  The sight and smell of the breakfast made her feel sick.

  But she couldn’t have eaten anyway. She was too on edge. Because today she was going to get out of here.

  She pushed the breakfast away.

  3

  She had a plan. It was simple, but she thought it could work.

  When he came, she would attack him.

  Which was a start, but it still wouldn’t be enough. She’d learned that the hard way before. He was older now, though, and weaker; she was strong from the press-ups and planks and other exercises. It would be different.

  Even so, she was still five-three and about eight and a half stone, and he was six-foot-three and probably sixteen stone. She knew from the times he had lain on top of her how heavy that was, and how hard it was to move that kind of weight.

  She’d get only one chance to hit him and it would have to work, or he’d overpower her and take Max anyway and repeat the awful, awful punishment he had meted out last time.

  So that one hit had to work. She had to maximize its effect. And for that she needed one more element, an element she thought she might have figured out.

  4

  The man opened the door. He was holding a tray, and he locked the door, his attention on the key.

  When he turned to Maggie, he frowned.

  ‘What?’ he said. ‘What are you doing?’

  Maggie was sitting on the mattress. She smiled at him. Max was sleeping on the floor, his head on a pillow; it had been a struggle to get him to go to sleep.

  She stood up. The man’s gaze moved up and down her body.

  Her naked body.

  ‘Put the tray down,’ she said, in the closest approximation she could manage of a sultry tone. ‘I’ve been thinking about you.’

  The man’s eyes narrowed in suspicion but she could see the sudden flare of desire in them.

  Desire for sex, yes, but more for love.

  He bent at the waist and placed the tray on the ground and she launched herself at him, hitting him hard in the small of his back. He fell forward and there was a thud as his head hit the wall. The tray fell to the floor, the plate and cup clattering together before settling on to the carpet. She grabbed for the key, but he twisted his hand away and rolled on to his back, staring at her, his breathing heavy. Blood beaded on his forehead. He put his finger to it, and examined his blood.

  ‘You fool,’ he said. ‘You stupid fool. You really think that is enough to hurt me?’

  He levered himself up on to his elbows then stood up. Maggie took a step backwards. It was over, already. Her plan had failed miserably. And now he was going to punish her.

  At least Max was still asleep. He was a good sleeper, so she doubted he’d wake up. She was glad; he didn’t need to see this.

  He grabbed her upper arm and shoved her, hard. The gasp she made as her back hit the wall and the air left her lungs reminded her of his strength, of the strength she had thought – ridiculously – she could overpower.

  And now, the payback.

  ‘What are you going to do to me?’ she said.

  The man contemplated her.

  ‘Fruitcake,’ he said. ‘My little Fruitcake. I understand why you did that. I’m not inhuman. I know how hard what’s to come will be for you. But it’s for the best. I can’t leave him with you. If I do, we won’t be able to be together.’

  Maggie didn’t reply. She couldn’t. The fear of what he was going to do to Max and her anger at her failure to save him were too great.

  ‘So I won’t do anything to you, this time.’ His expression hardened. ‘But don’t do it again, Fruitcake. This is your one free pass, OK?’

  She nodded.

  He smiled.

  ‘Love you,’ he said, and unlocked the door.

  Twelve Years Earlier, 9 July 2006

  1

  Martin Cooper opened his eyes. He looked at his watch; it was almost four thirty in the morning, which meant he’d been asleep for around two hours.

  That was all he was going to get.

  It had been two nights. He rubbed his eyes. They felt raw. The night Maggie disappeared he hadn’t slept at all and, with tonight’s two restless hours, he could feel the ex
haustion building up. It made no difference, though. There was no way he would be able to sleep again.

  And he didn’t want to. He wanted to find his daughter.

  He got out of bed and crossed the landing to her room. He opened the door and looked inside, half-expecting, half-hoping, to see a shape in her bed, sleeping off the effects of wherever she’d been.

  It was empty.

  On his way back from the park the night she disappeared he’d called the police and reported she was missing.

  We’ll put out an alert, the officer he spoke to said, but she’s probably with a friend. More than likely she’ll turn up in the morning.

  Except he’d spoken to all her friends and she wasn’t with them, and they didn’t know of anyone else she would have been with, any boy or man she’d mentioned.

  So he and Sandra and James and his brother, Tony, and his friend from work, Reid, and Freddie, his neighbour, had spent the day looking for her. Between them they’d gone to every pub in Warrington and Manchester and Liverpool and Wigan and St Helens and anywhere else they could think of, and shown them a photo of Maggie.

  None of them remembered seeing her. Quite a few said they couldn’t be sure.

  Busy night, mate. Lots of people in here. Have you tried the cops?

  He had. They hadn’t done much. They were looking for her, but they still thought she’d show up.

  He’d lost track of the number of times he’d heard someone say most of the time teenagers do.

  Most of the time wasn’t good enough. And Martin knew his little girl. She hadn’t gone off with a new boyfriend, enjoying herself while her parents worried. Some teenagers would – and maybe they were the ones that showed up – but not Mags. Not his Fruitcake.

  If she was missing there was a reason, and he needed to find her.

  He hadn’t, though. He came home, eventually, at one a.m., flat and exhausted and terrified. He’d slept, for those two hours.

  And now he was awake. He didn’t know when he would ever be able to sleep again.

  2

  Next to him, Sandra rolled on to her side. Her breathing quickened and she sighed.

  ‘Are you awake?’ he said.

  ‘Yes. I barely slept.’

  ‘Me neither.’ He looked at his watch again. ‘It’s four thirty-seven.’

  Their bedroom door opened slowly. James stood in the frame. ‘I couldn’t sleep,’ he said. ‘I was waiting for you to wake up.’

  ‘You should have come in,’ Martin said. He felt a surge of love for his son. ‘Anytime you need me, I’m here.’

  ‘It’s early.’

  ‘It doesn’t matter.’

  ‘Dad,’ James said. ‘Can we go and look for her?’

  Martin replaced the nozzle in the petrol pump and walked across the garage forecourt to pay. The car had been full the day before, but he had driven every street and park and country road for miles around. Martin had marked the ones they had driven on a map with a fluorescent marker and there were very few left. He had driven slowly, James looking out of one side, him looking out of the other. At every open pub or newsagent or café or clothes shop or place that looked like it might have attracted a fifteen-year-old they had stopped and shown photos of Maggie.

  No one had seen her.

  He scanned the shop as he entered, in case Maggie was inside buying chewing gum or a magazine or a packet of cigarettes. He hoped she was. He hoped he found his fifteen-year-old daughter buying cigarettes, because then he would know she was safe.

  Because then he would have her back, and he could sleep and eat and breathe and live again.

  He handed his card to the shop assistant.

  ‘Number six,’ he said. As she rang it up, he put the photos of Maggie – one a close-up of her face taken a couple of weeks ago, the other her school portrait – on the counter.

  ‘You haven’t seen this girl, have you?’ he asked.

  The woman – about his age and with a pinched, smoker’s face – gave him a suspicious look.

  ‘No,’ she said. ‘She missing?’

  ‘Yes. She’s my daughter.’

  The looked softened into one of sympathy.

  ‘Oh. How long’s she been gone?’

  ‘Two nights.’

  Just saying it made him feel sick with worry. It had a similar effect on the woman.

  ‘Two nights is two nights too long,’ she said. ‘Hold on. I’ll be right back.’

  She picked up the photos and walked through a door into an office. A few minutes later she came back holding a sheaf of paper.

  ‘Photocopies,’ she said. ‘I can hand them out, see if anyone recognizes her. Give me your number and I’ll make sure we let you know.’

  Martin wrote down his phone number, in part glad of the help, and in part terrified.

  Because it suddenly felt all the more real.

  3

  They got home at nine. There was a car parked in the driveway next to Sandra’s red Ford Focus. A dark blue Honda Civic with a large dent in the boot. Martin stiffened.

  ‘Who the hell’s that?’ he said. He pulled up at the side of the road and opened the car door. ‘Let’s go and see.’

  James followed him into the house. He had large dark circles under his eyes and a drawn look. Martin put his arm around him and kissed his forehead. It was oily; his son was giving off a pungent, hormonal smell.

  ‘It’ll be OK,’ Martin said. ‘Really, it will.’

  He was trying his best, but he wasn’t sure he was able to sound like he really believed his own words.

  In the living room, Sandra was perched on the edge of the sofa. She had a mug of tea in her hands. A woman with short, dark hair was sitting in the armchair opposite her.

  ‘Hi,’ she said. She didn’t need to ask if he had found Maggie. She gestured at the woman.

  ‘This is Detective Inspector …’ her voice tailed off.

  ‘Wynne,’ the woman said. ‘DI Jane Wynne.’ She looked at Martin, her face still and expressionless. There was a questioning, intelligent look in her eyes. ‘I’m here about Margaret.’

  ‘Maggie,’ Martin said, reflexively. ‘We call her Maggie.’

  Wynne nodded. ‘Maggie,’ she said. ‘You reported her missing two nights ago, around midnight.’ She paused, her expression carefully neutral. ‘Even though most of these cases resolve quite quickly, we do feel that this case requires more attention.’

  Martin steadied himself against the back of the sofa. Although he wanted all the help they could get with finding Maggie, these were not words he wanted to hear.

  ‘Why?’ he said. ‘Why does it require more attention?’

  ‘It’s a combination of things,’ Wynne said. ‘Maggie has no history of this kind of behaviour. You reported that none of her friends have seen her. She’s fifteen. And then there’s the amount of time that has passed. Although many teenagers go missing, it’s been two nights. And that is a concern.’

  ‘You think something bad has happened?’ Sandra said, in a low voice.

  Wynne glanced at James. ‘I think it’s a possibility,’ she said. ‘If she was away for one night, that would be pretty normal for a teenager. Drink too much, fall asleep somewhere, come home the next day, fearing punishment. All pretty standard. But two nights is different.’

  ‘So what happens next?’ Martin said.

  ‘We contact the press,’ Wynne said. ‘Get her photo out there. You take me through the last few days, I interview her friends, look at phone records, see what might be of interest, whether there are any leads. We assemble some officers to follow those leads.’ She rubbed her eye. ‘And then we do whatever we can to find your daughter.’

  4

  Martin stood in his daughter’s room. It was a curious mixture of childlike and grown-up; on her desk were some earrings and a CD by an artist he had never heard of and a book of short stories by Kate Chopin, yet by her pillow there was the blue bear – Rudi – he had bought her when she was six and he and Sandra were trying t
o stop her climbing into their bed every night.

  He’ll keep you safe, he said. You can cuddle Rudi.

  It had worked, after a while. When she came into their room he let her settle then carried her back to her bed. If she stirred, he put Rudi in her arms and she went back to sleep.

  Wynne had looked around the room, searching for anything that might give a clue to where she was. She didn’t find anything – Martin wasn’t sure what she would have found: drugs, maybe, or someone’s name or address – but whatever she had been looking for, she had left empty-handed. Likewise Maggie’s emails. Sandra knew her password and Martin had agreed to let Wynne look at her account. There was nothing that hinted at where she might be.

  He sat on the edge of her bed. Wynne had talked about a press conference, an appeal on television to anyone who might have information important to the investigation.

  You’d be surprised what they throw up, she said. People’s memories get jogged about something they saw, they call it in, it turns out to be valuable.

  It hadn’t reassured him. In fact, it had had the opposite effect.

  It brought home that this was not simply a teenage girl doing something irresponsible.

  This was an investigation, a news story. It was not going away. He picked up Rudi and rubbed the soft, threadbare patch over his right eye. He held him to his face and the smell of his daughter enveloped him.

  For the first time he wondered whether he would ever smell that smell again, and he started to cry.

  Twelve Years Earlier, 9 July 2006

  1

  DI Wynne sipped her coffee. It was milky and sweet. She didn’t like it that way, but Detective Superintendent Marie Ryan – a couple of ranks above her and not known for her frivolity – had handed it to her and she didn’t want to say anything.

  ‘So,’ Ryan said. ‘You’re working on the missing girl? You don’t think she’s gone off with a boy? Escaping to the big city.’

  ‘I don’t think so,’ Wynne replied. ‘She doesn’t seem the type.’