13 Nights of Horror: The Disappearance of Rose Hillard (3 page)

With that, she headed upstairs, leaving Michael to lean back against the wall and close his eyes. Above, Rose could already be heard stomping to her room. Moments later, her bedroom door slammed shut.

Today

“It’s a mess is what it is,” Gorman muttered as he poured himself a glass of whiskey. “If people find out that a thief got into my office, I’ll be a laughing stock.”

“Who’s going to find out?” asked his wife June as she watched from the doorway. “You’ll just smooth it over, the way you always do. No-one has to know a damn thing. Just keep it under your hat.”

Gorman winced as he took a gulp of whiskey. As his throat burned, he poured another glass, his hands shaking so much that he spilled as much again. He knew he shouldn’t drink, not after taking so many pain-killers during the day, but he promised himself this would be his last shot of the night.

“Here,” June added, hurrying over and taking the bottle. With a steady hand, she topped up his glass and passed it to him. “How’s your hip?”

He nodded.

“Bad? Is it the cold weather again?”

No answer.

“So did you work out yet
why
someone would break in?” she asked. “Were they after evidence from one of your cases, maybe? I mean, I thought people usually tried to break
out
of the police station, not the other way around.”

“It was just…” He paused, fully aware that if he started to tell her the full story, he wouldn’t be able to stop without explaining everything. “It was nothing. I couldn’t find any sign of things being missing, not anything in particular. They just threw everything around, that’s all.”

“Well there you go, then,” she continued. “It was probably just kids, or someone who wanted revenge for a parking ticket.” She waited for him to reply, but she could see from the look in his eyes that his mind was on something else, something far away. “You know you can tell me,” she added. “You’ve always told me everything, Ben. I’m your wife, it’s only right that you should share your troubles with me, and you know I’m never going to tell another soul. I like being your sounding board. I want to ease your mind.”

“I can’t be…” He paused. “There are some things I can’t tell you, June, and that’s just the way things have to be.”

“But -”

“I’m a police officer. Some things simply have to remain confidential.”

“I thought you’d never kept a secret from me?” she asked.

“No you didn’t,” he replied, with a hint of sadness. “You never said anything, but you always knew there were a few things I couldn’t tell you. It was like an unspoken agreement between us. This is one of those things, June.”

She stared at him for a moment, as if she was trying to read the expression in his eyes.

“For something to get you this worked up,” she said finally, “I can only think of one case it could be about.”

She waited for him to reply.

He looked down at his empty glass.

“It’s Rose Hillard, isn’t it?” she continued. “What’s wrong, Ben, did you… Did something happen? Did you finally get a lead? Did you find her, or… Did you find her body?”

“June -”

“If it’s about Rose, you
have
to tell me. Please, Ben, I was her schoolteacher, for God’s sake, I watched her grow up and there’s not a day goes by that I don’t think about her, wondering if she’s alive out there or…” She paused, with tears in her eyes. “If you know whether she’s alive or dead, can you at least tell me that? Just to set my heart at ease?”

He shook his head.

“Just one hint?”

“June…”

“She’s dead, isn’t she? She’s dead and you’re not going to tell anyone, not even her poor family.”

“June,” he replied firmly, “you’ve really got the wrong end of the stick on this one.”

“No-one blames you, you know,” she continued.

“Blames me?” He paused. “For what?”

“For whatever happened to her all those years ago. For the fact that maybe… Maybe it was something awful and maybe the people responsible were never caught. For… For the fact that if she’s dead, her body was never found. You do so,
so
much for this community Ben, and people are thankful every single day that you’re around. I know the disappearance of Rose Hillard has haunted you these past five years, I see it in your eyes, I hear it in your voice, but I just want you to know…” She leaned closer and kissed the side of his face, before taking a step back. “You’re the best thing that ever happened to this town,” she said finally. “Every single person here believes in you.”

“That’s good to hear,” he replied with a faint, nervous smile. “I always do my best and… There’s no news about Rose. Whoever broke into my office, they were just kids. And I promise you, I’ve never kept anything from you when it comes to Rose.”

“Do you think there’s a chance she’s still alive? Could she be out there? Maybe she ran away and started a new life? I mean, it’s hard to believe, she loved her family so much, but you know what girls can be like if they meet the wrong man. Maybe she ran off and she’s happy?”

“Anything’s possible,” he told her, feeling a heavy sensation in his chest. “And that’s the point, isn’t it? As long as no body is found, the whole town can still have hope. No-one has to face the possibility that something terrible could have happened right here among us.”

***

Opening his eyes suddenly, Gorman stared up at the dark ceiling and listened to the sound of rain still battering the town outside. When he glanced at the bedside clock, he saw that it was almost 1am, which meant the storm had been raging for almost twelve hours now. Frankly, he couldn’t shake the feeling that the elements were trying to completely wash the town of Vantage away, to scrub it from the map completely. If that was the case, he figured he’d have to stay behind, to go down with the ship so to speak.

Vantage was his town. He protected it, and if anything bad happened, it was his fault.

Rolling onto his side, he immediately felt a sharp pain in his hip, and although the pain quickly faded, he could already tell that sleep wasn’t going to come easily.

After a few minutes, he began to notice something strange about the sound of the rain. Every so often, there was a very faint clicking sound mixed in with the constant hiss of the downpour, and a while later he began to notice certain patterns of repetition. Wide awake, he began to memorize the sound of the rain, and finally he sat up and stared at the dark blue shape of the curtains on the other side of the room. He was convinced now: the sound of rain was on a loop, and the occasional click was the sound of that loop starting again.

Getting out of bed, he limped slowly to the window and peered outside. Dawn was still many hours away, leaving the whole town to weather the storm in pitch darkness. In the distance, the vast forest was just about visible as it spread away as far as the eye could see, and the rain was still falling, pounding against every surface. It was cold outside; he could tell that from the pain in his hip, which had been getting steadily worse for a day now as the weather gradually worsened. It was almost as if the storm was getting inside his body.

He waited.

The click was due.

He waited some more.

There.

He was right. The rain
was
somehow on a loop, as if it had been recorded and was being played back.

With June still fast asleep on her side of the bed, Gorman grabbed his cane, made his way out of the room and limped slowly along the dark corridor that led to the front room. He was wide awake, with no desire to go back to bed and struggle to get a few more hours’ sleep. Reaching the patio door, he looked out at the rain-soaked garden, where some of the bushes had been battered down almost to the ground by the incessant force of the storm. The pain in his hip was becoming unbearable, so he grabbed the bottle of pills from by the window and swallowed one, all the while keeping his eyes on the garden.

He waited.

The click was due again.

He waited some more.

There.

He took a deep breath.

Unlocking the patio door, he stepped outside. His bare feet felt ice-cold against the wooden decking, but the patio was covered by a small wooden awning that kept the rain from hitting him. Still, he slid the door closed again and made his way to the edge of the patio and then down the steps that led to the grass. As soon as his bare feet sank down into the soggy ground, he felt cold mud starting to bubble up between his toes, and the constant stream of rain was already soaking through his night-clothes and running down his skin.

He waited.

The click was due again.

He waited some more.

There.

And then suddenly, this time, he realized there was another sound, coming from the far end of the garden.

Walking forward, ignoring the rain that was running down his face and getting into his eyes, he turned his head slightly as if to better hear the faint noise that was intermingled with the sound of the rain. Finally he realized it was a voice: a girl’s voice, hissy and filled with static as if it, like the rain, was being played from a tape.

“Don’t hurt me,” the girl’s voice was pleading desperately, filled with fear and pain and dread. “Please don’t hurt me, I’ll do anything you say but please don’t hurt me. I don’t want to die, I don’t want to -”

The voice, still so faint that it was barely perceptible, broke down into sobs.

Gorman continued to limp barefoot across the soaking lawn, his eyes fixed on the trees at the far end of the garden. He could tell he was getting closer to the source of the recording, even though he couldn’t see anything out of place. After a moment, however, he noticed that the old apple tree seemed to have become bent and twisted, as if its highest branches were trying to grow back down into the ground.

“I don’t want to die,” the girl whimpered. “Do anything you want to me but please don’t kill me! You’re going too far! I just want to -”

Suddenly she screamed.

Gorman stopped dead in his tracks.

The scream was already over, but its memory echoed in his mind, in just the same way that it had echoed for the past five years.

“Please,” the girl sobbed desperately. “What is that? Please don’t come any closer. Please, please, this isn’t what happened last time, please…”

He’d heard the voice before, of course. It was from an early part of the video, the same video that was on the missing disc. He’d only ever watched it once, and only because he had to know what had happened to her. After the video had ended, he’d sealed it in the envelope, placed it in the back of his safe, and tried to pretend that it didn’t exist. And yet now, after all these years, he could hear it again. Making his way to the bottom of the garden, he looked around for some sign of a presence nearby. Someone had to be deliberately playing the video for him, trying to drive him crazy, but he couldn’t work out where they were hiding or why they’d want to torture him so mercilessly.

“Come out!” he shouted.

He waited.

He heard the click.

He waited some more.

“Please,” the girl’s voice continued. “Please, please, please, please, please…”

And then, somehow, despite the sound of the rain all around him, he realized the recording of the girl had stopped.

He waited.

The click was due again.

It didn’t come, almost as if the loop had been played out.

“What do you want?” he called out, even though he knew it was too late. Instinctively he reached down for his gun, only to realize that he’d left it inside. “Come out here and face me like a man, damn it! Whoever you are, this is not the way to -”

“Ben?”

Turning, he saw to his surprise that June was standing right behind him, wearing a rain-coat over her nightgown and staring at him with a horrified look in her eyes. After a moment, however, that horrified look melted to become an expression of pure pity.

“What in God’s name are you doing out here?” she asked.

“I…” He paused, realizing that there was no way he could tell her the truth. “Jesus, June, you’re going to get pneumonia.” Grabbing her by the arm, he steered her back toward the house. “I just thought I heard something,” he continued, “that’s all. I came out to take a look.”

“Heard
what
?” she asked, still confused.

“It doesn’t matter. It was nothing.” He led her into the house and then turned to slide the door shut. As he did so, he spotted a shape down at the far end of the garden, close to where he’d been standing a moment earlier. It was a figure, a young woman, and she was staring straight at him. This time he could see her face, and her dead eyes stared back at him with slow-burning intensity.

“Ben?” June continued. “Are you okay?” She followed his gaze, looking toward the bottom of the garden. “What is it? Do you see something?”

“No,” he replied, even as he maintained eye contact with the distant figure. Finally, with a shiver, he grabbed the curtains and pulled them together to cover the patio door completely, before turning to his wife. “Nothing at all.”