Helen Callaghan
* * *
NIGHT FALLS, STILL MISSING
Contents
Prologue
Friday Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Saturday Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Sunday Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Monday Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Chapter 31
Chapter 32
Chapter 33
Chapter 34
Chapter 35
Chapter 36
Chapter 37
Tuesday Chapter 38
Chapter 39
Chapter 40
Chapter 41
Chapter 42
Chapter 43
Chapter 44
Wednesday Chapter 45
Chapter 46
Chapter 47
Chapter 48
Acknowledgements
About the Author
Helen Callaghan was born in Los Angeles, California, to British parents, and her early years were spent between the USA, England and Scotland. After several false starts as a nurse, barmaid and actor, she settled into bookselling, working as a fiction specialist and buyer for a variety of bookshops. Eventually, she studied for her A-Levels at night school and achieved a place at Cambridge University as a mature student, studying archaeology. Every winter, when possible, she retreats to Orkney to write.
Helen is the Sunday Times bestselling author of Dear Amy and Everything is Lies.
By the same author
Dear Amy
Everything is Lies
For Mum and Dad
Prologue
Langmire, Grangeholm, Orkney, January 2020
The TV blares away in the background in the little living room at Langmire.
Madison slouches on the sofa, dressed only in an oversized blue pullover, draining her glass of Sauvignon Blanc. She is barely watching it – if anything, it is simply white noise to keep her company in the endless restless quiet.
The silence here is a strange thing. It is beautiful during the late red dawns and early darknesses, almost holy, punctuated only by the cries of water birds and the murmur of the sea. When she lies in her bed, woken from the deep sleep that the constant physical labour on Helly Holm brings upon her, the thought of going home to the roar and clank of London and leaving this place behind causes her an almost physical pain.
But there is something about this particular hour – eight, nine o’clock on a Saturday night, when a house should be full of post-dinner chatter, contented binge-watching with friends, a glass of wine or two before winding down for bed – that makes her lonely, melancholy.
Well, she thinks ruefully, biting her full bottom lip. Melancholy is perhaps one way to describe it.
It is more like a subtle dread. But she is not frightened, no. Not yet. Madison never admits to fear.
She stands up, about to move off to the fridge and recharge her glass, when, glancing through the window, out across the water, she sees the tiny flicker of a white light.
She pauses, squinting out into the darkness. The light isn’t steady, but bobs about like a tiny firefly over the sea, until it is momentarily consumed in the flash of the lighthouse.
Except this light can’t be on the sea. It must be on Helly Holm, which she cannot see in the moonless night until the lighthouse flashes awake, once every twenty seconds.
Madison purses her lips, puts her glass down on the window sill, picks up her phone.
Yep, she sees after a quick check on the tide tables, the causeway is out from under the water now, as it is twice every twenty-four hours.
There’s nothing to stop anyone from crossing it and poking around the dig. Though, that said, why anyone would be foolish enough to attempt such a thing in complete darkness on a tidal islet with no phone signal is a mystery. Most of the tools and all of the samples are taken home in the boat at the end of the work day, and everything else is locked in the storage boxes. There will be nothing out there worth stealing.
Perhaps it’s someone with a metal detector, who’s seen the archaeologists there, and now with them gone for the night they want to try their own luck.
Madison sighs, a little huff of annoyance.
Part of the reason that someone is posted out in Langmire cottage (ostensibly, at least – Madison has her own views on why she has been isolated out here at the last minute) is to act as watchman for the site.
Madison scrolls down her phone to Iris’s number, calls her. After just a couple of rings it goes straight to voicemail.
Hmm. Now what?
For a second she considers calling Jack, but just as she is about to she pauses. No, not Jack.
Through the cold glass, lit for a moment by the tower with its blazing electric lantern, Helly Holm looms like a dark mountain against the starless sky.
Then it all vanishes, back into blackness.
She narrows her eyes, considering it.
Why doesn’t she swing by in the car and take a look from the shore?
FRIDAY
* * *
1
Caithness, Scotland, January 2020
It was only three o’clock but the sun was already slung dangerously low on the horizon, a bright, burning orange. Small lakes reflected its failing light, and looked filled with molten gold.
Fiona Grey leaned in with the petrol nozzle, careful not to let her new red coat brush against the thick caking of mud and road salt smeared all over her little car. She already suspected that her boots were a write-off.
She was heading north.
Her breath steamed before her, a fragile plume, as the old-fashioned pump grumbled and pulsed and the stink of petrol was everywhere. Apart from this everything was silent, hushed by the snow – only the occasional splashing of a passing car through the slush on the nearby road intruding. The lively wind was fresh against her face, as though it was slapping her awake, and she was grateful.
She would be more grateful for a hot coffee, however.
She had set out from Inverness after breakfast and stopped to shop for some suitable cold weather gear – there had been no time to do this in Cambridge as Madison’s summons had been too urgent, too peremptory – and this, she thought, eyeing the sinking sun, had been a tactical error. It would be long dark before she reached the ferry port at Scrabster, and the drive, which had followed a perilously winding cliffside road through towns with evocative names like Golspie, Dornoch and Dunbeath, had been beautiful but hair-raising in equal measure.
The car filled, she went inside to pay a large, pleasant blonde woman, who looked in danger of being crushed to death at any moment by the enormous number of boxes, cardboard stands and groaning baskets full of car fresheners, almost-out-of-date chocolate bars and window scrapers festooning the shop.
‘That’ll be thirty-nine pounds six, hen,’ she said. ‘Is that all you’re after?’
Fiona took her card out of her pocket. ‘Actually, I wondered if I could get a coffee …’
The woman shook her head, sighing at the panoply of goods surrounding her, as if mourning the lost opportunity Fiona p
resented to be rid of some. ‘Ah, sorry. The machine is broken. Are you heading out for the ferry?’
Fiona admitted she was.
‘Sailing for Orkney tonight?’
‘Yes,’ Fiona said, her mouth growing a little dry.
‘Where are you from?’
‘Cambridge.’
The woman nodded. ‘You on your holidays, then?’ she asked, putting the sale through before offering Fiona the card terminal.
‘Um … well, I’ve been asked to go up and visit a friend who’s working there. She …’ Fiona stilled, having caught herself just in time. ‘She says she needs my help with something.’
The woman raised an eyebrow while Fiona keyed in her PIN. ‘That’s a long way to come to help someone.’
Fiona had only shrugged.
Before getting back into her car, she took out her phone and captured a quick photo of the magnificent melting sunset.
She texted the photo to Madison, with a quick message – Getting closer! Fx
She was not expecting a response at this time of day – about now the dig was probably still in full swing.
Hi hows it going? Mx
Fiona, surprised, tapped in her reply, smiling.
Hello stranger – all good here! Not long now … Already bought some fizz! x
She buckled herself into the car while she waited for the reply.
Sounds good! Missed u sooo much! Be great to see u! Mx
Relief flooded Fiona. Madison had been cagey throughout this journey northwards, and they hadn’t spoken since Fiona had left Cambridge.
You too! How are you? Are you okay?! x
There was a long pause before the reply came.
Yeah, why wouldn’t I be? Sry gotta run. See you when the ferry gets in! Mx
Fiona frowned at the screen, her cheeks heating as though she’d been slapped.
If everything was fine, what was she doing here?
Before she knew it, Fiona had hit the number and was calling her friend.
Almost immediately, it was answered.
‘Oh, hi Mads, I just wanted …’
‘The person you are calling is not available,’ interrupted the answerphone message. ‘Please hang up and try again later.’
Madison had disabled her voicemail months and months ago, on the advice of the police after the court case, and then never reinstated it.
Fiona sighed, dissatisfied, then shrugged, throwing her phone on to the empty passenger seat next to her.
Doubtless all would be revealed, she thought, attempting to put it from her mind, despite the coiling disquiet in her belly.
∗ ∗ ∗
‘What do you need me on Orkney for?’ Fiona had asked. She’d been in the bath, her phone resting on the tiled border next to her beeswax-scented candles.
Her heart had leapt when Madison had called – she’d missed her, she realised, missed having someone to share the minutiae of her life with, missed her spiky sense of humour, missed that communion with someone who really knew her.
They had been friends since they were little girls, growing up in the same village together, fascinated by the same things, but actually living worlds apart. Fiona had been raised by her alcoholic father, after her mother had abandoned them both. There had been an Aunty Lisette, busybody and virtual stranger, who’d occasionally visit and cluck over Fiona’s ragged clothes and her dad’s collection of empty lager cans that rolled about under his bed, but after she’d died the extended family had promptly dropped the pair of them. Perhaps they’d had troubles enough of their own.
Madison, in contrast, had lived in the biggest house in the village, a sprawling seventies concoction on the very top of the hill, bookended by ugly extensions. It was presided over by Madison’s American father, Gulf War veteran and self-made man, a distant and dark creature who somehow managed to make the whole family fall into nervous silence the minute he entered the room, and Judy, Madison’s fragile, impeccably turned out English rose mother who, without ever saying as much, had always made it perfectly clear that Fiona was not welcome.
It had made no difference. From the day they’d started at Blackdown Hill Preparatory, they had become inseparable – Madison the bold, ballsy agent of chaos who feared nothing, and Fiona her studious, long-suffering antithesis, picking up the pieces.
And it had seemed to Fiona that she could foresee no time that this would ever change.
How little Fiona had been able to foresee, in the end.
‘What? I can’t ask my bestie to come visit me?’ Mads had been mulish, almost sulky, and Fiona felt her heart sinking.
‘You can …’ she said, dipping her toes back under the cooling bathwater. ‘But you know it’s difficult for me in term time …’
‘It’s not term time.’
‘It is term time,’ said Fiona, trying to be conciliatory but firm. ‘Term starts on January the fourteenth …’
‘Oh, so at most you’ll miss a day or two. And you can pass it off as research. You know,’ said Mads, warming to her theme, her voice becoming silky and persuasive, ‘it’s this big exciting dig, in this beautiful part of the world with a celebrity archaeologist, potentially going to make everyone’s careers, with lots of fab metalwork …’
‘Yeah,’ said Fiona, before she could stop herself. ‘An uninhabitable Scottish island in the middle of darkest winter. I’m sure the digging is fabulous.’
‘There’s no need to be sarky,’ snapped Madison, her charm offensive abandoned.
Silence.
Then, a tiny, contrite voice. ‘Are you still there?’
Fiona let out a stiff little sigh. ‘Yes.’
‘I’m sorry,’ said Madison, and for the first time in the phone call she sounded like her genuine self. ‘I’m just … I can’t tell you what I think is going on. But I don’t feel safe here. Not at all.’
‘Hang on.’ Fiona eased upright in alarm, the water swirling around her. ‘What do you mean, you don’t feel safe? Has someone threatened you?’
‘I … no. Well, maybe. I dunno.’
‘What does that mean?’ Fiona’s thoughts leapt forward. ‘Is Dom back?’
Silence again, then, ‘I told you, I don’t know.’
‘What?’ Fiona was stunned. ‘Who else could it be? What’s that twat doing now?’
‘Oh, the usual. Someone’s tweeting bollocks at me. Whoever they are, they’re on Orkney.’
‘He’s up there on Orkney? How do you know?’
‘It says so. On one of the tweets.’
‘Have you spoken to the police yet? What did they say?’
‘No, I haven’t spoken to … I don’t know it’s him. You know. Dominic.’
‘What?’ Fiona’s jaw dropped open. ‘Who else could it be?’
‘I don’t know!’ snapped Madison. ‘You know, this isn’t my fault!’
Fiona took a deep breath, tried to calm herself. ‘I know. I’m sorry, I’m just worried about you.’
‘I know you are,’ said Madison, with a sigh. ‘And it’s not like I don’t love you for it. But you need to relax.’
Fiona stared at the phone. Madison’s attitude didn’t make any sense. ‘Why do you think it’s not him? Why aren’t you worried he’s on the island with you?’
There was a pause, Madison’s breath hissing softly as she thought.
‘I can’t explain it. But it’s just different this time.’
‘You need to go to the police again,’ said Fiona urgently, trying to rein in the desire to reach through the phone and shake Madison. ‘Isn’t that why you want me to come up, because it’s bothering you?’
Now it was Madison’s turn to be quiet.
‘I don’t understand,’ said Fiona, frowning at the phone. ‘You’re out there in that cottage on your own and he might be …’
The silence expanded.
‘Madison?’
‘Yeah?’
‘What’s going on?’ asked Fiona. ‘I mean, really going on?’
‘I … Look,
I just need you here. I need to show you something. The only way you will get a chance to see it, to see what I mean, is to come up here.’
‘Mads, it’s not that simple.’ She tried not to sigh again, caught between the competing impulses of frustration and alarm. ‘Whatever it is, you must be able to talk about it …’
‘Fee, I … no. I can’t. Not right now. I don’t even know what I think is going on. But I need you here now. I’m freaking out.’
‘Mads, it’s not that …’
‘You never fucking believe me.’ Madison sounded angry, and close to tears again. ‘You think I’m crazy, I know!’
‘Calm down. Yes, I do think you’re crazy. It doesn’t mean I don’t believe you.’
‘Then come,’ she said, and Fiona heard her blatant, exposed need. ‘Please come. I have never been so fucking miserable. I’m losing my mind … Please do me this one favour. Please come. Please.’
∗ ∗ ∗
‘Oh hi there, Nanook of the North,’ Adi said, his voice pleased. He’d answered almost immediately. ‘I was just thinking about you. How’s it going?’
All was darkness, except for the sodium orange light of the harbour. Through the windscreen of her little car she could see the ferry approaching the terminal, and against the black sea and black sky it seemed to be a tiny floating island of light, trapped between heaven and earth.
‘I’m okay.’ She’d smiled, feeling herself relax against the driver’s seat, letting the warm chocolate of his voice melt over her. ‘Got to the ferry port in one piece. Just waiting to drive on.’
‘How are things?’
‘Things are freezing.’
He snorted. ‘It’s Scotland in January. What did you expect?’
‘I dunno,’ she said. ‘That they would be freezing.’
He laughed. In the background music was playing – Amy Winehouse’s ‘Tears Dry on Their Own’. ‘When’s your ferry?’
Night Falls, Still Missing Page 1
