Either Side of Midnight (The Midnight Saga Book 1)

by Tori de Clare

  ‘Please. What’s happening? Don’t do this.’

  ‘I said don’t speak.’

  Something sharp jabbed into her right arm near the top. Her first thought was she’d been punched, until she realized she’d been injected. Her head started to swim and walking was becoming difficult. Her head was floating, reality becoming less clear. It brought relief. His voice drew her back.

  ‘Keep moving.’ His hand clawed her arm and roughly shook her.

  She carried on with help. She couldn’t hold her head anymore. Her chin rested on her chest. Her legs were becoming warm and numb. They stopped walking. The blanket was ripped away. Her eyes adjusted. They’d stopped beside a graveside, loose piles of earth on each side. A huge arrangement of flowers sprawled out near her feet. The top half of a man was holding a spade, looking up at them from inside the hole. He climbed out and jabbed the spade into the ground. The guy said nothing, but he stared Naomi up and down like she was dinner. She’d lost her inhibitions, but not her mind.

  ‘No,’ Naomi muttered, ‘no, no, no.’ The objections carried on inside her head, but she wasn’t sure she was making sound. She was aware of pressure on her arms, supporting her. The tape was being unravelled behind her back. Her arms were free, and sore. Why couldn’t she use them? Either they’d gone to sleep or had detached from her body completely. Her left hand was grabbed. Her senses sharpened again. Her rings were being ripped from her finger and a hand was trawling up and down her thigh.

  ‘No,’ she muttered, too weak. ‘Please. Nathan. No.’ Sentences wouldn’t form.

  ‘I think she wants a man,’ said the one closest to her.

  ‘No time,’ said the other.

  ‘Give me a break.’

  ‘I said no time.’

  ‘Just let me –’

  ‘Put her in,’ said the other voice, insistent and commanding now. Whose voice? She was floating again, glad to let go. But she needed to stay in touch. She wanted to live. At the same time, oblivion was calling.

  She must have drifted. Next thing she knew, she was lying on a hard surface in a deep pit. It was icy cold. Someone loomed over her. Behind him, the moon was a lopsided white ball with a misty halo. A few stars peeked out, barely daring to look. Her head wouldn’t move, but her eyes rolled far enough to focus on the man with the balaclava and watch him withdraw a gun. He stepped down until his feet were touching her legs, and crouched.

  ‘Check we’re alone,’ she heard.

  She couldn’t speak, couldn’t object, couldn’t move a muscle besides her eyes. Her eyelids gave up and folded. She felt something hard and cold against her head close to her eye and heard the gun fire, a deafening sound that rattled her brain but couldn’t rouse her muscles. She was paralysed. Another shot. Her face was wet. Something warm was slithering across her eye and down her cheeks. There was a long pause. Fingers pressed firmly against her neck.

  ‘That’s it, she’s dead. Check.’

  No reply. She’d been pronounced dead by the man with the recognisable voice. She heard it, which could only mean one thing: she wasn’t dead. She heard a zip then felt herself being constricted inside something as the zip stopped near her neck.

  Through a mental fog, she clung on. She needed to scream, tell them she was still conscious. Would they care? That’s it, she’s dead. The words echoed in her head as if they were bouncing round an empty room. They couldn’t get out. There was no door. They weren’t true. She needed to tell someone they weren’t true. She wished they were true when she felt the weight of something heavy being hurled at her legs. Something was crushing her. She was losing her battle with consciousness. She loved Nathan, but that wasn’t her final thought. Two words clung on the longest, in the sterile room with no door. She was trapped with them, alone, consigned to them for eternity.

  Buried alive.

  There was a blaze of white light. The zip roared past her face.

  <><><>

  Camilla and Henry Hamilton passed a familiar sign that informed them that home was just two miles away. In advance, Camilla demanded to be dropped by the front door. Her feet were sore and her head ached after the day from hell. At the best of times, patience wasn’t a virtue she valued very much. At the worst of times her fuse was shorter than a used candle wick.

  This was the worst of times. She was panting angrily between words.

  ‘This is hardly what we imagined for our daughter, Henry. Is it?’

  Henry Hamilton let out an abrupt, ‘Mm,’ before falling silent. Long experience had taught him that Camilla would arrive at her own conclusions in time. Offering an opinion either way was entering a minefield. Letting go of an unscripted noise could mean curtains. When Camilla was in one of these moods, his only safety was in virtual silence. In any case, she didn’t want answers to her questions. She wanted a flexible ear to bend for as long as necessary.

  ‘All that talent thrown away on that man.’ She shook her head. ‘What kind of a life will they have together? Nothing in common.’

  ‘Hmm.’

  ‘He has no career path, Henry. No plans.’ Camilla shook her head again and stared into the black space beyond the window. ‘Not a single person representing his family today. It felt entirely wrong.’

  Henry waited a moment in case there was more. ‘Mm,’ he growled.

  ‘Did the best man look familiar to you, Henry?’

  ‘Not in the least.’

  ‘Dreadful speech. Crude and embarrassing. I’m sure I’ve seen him somewhere,’ Camilla mused. ‘And why Nathaniel didn’t shave this morning, I do not know. Must have been two days’ growth on that smug face of his.’

  Clasping the steering wheel hurt Henry’s hands. Thirty minutes was about his limit before griping pains gnawed the full length of his fingers. They’d been in the car for thirty-five minutes now. He released the wheel one hand at a time and flexed his fingers inside his leather driving gloves. The movement caught Camilla’s eye. Henry could feel her watching him now, really examining him.

  ‘Don’t you think?’ she asked, listening properly for the first time.

  Henry didn’t understand the question. He’d lost the plot for a beat and now she was testing him. Guessing and getting it wrong was worse than owning up to the attention lapse. He opted for the lesser of the evil pair.

  ‘Sorry Camilla, my fingers have started to bother me. What was the question?’

  ‘I’m talking about Nathaniel’s facial hair,’ she said slowly and deliberately as if he was a toddler. Her hands clapped loudly onto her thighs. ‘Haven’t you been listening to anything I’ve said?’

  ‘Of course I’ve been listening to everything. No career, no family representation, no –’

  ‘I hate it when you do that.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘List what I’ve just said. It only proves you were hearing me, not that you were listening.’

  ‘I can assure you I’ve been absorbing every word.’

  She threw him a warning look which he collected out of his peripheral vision.

  Henry didn’t retaliate except to gently shake his head. Having made her point, Camilla shifted her gaze out of the window again.

  Henry slowed and signalled to turn into the drive. The gates were open. He was pressing his palms against the steering wheel and wriggling his fingers constantly now.

  ‘So,’ Camilla said, without looking at Henry, ‘are we going to discuss the real problem, or not?’

  ‘Which is?’

  ‘For goodness’ sake,’ Camilla snapped.

  Henry cut in quickly. He was banking on an early night, not getting tangled in a heated exchange that could lead to senseless hours of sleep deprivation.

  ‘I’m sorry, Camilla, I’m not with you.’

  Camilla folded her arms and huffed all her breath out noisily. Henry fed the steering wheel through his hands as they drove down the curvaceous tree-lined driveway. The house crept into view with the moon slipping in and out of cloud just above. Apart from the dim glow of an o
utside light close to the front door, the house was in darkness. Camilla reached for the door handle and lifted her handbag off the floor.

  ‘Read between the lines, Henry. Apart from the fact that Naomi has just married beneath her, I’m upset because Annabel wasn’t there. You haven’t mentioned her all day. Not once. Do I have to beg you for information? Did she talk about coming, at any point?’

  Henry took her hand. ‘I didn’t want to upset you by talking about her.’

  Camilla lifted his hand and threw it back at him. ‘Just yes or no?’

  Henry paused. He’d pulled in as close to the front door as possible. When he finally looked at Camilla, she was glaring at him without blinking, mouth in a tight line.

  ‘No, she didn’t intend to –’

  ‘Right.’ Camilla opened the door with one hand and plucked her key from her bag with the other. ‘Cynthia didn’t leave the hall light on. I told her specifically to leave the light on.’

  She leapt from the car and violently slammed the door without looking back. Henry watched her trim shape bob up the two steps and disappear inside the house. It seemed a long wait before a light came on, after which he proceeded methodically to the garage, humming as he went.

  <><><>

  Camilla dropped her bag and stood behind the front door in darkness. Her head fell into her hands and she released the painful lump in her throat. Between gulps and sobs, she realised she could still hear the low buzz of the engine outside. She frantically groped around for the hall lamp, and then the car moved on.

  Her eyes adjusted. She focussed on the portrait above the hall table, taken from a photograph. It was almost perfect and gave the girls a surreal glow. Naomi and Annabel smiled down in pretty dresses, aged twelve, hair in ribbons. Naomi was wearing her new necklace. No twins had ever been less alike. Naomi was dark-haired, dark-eyed, Annabel blonde-haired, blue-eyed. Both girls were so beautiful, Camilla thought. Their eyes spoke of their friendship, their differences that didn’t matter, their uncomplicated lives. That was then.

  Camilla’s concentration was broken by the slow trudging of Henry’s footsteps. In the time it took Henry to put his key in the lock and make his way through the door and into the hall, Camilla had disappeared up the stairs two at a time and locked herself in the bathroom.

  3

  When a squeaky door opened, Naomi was confused. She was alone and peaceful in a bright room that was colourless and entirely empty. If there was a door she couldn’t see it, yet after a fruitless search, someone definitely closed a door. She heard it clearly. Her eyes opened to intense light. She closed them and squinted hard. The empty room had disappeared and she found she was lying in a bed, comfortable and warm. Her eyes widened slowly and blinked a few times to adjust to brilliant sunlight. Her head hurt. Her limbs felt stiff and sluggish. As she grappled to understand why, she heard footsteps running down some stairs.

  Where am I?

  ‘Nathan?’ she called, voice weak. ‘Nathan?’ She couldn’t project the sound. She listened, but nothing happened, no response. There was only a melodic silence. She identified it as birdsong outside. There was a whole choir assembled somewhere, rehearsing frantically. Where was Nathan?

  She couldn’t decide if she was awake or asleep. Her brain was fighting to unscramble, but her senses, dull and distant, lagged behind in her dream. The surroundings were unfamiliar. She was staring through a huge panelled window that ran floor to ceiling. Closer inspection confirmed that it was actually two doors with brass door handles. Full-length floral curtains were open and pinned behind brass holders. The curtains were pretty but wouldn’t have featured in the latest catalogue. Laura Ashley, perhaps. Off-white background, pastel flowers in wavy lines.

  She pulled her eyes away. Who cared about curtains? What day is it? She ran through the days of the week starting at Monday. Nothing made sense until Saturday. Saturday? Panic seized her for a moment. She was getting married. That thought ushered in the memories: a long walk up a short aisle clutching red lilies in one hand and her dad’s arm with the other, and Lorie, her only bridesmaid, close behind. Nathan had looked over his shoulder, smiled and extended his hand as she got close to him. She took it and handed her flowers to Lorie.

  Nathan twisted his fingers into hers and whispered into her hair, ‘You look stunning.’ He smelled of his favourite aftershave.

  In the warmth of a cosy bed in direct sunlight, her memory threw up a scene in a misty bathroom where she’d frantically searched for her necklace. She touched her neck to find it bare. The memories were clearing now. She recalled her shaky voice during the vows, the reception, the hotel room, Nathan holding her to his chest on the bed. She sat upright, gripped by the reality that Nathan was gone. ‘Gone?’

  She remembered the claustrophobic darkness, relived the chill of that voice. If you want to live, don’t struggle. Don’t speak again. She’s dead.

  Dead? She fixed her glare on the empty wall ahead, heart thumping. Surely her heart wouldn’t be so alive if she were dead. She twisted her head to scan the breath-taking view through the doors that led to a wooden balcony outside. The sight beyond it made her gasp. If this was death, she could live with it. There was a range of tumbling hills stretching into the distance, speckled with sheep. The patchwork hillsides were in every shade of green, soaked in sunshine. The peaks turned bald and into a non-descript brownish colour crowned with an azure sky dabbed with a few brushstrokes of low white cloud. A single chimney peeped from a distant hill. Trees dotted the landscape, changing for autumn. She couldn’t see any roads, but could pick out the slithering impression of a stream running away from the house.

  Her heart-rate slowed and the panic subsided. Her eyes wandered. She absorbed a spacious and beautiful bedroom with plain walls, a wooden beamed ceiling, and a pale wooden floor. She was sitting up in a large bed with a cast iron black frame and an embroidered white duvet cover with a pale pink trim.

  Naomi rotated her head to complete her study of the room. To her left, by the side of the bed close to the window, was another door, ajar. She could see a brass door trim and a couple of white tiles. A bathroom. The wall behind the bed was decorated to match the curtains, same dated floral print, same pastel shades. Opposite the bed was a chest of drawers holding a single pink rose in a skinny glass vase. The rose was fresh and wide awake. Beside it was a wicker chair with a cushion and a folded white towel. To her right in the far corner was the main door, closed with a key hole, presumably locked. Beside that was a long wardrobe with a slim mirror attached to one of two doors. She could see the bulge of her covered legs in the mirror, but not her face. As she leant forward to find herself, it occurred to her for the first time that she was shackled to the bed.

  She concentrated on herself now. Both wrists were secured by two metal rings covered in soft black leather. She followed the lines of two long chains attached to the bedframe behind her. The rings weren’t tight around her wrists; the chains were coiled on the bed sheets. She could move freely. She was hurting all over, not badly, but there was a general smattering of cuts and bruises; dull aches, sharp pains. One arm hurt more than the other. When she investigated why, she found a needle mark surrounded by puffy red skin.

  Naomi lifted the duvet and found herself in a knee-length silk nightshirt buttoned all the way down. Her coat was gone. Someone had dressed her. Someone had looked at her in her see-through underwear.

  With a burst of energy, she kicked off the covers and checked herself carefully. She was still wearing the same gear. She searched for other clues. Her legs were scratched and there was a bruise on her right shin. She undid the nightshirt. Her side had been dressed with something square and padded, secured and crossed with two strips of surgical tape, neatly done. It confirmed again that someone had touched her and looked at her. There was no evidence of anything worse, but that proved nothing. Not knowing what had happened left her chasing scenarios and feeling nauseous. She hadn’t saved herself for Nathan for some sick creep to snatch her and
take advantage. Unless he already had.

  As she flopped back against the pillow she had a flashback about a gun. The creep owned a gun. Wait, he’d used it. She remembered lying in a hole in the ground, seeing the stars behind a black figure that held a gun to her head. The memory was unclear. Either he’d used the gun, or she dreamt he’d used it. She recalled the powerlessness and the detachment from reality. The sound of gunfire was more-or-less the last thing she remembered. She pawed every inch of her head. It was tender on one side above her ear, but there was no dressing. She was leaning towards the probability that it was a dream until her fingers closed around matted hair on the same side. The white pillowcase behind her, showed smears of dried blood.

  She remembered something else: pressure on her legs – something being thrown at her, then a bright light. The memories were warped and unreliable. If she’d been covered in earth, she’d be filthy.

  She sat up again and examined her nails, her legs and arms. There was the expected amount of bruises, but no sign of dirt. Her nails were white and manicured the way they’d been prepared for the wedding, but her rings were gone. She habitually reached for her necklace and was disappointed again. Trying to piece the night together left a half-finished puzzle. Nothing was clear after the walk through the headstones.

  The soles of both feet were perfectly clean. The creep had washed her. Which creep? She shivered. There were two, one whose voice reached for distant memories, and one she didn’t know. They could be downstairs right now, deciding what to do with her, or to her. As beautiful as this place was, she had to get out.

  She shifted her focus to long distance out of the window again. The nearest neighbours consisted of a cluster of five sheep at the bottom of a hillside. The closest house could have been a mile away, even two. There was smoke coming from the chimney – someone was home. Fact: no one would hear her scream from here. This scene could have sold a thousand postcards. She pictured whoever lived in the faraway house, sitting in front of a log fire, horrified by the headlines. No clue that the victim was a smoke’s-puff away.