The Babysitter: A gripping psychological thriller with edge-of-your-seat suspense

by Sheryl Browne

  ‘It’s my fault!’ Dylan blurted in her ear, before she had a chance to speak. ‘It’s my fault. She’s just lying there, and I—’

  ‘Whoa, Dylan, slow down. What’s happened? What’s your fault?’

  ‘Me mum! She’s… dead! She’s…’ Emitting a guttural sob, Dylan broke off.

  ‘Stay where you are,’ Jade said firmly. ‘Don’t touch anything or say anything. Not to anyone, Dylan.’

  Dylan choked back another distraught sob. And another.

  Hell, he was losing it. ‘Dylan!’ Jade felt panic twisting inside her. ‘Do you hear me?’

  ‘It’s my fault!’ Dylan repeated, sounding like a distraught parrot.

  ‘Dylan, it is not your fault! You weren’t even there,’ Jade barked. ‘Were you?’ she tacked on quickly.

  Dylan sniffled snottily. ‘No,’ he said timidly, after a second. ‘I was fixing the barn roof, and when I finished I couldn’t find her. I thought she’d gone out, like you said, but…’ He broke off with another sob.

  ‘No one will blame you, Dylan, I promise.’ Jade softened her tone. She needed him to get a grip. God forbid he should get it into his thick head to dial 999. ‘But you have to listen to me. You need to stay calm, stay there and not talk to anyone – don’t even use the phone. Can you do that for me?’

  There was a hiccuppy pause. ‘Uh-huh,’ Dylan replied uncertainly. ‘Will you come?’

  ‘Of course I will. I’ll be there as soon as I’ve dropped Poppy off at school,’ Jade assured him. ‘It will be fine, my love. I’ll help you sort it all out. Just make yourself a cup of sweet tea and sit tight. Okay?’

  ‘Okay,’ Dylan said, sounding somewhat relieved.

  Thank God for that. Dylan subdued, for the moment, Jade hurried back inside to finish making Mark’s coffee. She needed to be gone, but first she needed to check how the land lay here. They hadn’t kissed and made up, she was aware of that. Other than to say goodnight to Poppy and Evie, Melissa had stayed in her bedroom. And no wonder. Clearly, she’d decided to keep a low profile. Mark had been white with anger when Jade had left to fetch the McDonald’s, and then subdued when she had arrived back. She’d learned from Melissa when she’d taken her some warm soup, with the necessary extra ingredient, that they’d argued about the catastrophe that was dinner. He’d been avoiding her since, Melissa had said shakily, meaning Mark had valiantly restrained himself rather than tackle the ridiculous woman about her drinking habit. Probably because it would lead to the inevitable argument, which Jade knew Mark desperately didn’t want his children to witness. He really was a lovely man. After helping Poppy with her Peppa Pig construction kit before her bedtime, he’d spent the rest of the evening listening to his music – trying to distract himself, Jade guessed. Then he’d spent the night on the sofa, fetching a pillow and sheets from the airing cupboard this time, which meant it might be becoming a more permanent arrangement.

  Perfect. Jade hummed happily to herself. Who would have thought a little lump of clay could wreak such havoc?

  ‘All finished?’ She smiled brightly at Poppy as she passed by with the coffee.

  ‘Yup,’ Poppy said, picking her bowl up and tipping the last dregs of milk towards her mouth.

  ‘Good girl,’ Jade said, though she felt sorely tempted to slap her. Ill-mannered glutton. She really did have to go. ‘Go and get your shoes on then, sweetheart,’ she urged her. ‘I have an appointment this morning. If you’re really quick getting ready, I’ll bring you some sweets later. How does that sound?’

  ‘Yay!’ Poppy clapped delightedly, slid off her chair and skipped happily to the stairs.

  Spoiled little brat. Quashing her irritation, Jade went quietly into the lounge. There was a chance Mark might still be sleeping. After all that had gone on, Jade doubted he’d had a very restful night.

  But she found him sitting on the sofa, contemplating the bottle of vodka on the coffee table, obviously debating how to tackle his self-centred, needy wife about it. Poor Mark. Jade’s heart went out to him. ‘Morning,’ she said, toning down the cheeriness. She didn’t want to appear insensitive.

  Mark dragged his hands tiredly over his face and got to his feet. ‘Morning.’ He forced a smile, for her sake, bless him.

  ‘I made you a coffee,’ Jade said, walking across to put the mug on the table. ‘With extra caffeine. I thought you could use it.’ Glancing at the vodka, she smiled sympathetically.

  ‘I could.’ Mark sighed, a world-weary sigh. ‘Cheers, Jade,’ he said, moving to bundle up his sheets, which were in a bit of a tangle. Definitely not a restful night then, Jade deduced.

  ‘How are you feeling?’ she asked, reaching to help him.

  ‘Okay,’ Mark lied. ‘A bit tired.’ He paused, a wretched look in his eyes. ‘I’m sorry about all this, Jade,’ he said, glancing embarrassedly away and back again. ‘If you wanted to hand in your notice, I’d quite understand.’

  ‘And leave you in the lurch? I wouldn’t dream of it. The children need stability above all else right now. I don’t want to add to their troubles.’ She flapped a sheet and folded it briskly. ‘I could cancel my arrangements, though, if it would help. Under the circumstances, I mean.’

  ‘Arrangements?’ Mark’s expression was one of confusion. And mild panic, Jade noticed, gratified. He was going to miss her. But not half as much as she would miss him.

  ‘I mentioned it to Mel. My friend, Samantha… she gets the result of her biopsy today. I said I’d go with her.’

  ‘God, no, don’t cancel,’ Mark said emphatically. ‘Go. I’m sure we can manage for…?’ he trailed off on a question, his look now hopeful.

  God love him. He really was in an intolerable situation. The sooner Jade could get him out of it, the better. ‘Just the one day,’ she assured him. ‘She lives in London though, so I wouldn’t be back until quite late.’

  ‘No problem.’ Mark smiled, relieved. ‘I’m off for a couple of days, so I can look after Evie and collect Poppy. I’m guessing you could use a break anyway, although that’s probably not much of a break. Give your friend my best. I hope it all turns out okay for her.’

  Even now, he was thinking of others. Jade’s heart fluttered inside her. A gem, he really was. ‘I’ll take Poppy to school on my way,’ she said. ‘Evie’s fast asleep. She’s due a feed at nine. You have my mobile if you need it. Good luck with…’ Pausing, Jade glanced again at the vodka. ‘Everything.’

  ‘Yeah, thanks. I might need it.’ His look now, Jade noticed with quiet satisfaction, was one of utter despair.

  * * *

  Seeing Dylan standing at the far side of the pig field, Jade called to him as she climbed out of the car. When he didn’t respond, she called out again, and then cursed and heaved the gate open to head towards him.

  ‘Dylan!’ Jade was seriously irritated now. Squelching through mud and pig shit in her trainers was most definitely not on her list of favourite things to do.

  Finally, he turned towards her as she skirted around the pig house, careful to give Inky and bloody Oinky a wide berth. ‘It’s my fault,’ he said pitifully, his face the colour of damp putty and slick with sweat.

  ‘Dylan…’ Jade tempered her tone and tried to hide her annoyance. Could he not hear himself? He sounded like a two-year-old, for God’s sake. ‘Whatever’s happened, it is not—’

  Jade stopped, gulping back a violent bout of nausea as she followed his gaze down to the ground. Bloody hell. They’d eaten half her face.

  ‘Oh my God!’ Dylan!’ Jade looked away from the woman, genuinely horrified. She was going to step carefully amongst those carnivorous little fuckers in future. ‘What the hell have you done?’

  ‘Nothing!’ Dylan widened his eyes in obvious terror. ‘She was upset,’ he blurted defensively. ‘We had a row, yesterday morning. She wanted me to phone Uncle Bob and ask him for a job, but I didn’t want to work on a building site. I told her I wanted to stay here, on the farm. Uncle Bob doesn’t like me and Eric is always taking the mickey. I don�
��t want to work in Birmingham. I told her and she got all upset. She wasn’t talking to me and I—’

  ‘Dylan, stop.’ Jade moved closer, clutching his shoulders with both hands. He was blinking rapidly, close to hyperventilating or wetting himself. ‘Slow down. Who’s Eric?’

  ‘Me cousin. He’s always winding me up.’ Dylan dragged an arm under his nose and glanced embarrassedly down.

  Gosh, I wonder why. Supressing a sigh, Jade arranged her face into suitably annoyed. ‘He’s obviously an idiot,’ she supplied what he needed to hear, whilst bracing herself to bend down and examine the woman at closer quarters.

  ‘She’s gone, Dylan.’ Hoisting herself quickly to her feet, she looked at him, oozing sympathy.

  ‘Dead?’ Dylan squeaked.

  Yes, idiot, dead. Jade nodded solemnly. She looked dead enough, but, having found the faintest of pulses at the base of her neck, Jade suspected she wasn’t yet, quite. So, what did she do with her now? Finishing the job would be the kind thing to do, but she could hardly do that with Dylan looking on. The pigs would probably chomp their way through the rest of her eventually. But that would take time and they could hardly leave her here meanwhile.

  ‘It’s my fault.’ Dylan gulped hard.

  Jade gritted her teeth. If he said that one more time, in that wimpish tone, he’d be joining his mum as the bloody pigs’ lunch. ‘Dylan, it’s not,’ she stated firmly. ‘But… it is possible they might blame you.’

  Holding his gaze, Jade tried not to notice his Adam’s apple bobbing grotesquely in his throat. ‘She probably passed out or had a heart attack or something. Did she mention she’d been having pains in her chest?’

  Dylan’s face drained of what little colour he had. ‘After Dad died,’ he said, his voice now a croaked whisper. ‘She said her heart was hurting.’

  ‘Well, there you go then. It wasn’t your fault. It might even have been brought on by Mark Cain sniffing around again.’

  ‘Cain?’ asked Dylan, his thickset brow furrowing. And then a spark of fury glinted in his eyes. Good, Jade thought. That’s what she needed – Dylan angry, not cowering and bawling like a baby. Ready to do whatever it took. She had a plan, and it involved Mark being ‘seen’ to be driving around certain areas. If Dylan pulled it off, she’d succeed in tarnishing Mark’s ‘white knight’ image in Melissa’s eyes. She had to get that bloody woman off the scene before it was poor Mark who ended up on medication.

  ‘With all the stress she’s been through, worrying about why he’s snooping around could easily have caused her to have a heart attack. Bastard. He might even come back,’ she said, forcing the point home.

  ‘Oh shit.’ Dylan looked fearfully past her, as if expecting Mark to arrive any moment, blue lights flashing.

  ‘We have to move her.’ Jade nodded determinedly.

  ‘But…’ Dylan looked uncertain. ‘Shouldn’t we call an ambulance or something?’

  ‘She’s dead, Dylan,’ Jade reiterated. Or she soon would be, judging by how much blood she’d lost. ‘And we don’t have much time. He might come back,’ she reminded him. ‘We can’t just leave her here for him to find, can we? Even if he doesn’t blame you, he’s bound to set you up, especially if he has an inkling about us, and he must have. Why else does he keep coming here?’

  Glancing back at his mum, Dylan thought about it. He was going to go for it. Jade could almost hear the cogs creaking. ‘And we have to move Daisy, too. Today. We’ll take her in the car and put your poor mum in the barn where she’ll be nice and safe until we can bury her properly. How does that sound?’

  Dylan still didn’t look a hundred per cent certain, but he seemed placated by the bury her properly bit.

  ‘Don’t worry.’ Jade pressed a kiss to his cheek, though with Dylan’s sweat glands in overdrive and that faceless old hag staring up at her, she actually felt like vomiting. ‘I’ll help you, I promise.’

  By which she meant she would offer moral support. Jade had no intention of getting her hands dirty. She was meeting the delightful DS Cummings tonight. And, as much as the thought of being anywhere near him made her skin crawl, she intended to look her provocatively enticing best.

  * * *

  ‘We have to go, Dylan,’ Jade said gently an hour or so later, watching him sobbing in earnest, chest heaving and huge round shoulders shaking as he looked down at his poor soon-to-be-deceased mother.

  Realising he’d be there for the foreseeable future if she didn’t hurry him up, Jade stifled a despairing sigh and attempted to comfort him. Placing a hand on his arm, she rubbed it gently, sending goose pimples up her own – and not in a good way. ‘Come on, my love,’ she coaxed, encouraging him away. ‘We need to move Daisy. Your mum’s at rest now.’

  ‘Do you think she’s happy?’ Dylan looked at her beseechingly.

  Delirious, I should think. Jade really had to work at keeping her face straight. ‘Of course she is. She’s with your dad now, isn’t she? Her heart won’t be hurting any more, Dylan. She won’t be in pain.’

  Appeased, Dylan nodded slowly. ‘Bye, Mum,’ he said gruffly, running a hand under his nose and finally turning away. Thank God, Jade thought, taking his hand as they walked back towards the cottage. They needed to get a move on if they were going to get this done while Mark was collecting Poppy from school. Melissa shouldn’t be a problem. She’d dosed her up with enough drugs to knock out a horse.

  Forty-Three

  MELISSA

  Mel was lying down when Mark finally came into the bedroom. She didn’t want to be. She’d tried so hard to get up, to get dressed. But with the room spinning around her, she’d made it halfway to the bathroom before giving up and crawling back to bed.

  ‘Mark?’ Mel struggled to sit up. She was desperately trying to piece the events of the last few weeks together, trying to work out how in God’s name she ended up here, but everything was fragmented, disjointed. She couldn’t seem to separate dream from reality any more, memories slipping away from her like wisps of smoke on the air.

  Easing her legs over the edge of the bed, Mel summoned up what little energy she had and heaved herself to her feet. Taking a step, she stumbled, and her heart, already heavy with guilt and confusion, plummeted like a lead weight in her chest. Mark didn’t move to help her, as he would have done a short time ago. His face white, his expression inscrutable, he stayed where he was by the door, watching. Waiting? For her to fall? Mel swallowed hard.

  ‘Here,’ he said, walking across the room after a second, during which time Mel had sunk heavily back down on the bed. ‘If you need it so badly, take it.’

  Stopping in front of her, he lifted his hand and tossed a bottle onto the duvet.

  Vodka? Mel glanced at it, bewildered. ‘I don’t…’ She drew her gaze back to his. ‘We don’t drink vodka.’

  ‘Apparently one of us does,’ Mark said, scanning her eyes, his own dark, thunderously dark, and… accusing?

  She blinked at him, stupefied for a second, before the disturbing realisation dawned. ‘You think it’s mine?’ she asked, incredulous.

  ‘It was in the cupboard under the sink. I sure as hell didn’t put it there,’ Mark said coolly. ‘So, tell me, Mel, who else might have?’

  Mel stared at him, stunned. He didn’t really think…? No, surely not. She never drank vodka. She didn’t even like the stuff. ‘It’s not mine. Whoever put it there, it wasn’t me.’

  Mark held her gaze. Apart from a telltale tic in his cheek, his expression didn’t flinch. ‘Right,’ he said, shortly, and turned away.

  ‘Mark! I didn’t. It’s not mine!’ Mel sounded desperate, even to herself.

  Mark stopped.

  ‘It’s not, Mark. I swear it’s not.’

  Mark pushed his hands into his pockets, his shoulders tensing.

  ‘Why would I put it there?’ Mel implored him. ‘Why would I do that, and then tell you the sink’s blocked? Why would I do that, Mark?’

  Mark shrugged. ‘Because you forgot you’d put it there?’<
br />
  ‘It’s not mine!’ Mel screamed it.

  Mark whirled around. ‘So, who did put it there then, Mel?’ he demanded angrily. ‘Hey? Jade? Poppy? Evie?’

  Mel shook her head, confused and scared – by the tone of his voice as much as the nightmare her life had become. She was losing him. He was pulling away from her. Second by second, right there in front of her, he was pulling away. And there was nothing she could do about it.

  ‘Hercules?’ Mark shouted when she didn’t answer, causing her to jump. ‘The fucking fairies?’

  Mel bit back her tears. She wouldn’t. She wouldn’t cry in front of him. Her heart twisted painfully, because, truthfully, she knew he wouldn’t come to her now if she did. ‘I… I don’t know,’ she stuttered, desperately scrambling through her dysfunctional brain, acknowledging, not wanting to acknowledge, that there was only one person it could be. ‘Jade,’ she whispered finally. ‘It must have been Jade.’

  ‘Right.’ Mark laughed bitterly. ‘Without Jade,’ he said, his eyes now burning with fury, ‘this house would be falling apart.’

  The comment hit her like a low blow to the stomach. Mel didn’t speak. She couldn’t.

  Mark sucked in a breath and looked away, absolutely disgusted. ‘I’m going,’ he said hoarsely. ‘I can’t do this.’

  ‘Who else?’ Mel shouted, behind him. ‘Who else could it have… Oh God.’ She stopped, cold foreboding sweeping through her. ‘It was you.’

  Mark didn’t answer. His step faltered, but he didn’t turn around.

  ‘You want me gone, don’t you?’ Mel swallowed back a sick taste in her throat. ‘Is that it, Mark?’ she asked him, her emotions swinging violently. ‘Is that why you’re trying to convince me I’m going out of my mind? Why you’re driving me away? So you can be with Lisa?’ Someone else, if not her? Who, Mark? How many other women do you have intimate conversations with?’

  Still Mark didn’t say anything. Her heart now beating a rapid drumbeat in her chest, Mel watched as he walked calmly out of the room without uttering even a word.