“No, I left it back at home,” I say. “I live over there.” I point blindly through the trees I’ve just come through. “I live on the estate.”
“You need a pass,” he says bluntly.
“Oh, for God’s sake, I live here! I’m Leon’s wife.”
“Well, then you’ll be able to get another one easily enough,” he says, holding his scanner up to a guest who’s remembered their ticket.
I haven’t got time for this, I want to scream, reaching for my phone in my back pocket to call Leon. I try the other one and helplessly pat myself down, but I already know it’s not there. I must have left it on the bed when I raced out of the house.
I consider rushing him, but he’s big and strong, and even if I got past him, where would I go? I don’t even know what I’m looking for; I just know I’ve got to find it.
I turn away and run along the perimeter toward the stage. The ground is uneven underfoot as I track along the fence, but I can’t look at where I’m stepping at the same time as peering in through the wire mesh, trying to see if I can spot Jacob from afar, among the growing queues at the Pimm’s tent and the strawberries and cream kiosk.
I wonder what I’ll do if I spot him. Will I scream and shout, demanding to know what’s going on? Or will I just be so relieved to see him alive and well that I’ll want to hug him?
There’s a hub of activity behind the stage, as musicians, crew members, and engineers make the final preparations before the show starts. I look for Leon among the melee, knowing this is most likely where he’ll be, but even if I spot him, he’s not who I need to find. It’s only Jacob who can save me.
The perimeter goes way beyond the stage, every step taking me further and further away from where I need to be; every second allowing more people through the gates. I should have gone in the opposite direction; perhaps I would have found a more affable security guard.
I’m just about to turn back along the fence, daunted and panicked by the length of it, unable to see an access point, when something catches my eye.
Over by the old stables, which are just visible through an opening in the trees, a flurry of pigeons flap and squawk out of a gaping hole in the moss-covered slate roof. It’s as if they’ve heard a shotgun, yet the only sound I can hear is the distant hum of the burgeoning crowd.
I’m momentarily rooted to the spot, my body waiting to catch up with the fanciful theories racing through my brain.
Without even acknowledging I’m going to do it, my feet are walking down the slope, away from the fence, and through the wildflowers toward the outbuildings. It’s as if something is pushing me, propelling me forward, and I couldn’t stop even if I wanted to. By the time the leaning flintstone stable block comes into full view, I’m almost running, desperately needing to quash the macabre movie that is playing out in my head.
As I squeeze through the barriers around the site, I can hear a loud clanging sound coming from inside. It may just be builders clearing the place up, but I don’t recall Leon saying he’d instructed anyone to start working on it seeing as they’re awaiting planning permission. Besides, I can’t imagine he’d choose this weekend to do so.
The incessant drumming of metal against metal is getting louder as I pass by the disused swimming pool, the faded tiles on the top step just visible above the stagnant green water that fills it. Pieces of wood, discarded drink cans and what looks like an old smock litter the surface, and I shudder at the thought of what has become of the items that don’t float.
I creep forward as if I’m a sniper in training, sprinting the last few yards and pushing my back up against the jagged wall. I imagine what I’ll say if Tom, the head gardener, comes around the corner to see me playing a grown-up game of hide and seek. Or even worse, if Tristan is watching this all unfold in real-time on the cameras up in the security lodge. Though that concern is allayed when I remember him telling me that Leon had limited the coverage to the immediate concert site this week.
I instinctively crouch down as I enter the stable block, staying below the line of the half-height walls of the stalls, not knowing what I’m about to encounter. Suddenly, the banging that had been reverberating around the stone walls stops and I can’t help but gasp as I hear a low groan.
“Hello, is someone there?” comes a voice.
I hold a hand to my mouth, willing myself to stop and think before I answer.
“Please,” says the voice. “Please help me.”
“Jacob?” I breathe, rounding the corner of the stall on my hands and knees.
“Naomi!” he cries out. “Oh my god, please help me.”
I can’t help but recoil at the sight of him, bloodied and bruised. His ankles are tied to chair legs and his wrists handcuffed to the bars of the stable stool. I instinctively want to go to him and set him free, but something’s holding me back and he can sense my reticence.
“You have to hurry,” he says. “She’s only just left, but she won’t be long.”
“Who?” I ask, as I crawl through the dark brown sludge puddles on the slimy stone floor.
“Who do you think?” he says bitterly. “I told you what she was capable of. I told you what she’d do if she found me.”
“Vanessa’s done this to you?”
He nods, his normally piercing blue eyes darkened by fear.
“But how did you get here?” I ask, as I set about untying the rope that is bound tightly around his ankles.
“She lured me here,” he says. “Pretending to be you.”
“What?” I ask, looking around for something to prise the handcuffs apart. “When?”
“After I met you at the hotel on Monday night,” he says. “I got a text about ten minutes after you left, asking me to come to Tattenhall as you thought I’d be safer here.”
“But I would never have done that.”
“I know, and it’s my own stupid fault,” he says. “If I’m honest with myself, I was hoping you’d changed your mind…”
“About what?” I ask.
He looks away as if ashamed, and I realize what he means. “But she was here waiting for me instead,” he says.
“So you’ve been here all this time?”
He nods. “I thought she was going to kill me.”
A stable door creaks and we look at each other, wide-eyed and terrified.
“Hurry, there’s a hammer over there,” he says. “If you dislodge this bar, I’ll be able to free myself.”
“Why didn’t you tell me you were really called Michael Talbot?” I ask, as I hit the bars of the stool with all my might, the metal curling an inch with every strike.
“I was too scared to give you my real name in the beginning,” he says. “And by the time I realized I could trust you, I knew if I told you the truth, you probably wouldn’t trust me.”
He takes a sharp intake of breath and I can feel his body going rigid.
“No!” screams a woman’s voice.
I freeze, unable to look up for fear of seeing a madwoman standing there, pointing a gun in my face.
“Oh my god,” she shouts. “No.”
I slowly bring my head up, steeling myself. But nothing could prepare me for what I see.
Even with her disheveled blonde hair falling onto her face and my brain’s refusal to see what’s there, there’s no denying who it is.
“Anna?”
27
My heart stops. The blood being pumped around my body seems to suspend in mid-flow.
Of all the conspiracy theories that have been rattling around my head these past few days, Anna being involved in any way was just not on my radar. Why would it be?
“I-I don’t understand,” I falter. “What are you doing here?”
She backs herself up against the stall wall. “When they said it was you, I didn’t believe them, but they were right.” She covers her mouth in a futile attempt to stifle her sobs.
My head feels as if it’s about to explode as I try to make sense of what’s going on. “What are you talking about? Who told you it was me?”
“The police,” she cries. “They’ve told me everything; the emails, the hotel CCTV, the phone…”
“The police think this is your doing?” asks Michael incredulously, looking at me.