by Graham West
Sinking to his knees, he recalled the moment he’d nearly died when his foot became entangled in a discarded bike frame at the bottom of the canal. He felt exactly like that now, as if the whole damned place was underwater. The air was too thick and heavy, and he was drowning.
***
Blakely closed his eyes and drew a deep breath, exhaling loudly enough for Penny to hear from the bedroom.
“Everything okay?” she called breezily.
“Yeah, just tired,” he replied, wondering if his wife realised he was lying.
His fascination with the spirit world was fading fast. He’d been online, checking out the sites dealing with paranormal activity, which said there was a difference between ghosts and spirits. Ghosts, he had learned, were not conscious; they were rather like holographic recordings on a loop and had no awareness of human presence. Spirits, however, were a whole different entity. When a person died, their spirit lived on but they didn’t, and it was often believed they would suddenly transform into some kind of angelic being. According to his research, death did not change the nature of a person, which made sense, when Blakely thought about it. Amelia Root had been a troubled girl, and she had remained troubled until she was laid to rest a century after she had died.
But now, weird things were happening all around him. Things that threatened to shatter his dreams. It was more than just a few creaks and bangs in a spooky old house. This was flying pushchairs, pitchforks with a life of their own, and a kid who talked to ghosts. No, not ghosts; troubled people who had passed over.
If Penny was worried, then she was hiding it well. It was business as usual, and her manager’s hat never slipped. Blakely needed a strong woman, and the thought he might have left his wife for Kim appalled him. In time, her rampant sexual desires might well have led her into the arms of another man, leaving him alone, mourning the marriage he’d destroyed.
But Kim was dead. He could still see her body lying in the woods, her shattered skull covered by a jacket. It was her death that had kept him focused on Penny and her commitment to Mosswood Adventure Park. He turned to see her standing in the doorway, looking every inch the business woman. She smiled briefly.
“I’m just going over to the reception. One of the girls had a bit of a run-in with a guest. Apparently, he was particularly abusive, and she’s in tears.”
Blakely nodded. “Don’t forget what my father always says: the customer is always right.”
Penny glared at him. “No, Dennis, they aren’t always right! If some jerk has abused one of my staff, he’ll get a warning, and if he tries it on with me, he’ll be on his way home.”
“How do you know it wasn’t the receptionist’s fault?”
Penny picked up her briefcase and turned. “That’s what I’m going to find out.”
Blakely chuckled to himself. Whoever the guy was, he had no idea what was coming his way.
***
Jenny’s heart sank the moment she set eyes on Kayla in a skimpy white bikini. “Why are you wearing that?” she hissed, checking she was out of Isaac’s earshot.
Kayla was taken aback. “It’s a bikini, and I’m having a swim!”
“It’s a bit brief, isn’t it?”
“I like it! What’s the problem?”
“You know what the problem is.”
“Look, if you can’t handle seeing my body—”
“Bitch!” Jenny muttered under her breath.
“What did you say?”
“You’re being a bitch!”
Kayla flushed. “Jenny, I’m not gonna let you dictate what I wear. I like this bikini, okay? So have a word with yourself and stop behaving like a control freak.”
Jenny watched helplessly as Kayla plunged beneath the water and reappeared on the other side of the pool. Why did she have to open her mouth? Why couldn’t she have just concentrated on her child? But she was aching, not just for the girl who had become like a sister, but for Jake, the man who loved her. The man who knew nothing of the turmoil in her heart.
Isaac peered up at her with questioning eyes. Kids picked up on tension so quickly. They didn’t need to understand or even hear; they seemed to feel it like a vibration.
“Hey, sweetie,” she cooed, kissing Isaac’s forehead. “Wanna go over by the fountain?”
Isaac nodded enthusiastically. Of course he did. Fountains were his favourite. Jenny sensed Kayla watching and glanced over at Danni, sitting alone with a coffee in the café bar. Had she seen the confrontation? Had she seen the hostility written across their faces? Maybe she knew. Jenny pushed the thought from her mind. That was verging on paranoia.
By the time she and Isaac returned from the fountain, Danni was on her third drink and was on the verge of leaving.
“I’m giving him another ten minutes,” she threw her phone down in frustration, “then I’m gone.”
“He hasn’t answered you?”
Danni bit her tongue. “Er, no!”
Isaac ran his plastic car over the tabletop, using the coffee cups as roundabouts. “Where’s Gan-gan?” he asked.
Jenny smiled. “That’s a good idea. We can go see Grandad. Maybe Uncle Darren will be there, too.”
Danni scowled. “I wouldn’t bet on it.”
Isaac grabbed his mother’s hand, and in that moment Jenny wanted to take him in her arms and never let him go. His innocence shone like a beacon of light in a murky world of betrayal and mistrust that she feared would swallow him whole in the coming years.
Chapter Thirty
Cody had woken that morning after a dreamless sleep. There had been no midnight adventures and no visits from his special friends. Not that he minded too much. His parents had booked an archery lesson, and he quite fancied being Robin Hood with a real bow and arrow.
The whole thing proved to be an adventure; he managed to hit the bullseye and everyone clapped and treated him like a superhero. It took a while to get used to the bow, and he narrowly avoided shooting the instructor in the bottom, which made all the other kids laugh. Mum got pretty close to the bullseye too, but Dad missed by a mile and said it was because he had a dodgy elbow.
Afterwards, they bought him a plastic bow and arrows with little red suckers, and he spent an hour trying to knock empty tin cans off the table outside the lodge. Then they went riding on the cycle trail, keeping away from the perimeter fence and the gate that led to the creepy part of Mosswood that Jacob Root had warned him about.
When they got back to the lodge, Dad ordered pizza for tea, which was pretty neat; next to cheeseburgers, pizza was Cody’s favourite, and because he’d been so good, he was promised a chocolate milkshake special, which had ice cream and chocolate sprinkles along with a little pot of popcorn.
It had been a good day. Everything had gone well, and he’d almost forgotten about Bailey but still wondered what had happened to Jacob Root and why those men had killed him. They were scary and mean, and he guessed they would have killed him too if he’d been there at the time.
Mr. Root hadn’t reappeared since. The only other dead person Cody had seen was the boy with red hair who’d been standing behind Bailey’s mum by the pool. Maybe he’d ask her who he was. Mum had said she was coming over for a drink, which probably meant Bailey was coming too. Cody thought it best not to be alone with her anymore. Not after she’d pulled him off the ladder.
Cody opened his sketchpad and emptied his multicoloured plastic case of crayons and pencils onto the table. He was hungry, but the pizza and the milkshake wouldn’t be here for at least an hour, so he had plenty of time to draw something…or someone. He waited a moment, his hand resting on the page, and felt the familiar tingle in his elbow, travelling down his arm and into his fingers. The pencil began to move, slowly at first but then, as always, it quickened, leaving his mind trailing behind.
When the pencil fell from his hand, Cody stared at the face looking up at him. It was a woman with her eyes wide open, like she’d seen something really bad, but before he could even guess at what, t
here was a smell, like the time Dad had left a burger under the car seat for two weeks, but much worse. It was horrible, and then, suddenly, his face was getting hot, the way it had when he’d opened the oven door that time.
It lasted only a moment, both the smell and the heat, but that was enough. Cody ripped the page from his sketchpad and screwed it up, hoping that whoever the woman was, she wouldn’t pay him a visit in the night.
***
Darren wasn’t sure if he was dreaming. He could see his own feet, and that had to be a good thing, but he could also hear a voice—his father’s voice—followed by his mother’s cries as she fought to push Darren from her womb. A long, ear-piercing scream and the sound of a soothing lullaby drifted over the tick of a clock, and then he was in his father’s arms, the stubble of his father’s unshaven face against his cheek.
It was his life, rushing by. His life, from the cradle to the grave—things he’d never have been able to recall, yet they were sounds he recognised instantly, but they faded as he regained an awareness of where he was. It was during those lucid moments he realised Taylor had deserted him. There would be no ambulance and no help. No one would come looking until it was too late.
The chatter, cries and squeals of the playground filled his consciousness, the smell of the classroom, the sound of the teacher’s voice. His favourite teacher, Miss Claymont—the first woman he’d ever mentally undressed. She had dark-brown eyes, and he would find himself gazing into them, oblivious to the words that fell from her perfectly formed lips. The infatuation had faded after a couple of months, when Samantha Benson arrived in her hitched-up school skirt.
It was love at first sight, and now her mouth pressed against his own in that stolen kiss at the bus shelter. He felt the rush of excitement, the pounding heart. She was his first girl, but she’d broken his fourteen-year-old heart and moved down south with her parents. He cried at the memory, the pain as sharp as it had been that Friday afternoon as she waved goodbye outside the school gates.
He’d found someone new. Alison Henshaw. But Alison never replaced Sammy in his heart, and although he smelled her perfume and heard her voice in his ear, she passed through his mind almost as quickly as she’d passed through his life. The sounds of the following two years echoed in his head, the voices from his past converging, creating a cacophony that made him cry out in pain. And then he was alone with Kevin Taylor in Alshaw Park, the chatter of the girls at the lakeside phasing in and out with the heady effects of cheap cider.
He screamed to drown the sound of the car engine, plugging his ears in a vain attempt to block out the next few minutes. But it didn’t work, and the screech of brakes was followed by a sickening thud that exploded in his mind. The sound of death.
Everything stopped in that single moment, as if the recording of his life had come to an abrupt end, leaving him nauseous and drained. “I’m so sorry, Dad,” he whispered. “I let you down. I’m so sorry.”
His voice was drowned by the sound of his father’s strangled cries—a man begging forgiveness, in despair at having failed his son. No words were needed. Darren realised in that moment; his father had never blamed him. Maybe he’d understood only too well that the breakdown of their marriage had broken his son’s heart. Some kids could cope. Some couldn’t.
Silence fell. Darren’s life was going to end right there. Taylor had tricked him, using a false identity, just as Kayla’s psychotic boyfriend had tricked Jenny and Jake nearly three years ago. They had survived because they were good people. They had never killed anyone. He had. It was that thing they called karma. A life for a life.
Footsteps.
He could hear footsteps, and tried to lift his head, but the pain made him cry out. He tried again, a little slower. The wood was so dark and there was nothing upon which he could focus.
“Are you okay?” The voice came from close by. A young female.
“No!” he croaked. “I think I’ve got con…” The word escaped him.
“You need to get out of the woods.”
Darren didn’t answer. Trying to form even the most basic words seemed beyond him, but through the darkness, he could make out a figure. Yes, it was definitely a girl.
“You need to get out of here,” she repeated. “Right now!”
Gradually, his eyes adjusted, and he could see her. She looked about ten or eleven and wore baggy blue denims and a bright-red top with the word Winner emblazoned in silver across the front. But it was her fiery red hair that made her stand out from the other kids, and word had got around. She was the one who’d pulled that kid off the ladder.
“What…who…what are you doing here?” Darren managed to utter even though his tongue was like a strip of dead meat he couldn’t swallow or spit out.
The girl didn’t reply. She just smiled, but there was something about her eyes…
Something that sent a chill from Darren’s aching head through to his toes.
Chapter Thirty-One
Cody sat impassively. Bailey’s mother stood with her hands on top of her head, howling, “She’s gone! I just went to make myself a drink and…”
“Oh my god! When?” Cody’s mother asked. “How long ago?”
“About an hour.”
“Where have you looked?”
“Everywhere. Don’t even go through the frigging list cos I’ve been there.”
Cody looked down at the face he’d just drawn. It was Bailey, with hair of red flames. Her eyes seemed to look beyond him, and for a moment, he thought she was going to leap from the page.
“She’s in the woods,” he blurted and looked up. His mother stared at him.
“How do you know that?”
“Has she said something to you?” Bailey’s mum asked. “Did she tell you she was going?” Her voice broke.
Cody wasn’t sure how he knew; the words had fallen from his lips before he’d had time to think. It was one of those things that grown-ups didn’t understand. “She never told me anything. I just know that’s where she is.”
Bailey’s mother looked as if she was about to collapse.
“I can help you look for her if you like,” he offered, hoping that she wouldn’t take him up on it.
“No!” his mother screeched. “There’s no way you’re going back in there.”
Cody shrugged, and Bailey’s mother burst into tears.
“I don’t know what’s up with that girl,” she sobbed.
“It’s because she’s got a dead person inside her,” Cody said casually, wondering again if he could stop the words escaping even if he’d tried.
Cody’s mother had never laid a hand on him until that moment, and it took him by surprise as she pulled him out of the chair and slapped him hard across the back of his legs. He screamed in pain and anger. “Why did you do that? I only told the truth!”
“That’s a terrible thing to say. I’m sick to death of all this ghost stuff!”
He fished in his pocket for the screwed-up drawing. His pain and anger turned to defiance as he almost ripped the paper, spreading it out, and held it up to his mother’s face.
“That’s her!” he said. “That’s the woman making Bailey do these—” He stopped. He heard a name, repeated over and over again in his head, and looked straight at Bailey’s mother, who was staring at him in disbelief. “She’s called Winifred Miles.”
***
Alex picked up the message on his radio. They needed a team to go looking for a girl who had gone missing in the woods—the same girl who’d disappeared the other day and turned up a few hours later as if nothing had happened. She’d probably do the same thing again, but her mother was panicking like crazy, so his boss had paired him up with Liam Garret, a new starter who looked as if he could take care of himself.
They’d been told to stay together, which seemed a little odd. Surely it would have been better to split up and keep the radio link open, but his boss had been insistent. There would be another team, Stan Moorcroft and Holly Abbott, who would contact them if
they found the girl.
Mosswood management would be glad to see the back of that Bailey kid. They couldn’t afford to take staff out of the park in peak season, and Alex was still wondering why they needed four people to do it. Blakely was probably concerned she’d end up spending the night there, but that wouldn’t be such a bad thing—teach the little brat a lesson.
Alex was starting to question whether Liam was cut out for Mosswood. He’d clearly misunderstood what his new job entailed, under the illusion that ranger meant he’d play the part of some kind of local wildlife adventurer. He’d done three years in the army, so they’d put him in charge of the assault course with its zip wires, climbing walls and nets. He was ideal for the part, except they’d forgotten to ask if he liked kids. Needless to say, he didn’t.
Several parents had complained about his overzealous style but, dressed in combats with a testosterone-fuelled approach to the role, he attracted most of the older boys and girls, anxious to impress their new taskmaster.
Alex didn’t like him much. Apart from Darren Pascoe, he rarely disliked anyone, but Liam was one of those macho guys that rubbed him up the wrong way and wasn’t even that good at hiding his dislike of the younger kids. As far as Liam was concerned, they were a pain in the arse. But it was Garret’s attitude to women that really wound Alex up, and the way he preened himself like some strutting cockerel every time one walked within his radar. He was the kind of bloke who would steal your girl from under the bed sheets without an ounce of remorse.
“You take left and I’ll go right,” Liam said with an air of authority he didn’t have. They’d only walked ten metres and he was already issuing orders.
“Er, no. We have to stick together.”
“Why? That’s bollocks!”
“I don’t know, but that’s what we’ve been told.”
“Fucking mental! We’re gonna split up. I’m tellin’ ya, we’ll find her quicker.”
Alex was already pissed off, having to spend time with this meat-head, with him trying it on. It was time to pull rank. “You go off and I’m calling Blakely.”
