Maddy smiles too, shakes her head of red curls, and I feel a rush of relief.
“No jealous girlfriends to worry about. Just his wife.”
44CARTER
What the actual fuck.
I’m certain I just saw Eden Fox dressed as an employee at The Manor.
Notdead.
Notmissing.
Very much alive and walking into the building.
My instinct is to run out of Gabriella’s room and down the stairs and confront her as soon as she steps inside. But I hear DCI Bird’s voice in my head.Sometimes less is more when questioning a suspect. Wait. Watch. And above all else, listen.I know more than Bird gives me credit for but she is a good detective, and I should try to learn from her.
“I’ll go downstairs and tell Mary that you’re here,” says the woman dressed in white. I’ve already forgotten her name and glance again at her badge.
“No need, Ingrid. I have some more questions for you while we wait for her. Is it likely that Gabriella will ever leave this place? You said she’s eighteen.”
“It’s possible, but she would still need full-time care. Her father is very successful at whatever he does but that means he is a busy man.I get the impression that if he could care for her himself he would. He visits all the time, and I think he just wants what is best for his daughter.”
“Whatdoeshe do?” I ask, wondering if she knows more about the company that Harrison works for. I looked up Thanatos but couldn’t find much online.
She looks puzzled. “I don’t know, but whatever it is pays well. The fees here are not cheap.”
“And Gabriella’s mother? Do they not visit their daughter together?”
“I’ve never seen her parents here at the same time. It’s normally only him.”
I glance at Gabriella.
Eighteen. Elegant. Beautiful. Clearly talented.
“She doesn’tlooklike she needs full-time care.”
The girl stops painting and stares into space and I remember that she can hear me. I feel bad about how insensitive some of the things I have already said might have sounded.
“Gabriella’s case is complex and unique. In her mind she is still a child, frozen in time when the accident occurred. Her most recent assessment was the same as the last, that she still has a mental age of eight, which is how old she was when the accident happened. For her, we think it might feel as though it happened yesterday, but she has never talked about it. Shuts down and clams up if anyone tries. She looks eighteen to us because she is, but she does not recognize pictures of herself how she looks now or even her own reflection—we had to remove all the mirrors from her room because she was scared there was someone else there—but she has frequently demonstrated that she recognizes herself in photos of when she was eight or younger. In extreme cases of trauma some people remain trapped in that moment for days, weeks, months, or even years. Sometimes forever. Gabriella can barely speak. She can’t work or support herself financially. She’ll eat if food is put in front of her but has neverprepared a meal. Although she is making progress—whispering the odd word here and there—it would be like leaving an eight-year-old child home alone.”
All the while we are talking I keep checking the door, waiting for Eden—or Mary, as this woman calls her—to walk through it.
“And tell me more about Mary. It sounds as though the two of them are close?”
“Mary hasn’t been working with us for very long, but she’s wonderful at her job and very popular with the residents. Especially Gabriella. I don’t know much about Mary’s personal life, she keeps herself to herself, but I know she started working here after her former employer died.”
“Who was her former employer?”
“I don’t remember the name. An elderly woman who needed a full-time, live-in carer, somewhere by the coast, I think. Mary had worked for her for years and was a little out of practice when it came to looking for a new job. She just turned up here one day with her CV. We were so short staffed—we always are, staff turnover is high in this business; it’s hard work for low pay and people rarely stay for long. So Mary was given a trial run on the spot and everyone adored her from the beginning. Especially Gabriella. The two of them have become quite close. I didn’t believe Mary when she said Gabriella had started to communicate. It was only the odd word at first, none of it made much sense, and she wouldn’t do it in front of anyone except Mary. So Mary started recording her on this old Walkman that she has, I think to prove she wasn’t making it up.” She looks toward Gabriella, then lowers her voice. “Honestly, the first time I heard the girl whispering it gave me goose bumps. I’m guessing her vocal cords are damaged after so many years of not being used, so the sound that comes out of her is a little bitcreepy.”
Gabriella drops her paintbrush. It clatters to the floor and I worry that she heard what Ingrid said. She doesn’t move, just sits and stares at the canvas. I walk over to her and bend down to pick up the brush,and when I place it on the easel I see that she has added a few more details to her painting of Spyglass. There is now a fox on one side of the house and a wolf on the other. Her parents are Eden Fox and Harrison Woolf. It can’t be a coincidence; DCI Bird says there is no such thing.
Gabriella turns her head to stare at the door. We all do when we hear the sound of footsteps approaching. Then her lips part and I hear the girl “whisper.” That isn’t what I’d call it. The eerie, broken sound that comes out of her mouth is so quiet it’s barely audible, but the raspy words wheeze out of her body, and when I hear what she says it sends a chill through mine.
“Run rabbit, run rabbit, run, run, run.”
The door opens and Eden Fox walks into the room.
