Stranger in the Woods: A tense psychological thriller

by Anni Taylor

  No, I wasn’t up to seeing anyone. I was back in my cocoon. Retreating from the world.

  “Who is it?” I asked tentatively.

  “It’s Greer Crowley and a friend of hers, Kelly.”

  “Really?” I said, shocked. “Here?”

  Mum nodded. “Will I—?”

  I inhaled. “Yes, of course.”

  She vanished back into the hallway.

  Unfolding my legs, I tried to look as if I hadn’t been sitting in the one spot since I’d woken this morning, which in actual fact, I had. I hadn’t showered since yesterday and my hair was in a messy knot. I wasn’t looking like the image of a professional photographer. Rational me knew that didn’t matter anymore. The whole thing about Greer hiring me to do the portfolio was in tatters. The magazine feature was no longer going to happen. But still, it was hard to let people see the real me.

  Greer and Kelly walked in.

  With smiles on their faces and dressed in light summer clothes, the two of them could have been any carefree couple, in any summery place in the world. The last time I’d seen them both, I’d been rushing with them through a Scottish wood in a desperate race to find a young, suicidal girl—in a greyish drizzle close to twilight. All wrapped up in bulky winter gear. And afterwards, there’d been tears and misunderstandings between Greer and Kelly.

  The way they looked now, I barely recognised them.

  Greer squealed. “Isla! Hope this isn’t too big of a surprise. But… you did invite me at one point. So here we are.”

  “Can’t believe it!” Standing, I hugged them both. “So good to see you two.”

  “We just met your brother out there,” Kelly told me. “He’s a wee bit cute, isn’t he?”

  I laughed. “He’s always been cute. When he finally realises it, he’ll be dangerous.”

  Mum brought in glasses of fresh orange juice, and we all sat at the glass-topped wicker table—small-talking about the weather and Scottish food and Sydney landmarks. Everyone was steadfastly avoiding talking about the things that had happened the night Peyton Chandlish died.

  “So,” said Greer, smiling brightly, “Kelly and I can’t wait to see this city of yours, Isla. I’m going to hold you to your promise of showing me around.”

  My mother gasped in delight. “Oh, there’s so much to see. We could all go together.”

  “I was hoping you’d say that,” said Greer. “I’ve seen you and Isla in your Instagram pictures together. You two look like you have so much fun.”

  “It’s a plan.” Mum glanced at me. “If you’re up to it, Isla.”

  I nodded, a grin slipping into my face as I turned to Greer. “I have to put myself back out there at some point or other. And you went out of your way to make me feel at home in Scotland. Mum and I would like to do the same for you and Kelly, here.”

  “Poor Kelly desperately needed some time away from everything’s that been going on,” said Greer. “The whole thing with Stella has been a big shock. And I couldn’t think of a better place to take her than here.”

  “Well, I’m glad you came. How is Stella?” I asked. “Is she…back with her mother?”

  Kelly shook her head. “No. She didn’t want to. And besides, the child protection unit wouldn’t have allowed it. So, we gave Stella the choice of staying with me or going to live with her grandparents. But she chose someone we didn’t expect. Rory. He was as surprised as anyone.”

  “I wouldn’t have expected that either,” I mused.

  “Yep. She was always so negative about poor old Ror’.” Kelly gave a wry smile. “But as we’ve found out since, that was just because it seemed to Stella that he was supporting Camille. Stella’s realised now that Camille kept Rory totally in the dark about Peyton. Oh, it’s terrible. Something that I didn’t understand is why a paedophile like Peyton was hanging around my sister after Stella left town. But we know why now. Camille was giving piano lessons to three young girls in her home each week. And that’s why the bastard was going there so much. Seems that he’d zeroed in on one poor lass named Amy, and he’d been busily grooming her, even taking over the piano lessons at times.”

  I gasped. “This must all be so hard on you and your family.”

  “Yes,” Kelly replied. “My mother is beside herself. Hamish has been drinking heavily and not helping anyone. Rory is divorcing Camille. And Camille might be up on criminal charges yet, about her knowledge of what Peyton was doing to Stella, and maybe to Amy as well. I don’t know how much she knew. My sister is trying hard with the victim angle, but she’s not a victim. Why didn’t I know what had been going on over there? I should have—” Kelly broke off, tears springing into her eyes.

  Greer’s arms came around her. “Camille chose wrong. But you didn’t. You didn’t know. And you kept Stella safe for two years.” Greer’s eyes were wet, too, as she glanced from Mum to me. “It was a hard choice for Stella to leave Kelly. She loves Kelly dearly. But she wanted to return to Greenmire and reconnect with her old schoolfriends.”

  Mum exhaled, her eyes wide at all she’d been hearing. “That poor girl. Isla told me all about her. I imagine she’ll have a long road ahead of her.”

  “A very long road,” agreed Kelly, sighing. She dabbed at her eyes with a tissue. “Would you mind if I use your bathroom?”

  Mum rose. “I’ll show you the way. This old house is a bit of a rabbit warren.”

  As Mum and Kelly left the room, Greer touched my arm. “How are you?”

  I sucked my lips in tight. “I’m getting there.”

  “I just can’t believe that all these things were happening under my nose. And Jessica…Goodness, I mean, she always seemed strung-out and over-anxious, but I never thought—” She snipped her sentence short, her eyes squeezing shut. “Oh, listen to me, Miss talk-too-much. It’s not up to me to speculate. It’s up to the courts.”

  A slow wave of nervous exhaustion hit me. “The first court case is just a week away.”

  “Yes, it is. Which brings me to the other reason I came to Sydney. I know you’ve been called as a witness for the prosecution in Jessica’s trial. I wanted to come and give you some support in person. I mean, listen to you, so worried about how everyone is doing, while you’ve been to hell and back yourself. You need some TLC.” She shivered, stroking her bare arms. “I’ve got goose bumps just thinking about that church. So eerie how you wanted to stop and photograph it that day.”

  “If not for that trip to Inverness, I wouldn’t have seen the church. And I might never have remembered it.”

  “Life is strange,” said Greer. “All these wee coincidences that sometimes lead to things we couldn’t have imagined. I’ve had trouble turning my mind off at night. I keep thinking…if you hadn’t realised that Stella was in the playhouse, she would have died. And Peyton would have kept on doing the awful things he’d been doing. And we might never have found out what really happened to Elodie.” She rubbed eyes that suddenly seemed tired. “I shouldn’t keep on and on with these thoughts. My mind is just like my mouth—never stops. But you know, the McGregors and the Keenans are like family to me. And you too, now. You’re one of us, whether you like it or not.” She smiled warmly.

  Mum stepped back into the room, and Greer steered herself onto happier topics.

  The four of us spent the next few days visiting the parks, museums and restaurants around the city. Mum was in her element—she loved Sydney with a passion.

  When it was time for me to head back to Scotland for the court case, I had not only Mum on the plane with me, but Greer and Kelly.

  Whatever was coming up next, I wasn’t alone.

  46

  ISLA

  The bleak Scottish sunrise had sputtered and dissolved into a dull, grey morning.

  I ran through the drizzle with my mother and Greer to the Inverness courthouse. It was a high court where serious crimes were heard—solemn trials—with a Lord Justice General presiding. I watched the lawyers walk in with their wigs and robes and it suddenly all felt te
rrifying. I knew the way that I was feeling must be magnified many times for Jessica.

  Immediately, I was whisked away to wait in a special room for witnesses for the prosecution.

  The court case was about to start, but witnesses weren’t allowed in the court room until they’d been questioned by the prosecutor. I already knew that Alban wouldn’t be in the witness room. He was neither testifying for or against his wife. I didn’t know most of the people in the witness room, except for Camille. Camille being there was a surprise to me, seeing as she was a good friend of Jessica’s.

  I’d been told that first up, all the prosecutor’s evidence would be given to the jury—bottle of pills, blood test results, DNA and other items. After that, the expert witnesses who would explain the evidence would be called. I wouldn’t be allowed to sit in the public gallery until after I’d had my turn at the stand.

  Stella’s testimony had already been given, in a police interview, and part of that testimony would be shown today, via a video. She wouldn’t be present in the courtroom, due to her age.

  The judge had closed the courtroom to the public and the media. We’d had to make special applications for support persons and family to be able to attend.

  Before the court case was due to start, Jessica would be called to plead guilty or not guilty. If she pleaded guilty, the trial wouldn’t proceed, and she’d face sentencing. Within minutes she’d pleaded innocent and I was informed that the trial would go ahead.

  The next thing to happen was the assembling of the fifteen members of the jury. Jessica, with the advice of her defence lawyer, would attempt to reject any of the jurors that she thought might take a negative view of her.

  It was two hours later that I was called to the stand.

  People watched as I made my way across the floor. The room went pin-drop quiet, except for a shuffle of papers. The court room looked as if it had been furbished in the 1950s and left that way—the judge and lawyers in their wigs adding to the look of age and formality. The air smelled of wet shoes and clothing.

  Jessica glanced my way and then turned her head sharply. She looked much the same as she had the day I’d first met her at Braithnoch. Carefully styled blonde hair. Elegant but nervous, with a tense bearing in her shoulders.

  I knew now that she’d been hiding secrets.

  I wondered if she was suffering as much as any mother ever had who’d made a terrible mistake. No matter what happened during the trial, she’d never get the chance to right the wrong she’d made. Elodie was gone and nothing could bring her back.

  After I was sworn in, the prosecutor explained to the jury that I had suffered an acute illness two years ago. He asked that the jury refer to the notes of my illness given by my doctors and psychologist. He explained to them that I had a case of amnesia and that I’d almost completely forgotten my previous trip. He also informed them that they had my blood and DNA test results—evidence that showed I’d been present in the old church two years earlier.

  The prosecutor then had me tell my story about travelling to the church with Rory and what I’d seen and remembered there. And I had to tell my account of being trapped in the house ruins at Braithnoch, including what Peyton said about me, the church and the person who’d sent him there.

  The defence lawyer rose to her feet then. She was a small, pert woman, with thick black glasses perched on her nose, and she reminded me of a librarian. But she didn’t speak like a librarian. She was intense, drilling me on every point that I’d spoken, trying to make my account sound as unreliable as she possibly could. My memory loss made that job easy for her. She also cast a great deal of doubt upon my blood sample—saying that it wasn’t clear whether it was menstrual blood or not. She painted a picture for the jury of a student who didn’t have much money and who might have needed to squat at an abandoned building for a few weeks—the old church. She speculated that the empty cans of food and rubbish had been mine.

  The questions being fired from the defence lawyer were awful and humiliating and I couldn’t wait to escape from the stand.

  After the defence was done, the prosecutor re-examined me on some points, trying to affirm to the jury that I wasn’t the crazy loon that the defence had made me out to be. But I wasn’t feeling hopeful. Even I was starting to doubt myself. After all, if I couldn’t remember that time of my life, anything could be true.

  I went to sit in between my mother and Greer in the public gallery, my heart thudding.

  Mum closed her hand around mine. “You did well, honey,” she whispered.

  I hadn’t done well. I’d stumbled over my words. I’d had to relive that horrific night on the moor in front of all those people as well as try to explain events from the past that were fuzzy.

  I was glad that Stella didn’t have to take the stand in the courtroom.

  The next witness for the prosecution was called to the stand—Camille Keenan.

  Camille glanced about nervously, avoiding looking in Jessica’s direction, her dark hair slicked into a neat bun and her lips glossed with red lipstick.

  “Ms Keenan,” began the prosecutor, “how long have you been friends with Jessica McGregor?”

  “Ever since the first year of school,” came the reply.

  “How would you describe your friendship in recent years? Close or distant?”

  “It was…close.”

  “How often did you see each other and what was the nature of the meetings?”

  “At least once or twice a fortnight. Just to catch up over coffee at a café, or at each other’s house.”

  “Ms Keenan, did you and Jessica ever discuss Peyton Chandlish?”

  She fixed her eyes down at her hands, rubbing her knuckles together. “Yes.”

  “What did you discuss about him?”

  “We both thought he was…attractive. We’d both crushed on him when we were teenagers, and so I guess when he started dropping around to see us, it seemed a bit of a thrill.”

  “Could you tell us specifically what Jessica said about Peyton?”

  “She said…uh…well, you see, her marriage to Alban had been rocky for quite a while. And she said that if Alban didn’t shape up then she might have a better option. She said…she said that Elodie wasn’t an obstacle.” Camille rushed her last words, then fell silent, sucking in a deep breath.

  The prosecutor frowned—in a way that seemed practised, for the benefit of the jury. “Can you please give us Jessica’s exact words about Elodie not being an obstacle?”

  “She…Jess…said that Elodie wouldn’t get in the way of her being with Peyton,” Camille whispered. “Because Peyton was fond of Elodie.”

  “Could you please speak that louder, for the record?” the prosecutor instructed her.

  Camille repeated her words, stammering.

  “Ms Keenan,” said the prosecutor, “we have a statement from you that concerns an unusual conversation you heard between Jessica and Peyton Chandlish. Can you tell us how you came to overhear it?”

  “Yes,” she responded. “This was the first time that I met Isla Wilson. She was walking away from my parents’ house. I was walking along the same path. I’d heard that my daughter, Stella, was there and I wanted to see her. I also planned to…I planned to meet with Peyton. But when I talked to him on the phone, he told me he was too busy. Stella ran off when she heard that I was coming and so I decided to keep walking and go to see Peyton, anyway. The Chandlishes’ house is just a bit further up that path. But when I got close, I heard him talking with someone. It was Jess. She seemed upset. I was curious, and I ducked behind a tree and crept closer in order to listen.”

  The prosecutor nodded. “Okay, now what did you hear?”

  “Jess asked Peyton what he was going to do. Peyton said he was going to string one of them up because her father had died by a suicide hanging and he thought it would have more impact. He was laughing about it. Jess told him it might be going too far and that she’d find another way to get rid of her. Peyton grabbed Jess roughly,
saying he was in too deep. Jessica said he wasn’t the one who needed to worry—that she hadn’t even seen his face last time.”

  “At the time, did you know who the person was that they were talking about?” asked the prosecutor.

  “No.”

  “Did you realise at a later point who the person was?”

  “Yes, I did,” Camille answered. “Days later, when I heard about the scarecrow being strung up in the tree, I wondered if Isla was the woman they’d been talking about.”

  “Objection, my Lord,” called the defence lawyer. “The witness is speculating on the meaning of words that she claims two others spoke.”

  “I’ll allow it,” said the judge. “The witness is answering Counsel’s question without making any claims. Objection is overruled.”

  The prosecutor faced the jury. “You will see in your notes that a scarecrow was hoisted up in a tree directly outside the cabin in which Isla Wilson was staying. It had a noose around its neck and the appearance could be perceived as threatening.” He gave the date and approximate time of the discovery. “We do in fact know that it was Peyton who put the scarecrow in the tree, because we have statements from his mother to say that she knew about this. A few days after her return from an overseas trip, Deirdre Chandlish found some instant photos in her son’s home office, in their basement.” The prosecutor instructed the jury to refer to copies of the photos they’d been given. “The photos were of the scarecrow when it had been cut with an axe from its original place on a hill and after it had been strung up in the tree. When she confronted her son, Peyton, he claimed it had been a harmless prank. Also, among the instant photographs, were pictures of Isla walking through the forest, including a day in which Isla visited the children’s playhouse where Elodie McGregor was taken after she was abducted.”

  I listened, horrified, thoughts ricocheting in my head. Jessica knew about the scarecrow. It sounded as if it had been Jessica’s plan to do something to scare me and make me leave. But Peyton had taken the prank too far. Maybe she’d simply wanted him to stomp around outside the cabin or something a lot more ordinary than the scarecrow idea. It had been Peyton stalking me the day I’d visited the playhouse. I guessed that he’d meant for me to see glimpses of him, to scare me. I wondered how long he’d been stalking me. He knew about my father dying by suicide. That meant he’d looked deep into my past. Maybe he had been watching me ever since that night in the church, to check if I’d started remembering anything.