“No…”
I looked up in shock. “What?”
“No, it was a very premature birth and your daughter’s weight is very low. She is in pediatric intensive care and… Look, I have to tell you that there is a strong possibility she will not survive the night. I am so sorry.”
Daughter? I stumbled, gripping hold of the wall.
“May I see her?”
The doctor had been telling the truth when he said she was tiny. Her body could have fitted into the palm of my hand, that is, if she wasn’t in an incubator, attached to tubes and drips to keep her alive surrounded by nurses who held my hand as I looked down at her tiny body. She had to survive, and, in my heart, I knew being Kate’s daughter, she would be a fighter, but was this a fight she had any chance of winning?
* * *
The police did their best to be quiet, but I had been unable to sleep and heard the arrival of several cars outside of the window of my room, the hushed talking and the footsteps through the corridor which stopped outside the bedroom door.
Looking out of the window, I could see they had opened my car and were looking through the boot and countless officers were waiting along with photographers ready to capture the moment for the masses. The bedroom door was smashed open, the police yelling. I complied, kneeling before being pushed onto my front, my face shoved into the filthy pile of the carpet, my wrists cuffed. I was dragged to my feet and taken roughly down the stairs. I ignored the flashes of cameras as they forced me into the back of a police van. It was over.
I was so very glad.
* * *
“Kate?”
“Adam… I’m sorry.” Her eyes remained closed, she sighed, lying on her back, otherwise still.
“Kate there is nothing to be sorry about.”
“Adam I went down to Devon asking questions. I allowed myself to be caught by that girl… Damn it, I was so stupid… Oh, God, if I had never told you to go to work at Hilary’s this would never have happened in the first place.”
“You are being very hard on yourself.” I took her in my arms, her body felt frail. I spoke softly. “Kate, you encouraged me to do something which would help my career. What happened… Look, what happened, happened. It was terrible, but it was not caused by you or what you did. When you went to Devon it was because you wanted to do the best for me, it was because you were so clever, you saw through Sally when even the police didn’t… You put yourself at risk to help me, trying, selflessly to prove my innocence. You always look after me. Kate, you are everything to me. Without you and what you did, I would still be in prison. Everybody else thought that I had killed that poor girl.”
“But, without what I did we would have a baby…”
“We do…” I whispered in her ear.
Her eyes opened suddenly, confusion on her face. “No… It was awful, I lost… I…”
I shook my head. “She’s tiny, but, she’s like her mum, she’s a fighter. They didn’t think she would survive the night, but she did. While you’ve been sedated, she has been getting stronger. She’s not out of the woods, but our daughter has a chance.”
“Our daughter?”
Kate had been hysterical and weak, the stress of her kidnap, the lack of food, the poor hygiene and the premature birth had taken their toll on her body. For almost a week she had lain nearly unresponsive, under deep sedation to allow her body to recover.
During that week, our beautiful daughter had stabilised, she was still tiny, vulnerable and in an incubator, but the nurses were starting to feel more confident. I had been there, every day willing her to become stronger, willing her to survive.
This was not the end of the risk, but she was in a place where the odds of her surviving finally started to weigh up against the odds of her passing. I had looked at this tiny person, so small yet perfectly formed and prayed.
“Kate, what are you doing?” She had forcibly shoved me from the bed.
“Get my clothes!”
Kate swung her legs out of the bed, standing shakily, grabbing the bedside table for support before starting to pull pads and wires from her chest. A nurse rushed into the room. “I need to see her… I must see her…”
* * *
Leaving the hospital, I suddenly realised how alone I was. I had been released. I was weak and bruised, my ribs still hurt where Sally had hit me, however, they had told me I was free to go, they needed the bed. But where was I to go and to what?
I had no home, no horses, no career. That had all been taken from me. Despite everything, there was no going back. What could I do? I stood in the cold of a winter morning, my breath clouding before me and realised there was nothing left for me. I had survived the most terrifying ordeal, but for what? I had once been a professional rider with a stable of great rides now what the hell was I? I walked to the nearest bench and sat down heavily, my head in my hands.
I didn’t look up when I felt someone sit beside me.
“Penny for them?”
I sat up, looking across towards Adam and burst into tears.
* * *
“Here. I’m sure it tastes awful, but it’s all there is.”
He placed the cup of vending machine coffee in front of me. I took a sip, grimacing.
“Told you it would be bad… So, I saw you leaving the hospital, where were you off to?”
“I don’t know Adam? They told me I was free to go, but where can I go? I have nowhere? What can I do?” I burst into tears again, Adam handed me another tissue before sitting back, a smile playing on his lips.
“Well… Rumour has it that you were once, not a bad rider. And, apparently a pretty good coach. What if I told you that someone still wants you and that there could be somewhere for you to go?”
36
Birthday Greetings
“…Happy birthday to you…”
Megan needed a little help in blowing out the single candle on her birthday cake but she got the idea of what was required from us all puffing theatrically! Who would have thought in just one year she would have gone from a tiny thing in an incubator clinging to life to our beautiful, happy baby?
I looked around the kitchen table. There were our extended family, Jacqui and the staff, all wearing party hats, Adam, pulling silly faces and making Megan, and to be honest, everybody else laugh, and finally, there was Hilary.
Of course, I’d agreed immediately with Adam when he told me he had offered her a place with us. She had needed something to get her started, the initial idea had been for her to coach riders and maybe, just maybe go back onto the circuit in time.
However, rather than the bad publicity putting off potential sponsors as she had imagined it would, the story of what had happened to her had rather excited a number of sponsors who wanted to ride on the coattails of her newfound fame. In the end, she had been able to take her pick not only as to who would fund her but also as to who gave her a selection of the very best horses, not least Bob, her stallion who had whinnied as he saw her, dragging his groom across the yard to get to Hilary.
She could have purchased any stable yard she wanted but she had chosen to stable these million-pound horses alongside our liveries and riding school ponies. She mucked in with the staff and offered to coach both our existing and up and coming staff which gave us a selection of working pupils who could experience both the hard work and diversity of the horse industry under our charge.
Adam took part in local and regional shows, but didn’t want to try to go any further, he was loath to leave my side and was there every day to support me and our new family.
A massive miscarriage of justice was what the papers had called Adam’s imprisonment, he had been offered a stupid amount of money which he accepted before promptly donating it to the Riding for The Disabled Association. We were all glad just to put the whole thing behind us, to move on and finally live our lives.
Hilary had only just moved out of the farmhouse this month. She had been our lodger and unofficial babysitter, a title fought over
by the grooms who loved Megan and had already made us promise she would start riding as soon as she was able.
Hilary had, in the end, been reluctantly encouraged to rent her own tiny cottage in Grange, however, still joined us not only daily at the stables but also with all of us on a Sunday evening in our new tradition where Adam or I would cook Sunday dinner and we would all sit around, long into the night with family, staff, and working pupils enjoying food and conversation, putting the week truly to bed.
* * *
We had been required to give statements and speak at Sally’s trial. She had looked so lonely, so broken as she had stood crying in the dock. Of course, she had been found guilty, that had been a foregone conclusion. Grace had ensured the case was suitably high profile using all of her influence to create a court of public opinion in the press and on any talk show which would allow her to speak.
In the end, she was found to have diminished responsibility, they called it some sort of mental disorder, the details of which escape me. She was to be sent to a secure hospital and would remain there for the rest of her life.
Despite everything, I’d felt just a little sorry for her in the end.
37
Treatment
I looked up as I heard the door open. She stood there in the doorway, a sudden look of fear in her eyes as she saw me sitting at the table across the room. She tried to push back, seemingly desperate to return from where she came, but the nurses gently brought her through. She sat opposite me, visibly trembling, unable to make eye contact.
“Hello, Sally… How are you doing?”
“Hilary, why are you here?” Her voice was quiet, broken. She glanced up at me briefly.
“I wanted to see how you were, I care about you.”
“Why? Why would you care? After everything I did, to you, and Kate and Olivia… I did…” She gulped, tears dripping down her face. “I…”
“Sally. You were unwell. I hope you will get better. I should have seen you were struggling, I should have recognised the signs, spent time getting you the help you so desperately needed. You always seemed so strong yet you were hurting inside. I am so sorry. Most of all Sally, I wanted you to know, you aren’t on your own.”
Sally looked up, tears running from her eyes. “I hurt you… You have every right to hate me…”
“I don’t hate you, Sally… I could never hate you. What you did… What you did was wrong. I think you know that. I think you recognise what you did was terrible. But I believe that it wasn’t you, at least not the Sally I used to know. Whatever happened to you, something went wrong in your mind. I can’t forgive what you did. I’m sorry Sally, but I just don’t think I can, but what sort of friend would I be if I just left you all alone?”
“Friend? I don’t deserve a friend…”
“Sally I know you’ll be getting treatment, maybe someday you can leave here. But, until then, I’ll visit you, if I may?”
The nod of her head was almost imperceptible.
For a long time, I had hated Sally, hating what she had done. For months the thought of her coldly killing a young girl revulsed me and I could never imagine a time when I would be able to forgive her. The pain of what she had done to me and Kate burned in my mind.
It was only when I saw her in court when I had sat, wanting revenge for what she had done, that I suddenly saw the helpless young girl stumble into the dock.
I listened to how she had a mental imbalance, how mental illness had clouded what was right and wrong in her mind. How it had made her paranoid, scared even. She’d spoken passionately about her work before this had happened, how she had never wanted to disappoint me. She’d caught my eye in the public gallery as she spoke.
Then she had spoken of how her life had changed. How she felt insecure. Her doctor had explained how her grip on reality would have changed, how she would have not understood what she was doing, how the condition would have created almost manic mood swings.
Of course, Grace had been baying for blood. She’d stirred up the press, yelling abuse in the courtroom until she had been forcibly ejected. I could never fully appreciate her pain, but I could understand how raw and visceral it was for her to lose her daughter. I could understand how she would never forgive.
In the end, the jury had agreed Sally had been unwell. They called it diminished responsibility; it wasn’t the girl I had known who had done these terrible things. Well, at least that was how I understood it. The Sally who had put us through all of this had been ill, confused and not able to appreciate what she was doing. It was as much my fault for seeing she was not behaving as she had. I had ignored the subtle changes, the signs that she was unwell. I truly blamed myself.
Sally was to be placed in a secure hospital indefinitely. And so that was where I was now, having travelled some distance unsure of what I would find. The idea in my mind was of some Victorian sanitorium, a dark prison for the insane.
In fact, it had been bright and cheery in the visiting room. Security was tight and very obvious; however, it was clear this was a place where she would receive the help she so desperately needed.
Sally’s eyes lit up when I started to tell her about my new horses, reverting, for just a moment to the girl who had been my hardworking and pretty groom. It brought me back to the nights we had spent together, laughing, sharing beer and pizza in the horsebox or those times we had ridden together admiring the view and racing to the top of the hills. Somewhere, deep within her troubled mind, I told myself, that girl was still there.
All too soon it was time to leave. I stood up, opening my arms. Sally nestled in my grasp, I could feel her once strong body, muscles now wasted, her ribs showing through her polo shirt.
I promised to see her again soon, handing her some equestrian magazines, the staples removed as instructed. I hoped she would enjoy them.
I watched as she meekly walked back through the steel door which locked soundly behind her. There was a moment when I stood alone in the visiting room. I would never quite forgive myself for allowing Sally to have become so unwell.
38
Rain And Sunshine
The door closed behind me.
I lay down on the cot like bed. It was so like the thin mattress which had been in the horsebox, the thought made me smile for the first time in many months.
I reached down; I’d been pretending to swallow the pills they gave me three times a day. Acting drowsy and subdued just as they had expected.
Scrabbling beneath the mattress I grabbed my collected haul. Oh, how nice it had been to see Hilary I thought as I placed the handful of gritty tablets in my mouth, gagging as I swallowed.
Oh, this had been so tiring. Life had exhausted me; I plumped my scratchy pillow and closed my eyes. I just wanted to sleep now.
* * *
My eyes snapped open with the sting of rain hitting my face. I was galloping through the trees and up the hill, the drumming of hoofbeats beneath me. Suddenly I burst into the sunlight, the rain creating the most beautiful rainbow which seemed to engulf me.
I’d never felt so alive.
A Note From The Author
In this novel, we encounter individuals with mental health concerns and it demonstrates that often it can be difficult if not impossible to detect in others when they are struggling with their mental health.
As equestrians, we often keep working despite injuries. Many of us will have crooked fingers, faded scars and fresh bruises from a variety of accidents over the years. However, we must not take the same attitude to our mental health and that of others.
Death Rider (The Rider Series Book 2) Page 26
