And it was the desperation, the misery, in her eyes that made something click inside Clara at last. She stared at her. “Something happened between the two of you, didn’t it?”
Mac glanced at her in surprise, but Clara kept her eyes on Alison, who scowled, her gaze shifting away. “No,” she said, “don’t be stupid.”
A beat or two, then: “Alison, I just want to know. I think something did happen, and I think that’s why you’ve always been so weird toward me.”
At this, Alison’s face changed, her chin dropping to her chest, and Clara understood now that her spiky belligerence had merely been a cover for something else, that she was far more vulnerable than she’d first appeared. “Look,” she said gently, “I’m just asking you to tell me the truth. After everything that’s happened, I think I deserve that, don’t you?” Clara waited, her gaze never leaving Alison’s face.
Finally she spoke. “Nothing happened,” she muttered. “Not really.”
Clara nodded. “But you wanted it to?”
Alison shrugged.
“How did it start?” Clara asked.
At this, Alison burst into tears, covering her face with her hands. “Come and sit down,” Clara said, leading her to a chair.
“My boyfriend left me,” Alison began, her voice thick, the pain clearly still sharp. “Luke and I got chatting on the stairs one day. Then I got locked out of my flat and he invited me in for a beer.” She glanced up at Clara. “You were out.”
Clara sighed. “Go on,” she said.
“He was so nice to me, and I thought . . .” She colored now. “He told me I was pretty, that I’d find someone else.” She wiped her nose with the cuff of her jumper and gave a loud sniff. “Then after that, he’d stop and chat if he saw me. I gave him my phone number and he’d text me. Nice stuff, you know? Telling me I was . . . Well, anyway, it started to mean a lot to me, the attention—you know. . . . He’d pop up to see me now and then when you weren’t in.”
Clara nodded. “And did something happen between you?”
Alison met her gaze and shook her head. “No.”
There was another silence, and Clara wondered if the younger girl would clam up again, but it seemed instead that she wanted to unburden herself now that she’d started. “I wanted it to,” she admitted. “I told him that I was falling for him.” There was a flash of anger in her eyes now. “I really thought he felt the same way. But then he changed, started being funny with me, acting like it had all been in my head, that he didn’t think of me like that. And I was so fucking angry with him. . . .”
“So that was what all the loud music was about, the dirty looks on the stairs,” Clara said.
Alison glanced away. “He made me feel good about myself for the first time in ages. Then there you’d be, the two of you, so happy together, rubbing my face in it. I wanted to make him see how bad I felt. And I guess I thought that him and I could be together if it wasn’t for you.”
As Clara listened, she felt the creeping heat of anger inside her. Stupid, stupid Luke. What had probably meant nothing more to him than a little harmless flirting had clearly meant much more to this silly girl.
A silence fell as Alison crossed her arms defensively in front of her, her pale face closed and truculent once more.
“Look,” Clara said. “You helped save my life. I’m not about to give you a hard time for flirting with my boyfriend. Trust me, Alison, whatever went on between you and Luke is the least of my problems.”
Alison nodded.
“Will you be all right?” Clara asked.
She got up. “Yeah”—she shrugged—“course I will.” She made toward the door but, once there, said stiffly, reluctantly, “I’m sorry, all right?”
Clara nodded, and she and Mac watched as Alison closed the door behind her.
TWENTY-TWO
CAMBRIDGESHIRE, 1997
I’d kept the newspaper cuttings. I don’t know why. Doug had no idea, of course—he’d have been livid if he’d ever found them. We were supposed to forget all about it, pretend we’d played no part in the whole horrible tragedy. But it didn’t seem right to throw them away. I felt I owed it to her—Nadia—to remember, that I shouldn’t get away guilt free or ever be allowed to forget what happened that day. Her poor family. Her poor mother. They never found out the truth. And I had to live with that—we all did. So I hid the cuttings in between the pages of a book tucked away at the top of the bookcase in our bedroom. I never looked at them; I didn’t need to. I knew what they said by heart.
But after I overheard Hannah on the phone to Emily, after it all fell into place, I took down the book—a thick Jackie Collins I was certain neither Doug nor Hannah would ever want to read—and there they were, the two separate folds of newspaper, yellow with age. It had been sixteen years since I’d last read them. I smoothed out the first one and even the headline brought it all back, those awful feelings, the guilt.
East Anglian Gazette
25 April, 1981
FEARS GROW FOR LOCAL MISSING WOMAN AND CHILD
Police have discovered no new leads on the whereabouts of Nadia Freeman, 19, from Bury St. Edmunds and her three-week-old baby, Lana. Ms. Freeman is said to suffer from complex mental health issues that had intensified following the birth of her daughter in March.
Nadia’s mother, Mrs. Jane Freeman, 56, said, “We are all desperately worried for my daughter and granddaughter. They are both so vulnerable. I want Nadia to know that she’s loved, that we will help her, no matter what she’s done. I only want to see my daughter and my baby granddaughter again. We are all so dreadfully worried.”
Police are urging any members of the public with information to come forward.
It’s
