Authors: Vicki Tyley
He pulled into the empty parking spot next to Megan’s Nissan Pulsar
hoping – though not expecting – to see her waiting for him. Cursing under his
breath, he clambered out of his car and surveyed the area. Not a soul in any
direction. Besides the few parked cars, the whole place appeared deserted. An
industrial ghost town.
The desolate brick warehouse Megan described was directly across the
road. There was no sign of activity in or around the building, but more
importantly, there was no sign of Megan.
Armed with the wheel wrench from his car, he crept down the side of
the old brick warehouse, conscious of his footsteps crunching the gravel.
He rounded the corner, the wrench slippery in his sweaty palms, and
spotted a couple of concrete steps about a third of the way down the back. His
assumption that they would lead to a door was proved right, but one look at the
padlocks told him Megan hadn’t gained access that way. Where the hell was she?
In that instant, the bushes growing up against the back wall beside
him moved. If he didn’t know what scaring the living daylights out of someone
meant before, he certainly did then.
“Fucking hell! What are you trying to do to me?” He thumped his
chest. “Kill me?”
“How do you think I felt?” Megan snapped as she pushed her way out
of the foliage. “I don’t normally dive into bushes for no particular reason.”
She brushed herself off and looked up. “Okay, okay, I should’ve stayed in the
car. But you’re here now. I’ve done a recce and this door is our best bet.” She
nodded at the wheel wrench raised defensively above his head.
He lowered it slowly to hang by his side. “We should wait.”
“Wait for what?”
“The police.”
“If you called the police, why aren’t they already here?” She
paused. “Or is your car faster?” she added sarcastically.
He had to admit he’d expected the police to be there if not before,
then shortly after he arrived. What if Neville had made an error when he was
passing on the address details? He reached into his pocket for his BlackBerry.
Megan put her hand out. “No, let’s not waste any more time. If
they’re still not here by the time we’re inside, then we can think about
ringing again.” She picked up a jagged rock about the size of a grapefruit from
the ground. “Now help me get this door open.”
It took the two of them using rocks, the wheel wrench and brute
force nine or ten precious minutes to break off the antiquated padlocks, and
then another couple to push the door ajar enough for them to squeeze through.
Greg went first.
His eyes took a moment to adjust to the gloom. He shivered, the
frigid air inside the cavernous warehouse chilling him to the bone. Pinching
his nostrils against the tickly musty smell, he scanned the large open space. A
dozen or so broken pallets, a stack of newspapers, a rusting bicycle minus its
front wheel, a heap of what appeared to be old paint tins in the otherwise
empty space, gave no hint to what the warehouse may have been used for in its
heyday. At the far end were two closed doors that Greg assumed probably led out
to front offices. In the far corner, jutting into the warehouse was another
office or room.
Megan stood next to him, so close he could almost feel the warmth of
her body. He glanced at her. She nodded and edged forward.
Tightening his grip on the wheel wrench, he started across the
concrete floor, his feet stirring up flurries of dust. He held out an arm,
keeping Megan safely behind him.
They’d almost reached the far wall when Megan stopped him. Her
fingers dug into his arm. “Did you hear that?” she asked in a strangled
whisper.
He froze, his ears straining for the slightest sound. “Hear what?”
“Sounds like a mewing kitten. Listen.” She released his arm and took
off, heading straight for the room in the corner to the right of them.
He followed in her wake, inhaling the dust kicked up by her feet.
She pressed her ear up hard against the faded and patchy brown door, the look
on her face one of intense concentration.
Greg felt the inside of his nose twitch, but was powerless to stop
it. What resulted was not some barely audible achoo, but a loud thunderous
sneeze that echoed around the warehouse. Then he sneezed again. And again.
“Shush!” Megan scowled at him as if he had sneezed deliberately.
He took a moment to wipe his nose and then joined her at the door.
Then he heard it. A faint plaintive cry much like, as Megan had suggested, that
of a mewing kitten. How did a cat come to be trapped in that room?
Megan snatched the wheel wrench from his hands, catching him
unawares, and like a woman possessed, attacked the door. She smashed through
the hollow door as if it was made of balsa, punching out a hole she could look
through.
“Oh my God! Oh my God! Oh my God! Oh my God!” Shrieking, she set
upon the door with even more ferocity, almost wiping out Greg in the process.
He yelled at her, but she wasn’t listening. Something she’d seen
inside that room had set her off, but what? The way she was brandishing the
wrench, he wasn’t game to try to get close enough to see for himself.
The wrench landed with a loud clank on the concrete. She was
through, the door a gaping hole of splinters.
He stepped through it after her. He gagged, the heavy fetid air
choking him. Megan, still chanting and seemingly oblivious to the smell, was
hunched over what looked to be a pile of old moldy blankets on a single bed.
The bare concrete floor was littered with empty plastic bottles. White plastic
shopping bags holding goodness knows what sat atop the two chairs in the
corner.
With his hand covering his nose and mouth, he edged over to Megan.
It wasn’t until he was almost on top of the bed he saw the woman. The only part
of her not buried under the blankets was her gaunt face. Vacant glassy eyes
stared out at him.
He’d only met Brenda the once, but her face had been splashed across
the newspapers and on the TV for weeks now. Still, he would never have recognized
the semi-conscious woman as that person, but Megan obviously did.
Greg stepped back, reaching into his pocket for his BlackBerry. His
hands shook as he called first for an ambulance and then the police. When he
was finished, he returned to Megan’s side.
Megan sat on the side of the squalid bed, stroking Brenda’s brow and
sobbing. Brenda whimpered and then closed her eyes.
Wishing there was more he could to do to help, Greg gave Megan’s
shoulder a gentle squeeze.
She turned to him, her wet face contorted in anguish. “She’s going
to be all right, isn’t she?”
Praying he wasn’t giving her false hope, he nodded. “The ambulance
is on its way.”
The ambulance? That suddenly gave him something to think about. How
were the paramedics going to know where to find them? How were they going to
get Brenda out? The back door was jammed. He and Megan had managed to jemmy it
open wide enough for them to squeeze through, but there was no way a stretcher
would fit through that small gap.
Not sure Megan had heard him before, he repeated himself. He ducked
back out through the hole in the door and headed for the stuck back door.
He almost broke his shoulder against the door, but all of a sudden,
it gave, opening wide and tumbling him on to the concrete inside. He picked
himself up, dusting off his hands and clothes, and went to check on Megan and
Brenda.
Planting his hands on either side of the door, he stuck his head
through the gap. Megan remained seated on the bed edge, crooning reassurances
as she caressed her seriously ill friend’s face. He stood watching, trying hard
not to think about the ordeal his sister must have endured. Had she too been
kept like an animal in a cage waiting to die? Had he brought her here?
Greg swung away from the door, his stomach churning.
One fact he couldn’t get away from was that his obsession, as Megan
called it, with Lawson Green had been justified. That bastard would wish he had
never been born, if Greg ever got his hands on him.
Megan stood by the
hospital bed gazing down at her friend’s sleeping form. Brenda lay on her back,
the fresh white sheet covering her chest tucked under her arms. An intravenous
drip attached to the back of her hand administered fluids and electrolytes to
her dehydrated body.
A few more days and it would’ve been Brenda’s funeral she’d have
been attending, not her bedside. The few bottles of water her captor provided
her with had been nowhere near enough to stave off dehydration. As each day
passed, she’d have become weaker and less able to help herself. Death hadn’t
been far away.
The police caught up with Lawson Green trying to board a plane to
Perth, less than four hours after Brenda had been found. From all accounts,
after the police arrested him, he’d rambled on incessantly about how he loved
Brenda and how she wasn’t supposed to die. On his last visit to the warehouse,
he’d found Brenda totally unresponsive, and panicked thinking he had killed
her.
The police cut the interview short as Lawson became increasingly
hysterical and more incoherent. Since then, Megan had discovered they’d charged
him with unlawful abduction and were holding him in a secure psychiatric
hospital.
I hope they throw away the key, she thought, pulling up a chair
beside the bed and sitting down. Brenda’s pale almost transparent eyelashes
flickered, a low moan escaping from between her bloodless lips. Megan gave
Brenda’s hand a gentle squeeze. Her friend’s face relaxed, her breathing
settling.
Megan slowed her own breathing in sync with the rhythmic rise and
fall of Brenda’s chest. Sterilized air filled her nostrils and lungs. Closing
her eyes, she dropped her forehead down on to the bed.
“Hey, sleepyhead.”
Megan sat bolt upright. “Hey, yourself.”
“The doctor says I can go home in a day or two.”
“Really?” Megan hadn’t expected they would let her out so soon.
Brenda nodded. “Two conditions, though. One I have to have someone
look in on me from time to time, and two, I have to have at least three meals
of hospital food.”
“There’s no question about it, you’re staying with me, but…” Megan
paused, drawing out the moment. “I don’t know what you’re going to do about the
hospital food.”
For a few giggly minutes, they discussed a hundred and one uses for
hospital food. From compost, to plugging holes, to feeding the dog, anything
but actually eat it. However, their merriment was short-lived.
The corners of Brenda’s lips dropped. “Any news on Lawson?”
Megan was at a loss to understand Brenda’s concern. “After
everything he did to you…”
Brenda’s hand lifted from the bed. “I’ve been thinking about it, and
I don’t believe he actually meant me harm. I can remember him dancing around
the bed telling me over and over it was for my own good. It was like he was
high on drugs or something. In his mind, he was protecting me. I know it
doesn’t make sense, but that’s how it was.”
“For God’s sake, the police caught him getting on a plane to Perth.
He was going to leave you there to die.”
Brenda gave a somber nod and then turned her gaze to the ceiling.
“Perhaps, but you weren’t there.”
Megan couldn’t believe what she was hearing. Brenda was defending
Lawson. It was on the tip of her tongue to retort, but instead she said, “You
get some rest and I’ll be back later. What clothes do you want me to bring in?”
Brenda pepped up as she ticked off her fingers: her black boots, her
stonewash jeans and the big woolly jumper from the top of her wardrobe. With
that and a promise from Brenda that she’d give the goulash and mashed potatoes
on that day’s menu a go, Megan was on her way.
Her hand was on the door when Brenda spoke.
“He’s not the killer, you know.”
Megan turned slowly. “How can you be so sure?”
“I’m still alive, aren’t I?”
“Yes, but—”
“No buts.” Brenda smiled and gave a little wave, the clear IV tubing
dancing on the hook above her bed.
Lost for words, Megan shook her head and pushed through the door,
stepping into the ward corridor. Brenda’s comments made no sense. Not one iota.
The ordeal had clearly twisted her mind.
“Knock-knock. I
hope I’m not interrupting.”
Greg looked up from the superannuation proposal he’d been slaving
over for the best part of an hour. “Not at all.” He lay his pen down and
beckoned Megan in.
She dropped into the closest visitor’s chair. “I can’t stay long.
I’m just on my way to the hospital. Can you believe Brenda’s coming home
today?” Megan sounded upbeat and the spark that’d been missing from her eyes
had returned.
Greg couldn’t be happier for Megan that Brenda had turned up, if not
unharmed, at least alive. And he did take some comfort from the fact that
Lawson was locked up in a place where he couldn’t hurt anyone else. Regardless
of all that, nothing could bring back his sister.