The Forgotten_An absolutely gripping, gritty thriller novel

by Casey Kelleher

  Surprising even herself when she’d picked up the phone and called him. Inviting the man out for dinner, under the pretence of helping her celebrate the success of her new spa venture’s grand opening tonight.

  Nancy knew that Bridget wouldn’t be able to help herself but mention it when she saw Jack tonight, and the truth was, Nancy wanted Jack to know.

  Their conversation had left her on edge somehow, and she wanted Jack to know, for once and for all, that his feelings weren’t reciprocated.

  That they never would be.

  Phillip Augustine was just the man to get that point across.

  A wealthy businessman, who just happened to be drop dead gorgeous to boot.

  The man was just the distraction Nancy needed.

  And as much as Nancy didn’t need the complications of a new man in her life right now, that didn’t have to mean that the ‘Ice Queen’ couldn’t have a bit of fun every now and then, did it?

  Twenty-Two

  ‘Could I have a word?’ Staff Nurse Langton said, eyeing Marie Huston as the woman approached the nurses’ station, clutching her large handbag tightly under her arm.

  In a hurry to rush off home after her shift no doubt. Two guesses to who she was rushing home to, Louise Langton thought wearily as she walked into her office, holding the door open to allow Marie Huston to follow her.

  Which, of course, the younger nurse did, without question.

  The tension between the two women was palpable. It had been for weeks. Since the rumours had started and Nurse Langton knew that she’d been skirting around this issue, but it was high time that she dealt with it.

  Especially seeing as the other nurses working here were becoming suspicious of Marie Huston too.

  ‘Please. Sit.’ An instruction, not an invitation, Marie Huston noted as she sat down on the chair opposite her superior. Recognising the serious tone to the woman’s voice.

  Something was clearly up.

  Nurse Langton had been acting off with her for some time now.

  Sharp and snappy. Instead of any real conversation, the woman was constantly throwing orders at her.

  Whatever Nurse Langton’s problem was, Marie just hoped that she hurried up and got it off her chest, so that she could get out of here.

  She was rotated off for the entire weekend, and she couldn’t wait to get home.

  Get back to Robert. Daniel, she corrected herself.

  ‘Have I done something wrong?’ Marie said then, earnestly. Not in the mood for a lecture tonight, which is no doubt what Staff Nurse Langton had called her into her office for.

  ‘Well that depends,’ Nurse Langton said, looking over the notes that were sprawled out on the desk in front of her. The requisition that she’d requested from the pharmacy.

  Marie Huston’s signature scrawled on almost every other column down the page.

  Part of her wanted Marie to come up with a viable, logical explanation, but she knew that the chances of that were slim to none.

  It was clear what had been going on here.

  ‘It’s been brought to my attention that you have been requesting a lot of medication, Marie. Far more than the required amount that we would issue out to our patients on this ward?’

  Nurse Langton’s tone was short, clipped.

  Studying the long list in front of her, the sleeping tablets and extra strong painkillers that had been issued out.

  She had her suspicions of exactly what was going on here, only she wanted Marie Huston to say it. For once, just once, she wanted the woman to be straight with her.

  After all the training and opportunities that Louise Langton had given Marie Huston since she started working here at the hospital, the truth was the very least the woman could give her.

  ‘I’ve signed for medication. Of course. If patients need a certain dosage…’

  Nurse Langton shook her head. Cutting Marie’s hapless excuses dead, mid-sentence.

  ‘No, Marie. This is far more medication than is needed. Much, much more and, looking at the inventory, this has been going on for months. Well over a year in fact… probably longer than that.’ Nurse Langton pursed her mouth.

  Four years, Louise Langton guessed. Ever since Robert Parkes had been discharged from their care.

  Her eyes bored into Marie’s, as if she was willing the girl to think twice before trying to fob her off with any more lies, giving her one last chance to tell her the truth. To come clean. Maybe then Nurse Langton could help her.

  ‘I want to know if you’re taking any of these for personal use, Marie, or perhaps if you’re taking them on behalf of somebody else?’

  Nurse Langton let her question hang in the air between them.

  Say it Marie. Admit it.

  ‘Of course they’re not for personal use. They are for the patients, a hundred per cent. Hand on my heart.’

  She knew, Marie Huston thought, as she shook her head. Her face a picture of confusion and shock at what she was being accused of.

  The old bitch knew about her and Robert.

  That’s what this was really about.

  Robert – Daniel, damn it – was no longer a patient here. He was none of Staff Nurse Langton’s concern. And what Marie did in her own private time was of no concern to anyone here.

  ‘Is there something else, Nurse Langton?’ Marie said then, challenging the woman to come clean about what this was really about.

  Nurse Langton eyed the younger woman then.

  Marie Huston might think that she had everyone here at the hospital fooled. That none of the nurses knew about her shacking up with one of their patients, but people did know. Of course they did.

  How could they not?

  Marie Huston had been obsessed with Robert Parkes.

  The man had been on the ward for almost a year in total, and Marie had spent all of her free time visiting the man, and most of her working hours too.

  So much so, that she’d nearly lost her job over him.

  Louise Langton remembered how Nurse Huston’s fixation on Robert Parkes had worsened once the patient had regained consciousness; the woman’s infatuation with the man had become like a drug.

  Nurse Langton had tried to help the nurse back then, too. Taking it upon herself to do Nurse Huston a favour, she’d moved the woman to another hospital.

  Claiming that St Andrew’s Children’s Burns Unit had needed extra staff, at the time.

  And as much as Marie had protested about going, Nurse Langton had insisted on the transfer. Letting Marie know that the temporary move wasn’t in any way negotiable.

  ‘I don’t feel that the relationship you have with your patient is a healthy one, Nurse Huston,’ Nurse Langton had said at the time. Truthfully. Nurse Huston had let her feelings get in the way of her professional outlook. ‘I think you may have crossed the patient/carer line. It happens sometimes. We get attached, I understand that. Especially in cases as intense and unique as this one. I appreciate that you care about your patients and that you are only trying to help, but I really don’t feel that you can offer the best nursing care to your patient when you get this involved, on such an emotional level. I think we need to put some distance between you.’

  ‘But you can’t…’ Marie Huston had protested. Shaking her head in disagreement. Outraged that Nurse Langton could make such a decision without even consulting her. ‘How can me caring about a patient possibly be a bad thing? I don’t understand? I know that I spend more time with him than any other patient, but come on! Robert Parkes hasn’t got anybody! In the nine months he’s been here, he hasn’t had a single visitor. Nobody is looking for him, nowhere on earth gives a shit about him…’ Marie Huston had raised her voice. Her temper getting the better of her. Instantly annoyed by Nurse Langton’s unfair misconception of her.

  She’d been doing her very best by her patient.

  How dare the woman punish her for caring too much? For just doing her job.

  Robert Parkes had only just woken up from his coma. He needed her n
ow. Nurse Langton couldn’t transfer her.

  ‘So what if I go the extra mile? So what if I genuinely care for my patients? That’s the whole point, isn’t it? That’s why we do what we do. He needs me. He hasn’t got anyone else…’

  ‘He doesn’t even know you, Marie. He’s been in a coma ever since we brought him in nine months ago. He has no idea who you are.’ Nurse Langton’s words had stung her.

  ‘I’m doing you a favour, Marie,’ Louise Langton had said, finally being completely straight with the younger nurse. ‘You are an excellent nurse. Truly. I just feel that your focus has become obscured of late. Please trust me, this is for your benefit. The last thing I want to happen is for you to damage your career, or worse still lose your job completely…’

  Lose her job? Was this woman threatening her?

  ‘The children at St Andrew’s Burns Unit, in Essex, would benefit greatly from having you on board, Nurse Huston. It will be great for your working portfolio, and it’s not forever. A month or two at the most. The ward sister is very excited about working alongside you.’

  It hadn’t been an empty threat either.

  Nurse Langton had meant every word of it.

  Her mind had been well and truly made up then. She was the nurse in charge here; it was down to her to make sure that her staff were working to the professional standards expected.

  Louise Langton had really thought that that would be the end of it all.

  Some time and distance between Marie and the patient would put pay to Marie’s constant preoccupation.

  And Marie had had no choice but to go.

  Only, she had soon found another way of staying close to the man.

  She’d started visiting him outside of the job and rumour had it that she was now in a full-blown relationship with the man. It didn’t take a rocket scientist to work out where all the drugs were going to.

  Four years on, Marie’s obsession had just gone from bad to worse it seemed.

  ‘I’ve given you the benefit of the doubt on a number of occasions, Marie,’ Nurse Langton said then, unable to hide the disappointment in her tone. ‘I’ve let things slide that I wouldn’t have done for any other nurse. But I can’t let this go. Not this time. I want you to empty your bag,’ Nurse Langton said, shifting in her chair uncomfortably, now that she’d finally made the accusation.

  ‘My bag?’ Nurse Huston said, defensive suddenly. She’d been expecting to lie, to protest her innocence. To fob Nurse Langton off with some spiel about another nurse perhaps taking the meds and signing them off in her name. The last thing she’d expected was to be searched. Not when she had a bag full of vials of pills and bottles of capsules. ‘But why? I haven’t got anything. I already told you.’

  Nurse Langton pursed her mouth, waiting.

  The silence between them was suddenly glaringly loud in the room.

  Marie Huston was cornered. Caught red-handed, she had nowhere to hide now.

  She stared out through the glass panel in Nurse Langton’s office door, nervously eyeing the other nurses that all seemed to be loitering around the nurses’ station.

  They all knew too, she realised.

  All of them, so nosey and desperate to listen in.

  Suddenly she recalled some of the strange looks that had crossed her colleagues’ faces lately when she’d been in their company. The raised eyes, and whispered voices. All talking in code.

  About her.

  This was just one great big conspiracy.

  They were all against her. All of them. They always had been, from the very start. Condemning her for wanting to help Robert.

  Or Daniel Byrne, as she now knew him, though he’d always be Robert to her.

  These women were just jealous because they didn’t have what she had.

  They never would.

  ‘Fine,’ she said then simply. Her voice shaking as she tipped the contents of her bag out onto the desk top; staring down at the floor, too ashamed to look the senior nurse in the eye as the boxes and pots of pills spread out across the desk between them both.

  But her shame was that she’d been so careless as to get caught out, not because she’d taken them in the first place.

  ‘You’re taking these for Robert Parkes, aren’t you?’ Louise Langton said, knowingly.

  That was the reason Marie Huston was risking her job and her reputation. The man that she was so obsessed and consumed by.

  Marie didn’t bother lying then. She knew. Marie had been careless; she’d fucked everything up.

  Work, home. Everything was just one big mess.

  She’d lose her job now, just like she was losing Daniel.

  He’d finish with her now – now that she wouldn’t be able to get him any more medication.

  He was already losing interest.

  She could feel it more than ever. Now that he remembered who he was, where he had come from. It was as if suddenly, right before her eyes, he’d become a complete stranger to her.

  No longer wanting his medication, he’d told her he needed to stay alert, and focused. So he could remember everything.

  So he could piece it all together.

  Spending all his time on the computer, stalking that bitch of a sister of his.

  Obsessed with his so-called family.

  The same family that hadn’t given so much as two shits about the man since he was burned in the fire. The same people that had never once bothered getting in touch with Daniel.

  She was the only one who had ever cared about him.

  The only one who had tried to help him, and what thanks did she get?

  None.

  If anything, he was drifting further and further away from her.

  She’d lose him soon if she didn’t act fast. That’s why she’d come up with her own plan. Keeping him drugged without him knowing.

  ‘I’m sorry that it’s come to this, really I am,’ Nurse Langton said then, her voice loaded with regret. ‘But I have a duty of care to not only my nursing team but to this hospital too. You know that I can’t just let this one go?’ She glanced at the clock then, before looking back at Marie. Her expression plagued with regret, though she really hadn’t been left with any other choice. ‘I’m going to have to report this, first thing in the morning. For now, you’re dismissed from the hospital.’

  Marie Huston nodded. Getting up from the chair, she smoothed down her blue overalls, before tightening her ponytail.

  Inside, her stomach bubbled with rage like that of a volcanic explosion about to erupt, but somehow she managed to keep her cool.

  To not show the woman how much she hated and despised her right now.

  Instead she simply walked out of the office without saying another word.

  Nurse Langton was going to get her struck off. The interfering old bint was going to lose Marie her job over this.

  The police would probably get involved.

  ‘I’m sorry that it’s come to this, I really am. I hope you understand,’ Nurse Langton called out.

  Only Marie Huston didn’t bother to reply.

  She understood just perfectly.

  Louise Langton didn’t know the first thing about being sorry, not yet anyway. But she’d soon learn.

  Twenty-Three

  He’s trying to lift his hands, but realises that he can’t. His arms are too heavy. His skin taut, tied behind his back with thick plastic cable ties that cut into his flesh each time he moves.

  He’s strapped to a chair, he realises.

  Unable to move. He can’t even lift his head now. Exhausted, as if even opening his eyes is too much effort.

  He should give in to it. That’s all he had to do. Close his eyes just one last time and this horrific ordeal would all be over.

  Instead he was fighting it.

  Every part of his body screamed with pain, every part of him hurting.

  His eye. Fuck! That heat! That smell.

  The pain so intense that he was gone again. Away into the blackness, the nothingness.
<
br />   Only to wake again, to that godawful sound.

  A creature wailing in agony, somewhere off in the distance. Only the noise was coming from him, he realised. From somewhere deep inside him.

  He could feel a cool liquid then, trickling down his body. Offering a few seconds of cool, blissful relief from his torture before the stinging sensation started. The burning as prickling liquid entered his slashed, exposed skin.

  That heady, intoxicating smell. He recognised it. Petrol?

  Then came the heat.

  The most intense heat he could imagine. Explosive. Engulfing his entire body.

  Fight or flight. Live or die.

  MOVE!

  Sitting bolt up in the bed, as his vision adjusted to the darkened room, it took him a moment or two to realise he was safe.

  It was just a dream. A nightmare.

  Though still his heart hammered loudly inside his chest. He was covered in sweat too. Perspiration trickling down his body, the bedsheets stuck to his clammy skin.

  He gulped back the acidic bile that rose at the back of his throat.

  He remembered everything now, every last detail.

  On his feet then, he ran for the bathroom. Making it to the toilet just in time to throw up.

  His stomach empty, he turned and leant over the sink. Holding his hands underneath the cool flow of water, before splashing his face.

  All the while resisting looking up. Avoiding the mirror right in front of him.

  In fear of what he knew he’d see staring back at him.

  Fuck it! he thought. What was some more torture to add to his already never-ending pain?

  He looked then. Recoiling the second he caught sight of his mottled, scarred face.

  Quickly he looked away.

  He tried to steady his breathing that poured out of him in quick erratic bursts.

  Through the nose, and out the mouth. Slow and steady.

  Forcing himself to look again at the monster staring back at him.

  Eyeing the long, jagged scar that ran the length of his face. The thickened fold of skin that left a puckered ravine down the centre of his face. The scars that he’d been left with for all the world to see.