‘Louisa. I need you. Your help. I’m about to go to the police and report her as missing. They’re going to ask me all sorts of questions – they’ll blame me, I know they will.’ He was beside her now, the warmth of his body perceptible. He laid a hand on her shoulder. ‘It’s always the husband, Lou. That’s what they believe – the police, the general public. Always.’ His eyes pleaded with Louisa’s. ‘You can help me. Like I once helped you.’
Louisa reeled back from him. ‘I don’t know what you think you did for me but I can assure you, I can’t help you, Oliver. Go to the police, do what you have to do. I really hope Melissa is just having some time out and returns home quickly. Good luck.’ She ushered him through the hall and out of the house.
Leaning against the closed front door, Louisa’s breaths came in short bursts.
You can help me, like I once helped you.
She repeated the sentence in her head. Did his voice have an edge of desperation? It’d sounded almost menacing.
She screamed as a force banged against the door, propelling her back away from it.
‘Please, Lou. At least come with me to the police? I can’t do this on my own.’ His voice sounded distorted through the glass.
‘Why? Why should I? I’m sorry about Melissa, Oliver, I really am. But I’m not coming with you,’ she shouted.
‘But I think it might have been to do with your party. Something happened there, I’m sure of it. Please, Lou-Lou, they’ll want to ask you about the party anyway, may as well come with me – it’ll save you time later.’
His words created a wall of fear around her.
Something had happened that night.
She opened the door again.
‘But I didn’t see Melissa at the party,’ she said coolly. Her voice belied her feelings.
‘You must’ve.’ His voice was almost a whisper. Worry, or concern – or maybe disbelief – etched itself on Oliver’s face.
‘I – I don’t remember. I’d had so much to drink. The evening is pretty much one big blur.’ Louisa regretted her words instantly. If she couldn’t remember anything, she couldn’t tell the police anything. But at the same time, it meant she couldn’t confidently deny seeing Melissa, or knowing anything about her disappearance either.
Louisa’s stomach twisted as she suddenly questioned whether Oliver could be lying. He did say Melissa had gone off for days at a time before – it was possible he knew this was just one of those times but was making it out to be more purely to make Louisa feel sorry for him.
She should call his bluff.
‘Wait there, then. I’ll get Noah’s car seat.’
If it was a bluff, it was a convincing one, and Oliver had now taken it to the next level.
Louisa waited on a plastic chair in the reception of Newton police station, Noah in his car seat next to her. Oliver had been in there for over an hour, and Louisa’s bum was now numb, her patience wearing thin. It crossed her mind that if Melissa really had gone missing, then some woman with a baby accompanying the missing person’s husband to the police station might look a bit off. Particularly if they discovered she was Oliver’s ex-girlfriend whose party he’d just so happened to be at when his wife was last seen.
Finally, a door opened along the left-hand corridor and Oliver sloped out, his head hung low. The impossibly tall man, who’d introduced himself as Detective Sergeant Mack, then called her name. She picked up Noah’s seat and made her way to the room Oliver had just vacated. As she passed him, Oliver placed a hand on her arm, giving it a squeeze. He looked terrible – his usually tanned skin now looking pale and waxy.
Louisa was only in the small interview room for about twenty minutes. DS Mack asked her a list of questions relating to her party: the time it started and ended, how many guests, if she remembered when people left, if she remembered seeing Melissa. There was a lot about what she remembered. Louisa’s head spun. She told him she didn’t remember some of the details, like when it ended, because she’d gone to bed before the guests had all left. She stated she had not seen Melissa. Her memory couldn’t exactly be classed as reliable, so it was best not to give information that might turn out to be misleading. After all, Louisa may well have been mistaken – her shock at the surprise party had meant she wasn’t taking in everything right. The woman at Oliver’s side when she’d first encountered him at the top of the stairs could’ve been another guest arriving at the same time as him.
The drive back to Louisa’s was peppered with awkward silences. Oliver only spoke a few sentences – mainly repeating the same thing:
‘You know I wouldn’t harm anyone. You know that, Lou-Lou, don’t you?’
From what little he’d said about how he’d been treated in the interview room after reporting Melissa as missing, Louisa had to conclude that Oliver had been right: the suspicion he was somehow involved in her disappearance was clear. He’d told the police of their argument and once he’d mentioned that, he said the atmosphere altered.
‘They’re assuming they’ll find her under my floorboards,’ he said. He appeared serious. Louisa suddenly felt sorry for him.
When they reached Louisa’s road it was five-thirty. Brian’s car wasn’t parked outside, so Louisa allowed Oliver to drop her right to the gate so that she wouldn’t have far to carry Noah’s car seat.
‘I hope she comes back, Oliver. She might already be at your place when you get there.’
The humph sound he made suggested he didn’t believe that but something niggled inside Louisa. Did he know she wouldn’t, couldn’t, return?
Oliver cupped Louisa’s chin with one hand, turning her face so she was looking directly at him. Their noses were almost touching. Oliver’s eyes narrowed.
‘I didn’t have anything to do with it,’ he said. His breath tickled Louisa’s skin. She closed her eyes, trying not to think about how close their faces were – how easy it would be just to kiss him.
‘I wasn’t saying you had,’ she said. But Oliver’s expression was one of disbelief, like somehow he’d just read her thoughts.
‘Really, Louisa. I’ve no idea what went on. I think it might’ve been something at the party that sparked her to disappear voluntarily. Or it wasn’t voluntary and someone else from that night is responsible.’
Icy tendrils touched her spine.
Not only had she not wanted, or asked for, a party full of people she barely knew – but now this party was turning out to be a nightmare, one that clearly wasn’t going to go away any time soon. Not if Oliver suspected something at her party had caused Melissa’s disappearance. Not knowing how to respond, Louisa instead told Oliver to let her know if there were any developments and, breaking the strange bond that had held her in his gaze, she turned away from him and opened the car door.
Blood.
Blonde hair matted with blood.
A woman.
Louisa gasped and sat bolt upright, pulling the duvet off Brian. Despite this, he slept on, oblivious to her rapid breathing and distress. Sweat trickled down her back. She didn’t know why she was seeing these images, but she was convinced that the woman