‘Yes.’
He ripped a page from a notepad and handed her a pen.‘Draw it for me.’
That afternoon Nel was physically there in the clinic, taking blood pressure, handing out jelly beans, trying to concentrate as patients described tingling sensations or dull aches, but her mind was with Jimmy.Had he been granted a search warrant?Where was he now?When would he arrive at the Warners’ place?
Dread sat heavily in her stomach.Ryan would be furious when he realised Sophie was gone.Had he arrived home yet and found the house empty?Did Sophie leave him a note?Nel pictured a lined page ripped from a kid’s schoolbook, like the one Sophie had used to write to her, sitting on the kitchen bench waiting for him.Loopy handwriting in blue biro announcing her escape.Or maybe she wouldn’t tell him anything, leaving him to work it out for himself.
Then a thought struck her.She’d assumed Sophie had taken the kids, but what if she hadn’t?She messaged Lauren between appointments.
Can you ask Leo if Charlie Warner was at school today?
She was washing her hands after examining a rash on Hazel Jenkin’s shoulder when her phone lit up.She stole a quick glance as Hazel buttoned her blouse.
He said no.Why?
She breathed out.Sophie had taken the kids.Nel pictured her behind the wheel of her Subaru, kids in the back seat, suitcases in the boot, speeding along a highway.Was she looking in the rear-view mirror, checking for Ryan’s car?Or did she feel free?
‘Sweetheart?Are you okay?’Nel felt the gentle touch of a hand on her arm and realised she’d been lost in her thoughts.She looked into Hazel’s kind, puzzled eyes.
‘Sorry!Yes, I’m fine.’She smiled.‘Right, I’m going to give you a steroid cream that should clear the rash up in a couple of days.’
She sat down at the computer to type up the prescription.
Chapter 51
Sophie looked in the rear-view mirror.Again.No sign of Ryan.She sat up taller in her seat to see the kids in the back.Harvey was lying with his head on Jasmine’s knee.She could just see the top of his blond curls.Jasmine looked up, meeting Sophie’s eyes in the mirror, and gave her a nervous smile.In the front seat, Charlie looked out the window where cows grazed on brown grass beyond barbed-wire fences.She’d been waiting for the questions to start, but so far there were none.Maybe they sensed it was better not to ask.
The dashboard clock said 11:14.She was hoping to reach Parkes before sunset.Six hours, if they didn’t stop.
There were only two roads out of Carrinya: the one to Melbourne and Adelaide, and the one that headed north to Sydney.Sophie had spent hours, days, months contemplating her route, trying to predict where Ryan would expect her to go.She’d nearly driven herself mad with it, deciding on a route, then second-guessing herself and changing her mind, before changing it back again.She had to pick one.She chose the Sydney road, and held her breath until she reached the turn-off before Bateman’s Bay, a single-lane road that led west past Canberra through to the Central West.
She’d written two notes.The first was to Nel, telling her about the ring.Had she read it yet?Were the police at the house right now?Had they found the ring she’d left in an Oakley’s case in Ryan’s bedside drawer?
The second note was to Ryan.
Mum’s had a fall so I’ve taken the kids to Adelaide for a few days.
I’ll call you tonight.Love, Soph xxx
She shuddered imagining his reaction when he found it on the kitchen bench.It wouldn’t take him long to work out she’d gone for good.Hopefully the police would find him before he found her.
Sophie had done an incognito Google search on the kids’ laptop—where to hide a tracker on a Subaru Outback—and checked all the spots listed in the helpful article, which she supposed had been written to help men like Ryan stalk their wives.She’d found nothing.
He was definitely tracking her phone though.She’d spent hours contemplating ways to use it to trick him.Last week while she was vacuuming, she’d daydreamed about posting it to her mother in Adelaide.She’d imagined Ryan watching it on a map, moving towards the southern city where he knew she had family, and following it there.The thought of tricking him delighted her.But what would he do when he got there?That’s when the daydream morphed into a nightmare, and she’d decided against it.She couldn’t put her mum or Annabelle in danger.In the end, she’d wiped the phone and left it behind, hidden in the kitchen cupboard, wrapped in the napkin where she’d stored her cash.
Harvey sat up and rubbed his eyes.‘Mummy?’
‘Yes?’
‘I need to do a wee.’
‘Okay, darling.We’ll stop soon.’
She checked the time again.11:54.When would Ryan get home and see the note?He sometimes dropped in during the day without warning, but usually not until after lunch.She probably had a few hours before he knew she was gone.
Chapter 52
The sun was casting long shadows across the road when Nel left the clinic.She still hadn’t heard from Jimmy.She must have checked her phone forty-five times since she showed him Sophie’s letter at midday.Maybe a surf would bring her some respite.
