Unplugged (34 page)

As each day passes, I imagine Craig another step away and further hidden. He
’s smarter than I gave him credit for. But what can he do? His life isn’t in Italy; his spoken Italian is average at best. Why do this? I didn’t once prevent him from seeing Ella; I was prepared to be reasonable. I hate myself for refusing to let him take Ella overnight; is this the reason why? Or would that have made it easier for Craig to take her and sooner?

Managing to stop myself vomiting for the first time in days,
I creep out of bed so I don’t wake Liam. In the other end of the suite, I fire up my laptop then scroll through the latest messages on a chat board I’ve joined. This group for people with abducted children has members whose situations are worse than mine.

“
Cerys.” Liam places a hand on my shoulder and I startle. “I told you not to go on that site; it upsets you.”

He stands next to me in his
black briefs, hair mussed from sleep. His tired face demonstrates the effect this is having on him too. I close the lid.

“
It helps,” I say.

“
No, it doesn’t. You feed your mind with horror stories.”

The sun
pushes through gaps in the heavy curtains of the hotel suite, the sound of birds welcoming another day where I have no idea where my daughter is. I flinch as Liam holds me because every time he does, I think how I should hold Ella. When he kisses me good night, it’s the same because I want to scream ‘why can’t I kiss my daughter good night’?

“
Cerys, eat something today.”

I shake my head, tears springing again. I don
’t deserve to feel okay; I’m a bad mother letting this happen to her. “I can’t keep anything down.”

“
You need to have energy for when we find her.”

“
When will that be, Liam? Two weeks and we’re no closer.” Foolishly, I believed Liam could help me find her straightaway, deluded myself into thinking Craig was too stupid to hide properly.

“
I think there’s a new lead.” He strokes my face. “Don’t get mad, I didn’t say anything last night in case you tried to bundle me into the car at 2 a.m.”

“
What? What is it? Have they found her?” I stand. I need to get dressed. Packed. “Is she in Italy?”

Liam leans over me and twists the laptop toward him.
“I’m waiting for photos.”

The unread email in the inbox contains picture files
, and my heart stops beating, for every second it takes for them to appear on screen. I squint at them, grainy pictures of a dark-haired girl and a man around Craig’s build.

“
I don’t know! How am I supposed to tell from that?” I say, pushing back the chair and storming away.

Liam follows.
“I know, but we can still go? It’s a couple of hours drive from here.”

“
But what if we go there and it isn’t her? And in the meantime we miss something here?” I rub my arms, the familiar throb aching my head.

“
And what if it is her and he’s gone tomorrow?” asks Liam gently.

But he isn
’t gentle Liam. He doesn’t know how I’ve seen his barely contained anger focused on walls, cupboard doors, and shouted phone calls when he thinks I’m asleep at the opposite end of the suite.

I worry what will happen to Craig when we see him.

CHAPTER
34

CERYS

The small town on the edge of the Adriatic
Sea is filled with holidaying families. I keep my focus on the map so I don’t catch sight of anybody’s happiness. Horrible to begrudge someone else of this, but I’m too raw. Ella’s hair and skin colouring match so many of the local children that I despair of finding her at all.

The movement of the car lulled me to sleep on the two hour drive and I wake up to face that five second realisation and stomach plummeting as my mind catches up with the world I
’m in. I sit quietly in the car park while Liam books us into yet another suite. The tall, modern hotel faces a road; and across from there, trees line a path, which heads toward a busy beach. Loungers and umbrellas are set in regimented lines, midway through the day and they’re covered in towels and tourists. Is Ella one of them?

In the room, I dump my things and pour over the emailed pictures on the laptop again. Liam orders room service and as he tucks into a large pizza
. I pick at a salad and stare at the blurry image of who could be my daughter.

“
Do you have the address where these were taken?” I ask him.

“
Yes,” says Liam, warily

“
Then why aren’t we there?” I grab my handbag from the floor. “Liam?”

Liam drops his slice of pizza onto his plate and rests his hand on mine.
“I need to eat, Cerys; and we need to decide what to do. What if we find him? How do we get her home?”

I snatch my hand away.
“If he doesn’t let her come with us, we’ll call the police!”

“
He might be reasonable.”

I arch an eyebrow.
“I don’t believe you just said that! Is anything about his behaviour reasonable?”

“Five minutes, Cerys, and we’ll go. But I want you to eat that before we do.” He indicates the salad I’ve taken two mouthfuls of. “I haven’t seen you eat anything for a day.”

The constant nagging about my eating leads to flare ups between us
; and right now, I need Liam behind me a hundred percent. I force myself to eat a forkful of the fresh, green salad that tastes of nothing to my dull senses.

“
There’s something worrying me,” Liam says quietly as he watches. “About us, not Ella.”

“
What?” I stab some more salad onto my fork.

“
I think you might blame me.”

“
What for?”

“
If you weren’t with me, he might not have taken her.” Liam looks intently at his pizza.

I curl my hand around his.
“Don’t think that, it’s not true.”

“
You even said it yourself. I should’ve kept away.”

“
No, Liam! Our relationship doesn’t excuse his bastard behaviour! This is all him and not you.”

He turns to me
; and the wariness I’ve seen in his eyes and his next words explain why he’s lost his cool with me a couple of times over the last few days. “I worry that when we find Ella and you go home that you’ll end this.”

“
Do you really think I’m that callous? That I’m using you?”

“
No! I just know you’ll do whatever it takes for Ella, and put her first. I get that I’m on the edge of your lives still.”

“
Liam. Please. My brain can’t cope with conversations about us.” I turn his face to mine, stroking his cheek. “I love you though; is that enough for you to hear now?”

Liam scrunches his face up, the way he dos when he
’s trying not to say something wrong. He studies me for a moment. “After we find her, we have some talking to do,” he says. “And I love you too, more than you know.”

“
I think I know.”

And we
’re dragged from our tiny moment of Liam and Cerys back into the nightmare reality of my missing daughter. The trail of thoughts starts in my head again, and I fight against reaching the conclusion I always do.

What if I never see her again?

****

The address Liam
has is a holiday rental close to the beach, a private apartment in a small complex, which means there’s no reception area to ask or show the pictures to. We park a few hundred metres down the street with the low-rise building in view. The apartment is opposite a lawned area. Trees act as a barrier between there and the road, and the entrance to the building is along a narrow lane. Liam’s white hatchback hire car is less conspicuous than his normal vehicle choice. Liam suggests we wait in the car, I watch everybody that passes like a cat stalking its prey, coiled ready to run out and grab Ella. Each minute that passes the more pressure builds in my head. If I don’t see her soon, I’ll get out of the car and look for her. Where, I don’t know.

Most of the
passersby come to and from the beach, holidaymakers enjoying the warm sun. As time passes and the sun lowers, the number of people leaving increases. A little girl and a man head from the direction of the beach toward us and I lean forward, straining my eyes as I wait for them to come into view. Something in the man’s gait is familiar, years with Craig and I’m confident I can spot him from a distance.

The salad I ate earlier fights
its way from my knotting stomach as the pair continue to walk along the path on the opposite side of the road. I go to open the car door and Liam touches my hand.

“
No. If it’s them, let them go inside and we’ll go to the apartment.”

The
brown-haired girl across the road is wearing a pink swimming costume, the same one I packed in her bag over two weeks ago. I choke her name in a sob and scrabble with the door handle.

Liam grips my hand
. “No, don’t! Wait.”

I
yank my hand away. “You don’t understand; I can’t sit here!”

“
Cerys! Wait like I said, please.”

He fights to get hold
of my arms as I smack his chest, catching them in a strong grip, stopping me going to my daughter. “I can’t sit here! You don’t understand! If Ella was
your
daughter, you would!” I scream at him.

Liam drops his
hold, and I recognise the instant hurt in his eyes before he looks away. I hesitate, torn between charging across the road to Ella and fixing the terrible thing I said to Liam. “I didn’t mean...”

Liam doesn
’t speak, a muscle twitching in his cheek as he stares ahead.

“
Liam?”

If he
’s not going to talk to me.
I throw open the car door and run across the road in my thin sandals.

“
Ella!”

Ella looks over. Craig has hold of her hand and when Ella tries to pull away
, he keeps hold. “Mummy!”

“
Oh, my God, Ella! Are you okay?” Reaching them, I kneel down and hold my daughter to my chest as if I let her go she’d disappear again. Ella’s hot from a day in the sun and smells of sunscreen. I kiss her cheek, and bury my face into Ella’s hair.

Gripping Ella to stop myself hitting him
, I stare up at Craig’s ashen face. “Why?” I ask.

“
Daddy said your phone was broken. I wanted to talk to you.” Ella reaches a hand out and touches me cheek. “Why are you crying? Didn’t you want to see me?”

“
Of course I did, baby, I’m just really happy and it made me cry.” I hold both of her cheeks in my hand and kiss her soft face.

Craig drops Ella
’s hand and continues to stare at me, not speaking. His brown eyes are darker due to the black circles beneath and I don’t think the pale stress on his face is only due to this moment. I glance over my shoulder; Liam is still in the car.

“
I thought she’d like a holiday,” he says finally.

“
Without telling me? Refusing to contact me? That’s not a holiday!”

“
Daddy said we could live by the sea, but I said I wanted to live near my friends at home.”

I narrow my eyes at Craig,
as his lies are unravelled by his daughter. A young couple passes us by, hand in hand, heading to the beach with their towels. They glance at us curiously, and I meet the concerned eyes of the blonde-haired woman. I look away.

“
Are you on your own?” Craig asks as the couple continues by.

“
You mean are the police with me?” I snap.

“
No, I mean is
he
with you.”

I push myself up and stand as close to him as I can without touching, itching to smack his face with my shaking hand.
“You mean Liam? Yes. He’s spent the last two weeks with me looking for Ella.”

We stare at each other for a few moments as I try to regain control of my breathing. This man
’s face is impassive, as if he has nothing to lose in the situation.

I draw a ragged breath.
“Craig, where are you staying? Can we talk?”

Craig doesn
’t answer because Liam appears at my shoulder. The two men regard each other silently, but I know Craig well enough to see that he’s intimidated by Liam. Craig shifts his gaze to me.

“
Hey, Ella,” says Liam quietly but doesn’t touch her.

Ella looks up at her dad as if expecting permission to talk to Liam and my anger grows when she doesn
’t respond. What has Craig said to her? If I hurt Liam with my outburst in the car, Ella just rubbed salt into the wound.