Don't Let Me Go (53 page)

‘I just wished I could find an answer, but there didn’t seem to be one. I had no idea that Erica Wade had already sent her email by then, I only knew that when I got back into my car I felt impelled to turn in the direction of the Wades’ house just in case Chloe was at the window, looking out for me. She used to do that sometimes, and it would break my heart to see how lonely she looked as she waved.

‘When I reached the house all the lights were on and though I had no idea why, I suddenly felt scared. I immediately turned into the drive, got out of the car and ran to the front door. It was open so I went inside, but no one answered when I called out. I carried on through to the kitchen and saw the back door was open and a light was on in the shed Brian Wade used as a studio. I don’t recall making a conscious decision to move quietly – I guess on some level I suspected I could be about to catch him with Chloe. Though I desperately didn’t want to see it, at least if I did I’d be able to get her away from him and make sure he never went near her again. So I crossed the garden as silently as I could. I was able to see the back of his head through the shed window, but he didn’t turn round. By the time I was close enough to look inside I could sense the panic around him. He was working so frantically at his computer that he had no idea I was there. Something was horribly wrong, I knew it; I noticed then that a massive hole had been dug in the garden, but there didn’t seem to be anything in it. Terrified it was meant for Chloe I ran back to the house, and as I went into the kitchen I saw a pool of blood seeping out from behind the centre island. Praying it wasn’t Chloe, I forced myself to look and saw that it was Erica Wade. She’d obviously been stabbed, and from the amount of blood and the way her eyes were open I could tell straight away she was dead.

‘Desperate to find Chloe I tore upstairs to her room, trying not to scream her name in case her father heard. At first I thought she wasn’t there. Then I heard a scraping on the cupboard door in her room. I couldn’t get it open, someone had obviously locked her in, but then I spotted a key on the floor . . . I wrenched the door open and there she was, shaking with terror . . . I didn’t know how much she’d seen of what had happened downstairs, I only knew I had to get her away from there. As I scooped her up her arms and legs went round me so tightly it was difficult to move, but I made myself run. As I went I kept getting flashbacks to when I’d been shut in a cupboard at her age and how I’d waited for my mother to come . . . I started to feel confused about who I was, who she was . . . It was like she was me as a child and I was my mother . . . I know it sounds crazy, but it’s how it was.

‘It seemed to take an eternity to get outside to my car, then she remembered Boots, her bear, so I put her in the passenger seat and ran back inside. I was sure Brian Wade was going to walk in any minute. I had no idea what I’d do if I saw him, but thank God I didn’t.

‘I was already drawing up outside my own house, about half an hour later, before I fully realised it was where I was going. All I’d been thinking till then was that I had to get as far away from Brian Wade as I could, and make sure Chloe was safe. She was so traumatised; she was still shaking as I lifted her out of the car and when we got inside she wouldn’t let me put her down. To be honest, I didn’t want to. Holding her reassured me she was all right, alive. That we both were. After what had happened to her mother and how crazed her father had seemed, it felt almost untrue.’

She paused for a moment, putting a hand to her mouth as the memory of it all shook through her.

‘At what point did you call the police?’ Anthony asked, gently bringing her back on track.

‘About then,’ she answered, the words coming out in a gasp. ‘I rang and said I was worried because I couldn’t get an answer from the Wades’ home, so could someone go and check everything was OK.’

‘So you’d decided by then to keep the child with you?’

‘In so far as I was thinking about anything clearly, which I wasn’t, I guess the answer has to be yes, at least for that night, because it would only have traumatised her further to be handed over to strangers.

‘It was about an hour later that the police came knocking on my door. She was asleep by then, upstairs on my bed, and because I knew that as soon as they saw her everything would have to go into motion to take her into emergency care, I decided to leave her there.’

‘Did the police ask you if you knew where she was?’

‘No, actually, they didn’t. They just told me that they’d responded to my call and that Mrs Wade was dead and Mr Wade had been arrested on suspicion of murder.’

‘Did anyone mention the child at all?’

‘Yes, they said that Mr Wade was claiming not to know where she was, but they were afraid that he knew exactly where she was.’

‘The implication being that they thought he’d done the same to his daughter as he had to his wife?’

‘That’s right.’

‘Do you know if they had any reason to suspect foul play where his daughter was concerned?’

‘I didn’t know then, but I was told later that photographs had been found in the shed of him and his daughter that were . . . Well, I guess that told their own story.’

Anthony nodded understandingly. ‘So was there an actual moment when you decided to yourself that you weren’t going to hand Chloe over?’ he asked bluntly.

She shook her head. ‘No, not really,’ she replied, ‘it just seemed to happen as it became harder and harder to think of how devastated she’d be if I did give her up, especially when I could see how happy she was to be with me. For her it was like a dream come true, and I just couldn’t bring myself to crush that dream.’

‘So what did you think you were going to do with her? There you were, a single woman, known in the community to be childless. How did you imagine you were going to pass her off as yours – if indeed that was what you intended?’

Swallowing dryly, she said, ‘My mother had already talked to me about visiting New Zealand, possibly even moving there, and from what I knew of it I couldn’t think of a better place for Chloe to be after all she’d suffered. I wanted to go anyway to be with my mother, but I didn’t feel I had the right to go away and be happy as if I was the only one who mattered, because Chloe mattered too. I just couldn’t leave her behind. She had no one, whereas with me she’d be able to have a loving home and family, cousins, animals, adventures,
friends
, and most of all the abuse would be so far away she might one day be able to forget it.’

‘And you didn’t think anyone else could give her that?’

‘Maybe someone could have, but I know what the care system can do to a child, and there was a chance she’d have had to go through many carers before a suitable adoptive parent could be found. Even then there’d be no guarantee that the adopters would go through with it – I’ve seen the way children can be crushed by eleventh-hour rejections, and I couldn’t bear the thought of that happening to her. I knew what it could turn her into, and it didn’t seem right even to risk it when I already loved her so much and she was so happy with me.’

‘However, you were successfully adopted yourself and brought up in a loving home?’

Had Gabby not been in court, Charlotte knew she’d have explained how lonely it could be knowing you didn’t quite belong in a family, and that your sister always mattered more. Since Gabby was there, she said, ‘I was, but it doesn’t always turn out that way, and as Chloe and I were already so close it seemed to make sense for us to stay together.’

‘So you kept her with you throughout the entire time you knew everyone was looking for her?’

‘Yes, I did. I felt terrible about it, but I had to put her first. I also knew that after the first few days had gone by, if they found out I had her, I could be charged with a criminal offence that might end me up in prison. Certainly they’d have taken her from me, and then I’d lose my job, never be able to work with children again, and I just couldn’t see what purpose that would serve for anyone.’

‘So you took her to New Zealand, where she was introduced to a life we will hear more about when the statements from the owner of Aroha Daycare and local policeman Grant Romney are read out for the court. In the meantime, I’d like to thank you for giving us such a full and frank account of how you came to rescue Chloe from the abusive home that had all but devastated the first years of her life.’

As Anthony retook his seat, Charlotte’s tension began beating through her skull like a drum. Kentley was going to cross-examine her now and though Anthony and Jolyon had done their best to prepare her for it, she knew this was going to be the hardest part to get through. Not because she’d lied about anything, but because of how he was likely to twist it.

‘Mr Kentley?’ the judge prompted.

Still listening to the lawyer next to him Kentley rose to his feet, cleared his throat and said, ‘Thank you, My Lady. No questions.’

As Anthony glanced up in shock, Charlotte felt herself reeling.

Seeming equally stunned, the judge said to Charlotte, ‘Well, Ms Nicholls, it would seem you can stand down, and this, ladies and gentlemen, would be a good time to break for lunch.’

‘I can’t believe he didn’t question you,’ Kim declared, as Charlotte joined the legal team in an anteroom. ‘What’s he up to?’ she demanded of Anthony. ‘Does he know something we don’t?’

Anthony’s expression was grim as Jolyon said, ‘He’ll be planning something, that’s for sure, but he can’t call any more witnesses without notifying us – unless he’s about to.’

‘Even if he does,’ Charlotte said, ‘there’s nothing anyone can say to disprove my testimony, because I didn’t lie or even bend the truth. It was the way it happened . . .’ She turned suddenly cold as a horrible thought occurred to her. ‘Oh my God, do you think they’re about to call Brian Wade?’ she gasped.

Anthony shook his head. ‘We’d know if they were, and anyway, even if they did, what would it change?’

‘Potentially everything if he lied,’ Charlotte pointed out.

Though unable to argue with that, he continued to shake his head. ‘Using a convicted paedophile to try and win their case would be nothing short of madness.’

‘So what’s going on?’ Kim implored.

‘My guess,’ he replied, looking at Jolyon, ‘is that he sensed he’d lose the jury if he started pulling Charlotte apart.’

Jolyon’s eyes narrowed as he thought. ‘I’ll buy that,’ he responded. ‘She came across as completely credible, someone who obviously loves the child, and no one’s ever going to damn her for that.’

‘Especially given the abuse she described,’ Kim added.

Charlotte was still watching Anthony.

‘I’m thinking about the statements from New Zealand,’ he said. ‘They’re going to be read out straight after lunch . . .’

‘And,’ Jolyon picked up, visibly brightening, ‘when the jury hears how well the child was doing over there, they’re going to be paying for her flight back themselves.’

To Charlotte’s dismay Anthony didn’t appear as encouraged.

‘You could be right, Jolyon,’ he said, ‘but I’m asking myself what I’d do in Kentley’s shoes to get around that, and I know I’d be relying on my closing statement to remind the jury that this isn’t about the child. It’s about Charlotte, and the fact that in the eyes of the law she has committed a crime.’

As Charlotte’s insides churned, Kim put in, ‘But you have a closing statement too, Anthony, and yours is the last they’ll hear before they go to deliberate.’

Anthony’s eyes came to Charlotte as with the merest trace of irony he said, ‘Then I guess I’d better make it a memorable one.’

Chapter Twenty-Five

IT DIDN’T TAKE
long for Grant Romney’s and Celia Bradley’s statements to be read out after lunch, and it was apparent from both that their admiration for the way Charlotte had made such a difference to Chloe’s life was affecting the jury just as Jolyon had predicted.

However, Charlotte was in no doubt that Kentley’s closing was going to be far more relevant to the afternoon’s proceedings than these character references, and knowing how concerned Anthony was, she could feel the jagged edges of panic digging into her unease as Kentley rose to begin.

‘My Lady, ladies and gentlemen of the jury,’ he pronounced through a sigh, ‘there is no doubt we have heard some very touching testimony in the court today, from the defendant herself, and from her friends in New Zealand. I don’t imagine there is one amongst us who seeks to damn her for loving the child. To the contrary, it is what we would hope for when a small child is as vulnerable as Chloe, that those whose job it is to remove her from harm’s way would care for her not only because it’s their job, but because the child really matters to them. Clearly Chloe mattered a great deal to Ms Nicholls. However, the question we have to ask ourselves is, can we say it’s all right for a social worker to take a child and keep it as though it were her own?

‘You know, I know and the defendant knows very well that things don’t work that way. Nor can they, because if they did we’d have social workers all over the place helping themselves to any child that might take their fancy, and who knows, giving them back when it’s no longer convenient to keep them. And what would happen then to the wretched little souls who no one felt a strong enough attachment to?

‘No, we can’t allow the very people we trust to do what’s right for our children to pick and choose which ones they might want to keep and bring up as their own. We have a system, albeit flawed, but a system nonetheless, to protect our children from those who neglect and abuse them – and from those who seek to steal them. Ms Nicholls was a part of that system and she has abused it in a way that, I’m sorry to say, led her to commit a serious crime.

‘We all heard my learned friend, Mr Goodman, try to pass his client’s actions off as a rescue, and on the night Ms Nicholls took the child it was most certainly that. We would hope that no one, least of all someone working in child protection, would leave a child in a house where a murder had already been committed. What concerns me, members of the jury, is not what happened that night, but what happened afterwards. She could, at any point, have handed the child over to a foster carer, she might even have had some say in who the child went to, but rather than do the right thing –
and she knew what the right thing was
– she hung on to the child, while allowing the police to mount a search that she knew was an appalling waste of their time and resources.