The Lost Girls: Maggie Turner Suspense Series book #1

by Pryke, Helen

  It was too quiet. She turned, and saw Charlie in front of the open wardrobe, a shoebox in one hand, its lid in the other.

  ‘It was hidden right at the back,’ she said, her expression guilty.

  ‘What’s in there?’ Jane asked.

  ‘I think you need to see this,’ Charlie said softly. She placed the box on the bed and pushed it towards her.

  Jane took a step forward, then faltered, dreading what she might find. Charlie’s earlier taunts rang around her head, mocking her once more. She gritted her teeth and bent over to look into the shoebox.

  What had been inside had shaken her so much that she’d stood, paralysed, hand over her mouth, suppressing a scream. She’d shoved the box back at Charlie.

  ‘Put it away,’ she said.

  ‘Jane, I think–’

  ‘No,’ she snapped. ‘Put it back, now. And let’s tidy up so he doesn’t know we’ve been here.’

  Charlie had put the shoebox back in the wardrobe and they’d straightened the room in silence, then closed the door behind them. Jane’s heart hadn’t stopped pounding for ages, her hands shaking as she went about her daily chores, the sense of dread never leaving her.

  What had she seen? What could have possibly upset her so much? She needed cold water for her arm, something to numb the pain shooting through her body. No, concentrate! He’d found out she’d been in his room. Did he know what she’d seen? Was that why he’d punished her? Or had he found out she was pregnant? No, he would have said something. She desperately tried to hide it, but she knew it was only a matter of time before he realised. She hadn’t wanted the brat in the beginning, but then something had changed in her and she’d felt more attached to it, somehow. Like she… cared about it. The thought of him harming her baby stirred something primeval in her, a feeling she’d never had before.

  She didn’t know why she’d told on Charlie, when she was already carrying her own secret inside. A wave of jealousy had surged through her when Charlie had told her she was pregnant; she wanted to be the special one in his life, seeing as she’d never had a family that had loved and wanted her. That was what he’d kept telling her, right from the beginning, so it must be true. Right?

  For the first time, doubt assailed her and she felt a pang of remorse for her family. Had they hated her so much? Had they really agreed to leave her with him, their own daughter, getting rid of her as if she were unwanted baggage? Or had they suffered when she didn’t come home that first night, and all the nights after that? Caressing her stomach, she tried to imagine what they must have gone through when she disappeared. She began crying again as she thought about her mum and dad, and even Chloe’s face brought fresh anguish into her heart. And then she remembered what she’d seen.

  27

  Chloe wrinkled her nose as the musty smell of the closed house and something more odorous hit them. ‘Ugh.’

  ‘The house hasn’t been opened for four years, I bet even the council hasn’t been round very often to check on things,’ Maggie said. ‘Look at the mould on the ceiling.’ She pointed at a black mass in one of the corners.

  ‘Gross,’ Mike said, coughing.

  ‘It’s just mould. Bit of bleach and hot water will get rid of it, no problem,’ Maggie said, laughing.

  ‘Not that. That.’ He nodded at a lump over by the fireplace.

  Maggie went over. At first glance, it looked like an old toupee that had been dropped on the floor and forgotten. Then she noticed the button nose and a tiny ear squashed against the head. ‘Oh, it’s a rat.’

  ‘Nice.’ Chloe looked like she was going to be sick.

  ‘It’s been here a while, it’s almost mummified,’ Maggie said. ‘Explains the smell, though. If there’s one dead rat, there are probably more. Right, let’s start exploring. Remember, you two behind me.’

  Neither complained, so Maggie guessed the dead rat had had an effect on them. The room was sparsely furnished, just a couple of sofas, a coffee table, and a dresser with crockery inside. There were no personal items anywhere, not even a magazine or a newspaper.

  They went along the hallway to the kitchen, which was just as stark and impersonal as the living room. Old-fashioned beige cupboards lined the walls, and an ancient toaster stood all alone on a beige Formica countertop. Maggie opened the cupboards, but they were empty. Only a few bits of crockery and cutlery remained.

  ‘Mr Sorensen was either very frugal, or so miserly he took everything with him,’ she muttered. ‘Not even an out-of-date tin of custard powder. What did the man eat?’

  ‘He left the cleaning stuff behind,’ Chloe said, bent over to examine the cupboards under the sink.

  ‘Figures.’ Maggie tutted.

  ‘Oh.’ Chloe turned around with a dirty yellow band held between her fingers.

  Maggie took it from her, careful not to touch the crumbling elastic more than necessary. ‘It looks like a hair tie. Not an accessory our Mr Sorensen would need, is it?’

  ‘Jane never tied her hair back, it wasn’t long enough. So it can’t be hers,’ Chloe said sadly.

  Maggie looked at Michael, who had gone white. ‘Mike? Are you okay?’

  He rubbed his eyes. ‘Charlotte used to tie her hair back in a ponytail,’ he whispered. ‘She hated her hair getting in her face and kept threatening to get it all cut off. Do you think it’s hers?’

  ‘Let’s not get too hasty,’ Maggie said. ‘It could be anyone’s, even the old lady who lived here before. But keep an eye out for anything else.’

  * * *

  They stood before the open cellar door in the hall, the damp and cold seeping up from the darkness below. Maggie shivered; whether it was from the cold or apprehension of what they might find, she wasn’t sure. She closed her eyes and took a deep breath. And then she was six years old again, inside the dark place that haunted her dreams, strange noises startling her as she sat in a corner sucking her thumb, eyes wide but seeing nothing in the blackness all around, warm liquid pooling beneath her as fear encased her in its icy clutch…

  ‘Maggie?’ Chloe’s concerned voice broke through her thoughts, bringing her back to the present.

  She opened her eyes, surprised to find herself still in the dimly lit hallway of the house, and leaned against the wall while she tried to focus on the task ahead. ‘I’m okay, my head was spinning for a moment. Must be the stale air.’ She attempted to smile, even though her chest was tight with tension. ‘If your sisters were here, he must have kept them in the cellar, there’s no sign of them anywhere else in the house.’ She switched on her phone’s torch and shone it down the stairs. ‘Let’s go?’ Chloe and Mike nodded.

  She carefully made her way down, testing each step before trusting it with her weight. The wood creaked and bowed but held fast. She felt hard stone beneath her feet and breathed a sigh of relief. The two teenagers stood beside her as she flashed the torch around the room. It wasn’t very big, and the ceiling was a lot lower than the rooms above, but the walls were made of thick stone, presumably to help keep it cool. There was a small window higher up on the wall, but the glass was so thick with grime that hardly any light shone through.

  The beam of the torch lit up a grubby mattress over in the far corner. Maggie gestured to the others to stay back, and went over to take a look. Underneath the mouse droppings, she could make out some rust-coloured marks. Blood?

  ‘Maggie.’ Her name echoed around the room, startling her out of her reverie. She swung around, shining her torch on Mike’s embarrassed face. ‘Sorry,’ he said more quietly. He and Chloe had taken out their own phones and were using them to look around. ‘I found these.’

  His torch lit up two plates on a wooden crate, covered in dust and cobwebs. They were smeared with the remains of whatever had been on there. ‘Do you think these were our sisters’ last meals?’ His voice sounded strained, as if he were trying to hold back the tears.

  Maggie felt his pain. Her lungs constricted, making breathing difficult, as she wondered if Thomas had been kept in a pl
ace like this before… She pushed the thought from her mind and focused on the task in hand, trying to calm herself down. ‘Let’s not jump to conclusions. I can’t see anything else that suggests they were here.’ Like two skeletons, she thought grimly. ‘But I’d say someone was definitely down here. Let’s check around, see if we can find any more evidence that it was your sisters.’

  They set to with renewed energy, convinced they would find something. Maggie could feel the dirt sticking to her skin, sinking down into her pores, the musty smell clogging her nostrils as she poked around the area under the stairs. She hated the cellar already, after only a quarter of an hour – if the girls had been here, how had they coped, being shut up in this room? She straightened her back, stretching her arms, and glanced over at the mattress. Had they been tied up? Drugged? Had they been terrified, not knowing where they were or what was going to happen to them? She gasped, suddenly suffocating in the stale air, feeling the walls close in on her, crushing her, oh God, she was going to die…

  ‘Maggie?’ Chloe touched her arm. ‘Are you sure you’re all right?’

  Maggie tried to get a grip on herself, for Chloe and Mike’s sakes. She was frightening them. ‘Sorry. It’s just small spaces, and the dark – they’re not a good combination for me.’ She gave them a weak smile. ‘I’m fine. Honest.’

  ‘Good. Because we’ve found something.’

  28

  He lied. He’d told her that her parents didn’t want her anymore, they’d never loved her, they’d only wanted a slave to look after Chloe. But now Jane knew that wasn’t true. She’d read the newspaper article with the headline in big, bold capitals: ABDUCTED GIRL’S PARENTS BEG FOR HER RELEASE. She’d hardly been able to believe the words as she’d read them, and when she’d got to the part about them having always loved her, she’d sneered in disgust.

  But then she’d seen the photo. Mum, Dad, and Chloe, standing huddled together, all with the same haunted look of desperation on their faces. Even though it was in black and white, she saw the dark circles under her mum’s eyes, the strain on her dad’s face as if he was using all his willpower not to cry. And Chloe, with smudges around her eyes, like she’d been rubbing them furiously just before the photo was taken, determined not to let her tears show.

  Jane’s world came crashing down as realisation hit her. He had lied to her for four long years, convinced her that her family hated her when the opposite was true, shut her away with false promises of a wonderful future with someone who loved her. How could she have been so stupid?

  29

  Bitch! I saw straight away she’d been in my room, everything was out of place. What if she saw the cuttings? I knew I should have thrown them away, Mother told me I should, but I wanted to keep some mementoes of those times. Now I’ll never hear the end of it. Mother will take great pleasure in gloating.

  Just like the other two, they think they can outwit me, but no one can do that. I can just imagine them both, plotting and sniggering behind my back, working out how to get rid of me. But my sisters tried before, and failed.

  Things were okay between us, all those years ago, before Jane and Charlie started talking together, comparing notes, excluding me from everything. So much for ‘All for one and one for all’. I was a lone wolf, no longer part of the three musketeers, banished from their room, their beds, made to feel like an outsider. All because I loved them. All because Charlie got herself pregnant. I thought they loved me too. I was wrong then, but I won’t make the same mistake again. This time I won’t be excluded, this time my little girls will love me back, this time they won’t start their whoring ways if they don’t want to suffer the same punishment.

  Fire is so cleansing, I find. It purifies the soul, eats the foulness in the air, burns away those intolerable imperfections my little girls still have. I hope Jane has learned her lesson, and that the cleansing has begun, but I feel, deep down, I’ll have to do the same as last time. First the blood, then the fire, burning it all away until nothing remains except soft ashes blowing in the breeze.

  I remember it so well. Mother came home unexpectedly early that night, and her face when she saw the thing at the bottom of the stairs was a picture. I wish I’d taken a photo and framed it, but it’s imprinted in my mind anyway, for all eternity. Her mouth wide open, but no sound coming out, just some pathetic whimpers as she stared in shock. I was right, that thing was no longer Charlie. Mother could see it too, and was just as disgusted as me. I was on tenterhooks as I followed her upstairs, I couldn’t wait until she saw what I did to Jane. I knew she would be so proud of me.

  30

  Jane hadn’t spoken to her for the last three days. She’d allowed Charlotte to bandage her arm, and then she’d retreated from everyone, staying in her room as much as possible.

  He forbade them to go outside now, and he kept the doors and windows locked whenever he went out. Charlotte had thought about throwing a chair at a window and smashing it, but the fear of him coming home was too deeply ingrained and she couldn’t go through with it. She wanted to scream in frustration. How on earth was she going to attract the children’s attention? The kitchen window looked out over the back garden, but the bottom was too far away for them to hear her if she shouted.

  She slammed her fist on the countertop, hot tears suddenly welling up in her eyes. She was scared. Jane had that terrible burn on her arm, which he said she’d done while preparing dinner. So why had he thrown her in the cellar for hours, instead of letting Charlotte bandage it right away? She’d kept quiet, not daring to question him, knowing that he could put them both back down in the cellar at any moment, but there was something wrong. The tension in the house was thick enough to cut with a knife, and she noticed he was talking a lot to himself. She could hear him as he paced around the living room, arguing with himself. She’d seen him, hands gesticulating as he walked around and around, his voice rising and lowering as he spoke. She couldn’t catch much, just her and Jane’s names every now and then. But she’d overheard one thing that had chilled her to the bone.

  She sat down at the table with a glass of water, her hand shaking as she lifted it. She was worried about Jane. Ever since they’d found the shoebox a few days earlier, she’d withdrawn into herself. Hardly surprising, really, but Charlotte couldn’t have her fall apart now, not when she needed her.

  She’d been going over and over things in her mind for hours. What was so special about the two of them? He’d told Jane he’d saved her from her family, who’d only wanted her around to use her as a slave, and she’d believed him. But why Charlotte? Her family had loved her, he’d had no reason to take her away from them. Oh, he’d tried to convince her that they didn’t want her, that Mike was their pride and joy, and they’d only wanted a son and not a daughter. In the beginning, scared, confused, and desperate, she’d half-believed him. She’d tried so hard to fit into that strange ‘family’, with her new sister and brother. He’d called himself their brother back then, and told her they were his little sisters. She hated it when he said that, stroking her hair, after doing things to her no brother should do.

  She fought back tears, trying to concentrate. For four long years she’d refused to accept what had happened to her, had suffered violent beatings and more for her behaviour, but she’d never asked herself why it had happened. She’d avoided that question for as long as possible, but now it was time to face up to things. Now she had to figure out why, before he became even more unhinged. She resolved to creep back downstairs that evening after they went to bed. If she found him talking to himself, she’d try and hear what he was saying. She wanted to know why he spoke about them so much, then maybe she could figure out why he’d taken her and Jane.

  The words she’d overheard repeated in her head.

  ‘They won’t listen,’ he’d muttered, wringing his hands. ‘I don’t want to do it, but I will, if I must. You were so proud of me before, I know you will be again.’

  31

  Mike showed her the mattress, which h
e’d lifted and turned over completely. The bottom was covered in a fluffy mould and stained with soil from the floor. It took Maggie a moment, and then she saw it. A folded piece of torn paper stuck on one corner, almost the same colour as the mattress.

  ‘Christ,’ she muttered.

  ‘We didn’t want to touch it in case we damaged it even more or something,’ he said.

  ‘What on earth made you think of turning the mattress over?’ Maggie asked.

  ‘Well, you said to be thorough,’ he replied with a shrug. ‘Do you think it’s a note?’

  Maggie peered more closely. ‘There’s ink showing through where it got damp, it looks like it.’ From the faded picture, she guessed it had been torn from a can of paint – there were some under the stairs that looked similar. She peeled a corner away carefully, cursing as it started to rip. ‘Mike, go and see if there’s a knife in the kitchen, one with a pointed tip. We need to slowly lever it off.’

  His feet thudded on the stairs as he leaped into action. He was soon back, panting slightly. ‘Here.’

  Maggie used the knife while Chloe shone her torch, and after a few tense minutes, she managed to peel it away. She gently pulled the folded paper apart and held her phone so she could see, then put her hand over her mouth as she read the slightly blurred words.

  ‘Well?’ Mike tapped his finger against his thigh.

  Maggie stared at the piece of paper for a few more seconds, then passed it to him without saying a word. Chloe peered over his shoulder.

  The silence in the cellar hung heavy in the air as they read the note. Maggie could hear water dripping outside the small window, the dull splosh beating the same rhythm as her heartbeat, time suspended in the dark underground room.