Where the Missing Go(78)

And Lily knew Nancy. She’s been looking after that house, much longer than I first thought. So did Dr Heath know Nancy too? He’s about Jay’s – I mean Nicholls’s – age, too.

And then there is Sophie’s older man, picking her up from school. Someone who she’d trust. Someone we all trusted, maybe. The dark car, that Danny saw Sophie getting into. The bonnet in front of me is blue, navy blue, and we’re slowing now, so we don’t miss the entrance to the deer park – it’s a sharp turn into the car park. And I’m thinking, Dr Heath must be what, early forties? So he’s about Nancy’s age too.

It’s too incredible.

And now we’re here, turning into the car park to the entrance to the deer park, it’s nearly empty now, just the odd car at the far end.

My phone’s still in my lap.

I keep my head up, like I’m still watching the road, and cast down my eyes. And I start tapping in numbers, not moving; surreptitiously. Like I don’t know; like there’s no reason I can’t make a call, I’m not entertaining this ridiculous idea—

‘Who are you calling?’ His voice is flat.

‘I just want to let my sister know where I’ve gone; she’ll be looking for me, you know, and you took the note I left—’

‘Give it to me.’

‘Just one second—’

‘I said, give it to me,’ and my fingers are shaking now, I can’t get the buttons right, it’s him it’s him it’s him—

The blow throws my skull against the side window, the glass smacking against the side of my head. I slump forward over my seatbelt, black spots jumping before my eyes. I can hear myself wheezing. The phone’s slipping out of my hands, now slack, my eyes closing, so I feel, not see him, scrabble at my lap to grab it. And then too quickly it all recedes, the world going dark.





44


My head hurts. I open my eyes. The floor is flat and brown. A dirt floor, gritty against my cheek, covered in a slurry of grey and white. Bird droppings, years and years of them. They must have been nesting in here. There is something wet on my bottom lip, warm and metallic.

Nausea wells up from my stomach. Should I shut my eyes, pretend that I am still out? But then I wouldn’t see him coming. No, keep them slitted, like I can hardly open them.

There are feet in front of me now – shiny leather shoes. I can just focus on the tips.

‘I know you’re awake.’ He crouches down and puts a cool hand on the pulse in my wrist. ‘You’re fine, Kate.’ He straightens up, and walks away. ‘Stop it. I mean it.’

My eyes track up now, from his shoes, to what he is holding.

I lift my head, a couple of inches from the floor, then slowly fold myself round and lean against the wall, feeling it rough through my clothes. My face is still throbbing, my cheekbone is hot. I put one hand to it, checking myself.

The knife is silver and vicious. It doesn’t fit in the hand of this man, in his shirt and tie, his smart work clothes.

I keep my eyes on him, but widen my field of vision to take in the rough walls and the dirt floor, the door behind him. It’s cold, a damp chill coming up from the ground, and the bare light overhead is dirty with cobwebs. I’m in an outhouse, not much more than a room with a roof. I’ve seen them in the deer park, buildings from its farming past.

I need to say it out loud now. I want to scream it to the rooftops.

‘It was you.’ My voice is cracked, like I’ve woken from sleep. ‘You had her, all this time.’

He smiles, showing his teeth. ‘Bit late, but you got there in the end’ – the knife moves in his hand, a silver gleam under the light – ‘though I’m afraid it is too late, for you.’

Dr Heath. Nick Heath, here, in front of me. I still can’t compute it. My doctor, the man I told my fears to, who prescribed my pills, gave me an ear, so sympathetic. But now his energy’s different; the mild facade gone, something keyed up and sharp about him. The person underneath finally showing.

And that knife … it’s a kitchen knife, long and sharp. But I know, absolutely, that he would use it.

Unsteadily, I get up, using the wall as a support. The park empties at dusk, even the dog walkers clearing out. He must have left the car nearby, then carried me the short distance to this place.

‘They’re coming, you know,’ I say, some instinct kicking in. ‘They’ll be looking for me, even now. They’ll have noticed, they’ll be worried. You should let me go, we can still sort this out …’ But the panic rises as I remember: even if anyone was looking, we didn’t take my car. He said we should take his.

‘Oh, really? Who’s looking, then? The police?’ He tilts his head, his expression almost sympathetic. I am back in the surgery: him listening to me, his professional face on. ‘Your family? Because I don’t think so, Kate. I don’t think anybody is looking for you.’

Behind him, a faint light is showing under the closed wooden door. The lock’s a simple latch. If I can make it past him – past that knife. Or there’s that smaller one, to my left, standing ajar – no, that must be to another room, or cupboard, I’d just be trapped.

So it’s the door behind him. My whole body is tensing now, ready to run, to fight—

‘Don’t try it.’ He lifts his arm just a little.