Page 36 of Cross Her Heart

The snippet of a report is back on. The mother of the boy Ava saved claims her son, Ben, says he was pushed into the water.

Pushed. Pushed.

‘We know you didn’t do that, Lisa.’ Alison sounds frayed. They think I’m crumbling, the madness dormant within me eating its way outwards. ‘We know you were with Marilyn Hussey and her husband when Ben went into the river.’

Marilyn. Oh, for Marilyn.

‘I need the radio on,’ I say. There is too much electricity in my head. I’m trying to make the links too quickly.Drive away, baby. The boy says he was pushed. Peter Rabbit.

‘We need to talk to you.’ A sharper voice. Nasal. The donkey woman. Bray of the clumpy body. Not that I can talk about anyone’s appearance. Greasy hair and flabby thighs, pasty in the flashes showing from under my dressing gown.

‘It’s about Ava.’

Her words cut into my overheated brain, although I think that whatever they have to say, I’m way ahead of them. ‘She isn’t with any of her friends,’ the policewoman continues, ‘and they all claim they haven’t heard from her.’

A crash and a curse come from another room. I don’t like the thought of their rough hands on my baby’s things. They need to remember that this is a victim’s house, not a suspect’s. I guess it’s easy to get confused where I’m concerned. No one ever sees me as a victim.

‘We’ve been through her phone and iPad.’ My eyes keep glancing over to the silent radio. I want it playing along with the TV.Leave with me, baby, let’s go tonight.

‘Lisa, are you listening?’ The policewoman is speaking slowly and loudly as if she thinks I’m stupid. Trying to bash the words through my thick skull.

‘She’s been chatting to a man. There are Facebook messages. Lots of them. They’d arranged to meet on the night she went missing.’ Her words, words I should be clinging on to, drift over me. I’m somewhere else entirely. My body is here, but my mind is scouring the past. We made a pact.

Cross my heart and hope to die.

Breaking those kind of promises wreaks vengeance. I should have known. Ididknow. I’ve always known. It’s the cause of the fear that’s eaten at me for so long.

Alison leans forward, obviously seeing how irritated the donkey is getting with me. ‘It’sJon,’ she says. ‘He’s the man Ava has been talking to on the Internet. But the things he’s been saying. Well – they’re not the sort of things a father would say to his daughter. Look.’ She nods at Bray, who holds out a sheaf of printed paper. I frown as I take them, and look at Alison. ‘What are you talking about?’ Finally, I engage.

‘Jon found Ava on Facebook. He’s been messaging her for several months. But he hasn’t told her he’s her father. The messages have been of a more …’ she hesitates. ‘Sexual nature. He’s groomed her to run away with him.’ She takes my hand as if we’re friends and it’s awkward for both of us. My palm is suddenly sweating, damp springing from my skin like the tears I can never cry. ‘Have you heard from him at all?’ she asks. ‘He’s not at his house. He told neighbours he was going travelling almost a year ago. The police are doing everything they can to find him – to find both of them – but they need your help. Is there anywhere he may have taken her? A place that was significant to both of you maybe? Or just to him? Somewhere you went on holiday? We can go through the files, but not everything will be in there.’

Drive away, baby. The rabbit. The photo smashed at the bottom of the stairs.It’s all making a terrible sense.

I want the radio on. I may miss something vital. I zone out their words, Alison and the Braying woman still trying to speak to me. I cling on to the printed messages though. I’ll study them later. I need to try and make some order out of all this if I’m going to save my daughter.

‘She’s not listening,’ Bray says. ‘We need someone who can get through to her. And she needs to ease off the meds for now.’ She stands up and leans over me. ‘Lisa.’ I ignore her. ‘Charlotte!’ She barks the name, and I can’t help but look up. ‘Is there any way he could know where you were living?’ she asks. ‘Anything at all?’

‘No,’ I say, although even as I do, I know it’s a lie. ‘No. No way.’

Another piece of the puzzle falls into place. I was young and stupid and it’s the only piece that could fit.

Clever. So very clever.

I wish I could cry.

37

AFTER

2006

Her heart thumps as she licks the bitter glue of the envelope. She shouldn’t send the letter. Sheknowsshe shouldn’t, but although the world might think she’s evil, if she can’t forgivehimfor the thing he did, then how can she ever expect to be forgiven herself? She can’t stay filled with hate. It’s too exhausting. And he’s sorry. He’s done the best he can to prove that.

They can keep giving her new names – Lisa, she’s now Lisa – but they can’t so easily wipe out all the versions of her who went before. They are ghosts who live under the skin and one ghost loved him for a while. Even with how he was towards the end, and after what he did when they left, she still misses how she felt in the early days. And he gave her Ava – Crystal has a new name too this time – so how can she not forgive him now that he’s done his best to make up for it all?

She physically flinches when she remembers the headlines – how he made their story, their life together sound so awful. How he blamed his drinking on her. How he said she’d ruined his life. All the tiny details of their relationship that she’d once treasured, he publicly trampled them and made them dirty.

At least they hadn’t been able to print her picture. But still, there had been the relocation and another identity to be created, more taxpayers’ money spent on someone most of the public would rather had been hanged for what she’d done. She was sure the team around her muttered at the ridiculous cost of it all and blamed her for being a lovesick fool who’d brought this on herself with her big mouth.

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