Prologue
I gaze through the kitchen window. A gust of wind shakes the sepia leaves on the grapevine twisting across the pergola. A sparrow hops lightly along the rattan sun lounger. It’s so pretty. So domestic. So perfect.
Sometimes I forget myself. I let myself relax and believe that everything is okay.
But it’s never okay.
And I can never relax.
One
Strange – I don’t remember seeing the front door open when I came down earlier. I peer outside, frown and push it closed with a click.
‘Girls! Come on, get your shoes on, we’re going to be late!’
Moments later, my ten-year-old daughter Eva bounds down the stairs, her caramel hair tied back off her face in a ponytail.
‘Is your sister ready too?’ I ask.
Eva shrugs.
‘Katie!’ I yell up the stairs, but there’s no reply. I sigh. My six-year-old is such a little dreamer. I kiss Eva’s forehead. ‘Can you run back up and tell Katie to get a wriggle on?’
Eva does as I ask while I slide my feet into two-inch heels and check my reflection in the hall mirror. I have an important meeting this morning with a potential new client. I need to look professional and I absolutely cannot be late. The school run must go like clockwork.
‘She’s not in her room,’ Eva says, reappearing in the hallway.
‘Try the bathroom.’ I smooth my eyebrows and turn away from the mirror.
‘I looked. She’s not there either. Or in my room.’
‘What about—’
‘She’s not up there,’ Eva interrupts, a look of panic darting across her face. ‘I even looked under the beds and in the wardrobes in case she was hiding.’
‘Katie!’ I begin marching through the downstairs rooms of our shabby Victorian fixer-upper that we’ve never quite managed to fix up, with its draughty hallway and rattling windows. My husband Robert and I had such grand designs for this place when we bought it. Maybe it’ll happen one day. My heels tip-tap across the stripped floorboards as I search the lounge, the kitchen, utility room, dining room, the downstairs loo… but there’s no sign of my youngest daughter. Back in the hallway, I freeze, remembering the previously open front door. Katie is a curious child. With a stab of pure terror, I think of the busy main road beyond the driveway and my skin goes cold. ‘Eva, check upstairs again – look in every single room.’
‘I already did that.’
‘I know, but can you do it again?’ As I bark out instructions to Eva, I’m almost falling over myself to reach the front door.
‘Mum, are you okay? What are you doing?’
‘I’m fine,’ I cry, but my heart has suddenly started beating like a machine gun. As Eva disappears back upstairs, I wrench open the front door and step out onto our driveway, scanning the small front garden as rush-hour traffic thunders past beyond the hedge. The sky is clear and blue, but there’s a nip of autumn in the air, a damp chill that makes me shiver. I weave between our two cars, checking my youngest daughter is not hiding behind either of them. Then I call Katie’s name and stare blindly around, trying to keep calm, but it’s plain to see she’s not out here. Shaking away images of cars screeching to a halt and my daughter’s little body tossed up over a car bonnet, I stride down onto the pavement and peer up and down the road, praying that I’ll catch sight of her. But there’s no sign, and despite her absent-mindedness, she surely wouldn’t leave the safety of our driveway. I’ve told her enough times that the road is dangerous. But she’s not out here, so shemustbe back in the house.She has to be.
Back inside, I check the downstairs rooms once again with Eva at my side. Katie’s not in any of them. Perhaps she went into the back garden for some reason. I ask Eva to keep searching the house while I go into the utility room and try the back door. It’s locked and the key is still on the hook, so it’s highly unlikely Katie is out there. But maybe she went out of the front door and then came around the side of the house, distracted by something or other. I slip the keys off the hook and open the back door, stand on the threshold scanning the garden – the mossy patio, the overgrown rectangle of grass, the fruit trees at the back, and the ramshackle, sage-green summer house.
‘Katie!’ I cry, my voice disappearing into the still morning air. ‘Katie! Are you out here? Time to go!’ I cross the stone patio and step onto the grass, my heels sinking into the soft earth. ‘We’re going to be late for school!’ My voice is definitely wobbly now, but I’m determined not to let my mind jump ahead again and imagine the worst. I make my way across the dew-soaked lawn to the summer house, try the door – it’s locked – and peer through one of the windows. Empty. Just the kids’ bikes and some gardening equipment.
‘Hello, Gemma, everything okay?’
I snap my head round to see my retired neighbour’s round face peering at me over the garden fence. ‘Sherry, hi. I don’t suppose you’ve seen Katie? I can’t seem to find her…’ I give a short laugh to show that I’m not really worried. But I don’t know why I did that because Iamreally worried. I make my way back down the lawn towards her.
Sherry frowns. ‘No, sorry. I’ll go in and ask Paul. I take it she’s not in the house then?’
I shake my head and bite my lip.
‘I’m sure she won’t have gone far.’
