Anything for Her (19 page)

‘What the hell are you doing here?’

‘I’ve been waiting for you to get home from work.’

‘Why would you do that?’

‘Because I have decided to forgive you, Michael.’

‘It’s not you I want forgiveness from.’

Her seductive stare turns into a menacing scowl.

‘Louise will never forgive you, Michael.’

‘I’m still going to try and win her back.’

‘Why? Why chase after her when you have me right here?’

‘I don’t want you, Denise. I thought I made that clear.’

She puts the champagne flutes on the bedside table. The candlelight illuminates the glasses, sending shadows of rising bubbles up the wall.

‘If you don’t want me, then why did you chase me in the first place?’

‘I wanted sex, not you. You offered me something I wasn’t getting in my marriage. I know that makes me an arsehole, but I can live with that. You need to live with the fact that you mean nothing to me.’

He stands rigid with tension. She makes him feel both uncomfortable and aroused at the same time. He loathes her, yet he desires her.

Refusing to back down, Denise gets up from the bed and approaches him, her nipples visible behind the
black lace.

‘You can try and push me away all you want, Michael. But I don’t believe a word you say. We have a child together.’ She rests her hand on her stomach. ‘Right in here.’

She unbuttons the top of his shirt and caresses the hairs on his chest, looking up at him as she begins to undo the rest. Michael once loved her when she was this horny. He could be as rough as he liked. She let him do anything to her. He snatches her wrist before she can reach his crotch.

‘Denise, stop.’

‘Why? You always told me how good I was at it.’

‘Denise, get out. I don’t want you here. I want my wife.’

‘I’m not leaving until I get what I want.’

He picks up her bag from on top the ottoman at the foot on the bed and thrusts it into her torso.

‘Take your shit and leave.’

He looks at her with utter fury and contempt. Flames from the candles flicker in his eyes and his hands shake by his sides.

‘You’re serious?’ she asks in disbelief.

‘Yes. I wouldn’t fuck you now if you were the last slut on the planet.’

Her eyes adopt a cold glare.

‘I was giving you this last chance,’ she says. ‘The prosecutors that want to send you to prison contacted
me. They’re going to give me ten thousand pounds to testify against you when the case goes to trial. They want me to tell the court how you boasted about your crimes after you and I had sex – every single time. Every time you cheated on your wife.’

He clasps her throat and forces her against the wall. The doors shudder and a photo frame dislodges from the wall and shatters on the floor.

‘You do that and I’ll kill you, you understand? You’ve destroyed my marriage. You’re not going to send me to prison, too.’

He spits the words viciously, his hot breath blasting in her face.

She looks up at him in disbelief. Veins have begun to elevate on her forehead from the strain around her neck. She exhales a pitiful puff of air with a whimper, almost a retch.

The more he looks at her, the more he wants to hurt her. He wonders if he can kill her and get away with it.

‘Michael, stop it! The baby!
Our
baby!’

She looks at him in terror, her voice strained from the tightening pressure on her neck, her wide eyes bulging.

He stares into her eyes: his own filled with vehemence. He longs to press down on her windpipe until her body falls limp, but he releases her, reluctantly. She gasps for air, heaving and coughing, clasping her hands to where his had been. Michael
grabs her by the wrist and yanks her behind him, leading her towards the stairs. Tears flow down her cheeks as she struggles to breathe.

‘Please, Michael! Stop this!’

He continues to lead her forcefully towards the ground floor, her bag banging into the bannisters. On the last landing, she stumbles helplessly onto her knees. Michael yanks her to her feet again, growing rougher with every storey.

When they reach the front door, Denise jabs her fist into the side of his head. He turns, dazed. She spits in his face and scratches his right cheek: blood instantly begins to form in beads, before trickling down his face. He grabs a fistful of her hair, opens the door and throws her out with all his might. She stumbles and falls face down, sobbing, right in front of Dominic and his grandparents, who are standing on the stone steps.

Michael stares at them, trying to summon a credible excuse. He has been caught, not only with a woman in lingerie, but Dominic’s aunt.

Dominic and his grandparents stare at them in disbelief, unable to fathom the scene.

‘He tried to kill me!’ Denise cries. ‘Michael tried to kill me!’

She scrambles to her feet, grazed and bleeding, and barges past the family, frantically searching for her car keys inside her bag and shivering from the bitter cold
that bites at her bare flesh.

‘It’s not true,’ he replies. ‘I promise you, it’s not true.’

Dominic stares at his father in horror, unsure who to believe: his father or his sobbing aunt. Michael’s parents stand behind their grandson, staring at their son as he stands in the doorway with a bloodied face.

Behind them, Denise speeds off down the road; the car’s engine roars as it passes. She turns off out of the square and out of the family’s life… until the trial.

Chapter Thirty-nine
That Night

Robbie and Jamie are huddled together in the back of the car. Their breath escapes as mist while they quiver with the cold.

‘I spy, with my little eye, something beginning with…R.’

Jamie scans for something beginning with R.

‘Road?’ he signs.

She shakes her head.

‘Red?’ he signs, and then points to his red coat.

She shakes her head.

‘Rescue?’

I wish
.

She shakes her head.

He looks around the car, his purple lips trembling.

‘Radio?’

‘Yes, radio. Well done,’ she signs. ‘Your go.’

‘Can we stop playing now, Mummy? I’m too cold.’

‘Okay.’

They sit in a shivering embrace, feeling sick from the cold that seeps deep into their bones. Robbie is constantly looking in the rear-view mirror: she longs to see a recovery truck creep around the bend.

‘Do you think someone is definitely coming for us?’
Jamie asks with his hands.

‘They have to,’ she replies. ‘They can’t be much longer.’

They sit in silence for a moment, their chattering teeth being the only sound.

Suddenly, the inside of the car fills with light.

They sit up straight and turn round.

All they can see are two headlights coming towards the car.

‘Is it the recovery truck?’ Jamie signs.

‘I think so,’ Robbie replies, staring intently as she tries to identify the shape of the vehicle.

The lights continue to get closer and closer, but the car is travelling fast. The lights suddenly swerve – revealing the black body of a car that is skidding and spinning – before returning to glare in their faces.

Before Robbie has time to shield her son from the blow, something hits the rear of the car with enormous force. The collision throws Robbie against the back of the driver’s seat at fifty miles per hour. Jamie flies past his mother like a fired bullet and smashes through the front windscreen, instantly disappearing from sight. The impact forces the car through the road barrier and sends it toppling down the verge into the darkness, with the other car following close behind.

Chapter Forty

The search parties slowly dissolved as the afternoon melted into dusk. The volunteers have returned to their warm homes and the police officers called it a day as soon as the dogs tired. Louise, however, continues walking through the woodland, calling out for Brooke, refusing to stop the search.

Her face is red raw and stinging from the cold. The chill has seeped through her clothes; her muscles ache, begging for rest. She knows she needs to stop searching, at least to catch her breath, but she can’t. She can’t give up.

The full moon illuminates the snow on the ground, lighting her way through the woodland. She ventures further and further, longing to find something else that belongs to Brooke – or Brooke herself. She needs her to be alive, but will accept finding her, however she may be. She cannot handle the anticipation or the disabling agony any longer. This nightmare needs to end.

Finding Brooke’s suitcase has made her assume the worst.

Brooke is dead. My baby is dead. Someone attacked her, took her, raped her and killed her, before chucking her belongings into the stream
.

Earlier, she heard the sound of a chainsaw being used to cut the suitcase out of the ice. That sound died hours ago.

The police officers encouraged her several times to leave the scene, offering to escort her back to the house. She refused. Nothing would make her leave. Now, with everyone gone, the darkness is her only companion.

Her imagination runs wild with images of her daughter being attacked, abducted and abused, before finally being killed. Her mind continuously replays the fabricated scenarios, forcing her closer to insanity.

Her throat is dry, so dry she cannot stand it. She sits on the cold ground, her back resting against the trunk of a tall tree, and shivers as the snow beneath her soaks through her trousers and numbs her flesh. She takes a handful of snow and puts it into her mouth and chews, causing her sensitive teeth to throb painfully from their roots. The snow numbs her throat as she swallows it down. She chews another handful, and rubs one more on her face to keep her alert. She has to keep going: she cannot stop until she finds her daughter. Snowflakes sit on her eyelashes and in the corners of her mouth as she rests her head back against the bark of the tree and looks up at the night sky. Above her, the skeletons of the trees, naked without their leaves, allow her to see the stars
sparkling in the darkness and wonder of space.

She doesn’t believe there is a supreme being up there. If there is, and that deity has allowed her daughter to be taken and harmed, she loathes it. If someone – or something – is up there, it had better stay away from her.

She closes her eyes. The sounds of the woodland invade her ears: owls hoot; creatures rustle through snow-covered shrubs; the wind whistles between the trunks of the trees. When she opens her eyes, she sees a deer standing before her. The elegant doe has large, innocent eyes – each dark pool reflecting the moon. Her legs are long and slender, her feet so small and light that Louise hadn’t heard her approach. The doe stands motionless, looking at Louise slumped against the tree, unsure whether she is friend or foe.

‘It’s okay,’ Louise whispers.

The doe instantly darts to the left – so swift and light it is as though she is floating – and bounces off through the woodland, with the moon shimmering on her soft, short coat as she goes.

Louise suddenly misses her. She feels alone in the dark.

Only now does she begin to feel unsafe. Her overwhelming focus on finding Brooke lessens for a second, allowing her to hear every sound around her as a threat, see the darkness as her enemy, and feel the cold like a cancer, spreading throughout her body.

Keeping her back against the tree, she stands up, looking around at the dark woodland. She sees shadows out of the corner of her eye; as though figures are hiding behind tree trunks, darting out of sight the second she turns to face them: taunting her. Twigs on the ground crack as though snapped by a heavy foot. Spooked, she starts running – longing to be back in the village, longing to be locked safely in the country house. Having walked so far, she doesn’t know how long it will take her to get back. Her phone had lost power hours ago, and she has no idea what time it is. It is as though she has just woken from sleepwalking, and has only just realised how far she has wandered.

Her feet crunch hard and fast in the snow that covers the uneven earth; sounds and shadows continue to taunt her while she weaves between the gaps in the trees. She doesn’t know which direction to go in – which way it is to the village – so she runs frantically, hoping to find a way out of the woodland that has turned on her. She slips on a frozen puddle and her view of the snowy woods is thrown up in the air with her. She tumbles violently down a snow-covered hill and is thrown here and there, picking up speed the further she falls. She smacks her head against a rock concealed by the snow; her phone flies out of her pocket as fast as a bullet. Louise sees nothing but darkness as she rolls to a stop, limp and
unconscious, under a large fallen tree, hidden from sight in the shadows.

Chapter Forty-one
That Night

Behind the wheel of the black car, Brooke is sobbing. The engine grumbles as she speeds away from her attacker.

She can still feel the boy’s touch, although he is miles away from her now. She can still feel the cold paint on the door against her cheek, and his hand on the side of her face. It’s as if his erection is still pressed against her back and his warm, beer-stained breath is still panting against her neck.

The tyres glide across the icy road, occasionally skidding to the right and to the left, but she is too distraught to care. She just needs to get home. She just needs to be safe.

Her bare feet control the pedals, while her heels lie abandoned on the floor. Her bag rolled off the passenger seat and emptied its contents on the floor of the car a while back.

Brooke wipes tears from her face and reaches down to find her cigarette packet and lighter. She finds a stray cigarette that has fallen out of the packet and places it in her mouth as she searches for the lighter. The car swerves to the left as she reaches down. She straightens the car and searches again. She finds it
and lights her cigarette, her eyes off the road. She lowers the window beside her and blows the smoke out of the gap. Her head is swimming from all the alcohol she has consumed, while traumatic thoughts whirl around her mind.