Nightmares of Caitlin Lockyer (Nightmares Trilogy) (28 page)

"You need to change your shirt," the round woman told me, her voice quieter than her first command. "For you, the cornflower
..."

I turned to see what sort of flowers I was expected to wear, but the girl held only a light blue striped shirt. I shrugged out of my own and put on the proffered one. The fabric felt thick and crisp against my skin – like my good suit shirts that I only wore on special occasions.
I guess this was one of them. The day Caitlin told the country what had happened to her.

I looked to Caitlin, her eyes closed as the girl took a brush to her eyes, darkening lids and lashes with careful strokes.

Reaching for Caitlin's hand again, I was quick to press my lips to her fingers before she could pull them out of my grasp. Of course, I got Vaseline all over them and felt stupid, so I started to apologise.

"
It's okay, Nathan," Caitlin cut me off, then was silent as the makeup artist painted her lips the same purple-pink as her dress.

"There you go, sweetheart," she said, standing back and smiling with considerable pride.

Caitlin's eyes fluttered open.

My breath caught in my throat. "You look beautiful, angel."

Her slight smile was enough to lift my heart. "Thank you, Nathan." She stood stiffly, holding still to have her dress arranged around her once more, before she held out her hand to me.

I took it and we were ushered into the studio to tape the interview.

A bloke wearing a headset told us to sit down, pointing at the armchairs arranged in a semicircle. Caitlin sank down in relief on one. One of the magpie girls swooped in to tweak Caitlin's dress and hair so that everything was perfectly in place.

Caitlin didn't let go of my hand, so I sat beside her while the dolled-up interviewer sat on her other side. The interviewer looked vaguely familiar, but for the life of me I couldn't remember her name.

She'd evidently been warned not to attempt to shake Caitlin's hand, so she just sat and smiled at us while people scurried around the two women, making sure they looked their best.

Caitlin looked pale, which only served to draw more attention to her big, dark eyes. I caught sight of what she looked like on camera on the screens in front of us – a hauntingly beautiful woman I ached to make mine. I looked over at her and she turned those eyes on me.
Help me,
they said, as she looked more vulnerable than she ever had before.

"I'm here for you," I promised her.

The interviewer cleared her throat and we looked to her. The questions began.

As she asked Caitlin the first question, my stomach clenched in the worst case of stage fright I'd had since primary school. I forced my face into sympathetic blankness as Caitlin told what she remembered, being kept in the dark, men hurting her. I let the words wash over me, trying not to visualise the vague events she'd described in more detail on Alanna's laptop. She wasn't asked to elaborate. Instead, the interviewer asked how she felt and prompted her when Caitlin appeared lost for words.

"I wanted to kill them all, but I knew I couldn't," Caitlin said at one point. "Sometimes I just wanted to die so that the pain would end." Her eyes filled with tears then, but she squeezed my fingers and, with iron self-control, she didn't cry, blinking the tears away. "And then, I woke up and Nathan was there. He told me it was over and they weren't going to hurt me again. It seemed too good to be true so I didn't believe him at first." Her watery smile left me wishing I could comfort her.

As if her words were some sort of cue, it was my turn.

"How did you find her?" the interviewer asked me.

I took a deep breath, trying to unlock my jaw to answer. I'd prepared a response for this and I had to get the words out.

Do it for Caitlin.

I looked at her beautiful, brave face and found courage I didn't know I possessed.
The power to open my mouth.

"I couldn't sleep. I went for a walk on the beach. I saw someone lying on the sand and when I approached she didn't move, so at first I thought she was dead."

Caitlin's huge eyes were on me, worried. Still, she smiled.

"I
... I asked her if she was okay, but she didn't answer."

Now her eyes held sadness.

"She was very cold and barely conscious, so I called an ambulance and got a first aid kit from my car while we waited for help to arrive."

Caitlin pressed her lips together, giving the slightest nod.

This was the hardest part. Slowly, slowly...

"She woke up before the ambulance arrived. She was so scared." I swallowed as I looked at her, remembering what I could never forget.

The interviewer's voice broke through my memories. "What was the first thing you said to her?"

I'm sorry. Oh God, so sorry.

"I told her it was over and that I was there to help."

One look at Caitlin's watery smile made me continue.

"She asked me to stay with her in the ambulance and the hospital, because she was afraid to be alone."

The image came to my mind then of what she'd looked like when she'd said that and I stared at her now, trying to replace the hellish image I remembered with the vision I saw now. "She's amazing," I blurted out. "No matter how much pain she was in, she never stopped fighting to live, to get better. Anything else would mean they'd won."

Caitlin looked so deep in thought she didn't seem to know what she wanted to say. Her lips formed words, but no sound came out. She tried again and I barely caught the words, her voice was so quiet. "End it."

I dragged my eyes from Caitlin to the interviewer. "This interview is finished," I told her, as Caitlin and I stood up together. I moved closer to Caitlin, so I could support her before she walked too far.

She stood still for a moment, her arms resting on mine as mine held her. She looked up at me slowly, a smile on her face. She brought her lips up to mine and kissed me. Her gaze never wavered from my face, even as her heels touched the ground again and the kiss ended.

"Beautiful,"
came a voice from behind us. I turned my head a little, to see a cameraman flip two emphatic thumbs up.

Caitlin sagged in my arms, squeezing her eyes shut, more exhausted than I'd realised.

"I'll take you home, if you like, angel," I said softly. She nodded wearily, leaning heavily on me as I escorted her out.

End it.
The words echoed in my head as I desperately hoped they didn't inspire the same memories in Caitlin as they did in me.

"An interview. You gave a fucking television interview."

His name was Paul Mott. It said so on his door.
An ordinary name for an ordinary bloke, the boss who was yelling at me for fucking up this entire operation from start to finish. This time, in person and not by phone.

I
'd failed. I didn't get all of them. Caitlin would never be safe and I'd never stop worrying.

"It won't be broadcast until Friday," I replied. "You still have time to pull the interview. You can contact the TV station and ask them not to air it." I kept my face blank, fighting a smile.

"Tell the news that they can't show an exclusive interview they paid for? Fuck, Nathan, they'd have a field day with that one." He glared at me. "How much did they offer you?"

I met his gaze squarely. "I don't know. I didn't ask for or accept any payment. I believe they offered money to Caitlin and she accepted it."
Money to support her through her studies. A tiny amount of compensation for what she'd been through. Millions couldn't make up for her time in hell.

"What questions did they ask you?"

My breath hissed through my teeth. "They asked how I found her."

"And you said?" His voice was dead flat and dangerous.

"Nothing about the police, shots fired or even the other bloke on the beach. I didn't say which beach or how we knew she'd be there. I said I stumbled across the poor girl, lying on the sand, all alone."

"You know you can't be working for us when it airs. You're no use to us as some hero everyone's seen on TV. Any hope you had of continuing your contract died the minute you walked into that TV studio. And the moment you opened your mouth
... you voided the contract, anyway."

My face was stony. "I was already photographed with her at the hospital. I had to go in, to find out what she'd say about what she remembered. She said
... less than I did, and that's saying something. Half the interview is her describing her feelings about what they did to her! Fuck, that's something no one should hear. I answered questions to back up her vague story so they'd believe it. That's all." I looked at him, about as angry as I'd ever been at any boss, no matter what the job. "The contract ends tomorrow. Let me keep her safe for one more day." And try to find a way to get her to let me stay for longer than that.

"If it was anyone else, I'd say fix it or I'll fire you, for it's not fucking hard." His eyes burned with anger. "But you can finish up tomorrow, along with your contract. I don't want any more fuck-ups, so you'll be handing over all your gear – weapons, body armour,
the works – today. I don't want to see you back here."

I nodded, knowing I couldn't ask for any more. "Do we have any more leads on the rest of them?"
Please tell me so I know what to look out for to keep her safe, even when it's not my job any more.

He sighed. "Our team has been through Laura's house from one end to the other and nothing. We have her computer files, but no one's managed to break into those yet. The only records she kept on paper are in a diary she had in her handbag. She occasionally made reference to contact with someone she called 'Al Himar,' but we haven't managed to work out who he or they are. Once we have access to her computer, we'll call in the translators and see what they make of it. If we don't close this operation properly, we'll look like right asses."

"What if they come after Caitlin tomorrow when I'm unarmed?" I asked.

He snorted. "Let her take care of them. She has a pretty good track record so far – maybe better than yours."

I didn't laugh. I wanted to cry. Instead, I just tightened my jaw and left. I had a gun to hand in and a shitload of worry to carry, with nowhere to offload it.

I arrived early at Caitlin's. It was still mid-afternoon, but I didn't want to stay away from her any longer. My head was too filled with dread for her safety when we were apart.

I dragged myself up her front steps, trying to pull myself together into some semblance of company for her, instead of the wet dishrag I felt like.

It was piano-lesson day, it seemed. The child I'd heard practising the piano for the last fortnight had played a very simple song, but the virtuoso who played what I barely recognised as the same song must have been the child's teacher, demonstrating how something so simple could become a complex masterpiece. For the second time that day, I felt like crying. Caitlin and I were right there at the child's skill level – our relationship working well enough to appear to be music. Would she survive long enough for us to take it further, to be the symphony we could be together? I wanted it – God, I wanted it, almost as much as I wanted Caitlin herself.

I couldn't wait any longer. I knocked on her door, dying to see Caitlin again.

The piano-played song ended in silence. The music lesson was over for the day, it seemed. Oh God, please don't let anything else be over. Not yet.

I heard Caitlin's steps creak on the boards in the hall before she opened the door. "Nathan – you're early!" Her eyes lit up and she threw her arms around me, delivering a delightful kiss.

My heavy heart lifted a little and I felt my smile return. "Angel," I murmured, not wanting to let go. She was the only light I could see, even with the sun still in the sky.

She laughed as she pulled away from me. "Come on in. I was thinking about an afternoon snack and the cheese looked really good
..." She took my hand and pulled me inside, leading the way laughingly to the kitchen.

From the fridge she pulled out something small enough to hold in her hand and proffered it. Nestled in her palm was a small cheese, coated in black wax. "Jo and I bought it this morning and I wanted to share it with you." She flitted around the kitchen, pulling out a cutting board and a wicked little knife. Caitlin stretched up onto her toes to reach the crackers in a high cupboard above the bench, but her balance was perfect.

She took the knife and touched the point to the wax.

"Let me help you with that," I offered, worrying about her hurting her hands by handling a knife and hard cheese.

Caitlin shook her head, still laughing. Her fingers were quick. With a few deft strokes she'd peeled the wax from the little cheddar and laid it naked on the cutting board. I watched her carefully as she started to slice the cheese, but Caitlin didn't show the slightest sign of any pain.

She's really recovering,
I realised.
My heart lifted a little more.

Caitlin held out a cracker, topped with a freshly cut slice of cheese. She popped another in her mouth, smiling as I took her offering.