Chapter 43 Finding Anna
Finding Anna
Matt’s hallway is cool after the afternoon sun, as he hefts the padlock and chain off and opens the partition door.
I go to walk through, but his hand stops me. My heart is thumping fast and high in my chest in spite of my relatively cool demeanor.
I smile, keeping everything under control, everything breezy and fun.
“Not so fast,” he says, blocking my way with a boyish smile, as he did the night before, though now everything he does seems tinged with menace. “You haven’t paid the entrance fee yet,” he adds.
I draw my eyes even with his—there’s still a chance he has nothing to do with this. “How much we talking?” I ask playfully.
“I don’t know,” he says wryly. “Empty your pockets.”
My blood runs cold. My pockets are full of anti-attack paraphernalia. If it isn’t him, that’s bad, and if it is him, then it is worse.
My fingers brush against the rape alarm—I could just press it now if I needed to. If I set it off right here in the un-soundproofed hallway, I know it would be heard, but deeper into the house, I’m not so sure.
“Sorry, Matt, I just really need to find the earring,” I say calmly.
He studies me, unreadable for a moment, before answering. I’m beginning to doubt he buys my story now at all.
“Yeah, sorry,” he says finally, a little surprised, then he smiles, breaking the tension. He takes my free hand and leads me into the dust-filled house, closing the door firmly behind us.
“I’ll show you the rest of the house, too, if you like?” he adds.
I balk internally at this, at the idea he might walk me right into a room just like Anna’s and I’ll have walked in of my own free will. But I remind myself that Aoife will be here in less than nine minutes.
“I think maybe I just lost it in the basement when I used the bathroom,” I suggest, finally looking up at him.
He studies me for a moment. “Yeah. Maybe you did,” he concedes, amused. “Why don’t we both go down and check the basement.”
My blood runs cold at his words, or perhaps the way he says them, with such kindness and vulnerability. Something has changed in the air between us but I don’t know in what way.
He leads me downstairs, then stops at the kitchen door, gesturing me to carry on downstairs alone while he goes through into the kitchen.
“I get the feeling you’d rather take a look down there alone, wouldn’t you?” he tells me. “I’ll be in here if you need me.”
I want to turn and run straight out of this house into the street and keep running. I force a frown, as if I have no idea what he is talking about.
He smiles, then leans in and kisses the end of my nose. “Go on,” he tells me, “go explore—basement, garden, my bedroom—knock yourself out. I’ll pour us some wine.”
I look past him into the kitchen; on the counter an open bottle of wine waits to be poured.
“Okay.” I smile and turn away from him, against every instinct in my body, and head down to the basement.
I know Anna’s room isn’t down there, I know that, and yet, I don’t know that. The blue dot says she is here. Fear bubbles up, unbidden, as I descend. I feel his eyes on me as I disappear from view.
It occurs to me that he might lock me down here, even if it isn’t the room; that might be his plan.
I catch my breath and try to refocus. I can do this, I remind myself. I look at my watch. It is already 3:07 p.m. Aoife will be here in three minutes to get me.
I enter the basement room and flick on the lights. There’s only cinema seating and tables, covered in plastic coating just like the night before.
I wander over to the only other door and open it; the white tiles of the toilet blink into view as I flick on the light.
I pull out my phone and open the GPS tracking app. The blue dot appears ahead and to my right.
I straighten. I’m not mad.
I look up in its direction: it is to the right of the cinema screen wall. I head toward it and gently rap on the wall’s surface, checking for a hollow. My rap does not echo; the wall is solid.
“How’s it all looking?” a voice comes from close behind me. “All structurally sound?”
I jump, letting out a yelp. There’s no way to cover it.
He frowns. “Was there anything in particular you were looking for in the walls?” he asks, his tone wry.
In his hands, two glasses of red wine glimmer in the basement light.
“Yes,” I say, doubling down on this odd new vibe. “I’m looking for the bodies.”
He coughs out a surprised laugh, his eyes not leaving mine for a second. “Right. And? Any luck yet?”
“No. But I haven’t finished looking.”
Aoife will be here any minute now.
He offers up either of the wineglasses for me to choose. I look between them, unsure which he wants me to pick. Both could be poisoned, of course.
“You first,” I say, indicating the glasses.
He shakes his head. “Wow. You’re being really silly—you know that, don’t you,” he says before taking a big slug from one of them and then another slug from the other.
I reach out and take the second one. He laughs.
I knock back my entire glass of wine, a splosh of red whipping out of my glass onto the vacuum-sealed carpet. When I come up for air, I tip the glass back toward him.
“Refill, please,” I say, wiping my mouth on my sleeve. Now he has to go back to the kitchen.
There’s a mild hint of concern around his eyes. “Frankie, I think we should probably—”
At that exact moment the doorbell bursts to life upstairs, surprising us both, the air suddenly electric between us.
“Shit,” he says, looking back to the stairs, then to me.
The doorbell sounds again, followed by a flurry of loud, insistent knocking.
Aoife.
Matt frowns deeply. “Jesus Christ. Sorry, this is so weird. I didn’t even know that bell worked. No idea who that is. I’d better—”
He turns to leave and I watch him disappear up the stairs to the front hall, where I hear him open the partition door, shut it behind him, then open up the front door. Then the sound of muffled voices.
I have only a few minutes, tops. I whip a look around at the windowless room. She’s not in here. But if I can maybe find her window outside, if I can take a photo of it, it’ll be enough to take straight to DI Cobham.
Aoife’s distinctive voice is audible as I bolt back up the stairs into the kitchen, my entire body loosening ever so slightly at the sound of her. I’m safe, almost safe.
I burst out into the sheltered garden. There are no houses visible beyond its tall trees and bamboo.
On my phone the blue dot blinks on, but it isn’t where I thought it would be in the garden. It is coming from the outer edges of Matt’s garden wall; I head over, but as I do, the dot skips over into the neighbor’s garden.
I hesitate for a second.
Anna isn’t in Matt’s house; the signal is coming from next door.
There’s a chance I might just be able to see the window from back here. I clamber up onto the wall dividing both gardens and use my arms to part the bamboo enough to peer through at the neighboring property.
But the house here is abandoned, the back doors broken, the paint peeling, weeds growing from the windowsills. And there is no window at basement level here.
I check the tracker again. The blue dot is showing the next garden along.
I heave myself over the wall and land in the unkempt scrub of the abandoned house’s garden and dash across to the next wall. The blue dot remains stationary. I part the prickly bush that backs the overgrown garden of the abandoned home and peer into the next garden.
This one is immaculate, the lawn green and lush.
And then I see it: the thin window, partially hidden, low to the ground, through the branches of a rosebush, the outline of Anna’s only window.
Near it, set into the lawn, there is a narrow set of concrete steps disappearing down. The steps must lead to a door.
Thank God I didn’t call in Matt’s house or his nonexistent neighbor’s. The police would have missed this, but now I know it’s here.
A wave of vindication shoots through me, emboldening me.
I check the back windows of the house for movement or inhabitants.
The house looks so familiar, but I have seen so many recently, the memories blur and mix until I am not sure if this is a family home or a single man or woman’s house or anything at all.
When I am certain there is no movement, I try holding back the brambles to take a snapshot of the window but I cannot do both at once.
I push my way through the thick knot of it, scratching my hands and cheeks on the thorns, clothes snagging as I clamber down into the bushes behind the house, scraping almost every uncovered piece of flesh on my body in the process.
I check the back of the house again before breaking cover and dashing for the low window, where I drop down and, with shaking hands, snap a burst of photos of it.
That done, I quickly rise, my eyes catching the concrete staircase leading down to what I assume is the entrance to Anna’s room.
Without thinking, I bolt for it, flying down the steps as fast as I can.
At the bottom, I slam hard into a metal door, the clank of it echoing.
I open my mouth to call to her then stop. I might put us both in danger and I can’t get her out now, I have no key. There is nothing I can do now but gather evidence and run.
I raise my phone to snap the heavy metal door, and that is when I see him in the reflection of my phone screen, descending the steps behind me. I hardly have time to flinch before the blow connects with my skull and a white-hot explosion of pain sends the world into blackness.