Finding Grace(84)

Nothing is making sense. I just want to get Grace and go home. I feel sick and dizzy with the horrible feeling that they don’t intend letting us go. I wish I hadn’t come here alone, I wish…

‘I loved Stefan because he is my brother.’ Her voice shakes. ‘Was my brother, until you took his will to live.’

‘What?’ My mouth is so dry I have to force out the words. ‘He told me his sister died… she had leukaemia.’

‘He told you a lot of other things you just blindly believed too, Lucinda,’ Angela remarks.

She’s even closer to Grace now, pressing the knife up close to her throat. My daughter is not crying, not showing any recognition of the fact I’m even here. She’s very close to collapsing.

‘Ever lost anyone you love so much it feels like a piece of you has been torn away?’ Angela taunts me.

‘No!’ I jerk forward but Rhonda holds me back. I try to shrug her off but her grip is firm.

‘Angela will do it, she will stab her,’ Rhonda whispers in my ear. ‘Stay calm or you’ll get your daughter killed.’

Stay calm? My legs feel like melting wax, as if they’ll not hold me up much longer and a bubble of panic is rising fast in my chest.

‘What do you want?’ I shriek.

‘A hundred grand. In cash. That’s what we want,’ Rhonda says slowly. ‘That’s what Angela wants, anyway. But me… I want something different.’

‘Anything,’ I whisper. ‘Anything! I just want my baby back.’

‘Sweet. But you see, you need to suffer, too. Suffer like I’ve suffered all these years. You need to experience the empty wasteland of utter loss, Lucinda.’

Rhonda applies pressure to the knife and Grace cries out in pain.

‘For God’s sake!’

I try to leap forward but Rhonda pulls me back and I feel the ultra-sharp point of a knife pierce through my thin cotton top and into my skin. I cry out, stop struggling.

A wave of hopelessness engulfs me. I feel like I’m drowning, I can’t keep my head above water.

I’m going down… and then I remember. I remember the one thing that nearly destroyed me, can save us both.

‘You can’t hurt Grace,’ I whisper. ‘She’s Stefan’s daughter. She’s your flesh and blood, Rhonda.’

I feel her freeze at my back and Angela looks like someone hit her with a stun gun.

‘She’s lying!’ Angela yells and Grace screams as the knife blade bites into her again.

‘I’m telling the truth.’ I half turn so I can see Rhonda and she doesn’t force my face away. ‘Stefan came to Nottingham and found me again, ten years ago. He raped me.’ I’m speaking so fast I’m not sure I’m making any sense. ‘I found out I was pregnant but I never told him. I thought he was finished, after the car accident… I… I… I just wanted to get on with my life. I thought he’d go to the police about your supposed death, so I just tried to put it behind me.’

I want to say how much I hated him. How I would never give him the satisfaction of knowing he had a daughter… but now is hardly the time.

Rhonda pulls the knife away and steps forward in front of me, staring into Grace’s vacant face.

I begin to babble desperately. ‘See her nose, the fullness of her top lip? Tell me that’s not your brother! He’s still alive, Rhonda… through Grace.’

She believes it. I can see a beam of new hope shining through the dull misery of her face.

‘You’re her auntie, Rhonda,’ I sob. ‘You have to protect her. Let me take her home.’

‘Don’t fall for it!’ Angela growls. ‘She’s lying! Stefan would’ve known if he’d got a kid, he would’ve—’

‘You were different to the others in his eyes,’ Rhonda says softly. ‘I don’t know why, but that’s why I hated you so much.’

‘She was no different,’ Angela snaps, shoving at the knife as Grace screams out again. ‘She was always just another one of his tarts. It’s all lies, you silly bitch!’

‘Get her away from my daughter!’ I scream at Rhonda, suddenly full of fury. ‘She’s Stefan’s child!’

‘Don’t get any closer,’ Rhonda warns Angela.

‘What are you doing?’ Angela shrieks. ‘Don’t believe her lies… think of the money.’

‘The last time I saw you, I thought Stefan had killed you,’ I whisper. ‘You don’t have to do this, Rhonda. It’s not too late to make a fresh start.’

Her eyes brim with tears and her expression is wretched.

‘I wish I had died that day.’

Grace is quiet and terrified. I’m desperate to hold her, to check she’s OK.

‘Shut up, you stupid bitch,’ Angela spits and jabs the knife hard into Grace’s shoulder. My daughter screams and I dash forward… but Rhonda gets there before me.

I watch in horror as she snatches the knife and plunges it into Angela’s neck.

I rush to Grace and she buries her face in my chest as I turn to protect her from the gruesome scene before us.

Suddenly, I lose my balance as something hard thuds into me from behind.

‘Jeffery!’ I yelp, rigid with shock.