The Cove, page 19
part #1 of The Cove Trilogy Series
“Are you worried about the talk we had with Mrs White today?”
Pushing her lower lip out and narrowing her eyes, Melissa turned away.
“Remember what I said – you’re not in trouble. We were just talking about the picture you drew.”
Melissa shot her a sideways glare.
“Sweet pea, why did you draw Noah?”
Her daughter swung her shoulders from side to side. Picking up a stuffed rabbit, she hugged it to her chest.
“Have you been thinking about Noah lately?”
“Yes.”
“You miss him?”
Sealing her lips together, Melissa looked away. She nodded.
Carrie took her daughter’s hand and kissed it. She was beginning to wonder if Elsa White had been correct. Melissa’s whole world had changed. A boy she’d known had vanished and was probably dead. Another boy who was supposed to be dead had barged his way into her family and shoved her to one side.
Carrie reached out and stroked the girl’s head.
“I know things are tough right now. But it will get easier, I promise. But drawing pictures like that... Are you angry with Mummy and Daddy?”
She watched as Melissa shook her head then returned her gaze to the stuffed rabbit.
“What about the monster in your picture? Is it from a bad dream?”
Melissa shook her head again.
“Something you just made up?”
When Melissa spoke, her voice was barely a whisper. “Not supposed to talk about the bad man.”
“The bad man? That’s the monster from your picture?”
Melissa nodded. Her frown grew deeper.
“Why can’t you talk about him?”
“Not allowed to.”
“It’s just a picture, sweet pea. He can’t hurt you because he’s not real.”
“Yes, he is,” Melissa said.
“No, he’s not. Monsters aren’t real.”
“He is real!” Melissa suddenly bellowed. Tears slipped from her eyes as she clutched her rabbit. “Cal says not supposed to talk about the bad man or he’ll come and get me.”
Goosebumps crawled over Carrie’s skin.
“Sweet pea, that’s not true,” she said. “Cal can’t speak. You know that.”
“Yes, he can!” Melissa wailed. “He talks to me all the time.”
Carrie froze. Her heart hammered in her chest. She placed trembling hands on her daughter’s shoulders.
“Cal talks to you?”
Melissa nodded. She wiped away tears and stuck out her lower lip again.
“What does he talk about?”
“Not supposed to say.”
Nausea churned Carrie’s stomach. Surely it was a lie. It had to be. So why did she believe every word her daughter was saying?
“Melissa, please. It’s very important you tell me. What has Cal told you?”
Silence. Melissa turned away.
“Has he talked about Noah?”
Now, Melissa began to sob. Her shoulders shook as tears ran down her face in streams.
“I want Daddy!” she wept. “I want to go to sleep!”
Pulling her daughter to her chest, Carrie embraced her.
“Daddy will be home on Sunday,” she whispered. She turned to face the open bedroom door. Television sounds floated up. She kissed the top of Melissa’s head. “No one is going to hurt you, sweet pea. No one.”
<>
Cal was sitting cross-legged in front of the television as an action film exploded across the screen. Carrie stood in the doorway, watching him. He knew she was there. Every few seconds she saw his eyes flick in her direction before returning to the television.
Moving into the room, she sat down next to him and put a hand on his shoulder. He flinched.
“I need to talk to you,” Carrie said.
Cal ignored her and flipped the button on the remote.
Taking it from him, she switched off the television. Cal furrowed his brow.
Slowly, Carrie unrolled Melissa’s picture.
“Do you see this? Do you see what Melissa drew?”
Cal’s eyes begrudgingly moved over the sketch.
Carrie pointed to the three children running from the house. “Melissa says this is you, this is her, and this is a boy called Noah. He’s Jago’s little brother and he’s been missing for a while. Have you heard about him?”
She watched as Cal focused on where she was pointing. His eyes seemed to grow darker.
“The police have looked all over but they can’t find him. No one can.” She leaned in closer. “Do you know where he is?”
There was something in Cal’s eyes. Something black, impenetrable. He turned his head and stared at the blank television screen.
“What about this character?” She pointed to the demonic figure. In the dim light of the living room, he looked even more terrifying. “Melissa called him the bad man.”
Cal’s eyes wandered back to the picture. She couldn’t be sure in this light, but his face seemed to grow a shade paler. He turned away again, his breaths audible.
Carrie put the picture down on the carpet and flattened it out.
“Cal, I want to help you,” she said, watching as he stared down at Melissa’s drawing. “I know it’s difficult. I know you don’t want to think about it, but I need you to try. If Noah was with you... If he’s still alive...”
Cal’s fingers curled over his palms and dug into the flesh.
“I want to help,” Carrie said again. “Can you tell me who did this to you? Where they’ve kept you all this time? If you can’t tell me, can you show me?”
She stood and grabbed one of Melissa’s sketch books from the side. She held out a pencil. Cal glared at it.
“If you know where Noah is, you can tell me. Write it down. Do you remember how to write?” She could feel frustration bubbling inside her as Cal remained unmoving. He turned his head away from the pen and paper. His faced drew up into a scowl.
“Please,” Carrie said, resting a hand on his knee. Her voice trembled. Tears welled in her eyes. “I know you speak to Melissa. I know you’ve told her things. And I just –”
Without warning, Cal batted her hand from his knee and jumped up. He headed for the door.
“Sit down!”
Her voice was loud and angry, startling them both.
Cal bowed his head. He remained standing.
“Sit down,” Carrie said again, this time in a soft, guilty tone.
Cal stayed, rooted to the ground.
“Why can you talk to Melissa but not to me?” They were not the words she’d intended. She looked up at him, her eyes begging. “Please, Cal. Please, talk to me.”
But Cal did not talk to her. Instead, he left the room.
She heard his footsteps thunder on the stairs. She heard his bedroom door slam shut. She heard Melissa, startled and awake, call out for her.
Ignoring her daughter’s cries, Carrie brought her hands to her face. She squeezed her eyes shut. Tears came. She let them run down her face and drip on the empty sketch paper.
After a minute, she stopped crying, dried her face, and cleared her throat. Melissa’s drawing caught her eye. The bad man stared at her, his glowing eyes burning into her skin.
Cal was not going to tell her what she wanted to know. Nor was Melissa. But perhaps she would tell her father.
Suddenly, Carrie wanted nothing more than for Dylan to come home. To be wrapped in his arms. She thought about contacting him on the satellite phone then changed her mind. He wasn’t due back for another forty-eight hours. Telling him everything now would leave him trapped on a boat and worrying about his family. And he would turn against Cal. He would make her send him away.
Upstairs, Melissa had fallen silent. Carrie got to her feet.
As soon as Dylan was home, she would get him to talk to their daughter. Until then, she was on her own.
Picking up Melissa’s drawing, she stared at it for a while longer. Dread crept beneath her skin. Making her way to the kitchen, she pulled open a drawer and hid the picture inside. She locked the back door, slid the bolt across, and pocketed the key. Then she moved from room to room, ensuring all the windows were locked and the curtains were closed. Finally, she locked the front door and removed the key.
She would think about calling Detective Turner in the morning. Until then, no one was getting in or out of her house.
34
Nat’s head felt as if someone had opened it up with a pickaxe. She’d been awake for thirty seconds, had no idea what time it was, and was vaguely aware of a buzzing somewhere near her right ear.
Last night, she’d downed half a bottle of cheap whiskey stolen from Jack Dawkin’s shop. She felt bad for stealing it, but what choice did she have? She was still six months away from being legally able to buy alcohol, and thanks to her youthful looks, no fake ID in the world was ever going to convince Jack to take her money. Besides, Jack overpriced everything. If they didn’t use those damned security contraptions at the supermarket, she would steal from there. At least they’d be able to afford losing a bottle or two.
It was risky stealing from Jack. His shop was small and cramped, making it easy to get caught. She’d only stolen from him once before. The guilt had stopped her from doing it again, until last night. She supposed she could, like any other underage kid in town, persuade someone old enough to buy the booze for her. But that meant having more friends than Jago. He’d been in a mood last night and hadn’t wanted to see her, leaving her no choice but to slip a whiskey bottle into the inside pocket of her military jacket before paying for her tobacco at the counter.
Now, after a night of knocking back whiskey and listening to punk music at a damaging volume through her headphones, she found herself regretting stealing the booze in the first place.
Nat groaned as she scrabbled for her phone and opened an eye to see who was calling.
“What time is it?” she mumbled.
Jago’s low tones mumbled into her ear. “Nine-thirty. You sound like shit.”
“It’s Saturday morning. Why are you calling so early?”
“Have you seen the police outside?”
“What? Wait a second.”
Nat pushed herself up onto an elbow and grimaced as the pounding in her head intensified. Dragging herself out of bed, she stumbled to the window and pulled back the curtains. A patrol car was parked outside. A few metres along, the journalist’s car was being loaded onto the back of a tow truck.
“What’s going on?” she said into the phone.
“I don’t know. But if they talk to you, you can’t tell them what I did.”
Nat looked around for her tobacco pouch and papers. “So, you punched him. He deserved it.”
“What if I was the last person to see him? It won’t look good.”
“That’s a little dramatic, isn’t it?”
“Just keep it to yourself.”
Tobacco located, she tucked the phone between her ear and her shoulder, and began rolling a cigarette. “Fine. What are your plans for today?”
“I’m searching the hotel. Want to come with me?”
“Maybe. But it seems like a waste of time. The police already searched it.”
“That was almost two months ago. Besides, they’d been under-resourced because of the cuts. Maybe they didn’t search the whole place.”
“There’s no chance Noah could have climbed the hotel gates; they’re two metres tall. And they’re the only way in.”
“Whoever abducted him could have helped him over.”
Hearing the desperation in Jago’s words, Nat softened her voice. “If someone had taken him up there, don’t you think the police would have found him? Besides, the whole place is boarded up. Come on, Jago. Noah’s not up there. He can’t be. And if you really thought he was up at the hotel, wouldn’t you have searched the place already?”
Silence. The cigarette rolled, Nat licked the gum and sealed it shut. She sighed.
“There’s a window at the back,” Jago said at last, his voice cold and distant. “The board is loose. Some of the kids from town go up there to hang out. He could have got in the same way.”
Nat shook her head. Jago’s reasoning was becoming more ridiculous by the second. Tucking the cigarette behind her ear, she bent down to search for her military boots. The pain in her head grew sharp and nauseating.
“I thought you were going to speak to Cal again,” she said. “It sounds like a safer idea than wading through used condoms and junkie needles.”
“I’ll talk to him later. When Carrie lets me.”
“She must be so weirded out with her dead son walking around like that.”
Jago was silent again. Guilt pulled at Nat’s conscience. She supposed if it were her little brother who was missing, she would go searching places he couldn’t be in, too. The alternative was to give up hope.
“Look, I’ll check with Rose and see if I can come with you,” she said, letting out a heavy breath. “Margaret Telford’s dead dog has made her all twitchy, and now that the police are outside I’m anticipating a full curfew, effective immediately.”
“Whatever,” Jago said. “I’ll be heading up there as soon as the police are gone. Let me know.”
Nat slipped her feet into her boots and scanned the floor for her jacket. “Sure thing, Mr Monotone. I need to smoke a cigarette then throw up. See you later.”
Jago huffed a sigh into her ear.
She hung up and let the phone fall to the bed. Sometimes, she felt like murdering Jago in his sleep.
Giving up on finding her jacket, she pulled a black hooded top over her head, grabbed a lighter from the bedside table, and stumbled downstairs.
Her attire looked out of place in Rose’s cottage, which was rustic perfection, kitted out with a whole farmyard of porcelain animals and soft furnishings in floral print.
Nat hated every inch of it. But she loved Rose, who was kind and caring; much more than her parents had ever been.
She found her in the kitchen, staring worriedly through the window into the back garden.
“Have you seen the cops outside?”
Rose jumped. Her hand shot to her chest.
“I’ve just had an officer on the doorstep,” she said. “They wanted to know if we’d seen some journalist hanging around. Apparently, he’s missing.”
“Oh?”
Rose turned back to the kitchen window. “He’s not the only one.”
“What is it?” Nat asked, as she moved further into the room. The smell of coffee hung in the air, tantalising her hungover taste buds. A fresh pot sat on the side, next to a mug that already contained milk and sugar.
Rose shook her head. When she turned around again, her round face had grown two shades paler.
“I can’t find Honey,” she said. “I’ve looked all over the house.”
Nat poured hot black coffee into the mug and stirred the liquid with a teaspoon. She glanced up. “She’ll be around somewhere. She only ever goes outside to take care of business. She’s probably asleep under a cushion somewhere.”
“No, I’ve looked. She’s not in your room?”
“Honey doesn’t go upstairs. Besides, she’s not allowed in my room.”
“What about last night? You made sure she was in when you locked up before bed, didn’t you?”
“Of course.”
The truth was Nat had been so drunk when she’d last gone outside for a cigarette, she couldn’t remember where the damn cat had been. Having stirred her coffee, she picked up the mug and took a sip. It was hot and glorious. Instantly, the hammering in her head receded a little. But now she felt another sensation. Guilt.
Had she accidentally locked Honey outside? Sometimes the cat did follow her outside when she went for a smoke.
“She’ll be around somewhere,” she said. “I’ll smoke this, then I’ll help you find her.”
Rose glanced at the cigarette in Nat’s hand. “Those things will kill you.”
“So will those curtains,” Nat muttered, glancing at the kitchen windows.
“You’re not seeing Jago today?”
“Maybe later. He wants me to go on another one of his searches.”
“Where to this time?”
Nat raised an eyebrow. Sometimes it was safer to lie. “The woods again, I think.”
Rose thrust a hand on her hip and stared through the window. “I don’t know, Nat. The whole cove doesn’t feel safe today. I asked that policeman about Margaret Telford’s dog but he couldn’t tell me a thing. Said they’re still looking into it. I don’t like the idea of you wandering off.”
“I’m almost eighteen. I’ll be fine.”
“The last thing I need is social workers coming around, telling me I’m not doing my job. That I’m not taking care of you.”
Nat took another sip of coffee.
Rose stared at her for a long time, worry lines ageing her skin. “I could do with your help looking for Honey. That awful business with poor Margaret has got me worried out of my mind.”
“Cats wander sometimes.”
“Not my Honey.”
Guilt pressed down on Nat’s shoulders as she brushed past Rose. “I’ll ask the neighbours if they’ve seen her. Once I’ve smoked this and drank a gallon of coffee.”
“You were boozing again last night, weren’t you?” Rose said, shaking her head. “I wish you wouldn’t.”
Nat pulled open the kitchen door. Fresh air rushed in, making her feel a little better. “Come on, Rose. Even you were young once.”
Rose wagged a finger at her. “You have a shower before you go and bother the neighbours. Or they’ll smell you coming.”
Giving the woman a military style salute, Nat stepped outside and sparked up her cigarette. The lawn was overgrown and choked with weeds. She’d promised Rose several weeks ago that she’d mow it. She’d get around to it one day.
Puffing on the cigarette, she glanced at the tall wooden fence that separated their garden from Grady Spencer’s. Perhaps Honey had found her way to the other side and was now stuck.
“Damn cat,” she muttered and took another sip of coffee.
Uneasiness returned to her as she thought about the police outside. What had happened to that journalist? To Margaret Telford’s dog?
