Coming to the bed, Jack gazed down on her. ‘Did Ginny upset you?’ He had a gut feeling that Lianne was lying. Her mouth was saying one thing, while her expression said another. Something had sent her running to her room, and it was not a headache.
She feigned surprise. ‘What makes you think Ginny upset me?’
He gave a half-smile. ‘Because I know her,’ he said flatly.
Since the day she was born, he had felt a strong urge to protect Ginny. He blamed himself. By christening her with his grandmother’s name, he had burdened his child; evoked an unspeakable evil. For too long he had made excuses for her. Turned a blind eye. Now, after two unexplained deaths, he had to be extra careful. At first he believed she would never hurt her sister. Now he wasn’t so sure.
In the face of Lianne’s continuing silence, he insisted, ‘If Ginny spoiled the party, I want to know.’
Tempted to betrayal, Lianne opened her mouth to tell. But in spite of everything, she could not bring herself to do it. Ginny was unbearably cruel, and there were times when she was so afraid of her sister that she hardly dared look at her. The fear was strong. The love was stronger. ‘I’ve already told you,’ she lied unconvincingly, ‘I had a headache.’
Jack shrugged his shoulders, helpless against such blind loyalty. ‘If you say so.’
Liz was not convinced. She had never liked Ginny. Even as a child in arms, she had frightened her. ‘Don’t cover up for her.’
‘I’m not.’ Yawning, she pulled the blanket over her head. ‘Can I go to sleep now?’
Tired herself, Liz stood up. ‘’Night, then.’
Thankfully, Lianne turned over. ‘’Night, Mum.’
Later, when the house was quiet, she would go to Ginny’s room. Her sister had a lot to answer for!
Dropping into the armchair, Liz took off her high heels. ‘My feet feel like two balloons,’ she moaned, rubbing her fingers over her toes. ‘I’m getting too old to keep up with fashion. In future I’ll stick to low heels.’
‘Are we having a drink?’ Jack didn’t feel like sleep. He hadn’t expected to come back and find Ginny waiting downstairs, and Lianne in her bed. There was something wrong.
‘Not for me,’ Liz answered. ‘I had too many drinks over dinner. Anyway, I’m dog-tired.’ She saw how disturbed he was. ‘You don’t believe her, do you?’
He poured himself a short brandy and brought it to the chair. Perched on the edge of the seat with his legs apart and his arms resting on his knees, he rolled the glass between his palms. ‘She’s lying,’ he said, regarding Liz through narrowed eyes.
‘Hmm! You haven’t exactly set a good example in that department, have you?’ She had only part-way forgiven him.
‘I thought we’d agreed not to raise that issue again?’
‘You agreed. But all right!’ She raised her hands in protest. ‘We’ll put that aside for now.’ Rolling down her stockings, she took them off and laid them on the back of her chair. ‘Anyway, why would she lie?’
‘You know why.’
‘Because she’s frightened, you mean?’
‘Lianne’s never been frightened of her sister.’ Not like you, he thought.
‘Why then?’
‘Who knows? Your daughters are young women now. Young women have secrets.’
‘They’ll have to sort it themselves then, won’t they?’
‘You don’t seem bothered.’
‘I’m not.’ She never pretended to be a perfect mother. ‘I’m more bothered about you and me.’
‘We’re strong enough to get through.’
She came to kneel at his feet. ‘Still love me, do you?’
He stroked his hand down her hair. ‘Always,’ he murmured, kissing her on the forehead.
‘What will you do about your uncle?’ She hadn’t given up the idea that they might all still be friends.
‘I would imagine they’ve gone.’ He hoped they had. He hoped they would never again set eyes on him. Or Maureen Delaney.
‘You should ring the hotel.’
He inwardly cringed. ‘Don’t start that again.’
‘Do you want me to ring?’
‘Forget it, Liz.’
‘He means to give you a fortune.’
‘I said forget it, Liz!’
‘We could do with it. There’s this house only half-renovated, and your daughters will soon be going to college. They’ll need all sorts of help.’
‘We’ll manage. We always have.’ He sipped at his brandy and wished he could turn back the clock. If he could turn it back over twenty years, how simple life might have been.
She stretched out her legs. ‘Jack?’
‘What now?’
Shocking him to his roots she asked in softer tones, ‘Do you think Ginny killed your mother?’
The silence was like a physical presence.
He felt guilty. Did she really think Ginny had killed Katherine?
‘I don’t think I heard you right.’ He couldn’t believe what she’d said.
Turning to face him, Liz gripped his knees, her anxious gaze playing on his face. ‘There’s something very strange about her. She frightens me, Jack. Our daughter frightens me.’
Pushing her away he clambered out of the chair, mortified when his brandy glass slipped from his hand and made a small cut on her temple. ‘Christ! I’m a clumsy bastard!’ At once he fell to his knees. ‘Keep still.’ Taking out a serviette he’d picked up from the dinner table, he began mopping the trickle of blood.
He knew she was staring at him, and he felt threatened. He didn’t like feeling threatened. ‘You didn’t mean what you said just now, did you?’ he asked softly. ‘About Ginny?’
Her voice was barely audible. ‘I had a dream,’ she revealed. ‘It was so real, Jack, like it was actually happening.’
‘What kind of dream?’ Was it the same dream he had over and over? He mentally shook himself. No, how could it be?
‘A big cold place, like a courtroom. Ginny, all alone in a big cage… bodies everywhere…’ Horrified by her own mind she curled into a ball. ‘I think I must be going mad.’
While she described the fragments of her dream, Jack relived it like it was yesterday: the courtroom, his grandmother alone in the stand… on trial for her life. And oh, the pictures that were handed round the jury. Awful pictures, of death, and torture, and human depravity. And Liz had seen it! Liz had tapped into his worst nightmares and seen it all! But it wasn’t his grandmother she saw. It was Ginny.
He touched her and she looked up. ‘What’s happening to us?’ A sob caught in her throat.
Forcing himself to smile he grabbed her by the arms and stood her up. ‘We all have dreams,’ he muttered. Dreams. Nightmares. Fragments of the past that are woven into our everyday lives. ‘It was just a dream,’ he promised.
Her stricken gaze lingered on his face. ‘I don’t want to lose you, Jack.’
Softly laughing he held her close. ‘You’re right,’ he observed. ‘You have had too much to drink.’
Relief washed through her. ‘I expect you’re right.’
‘A good night’s sleep – that’s what you want, my girl! You go up. I’ll check to see what kind of mess they’ve left in the hall.’
‘They promised to clean it up.’
‘I’ll check anyway.’ He was still concerned. Something had gone on here, and he needed to know.
He watched Liz go up the stairs, then he made his way to the great hall. Pleasantly surprised that they had kept their promise, he sat on the edge of the stage and lit a cigarette. ‘They’ve left it tidy anyway,’ he mused aloud. ‘Nothing here to tell me what might have happened between those two.’
He smoked his cigarette, feeling calmer, feeling guilty. He had given strict instructions that there should be no smoking, no candles, no naked lights in this place, riddled with timber as it was. ‘Shame on you,’ he chided, stubbing the cigarette out on the hard timber flooring. ‘A man should practise what he preaches.’
He s
tayed a moment longer. Alone with his thoughts. With his nightmares. I’m sorry I brought this down on your head, Liz, he thought. I should sell up. Take you away. Start a new life somewhere else. He jumped down from the stage. Who was he kidding? He was trapped. Imprisoned in a cage of his own making.
Liz was fast asleep. Seeing her lying there, curled up like a child, made him realise how vulnerable she was. ‘I’ll make it up to you, sweetheart,’ he murmured, sliding in beside her. ‘If I never do anything else in my life, I swear to God I’ll make it all up to you.’
Restless, Lianne slept lightly. She had the awful feeling something terrible was about to happen, but didn’t know what, or how to stop it. At the root of it all was Ginny.
She dreamed. Then she woke. She closed her eyes and ached for sleep, but it wouldn’t come again. With her eyes wide open she saw herself and Ginny running down a long winding road. Someone was chasing them. Someone with murder in mind.
‘Lianne? Are you awake?’ A whisper. The figure, tall and slender, entered the room. ‘Lianne?’ Familiar now. Ginny.
‘Go away.’
‘I’m sorry.’
‘No you’re not.’ Unforgiving, she turned away.
‘Lianne!’
‘Go away!’ She could feel Ginny’s warm breath on her face.
‘He angered me. No one speaks to me like that.’
‘I’m glad he put you in your place.’
‘I wanted to humiliate him in the same way.’
Incensed, Lianne rolled round and sat up. The room was in shadow. She couldn’t see. A slight movement drew her to where Ginny knelt beside the bed, just a heartbeat away.
‘Don’t be hard on me,’ she whispered. ‘You know what I’m like. Sometimes I do these spiteful things. Afterwards I’m sorry.’ Her dark eyes were fathomless, sucking Lianne down. ‘I really am sorry,’ she murmured convincingly. ‘Do you forgive me?’
‘I should kill you.’
A quiet, merciless smile. ‘You should. But you won’t.’
‘What do you want?’
‘I had no right to open your birthday presents.’
‘I would have been more surprised if you hadn’t.’ The sarcasm was biting.
‘I didn’t give you your present because it wasn’t quite ready.’ She sniggered. ‘I’ve got it safely hidden away.’
‘I don’t want anything from you.’
‘Please.’
The love between them was like a physical chain. Each resenting it. Each longing to be free.
Softer now. ‘What is it?’
‘Come and see.’
‘Bring it here.’
‘I can’t.’
‘Why not?’
‘You’ll see.’ She switched on the bedside lamp. Her face alive with cunning, she rasped, ‘Oh, Lianne, I do hope you like it.’ Grabbing her sister’s dressing gown from the chair she urged, ‘Hurry up. And be quiet. We don’t want to wake them.’ Her gaze shifted towards the door. She was thinking of their parents. ‘Later, I have a surprise for them as well.’
Struggling into her dressing gown, Lianne was suspicious. ‘What kind of surprise?’
Playfully prodding her in the arm, Ginny chided, ‘Listen to you! Anyone would think I was about to murder them.’
Mentally recalling Ginny’s very words, Lianne was not convinced. ‘I’ll have to kill them.’ That’s what she had said.
Now it was Lianne’s turn to threaten. ‘I won’t let you hurt them.’
‘You take me too seriously.’
‘Only because… sometimes…’ She lowered her gaze.
‘Sometimes what?’
Lianne’s voice fell to a whisper. ‘Sometimes you frighten me.’
There was a span of silence, during which Lianne dared not look up. Presently, Ginny’s voice gentled into her thoughts. ‘You’ll make yourself a nervous wreck, worrying about nothing.’
Considering her sister’s words, Lianne seemed a little reassured. Not content though. Never content. ‘You don’t mean to hurt them, then?’
‘Like I said, you worry about nothing. You’re all the same, you and them. Always worrying.’ Her scheming smile gave nothing away. Lianne. Her parents. After tonight they would not have to worry about anything, ever again.
‘Where is it?’ Fastening her belt, Lianne slipped her feet into the cherry-red slippers. ‘My present. Where’ve you hidden it?’
‘I’ll show you.’ Impatient now, she led the way across the room to the door. ‘You have to like it,’ she whispered excitedly. Her voice took on a hard edge. ‘I’ll be upset if you don’t like it. You see, I’ve been planning it for ages.’
A few moments later they were downstairs. Ginny opened the door to the cellars. ‘Quiet now,’ she warned. ‘Every sound echoes.’
With only a pencil-torch to guide her, Ginny followed the familiar route. ‘I’ve been down the cellars many times these last few weeks, so I know the way by heart.’ Every now and then she would turn to make sure Lianne was following.
They went in silence: one exhilarated, the other apprehensive. In her heart Lianne had still not forgiven.
As they travelled deeper into the roots of the house, Lianne began to wish she had not agreed to come. ‘Let’s go back,’ she urged. ‘Show me in the morning.’ The damp air seeped through her dressing gown, and the shadows followed their every step.
‘Don’t be a baby!’
‘How much further?’ She was born in this house, but never in her life had she been down the cellars. Once, her father told her it was like a labyrinth, a maze where you could easily get lost. Fear took hold of her. ‘I want to go back.’
‘We’re almost there.’
As she spoke, they came into an opening. ‘Wait a minute.’ Taking a box of matches from her pocket she struck one and reached up. In preparation she had placed a candle on the ledge. She lit it now, and the shadows scuttled away. ‘See?’ Her voice was comforting. Like a mother’s to a child. ‘There’s nothing to be frightened of.’
Unwilling to move, Lianne stared into every corner. The cavern was awesome. High stone walls dripping with condensation, their ancient formation making weird and wonderful shapes: of animals and men, and monsters.
As they continued, their feet were bathed in small pools of stinking water. The odour of something rotten filled the cavern from end to end. ‘Why did you keep my present down here?’ Lianne whispered. Down here, where no one could possibly hear, she felt the need to whisper, almost as if they were in a church. But this was no church. It was an unholy place.
Ginny’s silence emphasised the sinister atmosphere.
They went through the cavern into a narrow place. ‘There!’ Ginny held the candle high. The shadows closed in. ‘Do you see?’
Raising her eyes, Lianne followed the halo of light. As it moved slowly along the high ledge, it fell on one gruesome sight after another. Dozens of dead creatures all in a row, strung together by their tails and making a weird garland across the ledge. The walls beneath were spattered with blood, dark meandering stains that even the stone could not absorb.
As Lianne stared up through tearful eyes, the creatures stared down through dead, wide-open eyes, black pitiful things, stark with the agony they had endured. Lianne gasped with horror. ‘Did you do that?’ She didn’t want to look on those poor tortured faces, but she couldn’t tear her gaze away.
Ginny’s voice murmured in her ear. ‘Mice,’ she hissed, ‘rats… gerbils. It was me who broke into the science lab.’
‘You’re sick.’ The words were emitted through clenched teeth, a great rage welling up inside her. ‘Don’t tell me you did this for me!’ The muscles of her face worked in and out as she tried hard to control herself. ‘Please, Ginny! Don’t say you did this for me.’ The thought was too shocking.
‘Why would I do this for you?’ She peered at Lianne’s stricken face. In the half-light she saw what Dave Martin had seen, a lovely young woman with a nature as warm and generous as her heart. She saw it as weakness
, and was angry. ‘You say you’re my friend, but you’re not. You’re just like them. You think I’m wicked and cruel.’
‘I don’t really think that.’ It was love that spoke. Sadness too, for an unforgivable atrocity. ‘Those poor creatures. What did they ever do to you?’
‘Nothing.’
‘Then… why?’
‘I get lonely,’ she snapped. ‘The creatures keep me company. I didn’t want to do it, but they would have run away.’
Lianne stretched out a hand. ‘Now that you’ve shown them to me, we can go back?’ She felt the need to humour her. ‘I’ll make you a cup of hot chocolate. How would you like that?’ When Ginny shook her head in disbelief, she went on, ‘I promise I won’t tell what you’ve done here. But tomorrow morning I hope you will speak to Father yourself.’ Her voice softened. ‘You need help, Ginny. I know it now. You have to talk to someone.’
Ginny’s laughter echoed round the walls. ‘You want to go?’ She clapped her hands together like an excited child. ‘Did you really think this was your present?’ she asked incredulously. ‘No! No! Your present is through there.’ Pointing to a small wooden door she would have taken Lianne with her. She was astonished when Lianne refused to budge. ‘Don’t you want to see it?’
‘No, I don’t want to see it.’ The smile froze on her lips.
‘It’s a very special present.’ The madness lit her eyes.
‘You can show me tomorrow if you like. Right now, I want to go back.’ Her instincts told her to play along, or be strung up there with the rest of the creatures.
Kissing her gently on the mouth, Ginny pleaded, ‘Don’t be frightened.’
A cold hand gripped Lianne’s heart. ‘I’m not frightened.’ There was something terrible here. Something evil.
Taking Lianne’s trembling hands into hers, Ginny pressed them close to her face. ‘I wish I could believe you.’ She was softly crying, the tears falling warm and sticky on Lianne’s skin. ‘You know I love you? More than anyone in the world.’
‘And I love you.’
‘Will you really come and see tomorrow?’
‘I’ve said so, haven’t I?’
‘Yes.’ A long deep sigh. ‘You’ve said so.’
‘Can we go back now?’
No Heaven, No Hell Page 21
