The Stepdaughter. Debbie Howells
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Название: The Stepdaughter
Автор: Debbie Howells
Издательство: Ingram
Жанр: Триллеры
isbn: 9781496706966
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Walking toward her, I put my hands firmly on her shoulders. “We are not getting a divorce.” I speak with a ferocious determination. “I know things seem a bit difficult just now. But we’ll get over it. You mustn’t worry.” Then I pause. “Have you spoken to your father about this?”
“Yes.” Her answer shocks me, that she’s talked to Andrew at all, let alone that she’s talked to him before me.
I stare at her, incredulous. “What did he say?”
She shrugs again. “Not much.” She breaks off, then her clear gray eyes look piercingly into mine. “He laughed. Then he said you’d never leave him.”
As she says that, my heart breaks for her. She’s a pawn. He’s using her, doing what I’ve always dreaded he’d do, drawing Niamh into his cat-and-mouse games with me. In that moment, I’ve never hated him more. I imagine him laughing, unkindly, cruelly, knowing he doesn’t care what Niamh sees, how she feels. He doesn’t protect her, look out for her. The only person who can do that is me. “He’s right. I won’t.” As I gaze steadily at my daughter, the web I’m caught in tightens.
Niamh’s nod is barely perceptible. Not knowing how else to reassure her, I play it down, changing the subject. “I had an email from your school. They should have the heating fixed by tomorrow. If the roads are clear, they’ll open again the day after. I don’t suppose you’ve heard from Hollie?”
“No.” Niamh walks over to the window, gazing ahead. “Where do you suppose she is?”
I go over and stand next to her, making out a flurry of snowflakes in the dim light outside. “I don’t know. It’s only been two days. Most likely, she’s at someone’s house somewhere.” I break off, because no one knows, and because the more time passes, the more worrying her absence becomes. In temperatures like this, she wouldn’t survive living rough.
“I’m scared.” Niamh wraps her arms around her narrow body. “I want to know what’s happened.”
“I know.” I feel exactly the same. “How do you and Hollie usually keep in touch?”
“Messenger,” Niamh says briefly. “Sometimes Instagram. But, you know. Mostly, she just turns up.”
“Try not to worry.” I place an arm around her shoulders. “She’ll be OK. We have to believe that she will turn up. I’m sure the police are doing everything they can.”
But I’m not sure. There are no rules when teenagers go missing, just as too many lives are cut short for all the wrong reasons. Right now, Hollie could be anywhere.
Nicki
Throughout the village, officers knock on doors and search gardens, woods, and fields, but by early afternoon, nothing of any significance has been found.
As I leave the Buckleys’ house, I turn to Emerson. “We need to talk to more of the villagers. In places like this, it’s impossible to keep secrets. Someone somewhere must know something about Hollie.”
“Maybe she left. If she’d decided to run off, she could be miles away by now.”
“How? There are no buses through here.”
“A friend could have picked her up. Or she could have walked.”
I’m silent, then seeing a lay-by, I pull over. “The village church is up there. Let’s take a look.”
Getting out, Emerson pulls the collar of his coat up as I lock the car and do the same. The path is frozen, the air sharp as we make our way along the path toward the churchyard. As the trees open out, the headstones are gray against the white of the frost. The church is small, dating back about six hundred years, with a small tower in which a single bell hangs. I try the door, surprised when I find it unlocked, but a search of the sparse interior yields nothing. Closing it behind me, as we start walking back toward the road, my phone buzzes.
“May.” As I listen to the voice at the other end, I feel the blood drain from my face.
It takes me two minutes to find Furze Lane, then another three to find Deeprose House. Sarah Collins is waiting in front of the heavy, locked gates. “The owners are away. There’s a caretaker who has a key, apparently. We’re trying to get in touch with him.”
“Where is she?”
Sarah’s voice is grim. “In the gardens. Milsom and Edwards came in from the fields—there’s a fence that’s easy to climb through. I assume that’s how she got in.”
“Can you show me?”
We walk in silence a short way down the lane, where Sarah turns into an opening and climbs over the gate. “Careful. Some friendly farmer has wrapped barbed wire around it.”
Heeding her warning, I manage to climb over unscathed, then follow her through thick grass to the other side of the field, where there’s a post and rail fence.
“She’s just through here,” Sarah says quietly.
All the time we were searching, there’d been hope. But as I cross the gardens, then follow Sarah through a hedge into a smaller enclosed part of the garden, hope is gone. In the pool in front of us, we spot her hair first—long, floating around her as she lies facedown in the water.
“She was under the leaves, ma’am.” As Milsom speaks, I notice the piles of leaves scraped back around the edges of the pool. “She must have fallen in. She was invisible until we cleared them. The water had frozen over her.”
She’s wearing the jeans and jacket Stephanie described, but only as Milsom speaks do I notice the ice, encasing her body, her hair, so that only the back of her head protrudes above it.
“We should inform her parents.” Sarah’s voice is flat.
“Not yet. We need to be absolutely sure.” Hearing voices, I turn and find two more officers walking across the garden toward us. That they’ve come that way must mean they have a key. They’re followed by two more carrying a stretcher. There’s silence as we stand there, while the ice is broken. Then as Hollie’s body is removed from the water and her face is visible, any doubts are gone.
“I’ll tell the parents.” As I speak, Sarah nods, her eyes grave.
I make my way back to my car, steeling myself. Many things about my job aren’t easy, but of all of them, the worst is breaking bad news. When you tell a parent that their child isn’t coming back, you know their life as it was has gone forever.