Her hand felt for the seatbelt. She struggled to open it, her hands slippery with blood. Stopping, she took a breath, wiped her hand on her shirt and tried again. This time, she managed it, feeling the belt open and slipping it from over her shoulder. Without its support, she slumped heavily against the door, crying out again.
It took several minutes before she could twist around and make the attempt to climb out. The distance to the opening seemed enormous. Gulping, she brought her legs up and reached for the passenger seat to pull herself up. Was Tia okay? She called her name, but her voice didn’t carry beyond the confines of the car.
With broken ribs on both sides, and one arm almost unusable, every movement was painful and the going slow. There was no sound apart from her own grunts and whimpers. She’d no breath to spare to call out again for Tia.
Finally, she managed to get a foot on the edge of the passenger seat and push herself up through the opening, crying out as she knocked against the side, feeling bones shift and scrape before collapsing onto the side of the car.
She lay for a moment while another wave of pain gripped her, biting her lip and taking shallow breaths through her nose. It was the strong smell of petrol that made her move again.
Ignoring the pain, she raised her head to look for Tia and saw her lying a few feet from the car. She wasn’t moving. ‘Tia,’ she cried out. There was no response.
Gritting her teeth, she pushed herself up, swung around and let her legs dangle over the side of the car. It probably wasn’t more than four feet, but that was a long way to drop with broken bones. Rolling onto her belly, she used her good arm to push herself down, holding on for as long as possible before making that final drop. She tried to stay on her feet but they wouldn’t hold her and she slipped, falling backward to the ground, her shoulder hitting a rock as she landed. She rolled away with a groan and lay face down, the clean smell of pine needles replacing the stink of petrol. She could have stayed there, her head cushioned on the layer of pine, could have closed her eyes and just let go. It would be good to be away from the pain. Her eyes flickered and closed for a moment before sanity kicked in. She had to move away from the car.
Unable to stand, she crawled, one painful inch at a time through the layer of leaf mould, banging knees and elbows off hidden rocks. Woodlice and ants scattered out of her way as she dragged herself to where Tia lay, unmoving.
The last year vanished. This was her twin. She was supposed to be looking out for her. Her father would be disappointed in her again. Will would be disappointed. She’d failed everyone.
‘Tia,’ she rasped, reaching her sister, putting a hand on her leg and shaking it. There was no sign of life. With a cry of despair, she crawled further until she was eye-level with her face. All she could see was blood. She reached out bloody, muddy fingers and touched her gently. ‘Tia, please, wake up.’ She couldn’t see whether she was breathing or not. Moving closer, she gave her cold cheek a gentle kiss. ‘Tia,’ she begged, ‘you have to be okay. Think of Will, think of Bill. I’m sorry I tried to make you leave, you can stay with us. Of course, you can stay with us. Tia?’
There was no sign that Tia heard, no movement. Ellie, tears streaming down her face, lay beside her and, finally, gave into the pain that rushed in, wave after wave.
40
Will was in the middle of a Skype meeting with colleagues in Edinburgh when his office door opened suddenly. He looked up from the screen with a frown. His secretary, Maisie, knew not to interrupt. Opening his mouth to ask what was going on, he shut it when he saw her unnaturally pale face and felt blood drain from his own when he saw the two uniformed police officers behind her.
‘I’ll have to get back to you,’ he told his colleagues, shutting the programme down without further explanation and standing to face whatever it was that was coming. ‘Ellie,’ he whispered, watching as Maisie stepped back to allow the police enter the office. She shot him a sympathetic look before closing the door.
He saw the look in their eyes and sat heavily. ‘Ellie,’ he said louder, an edge of despair in his voice.
PC Norman, grey eyes in a grimly serious face, stepped forward and introduced herself and her colleague, PC Woods, before taking a step closer. ‘There’s been an accident, Mr Armstrong. Mrs Armstrong has been injured. She’s in hospital.’
Will felt a wave of relief sweep over him. Ellie was alive.
‘There was another woman in the car,’ the officer said. ‘We believe her name was Tia Bradshaw. Do you know this woman?’
Will nodded. ‘She’s my sister-in-law, my wife’s sister. Her twin actually.’ He looked at them, frowning, his face pale. ‘They were in the car together?’
PC Norman nodded. ‘A few miles from Brighton.’
Will, looking a little grey, blinked. ‘Brighton? I don’t understand.’ He ran a hand over his face. ‘Is she okay?’
‘I’m sorry to have to tell you,’ PC Norman began, starting with the same words she always used in these situations, ‘that Ms Bradshaw sustained a severe head injury and didn’t survive the crash.’
‘Tia’s dead?’ Will’s face paled. He gulped, stood up and then immediately sat back down again, his eyes wide. ‘Bill? Oh God, my son, Bill? Is he all right?’
PC Wood quickly held up his hand. ‘Your son wasn’t in the car, Mr Armstrong. He’s with the nanny.’ Noting his blank face, he added. ‘Sally Watson.’
Will shook his head. ‘I’ve never heard of her, there must be some mistake.’
PC Wood looked to his partner, a slight shrug of his shoulder telling her he was out of his depth here.
Narrowing her eyes, she took out her notebook. ‘Your car registration, Mr Armstrong, what is it?’
Will reeled it off. ‘It’s Ellie’s car,’ he said, ‘not mine. We only had the one car, there didn’t seem to be much point having two in London, we use the tube for work and a taxi if we’re going out…’He stopped abruptly. He was babbling.
‘That’s the registration of the car involved in the crash, Mr Armstrong. Your wife regained consciousness for a brief time and identified herself. There is no doubt we have the right person. We called to your house first and met Ms Watson, she gave us your details. Perhaps your wife organised a temporary nanny at the last minute?’
Perhaps. It still sounded a bit odd but there were more important things to worry about. ‘What hospital is she in?’
‘The RHB,’ PC Woods told him and then gave a shake of his head. ‘Sorry, the Royal Hospital, Brighton.’
Will nodded and stood. ‘I have to get there.’ He looked at them and then gave a rueful smile. ‘I don’t know what to do.’
The police officers took this in their stride. ‘Leave it to us,’ PC Norman said. ‘We’ll organise a car to take you there and contact the nanny to ensure your son is cared for. She said she worked for an agency so there should be no problem.’
Will nodded, relieved to be able to leave everything in their hands. His head was muddled. Ellie injured, Tia dead. None of it made sense.
He remained in the same daze during the drive to the hospital, the driver taking one look at his face and keeping his mouth shut throughout the journey. Parking outside the main entrance of the hospital, the police driver turned to look at his passenger. If he’d been pale when he picked him up, he looked paler now. ‘You going to manage?’
‘I’ll be fine, thank you,’ Will said and pushed open the door and got out.
It was dark, and the lights of the hospital were glaring. He blinked away a tear and took the first step slowly, then the second, concentrating on each one, afraid that if he didn’t, he’d stop and not be able to move again. The doors opened automatically and he moved inside the huge reception area, his eyes darting around for something familiar. But there was nothing.
He didn’t know how long he stood there, people milling about ignoring him, everyone focused on their own problems nor did he know how long more he would have stood if he hadn’t felt a hand on his arm.
He tu
rned to see the driver. ‘I couldn’t leave you,’ the man said. ‘Come on, let’s see where you need to go.’
Will allowed himself to be led toward the reception desk where there was a short queue.
‘Wait here,’ the driver said and, courtesy of his uniform, dealt with the short queue by skipping it, taking only a few minutes to find out where Ellie Armstrong was.
Returning to Will’s side, he told him, ‘She’s in the intensive care unit.’
Will felt his legs weaken.
‘Come on, mate,’ the man said kindly, ‘I’ll take you up.’
In a daze, Will followed, getting a measure of reassurance from the firm hand on his arm. At the door to the ICU, a sign advised them to ring the bell and wait. The driver pressed the bell and stood silently at his side.
‘I have to go now,’ the driver said, when a nurse finally appeared. ‘Will you be okay, Mr Armstrong?’
Will, feeling a moment’s panic, wanted to beg him to stay. He took a steadying breath. ‘Yes,’ he said, gratefully, ‘and thank you, you’ve been extraordinarily kind.’
The driver nodded and turned to the nurse, ‘Look after him, will you? He’s pretty shook up.’
The nurse glanced at Will and then looked back at the driver and gave a quick, sympathetic smile. ‘They always are,’ she said, ‘don’t worry, we’ll take care of him.’
Will watched the driver go and then felt the nurse’s hand on his arm.
‘Follow me, Mr Armstrong,’ she said, leading him a short way down the corridor and stopping outside a door.
Will, who was beginning to feel as if he were caught in a dream sequence where he was led from place to place by a succession of people, felt a moment’s panic when she opened the door.
Panic, and a deep sense of dread as the horrific truth started to sink in. Ellie was injured. Tia was dead.
41
The reality behind the door, however, was a large waiting room where grouped seating and large, obviously artificial, plants didn’t take away the feeling that it was a place of sadness and despair. Will let the breath he’d been holding out in a hiss that was loud enough to draw a startled look from the nurse who still held his arm.
Taking her hand away, she indicated a chair. ‘Take a seat, Mr Armstrong,’ she told him, her voice gentle. ‘I’ll go and get one of the nurses who is looking after your wife to come and speak to you, okay?’
It wasn’t a question, Will guessed, as she left, disappearing back through the same door. He turned and sat, ignoring the grim, grey faces that occupied some of the other chairs.
It was ten minutes before the door opened and a scrub-suited woman came in, a frown on her face, a clipboard in her hand. ‘Mr Armstrong,’ she asked, looking around.
Will hesitated and put up his hand. It seemed the easiest thing to do.
‘There’s a room where we can chat,’ the woman said, indicating a door to one side.
Will didn’t want to chat, he wanted to see Ellie. But he stood and followed the woman’s back as he was told. For a gut-wrenching second, he thought of Tia. She’d have done the same, followed without question. She always did.
The room he was taken to was small and functional. One large table stood in the centre surrounded by several uncomfortable-looking chairs. It wasn’t a place to stay for long. It was a place to hear bad news. Will sat, his face in his hands. ‘She’s dead, isn’t she?’
The nurse sat beside him and put an arm around his shoulder briefly. ‘No, she isn’t, I promise you. She’s badly hurt but she’s doing okay.’ She took her arm away and sat back. ‘My name is Casey Jarvis, I’m the lead nurse looking after your wife.’
Will took a deep breath and looked at her. ‘How badly hurt is she?’
‘She has multiple lacerations from the glass, a couple of which needed sutures. The seat belt probably saved her life but it also broke her clavicle and some ribs, one of these perforated a lung and another nicked her heart.’
‘Nicked?’ Will asked, his eyes wide as he tried to absorb everything. ‘How seriously?’
The nurse smiled reassuringly. ‘The cardiology team have already been, they don’t seem too concerned but we’ll be monitoring it, of course. The most serious of her obvious injuries was the perforated lung, the thoracic team have inserted a chest drain which will remain in situ for a few days. There’s also a simple fracture of her left arm and a badly sprained right ankle, neither of which are causing any serious problem.’
Will frowned. He latched onto one word that puzzled him. ‘You said obvious injuries, what do you mean?’
She put down the clipboard. ‘Your wife regained consciousness briefly at the crash site while the paramedic was with her but has been unconscious since. She’s breathing independently, a good indicator that there’s nothing too seriously wrong, but she was badly shaken. Until she wakes up we don’t know if there’s some damage.’
‘You mean brain damage?’ Will said, appalled.
The nurse’s face gave nothing away. ‘We don’t know,’ she admitted. ‘If she doesn’t regain consciousness by tomorrow, they’ll do an MRI scan. It may just be her body’s way of dealing with the shock.’ She looked down at her clipboard briefly. When she looked up again, her eyes were softer. ‘I had a call from the police a short while ago, they informed me that the woman who was killed in the crash was your wife’s sister. Her twin. It may be that, on some level, she is aware of her death.’
Of course. The link was there even if Ellie so often wished it weren’t. He nodded. ‘It’s possible.’
The nurse smiled at him as if he’d given the right reply. He wanted to scream at her but instead he smiled back dutifully before asking, ‘Can I see her?’
She nodded and stood. ‘Don’t be frightened by all the tubes and monitors,’ she said, moving to open the door, ‘we’re keeping a close eye on her.’
Going through the heavy doors into the intensive care unit was like entering a different world. Nothing could have prepared him for the array of equipment or for the number of people who hovered around every bed, their faces creased in concern, hands everywhere, adjusting, checking, scribbling notes on clipboards. And everything was done to a symphony of beeps.
He followed the nurse to the end of a bed where she stopped and hung the clipboard she carried. ‘Here we are,’ she said.
Here we are? Will looked at the person in the bed, and his mouth fell open. This couldn’t be his wife, couldn’t possibly be his Ellie.
Approaching the head of the bed, he tried to see his wife through the bruises, the multiple cuts and the many tubes that snaked around her. He wanted to hold her hand but didn’t dare disturb the drip line in one, and there was a plaster cast on the other. He wanted to pull her into his arms and hold her tight, but he couldn’t. All he could do was stand and stare.
‘There’s a chair,’ said the nurse, pointing to one as if he wouldn’t recognise it, ‘you can pull it up and sit beside her. We’ll tell you if you’re in the way.’
‘Thank you,’ he managed, with a brief smile in her direction which she took as her cue to leave. He perched uncomfortably on the edge of the chair trying to think of the right thing to do, left alone with his battered wife and her attendant technology.
‘Oh God, Ellie,’ he said, reaching for the only part of her that wasn’t either broken and bruised or attached to something, his fingers stroking her elbow, reassured somewhat by the feel of warm flesh. ‘You have to pull through, you can’t leave me.’
Alone with his thoughts and the steady beep beep of the monitors, it didn’t take him long to figure out why they’d been on the road to Brighton, and why there was a strange woman looking after his child. He knew his wife too well to be in any doubt. She’d organised the nanny and somehow persuaded Tia to go for a drive, a long drive, all the way to that damn bungalow.
‘Did you really think you could just leave her there,’ he muttered, ‘that Tia would stay there without Bill.’ He leaned closer, his eyes filling with tears. ‘
I could have told you it was a waste of time, Ellie. But you didn’t ask me, did you?’ His fingers moved back over her elbow, the contact small but reassuring. ‘And now look at the mess we’re in.’
He stayed sitting beside her, leaving reluctantly when the nursing staff insisted and then he paced the reception until given the signal to return. By early morning, his skin was an unhealthy ashen colour and when he’d nodded off for the third time, he knew he had to find somewhere to sleep. The nurse on duty took his mobile number and promised, more than once, to ring him if there was any change.
‘Of course,’ she said, ‘now go and get some sleep. You must look after yourself, she’s going to need you.’
There was nowhere for him in the hospital, the only family beds available reserved for the parents of children, so he was directed to a nearby hotel where he was able to check in immediately. Opening the bedroom door, he moved to the bed, lay down fully clothed and was asleep within seconds.
He slept deeply until noise in the corridor woke him and then he lay unmoving for a moment in the hope that it had all been a horrifically bad dream. But, of course, it wasn’t. Tia was dead. Ellie unconscious. He checked his watch, midday. He needed to ring home and find out how Bill was and, more importantly, who on earth was caring for him.
Sally Watson answered the phone on the second ring and immediately put his mind to rest. ‘These are unusual circumstances, Mr Armstrong. I’m happy to remain looking after your son until everything has been sorted. I’m aware you’ve not met me but if you’d like to ring the agency, I’m certain they’ll put your mind at ease. I’m very experienced.’
‘No, no,’ he hurried to reassure her, ‘I’m sure my wife employed the best. I’ll keep you informed and let you know what’s happening as soon as I know.’ He hung up with a sigh of relief. She seemed competent. He hoped she was. A couple of days, he’d told her. It was a polite lie, he’d no idea how long they’d be there. He called the office and told the same lie. Deaf to their sympathy, he finished the call as soon as possible.
Secrets Between Us Page 20
