She must have fallen down. She must've fallen into the long grass. Yes . . . yes! That was surely a much more logical explanation than the other one pounding in the back of his head:
alien abduction
. Well, he was an avid
Doctor Who
fan. He was sprinting now. Sprinting to the spot where he'd seen that last curious flick of hair before she vanished.
But just as he got there, the ground beneath his feet dropped away and, flailing frantically with his arms, Owen felt himself falling.
The seductive Mr B:
Pale blue chambray shirt, ironed to within an inch of its
life (Ralph Lauren sale)
Red cashmere sweater tied over shoulders (sample sale)
Dark blue jeans (Armani sale)
Brown belt, brown ankle boots (discounted at
his cousin's shop)
Sunglasses in hair (Armani sale)
Generous application of aftershave (Acqua di Parma)
Total est. cost: £150
'How do you like my vroooooom?'
Mr B drove a bright red Maserati, which made Annie smile because it brought Ed's words to mind: 'Mr Flash in a big flash car promising to keep you in handbags and posh knickers for ever.'
Annie stepped as carefully as she could through the door being held gallantly open for her and then sank gratefully down into the leather passenger's seat. Mr B settled in comfortably beside her. When he fired the engine up, he revved on the accelerator and there was a throaty vroooom of power.
He turned his head, met her eyes and raised his eyebrows questioningly, which she suspected meant, '
How
do you like my vroooooom?'
'Very nice,' she said.
She had already decided how he was going to drive – just a little too fast with too much braking at corners and junctions. But as they set off through the business park, she realized she was going to have to re-evaluate. Mr B drove at a steady speed, carefully, almost professionally.
He flipped on a CD and something smooth and smoky snaked into the car. Ah yes, he was definitely a big seducer. But seducers got such a bad press, she thought. They did always know how to look after you. Well, at least at the beginning, even if they let you down at the end. But it was nice to enjoy just a little taste of the beginning. And she was a grown-up, she could do that without hurting anyone.
'Who is at the villa with you?'
Annie listed her children (Mr B giving the appropriate cries of disbelief when she gave their ages), then her sister and niece, then gave Connor a properly swanky introduction, explaining that he was famous in Britain. Finally, suspecting that this would put an end to all the Mr B's seductive attentions, Annie told him, 'And Ed, my boyfriend.'
'Boyfriend?' Mr B asked.
'
Ragazzo
,' Annie clarified, relieved that the Italian word had come back to her.
'Un
ragazzo
?' Mr B asked with a slow smile. 'Signorina Valentina!' he made a tutting noise but didn't stop smiling. An urgent trilling took his attention away from her and he pulled a tiny mobile from his trouser pocket.
As she heard him jabbering at high speed, Annie took out her phone and tried dialling Ed's number again. But she just got through to his voicemail.
'I'm on my way back,' she told him, 'I'll be there by about half-past five . . . and I'm bringing Mr B . . .' she wasn't sure what more to say about this, so she just finished with 'see you', and clicked off.
Annie listened to Mr B's animated mobile conversation and it was safe to say that she couldn't make out a single word. Well, OK, he seemed to repeat the word 'commercio' a lot and she had a feeling that this was beeeeziness. She wondered if Mr B was blowing out the date he had surely lined up for this Saturday night.
The car turned from the main road and began to twist along the narrower country road towards the villa. Darkness was falling quickly and already the sky was an inky blue with just a strip of gold low down on the horizon. As they rounded a corner, the headlights Mr B had just switched on swept over a field.
Annie's attention was immediately caught by a tall, thin woman in white shorts and a bikini top running across the field. The woman seemed to be shouting and waving her arms, and even at this distance Annie could see she was very upset. A moment later Annie registered who she was looking at. She lurched forward and shrieked at Mr B, 'Stop the car! Stop! That's my sister!'
Quickly he applied the brakes and the car came to a standstill.
Annie flung open the door and hurried towards the field, calling out to Dinah. Mr B got out as well but stood by the car, trying to work out what on earth was going on.
'Dinah!' Annie called, 'Dinah, it's me! What's wrong?'
Now that Annie was in the field and her eyes had adjusted to the dim evening light, she could see that Connor was there as well. He was about 200 metres or so behind Dinah, carrying a long stick, which he was using to swish at the grass.
'We've lost the children!' Dinah screamed back at her.
'What?' Annie screamed back, unable to take in what this meant.
'Billie and Owen! We can't find them!' came Dinah's terrified reply, her hands falling helplessly to her sides.
As Annie ran towards her sister, her mind briefly registered that Dinah was the colour of an overripe strawberry before filing it away as unimportant information.
OK . . . Annie was trying to think as clearly as she could.
'Where are Lana and Ed?' she asked, but before Dinah could reply, Annie went on: 'what were Billie and Owen doing?' She still didn't feel as if she'd taken this news in. She was too buffered by surprise and pro-secco even to feel properly frightened yet.
'Lana's looking all around the garden and staying near the house, in case they come back, Ed's doing the field behind the house. Annie,' Dinah couldn't help asking hopelessly, 'where are they?'
'What were they doing? Were they playing?' Annie asked. She was almost beside Dinah now, hadn't noticed Mr B striding through the field behind her.
'Ed let them walk back. A ten-minute walk. He last saw them at four o'clock,' Dinah was shaking, her voice flying up and down, totally uncontrollable.
Annie put both arms round Dinah and held her tightly, 'We'll find them,' she said, as steadily as she could.
'Owen!' Connor boomed out into the field.
'The children are lost?' Mr B was catching on.
Then Connor called Dinah over, and both Annie and Mr B followed. There wasn't much time for formal introductions, because when they reached Connor, they could see he was holding out a small pair of pink pants.
'Annie? Are these Billie's?' he asked hopefully, as if this could be a good sign.
Dinah started to scream and wail.
'Dinah, hang on in there,' Connor told her, calmly.
'We'll find them, babes,' Annie tried to reassure her, holding her tightly across the shoulders, but a very anxious feeling was taking hold of her heart now.
'Didn't Ed say Billie needed the toilet?' Connor reminded them. 'Well, maybe that's why pants were hanging on this branch. To dry off . . .' He pointed to the tree from which he'd unhooked the knickers.
Dinah's shallow breathing seemed to calm just slightly as she hoped that this explanation could be the right one.
'Maybe Billie did a wee and then they went off to play,' Connor continued. 'I'm sure they're fine, just a bit disorientated.'
'They've been here,' Annie said and squeezed Dinah. 'We're looking in the right place. We just need to spread out and make lots of noise. I'm going to go down there. Maybe I can climb that big tree and get a view from the top.'
'I'll go this way, Connor can go over there . . . Ed's phoned the police,' Dinah told her. 'They're going to be here soon.'
Annie began to march purposefully down the side of the hill in the direction of the big tree. When she was halfway down, she stopped, took a deep, deep breath, put her hands up to her mouth and roared 'O-WEN!' at the top of her powerful voice.
She listened, straining her ears, hearing only crickets, the rumble of a car passing miles away, and the breeze stirring the grass all around her. But there, so very, very faintly she could hardly even be sure of it, was something else, a ghost of a cry . . . She began to run towards it. She thought she had heard just the slightest trace of her son shouting back, 'Muuuuuum!'
'
Over here!
' Annie bellowed at the top of her voice again, this time hoping to attract Dinah, Connor and Mr B as well.
'
Over here!
' she shrieked again.
Now, as best she could in her fake snake Italian heels, Annie was racing, stumbling and tripping towards the bottom of the hill.
'
O-wen!
' she paused to yell at the top of her voice again, desperate to hear something back, so she could reassure herself that it really was him.
'Muuuuum!'
There it was, coming back at her, clearer than before. She wasn't imagining it! It
was
him.
'Thank God! Thank God! Owen . . . Owen,' she heard herself saying under her breath as she hurried on.
'Mum! Watch out!
' Owen called. His voice was close now, close enough for her to be able to see him surely, but she couldn't. She slowed down and looked carefully all around her, then up into the branches of the tree, but there was no sign of him.
'
Owen?
' she shouted, frightened again. 'Where are you?'
'In a deep hole,' came his reply.
Slowly she began to walk forward in the direction of the voice.
'Have you got Billie?' Annie asked and realized she was close to tears. The thought of Owen not having Billie was just too scary to even think about.
Before Owen could reply, Annie was parting the tall, dry grass to reveal a gaping black hole in the ground. Crouching down, she leaned over and called, 'Owen?'
About nine or ten feet below she could just about make out her son sitting with his legs spread out in front of him. With a leap of fright, she saw Billie's dress and legs down at the bottom of the hole too . . . Billie's head was on Owen's lap.
'Oh God!' Annie exclaimed, 'Is Billie hurt?'
'No, she just fell asleep,' Owen called up. He sounded incredibly matter-of-fact, considering. 'But I've hurt my ankle, otherwise I'd have tried to climb out.'
Annie leaned in as close as she could to take a look at her lovely boy. They smiled at each other in happy relief.
'Hello, Mum!' Owen said warmly, 'I've been waiting for you. You're always late, but I knew you'd show up eventually.'
'Have you any idea how frightened we've all been?'
'I was pretty frightened at the thought of spending the night in here,' Owen admitted, 'especially with Billie. She screams a lot. I was glad when she fell asleep.'
'It's a shame she didn't keep screaming, we'd have found you a lot sooner.'
Owen was holding something in his hand. Casually, he bit into it.
'Are you eating?' Annie asked with amazement.
'Yeah.'
'What?'
'Some pears . . . we went pear-picking with a friend of mine. We met her on the road and she took us all around . . .'