Dark Place to Hide (3 page)

‘It’s not like this is just
you
. He wants kids just as much, doesn’t he? You’ve always said it’s your big shared dream.’

Diane blinks into the distance. ‘It is…yes, it is.’

‘Are you worried about how he’ll react?’

‘No, of course not.’ She knows it comes out a little too quickly.

30 July – 7.50pm

Alexa’s face falls when I open the door.

‘I thought she’d be here.’

‘She is. Well, she was. She’s just popped out. She’ll be back shortly.’ Alexa seems to have a lot of bright light behind her; I want to shield my eyes.

‘You’re drunk,’ she says, her mouth sagging with disgust. She stomps inside, uninvited. Her white jeans are unironed and she wears a camisole top that leaves her belly button on display.

‘It’s been a difficult time. Diane’s gone to get painkillers from the village store.’

‘For you, I presume?’ My self-conscious grimace gives away the answer. ‘But that’s miles away. She’ll be ages.’ Alexa sits on the arm of the sofa, swinging a leg, and presses keys on her phone. She always has it in her hand when she’s in my presence, as if speaking to me is only ever a prelude to doing something else far more important.

‘It’s not miles. Well – it’s nearly two. She took the car, for once.’

Alexa stiffens. ‘She never drives.’ Her shoulders undulate like sand dunes as she hitches up the thin straps on her top that keep slipping down.

‘I know. She insisted.’ I know how you feel about driving, Dee, and I would never have asked. I was quite happy to suffer with my self-induced headache. I deserve it.

‘But she’s taking sedatives.’

‘She’s stopped. She’s keeping hold of them just in case.’

‘When did she last take one?’

I’m used to interrogations like this. For your sake, Dee, I always try to go along with her to avoid friction. ‘I don’t know.’ I glance at the clock on the wall, but it seems to be shifting around. ‘Last night?’

‘I can’t believe you let her get behind the wheel – after all she’s been through.’

‘She seemed…’

Alexa is swimming in front of me now and I want her to go away. She’s been over several times since the miscarriage. She doesn’t make much effort to hide the fact she doesn’t like me, but I do my utmost to make her welcome. I really do. But she’s not like you. She’s only ever been the palest shadow of you.

Alexa looks down at her phone, gets up and turns to the door. A muscle at the back of her arm bulges – one I never knew human beings had. She’s superfit. It shouldn’t surprise me now that Alexa’s competing regularly in Ironman triathlons. How anyone can get excited by swimming nearly two-and-a-half miles, cycling another 112, then rounding off the day with a full marathon is beyond me. But then yours is, after all, a family of extremes.

‘I’ve got to go,’ she says.

‘You’re not going to wait? She’ll only be a few minutes. She won’t want to miss you.’

Alexa’s phone has given her some urgent new mission and she’s already reaching for the door handle. She doesn’t say goodbye and charges down the path to her car.

I look at my watch, but there seem to be too many hands floating around the dial. Nevertheless, it feels like more time has passed than I expected. Shouldn’t you be back by now? My mind tracks back to our conversation yesterday about the baby. Was your reaction genuine? I pick up the TV
listings in search of a distraction. I don’t want to open up the possibility that you didn’t tell me the truth, that you were protecting me by being primed with a lie, although your reaction was so immediate, it’s hard for me to believe you were deceiving me. I drop the magazine; I’m too unsettled to take any of it in.

Even though Dr Swann insisted my tests were conclusive, I searched the infertility forums online late last night, just in case I could prove him wrong. But there were no success stories; no miracles for men with my condition, or at least none documented. I keep hearing your words:
One must have slipped through
. I must be the exception.

If that is the case, I can’t help feeling wholeheartedly cheated. Our one chance and it has slipped away. The chances of it happening again naturally…well…are virtually nil. Of course, I’ve started the treatment, but I haven’t told you yet about the success rates. Sixty per cent at best, for activating pregnancy, but a third of these are lost through miscarriage. It’s not a rosy picture. I don’t want to make things any worse than they already are.

As I poured the juice for breakfast, I looked up. You were standing at the bottom of the stairs in pyjamas speckled with dancing pink fish.

‘Explain it to me again,’ you said. Your buckled forehead told me you’d been worrying about this instead of getting proper rest. I pressed you to sit down and laid a blanket over your knees, even though it was toasty in the sitting room with the morning sun.

‘You remember when I had sarcoidosis?’

‘That was ages ago.’

‘Eighteen months.’

Confusion nipped the skin between your eyebrows. ‘But, that was some sort of virus – wasn’t it?’

‘It usually affects the lungs and skin, but everyone reacts differently. What we didn’t know was that it can affect testosterone production.’

‘Oh…’ The sound was clean and simple, like the response of a child.

‘And too many of the sperm are deformed or have poor mobility.’ My mouth twisted with shame at bringing these far-reaching deficiencies into your life. ‘It’s why my libido has been a bit iffy in the last year or so.’

You leaned back looking exhausted.

At some stage, you’re going to ask me how long we have to wait before my treatment makes a difference. The specialist says the gonadotropin injections won’t have any effect for six months and possibly long after that, if I have adverse reactions. I didn’t tell you that I’m already having side effects; my appetite has dropped in the past two weeks and I’ve had two nose bleeds at work. He told me that in rare cases the side effects – blood-clotting, fluid retention in the chest – can be fatal. He had to tell me these things. I’m hopeful, of course I am, about this coming right for us, but I’m not banking on it.

8.30pm

Another cluster of bricks tumble down the fireplace, making me jump. I’ve been slumped here on the sofa unaware of how much time has gone by. The bricks land in the hearth, like winning coins on a one-armed bandit. I wish I was better at DIY. You always laugh at me for my Heath Robinson-style attempts at fixing things with pieces of string and gaffer tape. At least I try. The builders are due in five weeks to rebuild the chimney. We also have subsidence in the extension at the back of the cottage with another surveyor coming next week, to see if we qualify for insurance. Our home is crumbling around us.

The light is peeling away from the sky. You left an hour ago. It takes less than ten minutes to get to the village shop in the car. You ought to be back by now.

I try your mobile, but there’s no reply. Where else would you go? Surely you wouldn’t stop at the pub when you know I need the painkillers? You wouldn’t, anyway – not if you’re driving. You wouldn’t do anything to put yourself at risk. I know you are a reluctant driver at the best of times – it’s down to that time you didn’t swerve fast enough (your words) and hit a deer.

A surge of panic hits me. Were you still too drowsy with the medication to be driving? Is it my fault? Has something terrible happened? I should have stopped you, like Alexa said.

As soon as I set foot outside, I realise I’m too drunk to stay upright on my bicycle, so I go back for Frank, who thinks this extra romp is a special treat, and we head out on foot. Frank snuffles through clumps of dandelions at the roadside. Nettledon is split into two parts. On the south side are detached cottages, spread out, with clumps of trees, and we are the last one before the farmland stretches down towards the valley. The pub, shop and church are on the north side surrounded by terraced cottages and in-between is a stretch of road, with trees and thick scrub on both sides belonging to the council. There are tight bends on this lane and the road is narrow.

We get to the signpost for the footpath and Frank pulls on the lead, trying to drag me into the woods. I apologise and tell him we have to stick to the main road. There’s no path and I need him by my side. Blades of grass gather between my toes and the heads of tufty weeds find their way inside my sandals.

What am I looking for? A black Astra at the roadside? Maybe you had a flat tyre, but wouldn’t you have called if you’d broken down? I try to recall. Yes, I’m sure you took your bag; your phone would be in it.

The headache brings waves of nausea with it. Too much vodka – idiot. It’s got to stop. Everything about the baby, about my part in it, or not – and my diagnosis – has temporarily got the better of me, but it’s no excuse. There are more important things at stake here. I force my eyes to search the tarmac. What else am I looking for? Skid marks? Did you have an accident?

There is a stretch of road coming up with a steep bank on the left. It drops away into woods and undergrowth. If the car left the road, the undergrowth would break the fall, wouldn’t it? We reach that spot. I examine the slatted fence, the bark of the large oak tree, the turf, for signs. Nothing is damaged or disturbed. What else am I looking for? I feel like I’m in one of my own lectures; I’m used to problem solving and I’ve always been good at it. I always spot the whodunit in my detective novels way before anyone else. As a child, I was always the first to find my way out of the park maze; I always won at Cluedo. I just have that kind of mind.

Frank and I reach the crossroads. You would have gone straight on here. I check near the white give-way markings for glass, the orange plastic of a shattered light. Nothing. Frank’s tongue flops to one side now. We must have speeded up. I check for fresh ruts along the verge, tyre marks in the mud outside gateposts. We reach the village green. I stride into The Eagle and ask Terry, behind the bar, if he’s seen you. When I mention the shop, he points towards Marvin Baines, the owner of the one and only village shop. Marvin is sitting with three other men, all with pint glasses drained to the same point. He rolls Frank’s soft ear between his finger and thumb. He hasn’t seen you either. I ask around. We moved to our cottage three years ago, so all the locals know us by now. I get nothing but shakes of the head.

I come out. It’s still light. I check the car park, the verges, the kerb for a black Astra. It isn’t there.

Where are you?

It might be nothing, but when I get back I notice my paperback is splayed open on the coffee table. I never do that; I use a bookmark. I’m inclined to spot these things. Being a so-called expert in criminology and forensics makes you look at the world in terms of puzzles and clues. You’re always telling me I’m turning into Jack Reacher, the fictional creation of Lee Child, with my ability to instantly ‘read a room’. I stand still. The laptop has moved. Have you been back? Did you wonder why I wasn’t here and set out looking for me? I call your name. The place looks messy. I hate things being untidy, but we’ve had to clear the alcove so the surveyor can see the cracks in the wall when he comes. Piles of paperbacks crowd the fireplace and you’ve been very patient about ‘my collection’, in boxes in the porch. How do we find a new home for fifteen antique typewriters? Thank you for not suggesting the garden shed.

Frank goes looking for you, too – in the garden and upstairs – but returns alone.

I do a circuit of the garden myself, go down to the river, calling your name. The end of the day is buried in a bruised sky. I come back inside and check my phone. There’s no sign of you. I sit on the armchair nearest the front door and wait. I keep the curtains open, I don’t want to shut you out.

9.45pm

‘Have you seen her?’ I ask.

‘Who?’ asks Alexa.

‘Diane, of course. She hasn’t come back from the village. I’m worried.’

‘No. I haven’t seen her. Did you call her?’

‘Of course – there’s no reply. You didn’t go after her?’ I ask.

‘No. I had to meet someone – in Cosham.’

‘It’s been over two hours.’

‘Maybe she’s gone to the pub.’

‘I’ve been there – no one’s seen her or the car.’

‘Maybe she’s broken down.’

‘I walked the entire route there and back.’

‘Well…then…maybe she stopped off somewhere else?’

‘There
is
nowhere else. Just a shop and a pub, remember?

‘Yeah, okay. But, maybe she’s dropped by a neighbour’s or gone to a friend’s for the night.’

‘She wouldn’t do that without telling me.’ There’s a snide silence as if Alexa thinks otherwise. I wonder if she knows more than she’s letting on. ‘Has she rung you?’

‘No.’

‘Please call if she rings, won’t you?’

‘Sure.’

I call a couple of our friends in the village, but no one has seen you. I try the next option. It’s a misconception that you have to wait twenty-four hours before contacting the police about a missing person. Maybe I’ve underestimated the state you are in. Perhaps you’re more vulnerable than I realised. Perhaps the enormity of the situation only hit you when you were halfway down the road.

I have colleagues in the Hampshire Police; guys who consult me for forensics’ analysis. I give talks for the force at training and open days and have become mates with a handful of them. They’re hardworking and reliable – I’m privileged to call them friends. DI Neil Fry lets me win at squash every now and again to keep me coming back. DS Paul Whitaker, on the other hand, is a rogue and adds three kilos to my barbell at the gym when I’m tying my shoelaces. They’re good blokes – they’ll get on to it.

I can’t reach Neil; he’s on holiday, so I try Paul’s mobile. His wife answers and tells me he’s off work with a stomach bug and needs to sleep. I call the local police station and explain what’s happened. The desk sergeant asks your age, whether you have your phone and need medication or treatment. I explain that you had a miscarriage five days ago, but that you seemed stable and had stopped taking the sedatives. I know what he is going to say before I hear the words:
Most people return within forty-eight hours. Can you do a ring-round of her friends? Have you rung her parents?
He says an officer will be in touch to arrange a visit if you still haven’t returned.