Part 40 (1/2)

She screamed

No She wouldn't believe it

He was mistaken He hadn't looked properly He didn't know the house as well as she did He didn't know all the hiding places

'LEAH!'

It just wasn't possible that Sebastien could have checked all the places a girl as clever and as brave and as beautiful as Leah could have found He couldn't be telling her that her little girl had gone

But you know the truth You knohat's happened You always knew this was going to happen if you weren't strong enough

He found her, Hannah

Jakab found her, and he took her You have no one else to blame for that And if you don't act now, use every second, you don't have the slightest chance of seeing Leah again

She launched herself past Sebastien Up the stairs Kicked open the first door on the left Saw the Fnok slu over her Backed into the hall Yanked open the next door Laundry cupboard Piled with blankets Hauled the places Found no one Opened the door on the right Leah's bedroom Saw a yellow plastic cuff on the bed, sliced open

He's got her If you ever doubted it, now you know

Back in the hall, into the bathroom

White tiles Bath Towels Toilet Sink

Nowhere to hide Nowhere to hide One last room to try The bedroo open the door

A king-size bed Plenty of room underneath it A wardrobe in the corner, old and echoey Floor-length curtains So many places to hide But none of them matter None of the open, and a breeze that smells of lavender and late autuh the gap, and now she can no longer deny what has happened, can no longer hope, can only think of a little girl's face and a ht, and what a lie that had been

CHAPTER 26

Aquitaine region, France Now Hannah turned and turned in circles, although she felt as if she were stationary and the rooht Nate had ashed the walls, and he'd cut a skylight into the ceiling that sloped between the huge oak beaht struck her froh the balcony s, bleaching her, purifying her

For ain its brilliance If the sun's heat could vaporise her as she turned, would she choose that? If she could cole moment, incinerate her memories, strip away her pain, transfored fibre, boil away her tears and her grief and her guilt, would she open her arms and embrace it?

So disorientated was she by Leah's disappearance, by the realisation that she had irl close, by the light that poured in through the s and seared her with its intensity, that Hannah wondered for a moment if the shock had killed her

Yet surely no afterlife could be cruel enough to accept not just her soul but all her agony, her fear, her shame If Nate waited for her here, how could she explain that she had abandoned their beautiful child to the ?

No, this was not a cathartic light; it was a light of clarity She knew her chances of finding Leah were fading But even the s It was all she had And for the moment it was all she needed

Hannah ended her rotations She forced herself to breathe, focused her eyes The first thing she saw, pinned to the frame of the balcony as a tiny red bead In an instant, she recognised what she was looking at It was one of the enaiven to her iven to her at Llyn Gwyr The saiven to Leah a few days earlier No accident had caused it to be pinned here Hannah plucked it fron Leah had left this for her She was sure of it What it meant, she did not know But she clutched on to it, to what it represented, and dived through the balcony doors and into the light

He had asked her to lie low and h Leah kneas sensible advice, she could not resist inching herself up in the seat high enough to see over the dashboard Sebastien twisted the keys in the ignition The engine of the big white off-roader ith a cough

'Elvis has left the building,' the old man murmured He staravel chippings, launching the vehicle backwards across the drive Sebastien hauled the wheel over and the 4x4 slewed around in a circle until its nose pointed down the track that led to the main road A cloud of white dust drifted across the windscreen He glanced in the rear-view ear

'Not thefor us!' Leah shouted, terrified that the Eleni she had seen guarding the gate would intercept them

Sebastien turned to face her She hadn't expected hiirl,' he said 'What do you suggest?'

She knew she had to make smart decisions She couldn't sit back and let hiether if they were to survive this Most i Mue surfaced in herMummy to the chair It made her want to cry and she knew she couldn't afford to do that, so she got angry instead 'Take the side road,' she said, pointing to the overgrown track on their left 'Through the woods'

Sebastien licked his teeth Then he nodded The Audi lurched forwards and Leah was flung back in her seat Within moments they passed out of the sunshi+ne and into the trees The off-roader bounced and rocked on the twisting track, tyres scrae pothole, and when Sebastien banged his head on the roof he said a word Leah had never thought to hear fro back for Mummy?'

'Soon'

'We can't leave her there with the Bad Man'

'Which one?'

'You know, the Bad Man'

'Fro, they all looked pretty bad'

Leah frowned, wondering if he was serious, wondering if he was being sarcastic 'So when are we going back?'

'When we've got you far enough away'

'But then we'll have to go all the way back again'

'Shut up a while, OK?'

Leah nodded, brushi+ng tears fro even faster now The track through the trees was only wide enough for a single vehicle Branches snapped against the windscreen Their tyres ripped up ferns and brambles

When the car skidded around a bend, Leah saw aon his back in the middle of the track He wore a khaki jacket, and black trousers with lots of pockets His eyes were open and the handle of a knife rose from his chest like the candle on a birthday cake Blood had soaked through his coat, darkening the soil around hiot to help'

'He's dead'

'You have to stop,' sheher head away

'There's no way round'

'You can't just-'

Their vehicle bounced over the corpse, rocking on its suspension but losing no speed Leah stuffed the front of her fist into herher eyes shut She wanted to screairl anyto prepare you for this She said it would be horrible, that you ht, wasn't she? You're lucky that Sebastien is here to guide you, because you've been pretty useless so far