The Escape: The gripping, twisty thriller from the #1 bestseller. C.L. Taylor

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      Jo continues to try and explain herself but Max has stopped listening. He’s thinking about his dad. He was twelve the first time he found him passed out on the sofa. He’d just got in from school and there was a strange, bittersweet, almost vinegary scent in the air when he opened the front door. He found the tinfoil, sticky with brown liquid, on the bathroom floor.

      ‘Have you done it before?’ he asks.

      ‘What?’

      ‘Taken drugs. At home?’

      ‘Are you serious?’

      ‘I wouldn’t have asked if I wasn’t.’

      Over the last couple of months Jo’s behaviour has become increasingly erratic. He’d put it down to her agoraphobia and mental health. No, she’d put it down to that. Neither of them could pinpoint why she was getting worse instead of better. Unless she was self-medicating …

      His wife sighs. ‘I can’t believe you’re even asking me that.’

      ‘Sharon said you seemed out of it when you picked up Elise the other day.’

      ‘That was after Paula threatened me! Jesus, Max. Would you listen to yourself? You’re being ridiculous. Just bring Elise home.’

      ‘She also said you deliberately dropped Elise when she was a baby.’

      ‘I was breastfeeding and she bit me! I didn’t do it on purpose. Jesus, Max. Why are we even having this conversation? Just bring Elise home or I–I’ll—’

      ‘Do what? Take her to Chester? Make sure I never see her again?’ Max is shaking with anger. Jo didn’t see the state their daughter was in when he turned up to collect her. The nursery staff had done the best they could to keep her occupied but her eyes were red and puffy, her cheeks tear-stained. As if she hadn’t been through enough – being kept indoors all the time when other little kids were laughing and playing in the sunshine. He’d done his best to understand what Jo was going through. He’d supported her, he’d listened to her, he’d put his own needs last, telling himself that all Jo needed was a bit of time. But she was turning into someone he didn’t recognise.

      ‘Max, don’t. I said I was sorry about that. I sent you a text and—’

      ‘Have you got any idea how worried I’ve been, Jo? I thought that Paula had hurt you. Have you rung the police yet?’

      Jo pauses for a beat. ‘No.’

      There’s something about the hesitation in her voice as she says the word ‘no’ that makes Max frown.

      ‘Why the hell not? Last night you had a go at me because I wasn’t taking you seriously and now …’ he sighs. ‘We’re going round in circles here. Look, we’re in the Holiday Inn and Elise is fine. She can sleep here with me tonight and I’ll take her to nursery in the morning. If you pick her up after work we can talk more then. OK?’

      ‘I … I don’t know. I really want to see her, Max.’

      ‘She’s fine. Honestly.’ He watches as his daughter clambers off the bed and toddles towards him, arms reaching for a hug, a huge smile on her face. ‘I’m sorry for going off the deep end but I was worried, OK, for you and Elise.’

      ‘I’m sorry too. I didn’t mean to scare you. Honestly, Max. When I woke up and realised what had happened I …’ She pauses. ‘Can I talk to Elise? Please. I need to hear her voice.’

      ‘Sure.’ He places the phone against his daughter’s ear. ‘Elise, sweetie. It’s Mummy. Say hello.’

      He listens as his daughter has a garbled conversation with her mother then he wrangles the phone away from her again.

      ‘I need to go. There’s a Tesco down the road and I need to grab some overnight things for Elise and some clean clothes for nursery tomorrow.’

      ‘You could come home. There are clothes here,’ Jo says, but the fight has gone out of her voice. She’s accepted that they won’t be coming home tonight.

      ‘Sleep well, sweetheart,’ Max says. ‘I’ll see you tomorrow evening.’

      ‘OK. Bye.’

      The line goes dead and Max slumps against the bathroom doorway, completely spent. His daughter, still standing beside him, reaches out her arms to be picked up and he swoops her up. He presses his face into her blonde curls and closes his eyes as her tiny hands wind their way around his neck.

       Chapter 11

       I saw you, Jo. I watched as you slept, flat on your back, your hands folded on your stomach like a corpse. A nice sleep, was it? Restful? You need to stay awake, Jo. You need to watch what’s happening around you because, if you don’t, if you close your eyes for one second, you’ll lose everything that’s ever mattered to you. Oh wait, too late. That’s already happening.

       Chapter 12

      Max leaves the Bristol News building through the revolving glass front door, his laptop bag swinging from his shoulder, his mobile phone in his hand. He’s running late for his interview with an elderly woman who is the most recent victim of a con by two men masquerading as council drain inspectors. One of them ransacked her house while the other one kept her talking in the living room. He’s keen to run a story to warn the public about the scam but, whenever he mentally runs through the questions he needs to ask, he’s distracted by other thoughts: a niggling worry about his conversation with Jo the night before.

      He’d dropped Elise off at nursery in the morning, as planned, then gone to work. When he went home afterwards, Elise threw herself at him the second he walked through the door but Jo barely reacted. She didn’t stand up from the sofa when he walked into the living room, and stiffened when he bent to kiss her hello. He wasn’t sure if she felt bad for leaving Elise at nursery the night before or if she was angry with him for the way he’d reacted, but he didn’t force a conversation. Instead he waited until they’d put Elise to bed then he reached into his messenger bag and handed Jo a bottle of her favourite wine.

      ‘Peace offering.’

      ‘Thank you.’

      He followed his wife into the kitchen and watched as she opened the bottle, poured the wine and handed him a glass.

      ‘I’m sorry,’ he said as they settled themselves on the sofa. ‘For everything. For losing my shit when I saw you’d been looking for houses in Chester. That was out of order. So was my reaction when you said you’d taken your dad’s medication.

      ‘It’s the investigation,’ he went on. ‘It’s left me feeling wired and jumpy. And I know that’s no excuse but, after spending six months with low-life scum, I assume the worst about people. I overreacted. I’m really sorry, Jo. I shouldn’t have taken it out on you.’

      Jo СКАЧАТЬ