‘Towards the high street, as far as I could tell. Can I go now?’
‘Once you’ve given a statement.’ At a signal from Garrett, a uniformed officer ushered the man into the back of a car. The DCI told another officer to relay the information they’d learnt to the search teams, then turned to his detectives. ‘It would seem we’re dealing with a clever girl.’
‘Very clever,’ agreed Amy, casting Jim a frowning sidelong glance. ‘Very clever indeed.’
****
After a couple of miles, Angel came to a place where the canal and the River Don ran parallel to each other, separated by little more than the width of a road. She climbed some steps at the side of a bridge, checked to make sure no one was about, then ran towards the river. She followed the Don’s winding bank into the heart of industrial Attercliffe, passing the grimy hulks of steelworks and occasional pockets of lightly wooded scrubland. Every so often she stopped to scan her surroundings for signs of the police search. But apart from the blinking lights of a helicopter circling above the city centre, there were none.
Several more miles of steady walking brought Angel to a dual-carriageway that crossed the river on a steel-framed bridge. She left behind the solitude of the river bank and made her way along the roadside, keeping to the shadows wherever possible, eyes and ears alert for police cars. The factory-flanked road was almost eerily quiet. It struck her, as it had many times during her previous stay in the area, how strange it felt to be in the middle of a heavily populated city and yet so alone.
She managed to make it to the flat without being seen by any passing motorists. The steel door grated inwards a few centimetres at a time as she heaved her scrawny, exhausted frame against it. Once the gap was wide enough, she squeezed through and closed the door. The derelict shop’s interior smelt of mildew and old smoke. She sparked her lighter into life, illuminating graffiti-plastered walls and the ashes of a fire containing the half-melted remains of several cider bottles. Someone had clearly been in the building since it was raided. Judging by the bottles, it was probably just kids. She stooped to feel the ashes. Whoever it was, they hadn’t been there for a while. The fire was long dead.
Angel approached a door at the rear of the shop that led to a small square of hallway and a flight of stairs. Something twisted in her stomach. The last time she’d climbed those stairs had been the morning after the night in the Winstanleys’ basement. She’d been out of it on ketamine, but not enough to stop the memory of what had happened from clawing at her. She would soon learn that there was only one drug that could give her that kind of oblivion.
As though her feet were made of lead, Angel climbed the stairs. The door to the flat dangled off one hinge. The doorframe was split from top to bottom. Something scuttled across the floorboards of a hallway with three doors in its left-hand wall and one at its far end. She didn’t flinch or even seem to hear. She advanced towards the first door, her eyes staring hollowly into the past. She saw herself lying on a double bed, with Stephen Baxley thrusting on top of her. She saw herself curled into a tight ball under the duvet, sobbing as if something inside her had been irreparably broken.
Angel opened the door. The bed was gone. There was a mattress on the floor that had been cut to ribbons – no doubt by police searching for drugs. The floorboards had been prised up in several places and a couple of holes had been hammered through the stud wall that separated the bedroom from the bathroom. Angel glanced into the bathroom. The porcelain sink had been smashed. The side of the bath had been levered off. The toilet was intact, but its bowl was brimful of stinking brown water. Next to the bathroom was a tiny kitchen. All the drawers and cupboards were open. The backs of the cupboards had been removed. The linoleum floor and work-surfaces were strewn with broken crockery, pots and pans, and the mould-furred contents of an upturned bin.
The final door, Angel knew, led to a lounge. When she’d lived there the room had been furnished with an old but comfortable brown sofa, a fold-up table with a couple of mismatched chairs, a television and a gas fire. All that remained of the furniture was the sofa, though it had received the same treatment as the mattress. There was a draughty hole in the chimney-breast where the gas fire had been. The green-swirled carpet had been pulled up and flung into a corner. Damp-stained curtains fluttered in a current of air that whistled through a crack in the barred window.
Angel closed the door and wedged the sofa up against it. She turned the cushions over and found that their undersides were intact. She slumped onto the sofa and shut her eyes, letting the silence of the night soothe her ragged nerves. As her sweat began to cool, the dank cold of the room made her shiver. She dragged the carpet over to the sofa and draped it around her shoulders. Then she set about cooking up a hit of Mexican brown. She shot herself up with enough junk to knock her out for the rest of the night. The last thing she saw as she floated off into a chemical haze was Doctor Henry Reeve’s face. Only now, instead of being bloated with arrogance, it was crumpled with fear.
Mark awoke with tears in his eyes. The painkillers that the nurses fed him at regular intervals were wearing off. But that wasn’t what had brought tears to his eyes. He’d been dreaming about Charlotte. In his dream, she was standing at the end of his bed, her hair clotted with blood. Her mouth opened and closed, but no words came out, just guttural sounds. Her arms were spread towards him, as if she wanted him to come to her. And there was such an imploring look of sadness in her eyes that he felt it like a physical pain in his chest.
Mark pushed the call button to summon a nurse. ‘I want to see my sister.’
‘I’m not sure that’s possible.’
‘Please, I need to talk to her.’
‘She’s still unconscious.’
‘I know. But I can talk to her, even if she can’t hear.’
‘OK, Mark, I’ll see what I can do.’
Mark’s features twitched with impatience as he waited. The urge to see Charlotte was so strong he was tempted to get out of bed and wander the corridors in search of her. There was nothing to stop him from doing so – there hadn’t been a constable stationed outside his door since forensic evidence had vindicated his story. He resisted the urge, knowing he had little chance of finding her before he was seen and returned to his room.
Eventually the nurse came back. She was accompanied by a policeman, who informed Mark, ‘You’ve been given permission for a brief visit, but I’ll have to go in with you.’
Relief gleamed in Mark’s eyes. The nurse helped him into a pair of slippers and a dressing-gown. ‘Do you need a walking stick?’
Testing his injured leg, Mark found that he could put his weight on it without much pain. ‘No thanks.’
The nurse led him to a room at the opposite end of the ward. A stifled sob escaped his lips at the sight of his sister. Her head was heavily bandaged. A tube snaked out from amongst the bandages, draining fluid into a bag hanging on an IV pole. More tubes and wires ran from her arms and chest to a bewildering array of drip bags and monitors. Her chest rose and fell in time to the rhythmic whoosh and hiss of a machine that breathed for her. Looking at her unrecognisably swollen and bruised face, it was hard to believe there was any life left in her that wasn’t being artificially maintained.
‘I’ll be waiting in the corridor,’ said the nurse, after she’d drawn a chair to the bedside for Mark. ‘Give a shout if you need me.’
Trying his best to ignore the constable standing at his shoulder, Mark took one of Charlotte’s delicate, blue-tinged hands between both of his. For a long moment he just sat and stared at her. Then he closed his eyes and wept. Suddenly, almost savagely, he swiped a hand across his eyes.
More tears threatened to come, but Mark stubbornly held them back. When he trusted himself enough to speak without sobbing, he leant in close to his sister. ‘Charlotte, it’s me. It’s Mark.’ He vainly searched her face for any flicker or twitch that might suggest she’d heard him. ‘Come on, Charlotte. Move something – a finger, an eyelid, anything. Just give me some sign that you can hear me.’ No response. Mark’s lower lip began to tremble. He bit down on it hard.
He sat stroking his sister’s hand until the nurse stepped back into the room and said, ‘Time’s up, Mark.’
‘Please, just give me five more minutes.’
‘I’m sorry, I can’t. Doctor’s orders. You’re still very weak yourself. You can see Charlotte again tomorrow.’
‘But what if—’ Mark broke off.
What if she doesn’t live that long?
That was what he’d been about to say. He shook the words from his head, reluctantly releasing his sister’s hand. ‘I’ll see you tomorrow, sis.’ Before standing to leave, he did something he hadn’t done in years – he kissed Charlotte’s cheek and whispered, ‘I love you.’
As soon as Mark was out of the room, the tears pushed their way to the surface again. Between his sobs, he asked, ‘What are her chances?’
‘I’m sorry, love, but I really couldn’t tell you.’ The nurse put her hand on Mark’s elbow, more to support him emotionally than physically. ‘I do know one thing. Your sister’s a fighter. And that’s the best chance she’s got.’
When Mark got back to his room, Doctor Reeve was waiting for him. ‘Hello, Mark,’ said the psychiatrist. ‘It’s good to see you back on your feet.’
‘I’ve been to see my sister.’
The nurse helped Mark into his bed, then pressed a button to raise it into a sitting position. Doctor Reeve waited for her to leave before asking, ‘And how did that make you feel?’
‘How do you think it made me feel?’ There was a defensive edge to Mark’s voice. He was tired of being asked questions.
‘I imagine it made you feel upset, scared, angry and many other unpleasant emotions besides. I have to say I admire your bravery. If I was you, I’m not sure I’d have the strength to see my sister in that condition.’
Mark released a quivering breath that made his shoulders drop. ‘It hurt so much to look at her, but I had to let her know she’s not alone. Do you think she heard me?’
‘It’s impossible to say for sure, but there have been many cases of people who’ve woken from comas claiming to have been conscious of what was going on around them.’
It gave Mark a little lift to think that Charlotte might have heard him. Their relationship had never been an easy one. Charlotte was prone to behaving with the senseless cruelty of a spoiled child. And he wasn’t exactly the easiest person to get close to. But none of that mattered any more. Whatever their differences, they were all each other had left.
Doctor Reeve took out a handheld tape recorder. ‘The police have asked me to tape our sessions,’ he explained, starting the tape-recording. ‘Now, Mark, if you’re feeling up to it, I’d like to delve a bit more deeply into what we talked about last night. Have you had any more dreams?’
‘I dreamt about Charlotte. She was covered in blood.’
Doctor Reeve nodded as though he wasn’t surprised. ‘Did she say anything?’
‘No. She just looked at me as though she wanted me to come to her.’
‘And how about the other dream? Have you had it again?’
‘No, but I will do.’
‘How can you be sure of that?’
‘Because it wasn’t a normal dream.’
‘But, again, how can you be sure of that?’
‘I don’t know, I just am.’ Mark touched the back of his head. ‘It’s like I can feel the memories – memories I didn’t even know I had – moving around back there. I just need someone to help me reach them.’
‘Well that’s what I’m here to do, Mark. What I don’t want to do in any way is guide you. That’s why I was so angry with Detective Monahan. By telling you what he did, he made it all the more difficult to identify whether your memories are real or imagined.’
‘They’re as real as what happened to me and Grace Kirby.’ Mark’s voice was sharp with conviction.
‘They may well be.’ Doctor Reeve spoke with infinite patience, as if he was dealing with a well-meaning but misguided child. ‘But for now, Mark, I want to put aside the question of what’s real and what’s not. What I want to focus on is simply helping you open your mind and seeing what, if anything, comes up.’
‘How will you do that?’
‘There are several therapies we could explore that might prove effective. But the one that could perhaps produce the most immediate results is hypnosis. By that, I don’t mean the kind of thing you’ve probably seen on the television. What I’m talking about is simply a state of deep relaxation. Right the way through, you’ll remain perfectly aware of where you are and what’s happening around you.’
‘When do we start?’
‘Right now, if you feel up to it.’ Mark nodded to indicate he did, and Doctor Reeve continued, ‘Before we start, Mark, it’s very important that you don’t try to force your thoughts in any direction. Focus on my voice and nothing else. Do you think you can do that?’
‘Yes.’
In a slow, half-whispered monotone, Doctor Reeve began. ‘Close your eyes. Take a deep breath, hold it for a few seconds, then exhale, letting all the tension go out of your body as you do so. Now I want you to listen only to the sound of my voice. All the other sounds inside and outside the hospital are fading away. And as you listen to my voice, I want you to concentrate on breathing slowly and deeply, feeling the air go in and out of your lungs. In… out… in… out… And each time you exhale, you feel your body getting heavier and heavier…’
At first, Mark was so stiff with tension and pain that he thought there was no way he’d be able to relax. But gradually and irresistibly the doctor’s voice lulled him into a warm, tingling state. A sinking feeling came over him, as though the mattress was sucking him in like quicksand.
‘That’s good, Mark. Now I want you to imagine you’re on the top floor of an office building, where the executives who make all the major decisions have their offices. And now you’re walking down some stairs to the next floor, where advertising and marketing people are hard at work, searching for inspiration. You continue on down to a floor crowded with more workers busy at their computers. This is where the real work of the business is done, by people the executives are hardly aware of. And still you continue on down, floor by floor, until you come to the lowest level of the building – the basement.’