Page 49 of Her Hidden Shadow

Slowly, Lauren got to her feet and gazed out. ‘There was a man.’

The lock was still slid across the gate. Nancy reached down and pressed the door handle. The door was locked, and the keys were hung up next to the door. Her daughter had merely let her fear get the better of her. Nancy was used to an isolated life, but this environment was proving no good for her daughter. ‘I know that text message scared you and with all that has happened, I understand you must be terrified. I’m going to deal with it, okay?’ As she pressed a little harder on the window, it nudged forward slightly. The catch was off. She closed the window properly as Fifi distracted Lauren. No one would have known it was open and there was no man in the garden.

‘How will you deal with it? You won’t call the police. You won’t let me call them.’ Lauren frowned and flicked the kitchen light on.

‘No, but I have a plan. I have a friend who will have a word with him for me. I’m going to call this friend, and I’ll sort this. There will be no more texts, I promise.’

Lauren exhaled. ‘Whatever. I can’t live like this. This place is sending me mad. My fiancé and best friend have just been murdered; I need my other friends and I can’t see them. Not one of them has offered to come to me. I even tried to call Robbie’s brother but he’s not answering either. I’ve never felt so alone.’ She burst into tears.

‘Come here. You’re not alone, you have me.’ Nancy held her daughter as she cried on her shoulder. ‘Do you want a chamomile tea? It might help you relax?’

‘No, Mum. I don’t need tea! I need to escape this limbo. I need to know what I’ve done to deserve such crap friends.’

She rubbed her daughter’s back. ‘It’s not you. Please never think that. People can be odd in circumstances like this. They don’t know what to say or do. Just give it time.’

‘Don’t make excuses for them. Please don’t.’

Lauren was right. Her closest friends were nowhere to be seen. ‘You’ve always got me. I will always be here for you.’

Lauren pulled away and wiped her eyes. ‘Thanks, Mum. Sorry about what just happened. I got scared, but I really thought I’d seen someone but maybe it was just that sheet of plastic. Promise me that no one attacked you last night and that scary man doesn’t know where you live.’

‘I cross my heart and I’d never lie to you, ever. I fell, that was all. We’re safe here. I promise.’ She almost choked on her lie and hoped that Lauren didn’t notice. Her daughter had been right earlier. Nancy knew that she could have easily been followed home and she saw the shadow of a man, but it wasn’t the murderer. The man she knew was far too much of a coward to do anything more than provide a few minor scares. Reaching across the kitchen, she pulled the blinds down. ‘There, we’re all cocooned in. I’ll close the lounge curtains, double-check all the locks and we’re as safe as safe can be. Now go and charge your phone.’

‘Thanks. I’m just going to watch a bit of TV. It might keep my mind from coming up with all kinds of crazy.’ Lauren snatched her phone from the table and left for the lounge.

‘Great. I’ll freshen up and then I’ll put some dinner on.’

Fifi followed Lauren into the living room. Nancy pulled two slats apart on the blind and tried to see into the dark corners of the garden. The plastic still flapped, and the gate was still locked. She swallowed, knowing she had no choice but to confront what was happening and that meant hashing all this out with the man who was behind all this, Preston Hemming. She hurried back upstairs and pulled her partly charged iPad from under the pillow. Within seconds, she’d reactivated her Facebook account and sent him the briefest of messages.

You. Me. Grafton’s Garden Centre. Tomorrow. Ten in the morning. Be there or I will call the police and I don’t care what happens to me.

Maybe it was time to confront her nasty messenger in the safety of a public place. She would record the whole conversation on her phone without him knowing. Yes, they clashed at that protest and, yes, it had got a bit physical but if he was turning up at her house, harassing her and her daughter, it had to stop, and preferably without the police being involved. She wasn’t scared. Never was, never would be. Hemming was nothing but a pathetic little boy with an angry streak. Nothing she couldn’t handle. In fact, she should have done this a long time ago. Her iPad lit up with a reply.

You’re on, bitch. Nice house, by the way.

With anger shaking through her, she turned the tablet off and placed it back under her bed. You’re on, Preston. She turned off her light and gave her eyes a moment to adjust. Staring out of her bedroom window at the back garden and beyond, she wondered if he was out there watching. No, she knew he was out there watching. He might scare Lauren, but he didn’t scare her. After she’d finished with him, he’d wish he’d never been born.

Thirty-Seven

Gina tapped her fingernails on her desk while waiting for Collier to get back from another mini briefing with Sullivan. They had Hale in interview room two and the clock was ticking. He’d been arrested at the station, so they had twenty-four hours in which to charge him otherwise they had to let him go. Wyre knocked on her office door and entered. ‘Thought you might appreciate this.’ She placed the steaming hot cup of coffee on her desk.

‘I’ve never needed this more. Thank you so much.’ She brought the cup to her lips, blew the steam away and took a sip of the dark liquid in the hope that it would bring her back to life. ‘I feel like we’re wasting precious time while they have another one of their secret meetings.’

‘I know.’ Wyre nodded. ‘One good thing though, he said he doesn’t need a solicitor so at least there’s no hold up there.’ She paused. ‘They told me to leave the incident room, so I thought I’d see how you were.’ Wyre sat.

‘Who’s they?’

‘Sullivan, Hale and Briggs.’

‘Briggs?’

‘I guess this is how it will be for this case. They talk first, share information about what’s been gathered on Jacob, then they decide what they want to tell us after.’

Gina leaned back in her chair. ‘He didn’t do it. We have Hale in an interview room. All is going to become clear soon and Jacob will be off the hook, even though Sullivan and Collier are doing their best to prove he did it before we’ve even spoken to Hale.’

Wyre played with a strand of her hair. ‘I just want everything to go back to normal.’

‘How have things been today, while I was out with Collier?’

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