The other thing with ugly heart was purely a moment of madness. This, I lecture myself, is reality. This is what my parents had. This is what makes a successful relationship. Not that uncontrollable fire and lust. This is what is required to bring children into the world and nurture them. This is what a woman can grow old beside. This is the something warm and comfortable that I will be able to slip into on a cold, rainy English night. Yes, that’s the right word. It will be comfortable. In time I’ll forget the other’s face. I’ll forget those silvery-blue eyes that seemed to pierce my very soul.
Mark’s apartment is in a really good part of St. John’s Wood. It is tranquil and civilized. We go up to his apartment without speaking and he closes the door.
‘I have an excellent bottle of Sancerre. 2009. Up for a glass?’ he asks.
‘Bring it on,’ I say with a grin.
‘Look who’s so full of surprises tonight,’ he says, tossing his keys onto a sideboard. ‘Why don’t you make yourself comfortable in there?’ he suggests, nodding towards the living room.
‘OK,’ I say, and start moving towards it.
He has a nice flat. The décor is a bit dull with dark wood and paintings of fox hunting on the walls, but nothing I couldn’t eventually fix. A sliding door leads to a balcony that has a great view of the park. I know because I have been here once before. The door to the master bedroom is open and I glance at the giant bed with its fluffy white throw. My first and instinctive reaction is to avert my eyes. The response irritates and annoys me. Come on, Dahlia. This is simply the next step in your relationship. One that has been a long time coming.
I hear him opening the fridge, the cork popping, and the clink of glasses. I am standing at the glass door looking down at the park when the lights in the room dim. I turn around and he advances holding a wine bottle by the neck in one hand and two glasses in the other.
‘Awesome view.’ Shit, I said that the last time too.
‘Yes, I rather like it,’ he says casually, and moves towards a long, chocolate leather couch. I follow him and sit beside him, quite close, but not touching. He hands me my drink. I take a sip and put it down on the glass table. He picks up one of the remote controls lying on the table and presses one of the buttons. Soft unrecognizable music fills the air.
I clear my throat.
‘Just relax. There’s no pressure to do anything,’ he reassures gently.
I’m not actually nervous. I’m just not turned on. I take another sip of my wine.
He trails his finger along my wrist. Inside me nothing happens. There is no desire to do anything to him or with him. This is not a good sign, so I put the glass back on the coffee table, lean forward and lay my hand on his thigh.
‘Oh Dahlia,’ he mutters, and grabs me quite masterfully as he swoops down on my mouth.
Good start, Mark.
As it turns out he’s a good kisser. Just enough of everything. He doesn’t force his tongue into my mouth either. His hand slides under my top and goes around to my back looking for my bra’s clasp. Finding none, he returns to the front where he defeats it in one efficient movement.
OK, he’s done this before.
He breaks the kiss and looking deeply into my eyes starts unbuttoning my top. He pulls the material aside to expose my breasts.
‘God, you have fabulous breasts,’ he says thickly.
‘Wait till you see my ass,’ I quip, but he is in no mood for jokes.
He bends his head and takes a nipple in his mouth. It feels pretty good and I give him a small encouraging moan. He begins to suck harder, but not enough to cause pain. He has technique, I have to give him that. My brain doesn’t feel like it is exploding in my head or anything like that, but I start to enjoy the sensation. Maybe people shouldn’t knock comfortable sex so much.
My mobile rings suddenly. The sound is jarring and I freeze.
He lifts his head. His warm, brown eyes are dark with passion. ‘Don’t take it,’ he orders throatily.
‘Um … it could be an emergency. I’ll just be two secs,’ I say apologetically.
‘All right. Go ahead,’ he sighs.
I pull the edges of my top together and scratch around inside my bag. I can’t imagine who could be calling me at this time of the night. I look at the screen and it is my mother. Mom never calls on my mobile. She thinks it’s a waste of money. We communicate almost exclusively via Skype.
With a frown I accept the call.
Five
Dahlia Fury
She’s my sister. Break her heart and I’ll break your face.
-Dahlia Fury
‘Dahlia,’ my mother says urgently.
‘What is it, Mom?’ I shoot back, my stomach contracting with dread.
‘Has your sister been in contact?’ she demands anxiously without answering my question.
Thrown by the unexpected question, I blurt out, ‘Daisy? No. Why?’
‘When was the last time you spoke to her?’ she goes on.
‘Uh … four days ago. Mom, what are you panicking about?’
‘She hasn’t called me, she hasn’t updated her Facebook, and her phone is switched off.’
The dread becomes a cold clamp of fear deep inside me. ‘When did you speak to her last?’
‘She hasn’t called for two days.’ My mother’s voice has become high and screechy. ‘You know how she promised me that she will call me every single day. Day before yesterday she stopped. I was a bit worried, but I let it go because she warned me that some of those remote places she was going to would have bad Internet connection. But nothing again today. That’s two days, Dahlia. She’d never not call for two days.’
My mother holds back a distraught sob. ‘I’m worried, Dahlia. I know something has happened to her. I’ve got this bad feeling in the pit of my stomach. I’ve had it for two days. Something’s wrong. I know it. I shouldn’t have let her go. Even at the airport I knew it.’
I clutch the phone hard. ‘Calm down, Mom. There’s bound to be a simple explanation. It’s probably as she said, she’s stuck in some little town where there is no Internet connectivity.’
‘What about her phone? Why has that been switched off?’ my mother fires back.
‘Maybe her battery’s run out.’
‘And she never got a chance to charge it for two days?’ she challenges. When my mother sounds more logical than me it usually means trouble.
I want to get my Mom off the phone and just think for two minutes. Obviously there is a reasonable explanation, but I can’t think with her close to hysterical in my ear. ‘Mom, can I call you back in half an hour? Let me see if I can contact Marie.’
‘I already did. Her phone is switched off too.’
I feel goose pimples start crawling up my arms. ‘What?’
‘Why do you think I’m panicking?’ my mother wails.
‘Have you tried Marie’s mother?’
‘No, I don’t have her number.’
I need to get my mom off the phone. ‘OK, I do. I’ll call her and call you back, OK?’ I coax gently.
‘Please hurry, Dahlia. I’m going out of my mind here. I’m so afraid. She’s only nineteen. She’s my baby,’ my mom whispers and starts sobbing again.
‘Mom, stop crying. Please. There’s bound to be a reasonable explanation. I’ll call you back in half an hour, or as soon as I know something.’
‘Yes, please, Dahlia. I wish you were here. Oh God! I wish I’d never let her go. I warned her never to hitchhike and she promised not to. I only let her go because she promised and she’s such a sensible girl. I don’t know what could have happened to her.’
‘Don’t worry, Mom. Like I said there’s probably a very simple explanation. I’ll call you back in half an hour, or sooner if I get some news.’
‘I’ll be waiting here,’ my mom cries tearfully.
My heart breaks to hear her little frightened voice. ‘I love you, Mom,’ I say, almost in tears myself.
‘I love you too, Dahlia.’
&
nbsp; I end the call.
‘What’s wrong?’ Mark asks.
For a moment I don’t answer. I can’t. My mind is a big, empty blank. Then the words come to me.
‘It’s my sister.’ I look at his concerned face. ‘Daisy. She and her friend, Marie, went backpacking in Australia. My Mom hasn’t been able to contact either of them for the last two days.’ I am surprised to hear how calm my voice is. I think I don’t, or just can’t bring myself to believe anything bad has happened to my sister. Not to sunny Daisy. Who’d want to hurt her laughing, freckled sweet face?
Mark narrows his eyes. ‘She’s nineteen right?’
I nod.
‘I don’t get it. Is it really so unusual if a nineteen-year-old on a backpacking holiday doesn’t call her mother for two days?’
I press my lips together and take a deep breath. ‘Daisy promised my mom she would call every day. She knows very well if she doesn’t call my mom will worry like crazy. I’m twenty-four and I’ve been living in this country for the last year. I still have to call my mother at least twice a week or she’ll go out of her head with anxiety.’
I start biting my thumbnail, realize I’m doing it, and stop.
‘Besides, my sister is not like other girls her age. She is incredibly responsible. She always keeps her word no matter what. If she hasn’t called it is because she can’t. I’m just praying that they’ve lost their phones in the desert, they’ve had their phones stolen, or something equally innocuous.’
Mark rubs his face thoughtfully. ‘Don’t get me wrong, but she’s a teenager on holiday. Is it so unthinkable that she could have let her hair down in a place where no one knows her? In fact, it is usually teenagers who are the most responsible that feel the need to let off steam when they are far away from home. She could be trying to appear more of an adult by not reporting in to your mother daily, having fun, meeting people, partying and kicking up her heels a bit.’
I shake my head. ‘Daisy doesn’t drink. She’s into clean living, healthy food and mystical things. She does yoga and chants mantras. The reason why she wanted to go to Alice Springs in the first place was because of the Aborigines. She thinks they are special and she wanted to go on a long ‘dreaming’ walkabout with them.’
‘There you go then. She’s on a walkabout.’
If only it was as simple as that. ‘She would have told my mom then. Warned her that she would be out of touch for a few days.’
‘Is there anything I can do to help?’ Mark asks, frowning, finally getting the seriousness of the situation.
‘Can you drive me home please?’
‘Of course,’ he says, and springs up instantly.
I get my bra on, quickly button up, and numbly follow him out of his apartment.
‘Have the police been called?’ Mark asks in the lift.
I can’t think. All my thoughts are muddled. ‘I don’t know, but I don’t think so. There must be a simple explanation,’ I insist. I realize I am desperately clutching at the idea that it is all a simple misunderstanding.
In the car I get onto Daisy’s Facebook page. As my mother said, Daisy stopped posting two days back. Her last post was a picture of her and Marie standing outside Olive Pink Botanic Gardens in Alice Springs. I go into Marie’s page. Her last post has a picture of her feeding a tame kangaroo. She is laughing, and I can see a little bit of Daisy in the photo too. I click out of Facebook and go into my email account. Daisy’s last email to me is from five days ago. I read through it carefully. There is nothing in it but a great excitement and happiness to be out in the big wide world. I find Marie’s mother’s number in my address book and call her.
‘Hello, Mrs. Reid. This is Daisy’s sister, Dahlia,’ I say calmly. If she is not worried I don’t want to alarm her.
‘Hello, dear. It’s been a long time. You’re in England now, aren’t you?’
‘Um … yes.’
‘Have you met the Queen yet?’ she titters.
‘Er … no. I was actually calling to see if Marie had called you.’
She pauses. ‘The last time I spoke to Marie was Thursday. They were going to go into the desert and I think she’ll only call again when they get back to Adelaide.’
‘Right.’
‘Is anything the matter, child?’ Worry has climbed into her voice.
‘No. No, I just wanted to contact my sister. Her phone is off.’
‘Oh yes, apparently there is no reception in the desert,’ she says, relieved.
‘Of course. I’ve got to go. Somebody’s calling me. Thank you, Mrs. Reid.’
I end the call.
‘You’ve got to call the police, or the American Embassy in Australia,’ Mark says softly.
‘I plan to,’ I say quickly, but I don’t want to call them yet. That would be acknowledging that she was truly missing. She can’t be. I just want it to be a misunderstanding. I don’t want Daisy to be missing. All kinds of horrible thoughts flash through my mind. They were going to the desert. What if they are lost there? What if they are lying somewhere, robbed and raped? Oh God!
I frown and try to think of where Daisy had told me she was going to stay in Alice Springs. I go back into her WhatsApp messages and find the name there. I Google the budget hotel and call them. A very sleepy man with a thick Australian accent answers the phone.
‘Yeah, yeah, this is the bloody Traveler’s Center. What do you bloody want?’
‘I’m looking for my sister. She should have arrived yesterday.’
‘Do you know what the bloody time is?’
I swing around to Mark. ‘What time is it in Australia now?’ I whisper.
‘Day time,’ he whispers back instantly.
I speak into the phone. ‘I’m very sorry I woke you up, but please, I’m calling from England and I really need to find her. It’s an emergency.’
‘Go on. What’s the Sheila’s name, then?’
‘Daisy Fury.’
‘How you spelling that?’
‘Daisy: D A I S Y Fury: F U R Y.’
‘I got no one here by that name.’
My heart is racing in my chest. ‘Can you check for one more name please?’
‘Is that another sister of yours?’ he asks sarcastically.
‘No, it is the friend who was travelling with her.’
‘What’s her name then?’ he grumbles bad-temperedly.
‘Marie Reid.’
‘How you spelling that?’
‘Marie: M A R I E Reid: R E I D.’
‘Sorry. No one here by that name.’
‘Are you expecting anyone by that name?’
‘Bookings are in a different book,’ he says reluctantly.
‘Please. Could you look? This is an emergency.’
He sighs elaborately. ‘Hang on a minute.’
I hear him put the receiver down and move away. I even hear the thud of the book hit the surface of wherever he has thrown it on, then pages being turned. ‘Yeah, it looks like they booked for five nights but were no shows.’
My heart is in my throat. Now I know without any doubt that it’s not something simple. It’s not innocent. ‘OK. Thank you for your help,’ I say and end the call.
‘It’s time to alert the police, Dahlia,’ Mark says.
‘Just one last call.’ My last hope. I scroll up on my WhatsApp messages from Daisy. I know for sure she gave me the name. Bingo. Koala House. I Google Koala House. An aggressive sounding woman picks up.
‘Hello, I am looking for my sister, Daisy Fury.’
‘Yeah, I know her. She and her mate haven’t settled their bill. All their stuff’s still here. I’ll keep it for two more days then I’m auctioning it off to the highest bidder.’
My stomach drops. My last hope is gone.
Mark parks outside my apartment. ‘Do you want me to come in with you?’
‘No. I’m sorry about tonight, Mark, and thanks for everything.’
‘Are you sure you don’t need me to go to the police station with you?’
>
I shake my head slowly. ‘No, I need to speak to my mom first.’
‘I’ll call you in the morning. If you need me at all just call me. Doesn’t matter what time of the night. Just call, OK?’
‘OK,’ I say distractedly. My mind is elsewhere. There must be some clue I’m overlooking. Something she told me. I refuse to believe that she is missing.
‘I hope you get good news during the night.’ He doesn’t sound very hopeful.
I open the car door and let myself out.
‘Goodnight, Dahlia.’
‘Goodnight, Mark.’
I let myself into the apartment and find Stella stretched out on the sofa in front of the TV.
‘You didn’t put out again? The guy’s going to end up with blue balls,’ she says with a laugh.
I go and sit on the couch opposite her. I feel dazed and numb.
Her teasing expression changes. ‘What’s the matter?’ she asks.
‘I think my sister is missing somewhere in Australia.’
‘What?’ she screams dramatically, only for once it’s not over the top melodrama. I’m screaming inside.
I cover my cheeks with both my hands. ‘It looks as if she has vanished into thin air. Her phone is turned off or dead, her Facebook page hasn’t been updated, and she never turned up at the bed and breakfast she had booked in to.’
Stella sits up and switches off the TV. ‘Have you called the police?’
I shake my head in a daze. ‘Not yet. I just found out and I can’t bring myself to believe it is not all just a stupid mistake or misunderstanding.’
‘Tell me everything,’ she demands.
I pour out all I know so far. I can hardly believe the words that I am uttering, but to my surprise, Stella doesn’t scream or do the usual exaggerated theatrics.
‘Let’s think about this,’ she says with a frown. ‘If she had met with an accident, she would have been identified by now and your mother would have received a call. Best case scenario: she has gone on a walkabout and lost her phone. The other two options aren’t so pretty. She’s been taken by a serial killer, or she has been kidnapped by one of these gangs that sell women.’
I take a great gasping breath. ‘Serial killer?’
You Don't Own Me: A Bad Boy Mafia Romance (The Russian Don Book 1) Page 3
