The Girls Who Disappeared(29)

‘Of course he isn’t. Wesley adores you.’ Her mother doesn’t take her eyes off the TV. But she reaches out, clasps her daughter’s hand and gives it an uncharacteristically affectionate squeeze.





17



Jenna


I make sure to stay a good distance behind Dale’s Volvo but not too far so that I lose him, which is harder than it looks on TV. It’s started to rain again and Dale’s brake-lights blur against the dark night. He’s continuing on to the Devil’s Corridor and I follow. He doesn’t take the left turning to the cabins but keeps on the main A-road and I follow suit. Where is he going? He said the man was found dead in Stafferbury so he shouldn’t be going that far. Up ahead his indicator winks and he takes the next left. My heart quickens. That’s interesting: there must be another way into the forest. I take the left too, careful to slow right down so that my headlights aren’t visible in his rear-view mirror. The track is windier and longer than the one that leads to my cabin and I worry that I’ve lost Dale. I drive slowly over the bumpy terrain. I switch to my side-lights so as not to draw attention to myself but I can hardly see.

After a few more minutes I notice that Dale has pulled into a kind of lay-by on the right, next to a police car. I stop and turn off my engine as I wait, hidden by the thicket of trees. I’m too far away to see Dale but I hear the slam of a car door. I leave it a while before I turn the ignition back on and then I drive very slowly into the lay-by and pull up next to Dale’s car. I plan to be quick, just to see where Dale has gone, and I’ll be back to my car before he notices it. I don’t want to risk him seeing me and annoying him because then he might not be so willing to help me. The ground is spongy as I step out but at least it’s stopped raining for now. From deep within the bowels of the forest I hear the hoot of an owl and I’m momentarily paralysed by fear. This is mad. What am I doing? I should just go back to the cabin and wait until I hear from Dale. But patience isn’t my strong point. I have to be doing something proactive. And what kind of a journalist would I be if I just stayed behind?

I continue walking, my mobile’s torch lighting the way. The track is narrow, more like a trench, and mud splashes up the back of my jeans and seeps into the soles of my flimsy fashionable boots. I don’t know if this is the way Dale went but I’m assuming so as it’s the main path. I concentrate on the way ahead, trying not to feel freaked out by the sounds of the countryside and the dark pressing in on me from all sides, except for the arc of light where I’m pointing my phone. Eventually I see the clearing up ahead. The same clearing I was in earlier today. Bile rises at the back of my throat when I notice a hub of activity near Ralph’s caravan: a white tent, two policemen erecting tape around it. There are flashes of torchlight and I can just about see someone I assume to be Dale heading into the tent with a woman in a forensic suit who is carrying a metal suitcase.

I hide behind a tree trying to catch my breath. The snap of a twig makes me freeze. The back of my neck prickles, as if someone has blown on it. I turn slowly, expecting to see someone behind me. Dale perhaps, furious, even though I’m sure I saw him go into the tent. But I can’t see anyone. I’d better get back to the car. I need to keep Dale onside if I want him to confide in me about what’s happened here tonight.

I make my way down the track, almost stumbling in my desperation to reach the safety of my car. Crime tape. Police. Forensics.

Ralph was murdered.

And the person responsible could still be here, in the forest.

Watching me.

As if on cue another twig snaps underfoot and I gasp in fright. There’s no denying it now. Someone is behind me. I can feel their presence. I don’t turn around. Instead I break into a run, slipping and sliding down the mud track. A brush to my shoulder. A hand trying to grab me. I scream, my legs buckling beneath me. A flash of pain to my head and then everything goes black.





18





I can hear a young child crying. It’s grating and insistent. Is it Finn? Finn …

Where am I? There is a shooting pain in my head, and when my eyes flicker open I see trees, so many trees, soaring upwards, their dark branches bobbing in the wind, the pine needles pressed together and eclipsing the sky. And then I remember. I’m in the forest. I’m lying on my back in the mud. I was being followed. The back of my head is throbbing. Someone attacked me. They could still be here. I have to get up. I need to get out of here and back to my car.

My hands sink beneath the mud as I try to winch myself up, and my whole body feels weak. Panic sets in at the thought my attacker is still here, waiting. My legs flail as I try to get a foothold on the ground but I manage to pull myself up and scramble to my knees. I need help. I look behind me, half expecting to see the perpetrator standing over me, but nobody’s there.

‘Hello?’ I hear a familiar voice from between the trees, then see a flicker of torchlight, bleaching the ground in front of me. It’s Dale, thank God. As he comes closer I see the disapproval on his face. ‘Jenna? What are you doing here?’ I’m still on my hands and knees and he bends down to help me to my feet. ‘What happened? Are you okay?’ I’m covered with mud – I can feel it in my hair and soaking into the back of my jeans. He’s still holding on to my elbow. ‘Did you fall?’

I feel like such an idiot. ‘I … I’m sorry. I wanted to see what was going on but then, on the way back to the car, someone was following me. They … they hit me …’ I must look a right idiot standing here in my mud-stained city clothes. What was I thinking?