Keep My Secrets by Elena Wilkes (large ebook reader .txt) 📗

phone flickers across the page. It’s a typewritten letter addressed to Peter, and on the back, Peter has drafted a handwritten reply. Martin focusses the torch and Frankie peers closer.

It’s nothing like the writing on the notes; the script is totally different. It has an upward left to right slope and the writing is pinched and tiny.

She looks up at Martin and shakes her head, puzzled.

‘And the laptop?’ he whispers.

She shakes her head. ‘Maybe we just don’t know enough about how these people work,’ she hisses in a low voice. ‘They’re secretive. They know how to hide stuff so that it all looks innocuous.’

‘So what do we do?’

‘Let’s take this.’ She unplugs the laptop. ‘We’ll find someone who knows how to dig deeper in to the memory. If there’s nothing there, then we have to find Peter and we threaten him,’ she whispers, wide-eyed. ‘We tell him what we know. We make sure that he’s aware we’re watching him. And we will watch him, and we’ll keep watching him for as long as it takes.’

There’s a sudden sound and they both snap round.

Frankie can hear Martin’s breath, high and scratchy. Neither of them moves a muscle. There it is again… a tiny creak coming from the next room.

Holding her finger to her lips, Frankie slips closer to the door and puts her ear to it.

Martin is frozen to the spot. Frankie holds up a hand, hesitating in mid-air. She listens.

Is it Chloe?… Where’s she gone? The bathroom? For one terrible moment she thinks she might have gone in to Vanessa and woken her.

She holds her breath.

There’s another crack and the slight squeal of a door.

She waits. It all goes quiet. She points at the bedroom wall and holds up a hand. Martin nods.

Time stands still. Nothing moves. Carefully, very carefully, she eases the door open, glancing back once to make sure that everything is as they found it. The landing is dark. She beckons Martin forward to where the stairs begin. Just a few steps and they’ll be down them and out of there… Just a few more steps.

There’s a soft shushing movement from behind Chloe’s door.

They freeze. Only Martin’s eyes move in the darkness.

The door is no longer closed. A shadow in the gap moves a little. Frankie thinks her heart might burst at any moment. She can’t look at Martin. They stand, paralysed.

‘Fraaankie…’

Her whole spine turns to ice.

Slowly, almost in imperceptible degrees, her eyes move towards Martin. His face is like a ghost.

‘Fraaankie…’ A giggle, tinkling like a child. ‘Mummy…’

The door begins to open. Bit by bit, inch by inch, it widens to reveal the moonlight dappling across the sheepskin rug, a duvet, thrown back. A dented pillow.

No Chloe.

Frankie reaches out, cautiously touching the door edge. She can feel Martin close behind her. They step into the room. There’s no one there. They stand, unsure, blinking into the shadows. There’s a movement: a red eye blinks right back, as a cloak of darkness shifts and it turns to face them.

The door slams.

The light goes on.

Jack is standing with his back to it. He smiles suddenly. His look is indescribable: the eyes are mad, glassy: drugged up.

‘Well, well,’ he chuckles. ‘Well, well… It’s just like old times.’ He smiles broadly at Martin who only stares back at him.

‘Jack? What are you doing here? What is this?’ she starts.

‘Why did you have to come back into our lives, Frankie?’ Jack shakes his head. ‘Why couldn’t you have just gone away like you were supposed to?’

‘I don’t understand…’ she grapples. ‘What’s going on?’

‘You had to turn up on our doorstep when everything was just ticking along nicely.’ He takes a breath and tuts. ‘I had it all sorted: Dad and you and Vanessa and Chloe. But you had to keep turning up and I had to keep finding ways to head you off.’

‘Where is she?’ Frankie takes a step towards him but instantly feels Martin’s hand on her arm. She sees his gaze flicker downwards. Jack is holding a can of lighter fuel.

‘Of course she’s not here. Vanessa thinks you’re the devil incarnate.’ He smiles. ‘You’re so easy to wind up and manoeuvre, Frankie.’ He grins widely. ‘All that sitting outside the house, and being a nuisance at the school; you’re such a nut-case. So she’s taken Chloe away.’ He cocks his head on one side. ‘I had to make sure she’s safe. She’s my prize possession.’

‘You orchestrated all that?’ Cold air slips into Frankie’s lungs as her brain tries to process what she’s hearing.

‘Chloe looks just like Charlotte, she sounds just like Charlotte, she feels just like Charlotte.’ The grin becomes a wet leer.

Frankie gasps in fury. She wants to scream and claw his face off. But Martin’s grip on her arm tightens.

‘Don’t worry. I haven’t touched her yet. She’s a dish that’s yet to be savoured. The anticipation is as delicious as the first spoonful.’ He licks his lips.

‘It was you.’

The sound of Martin’s voice snaps her round.

‘What was me?’

‘It was Peter Vale and you.’

‘No, no.’ Jack grins his strange grin. ‘No, my dad is a fine upstanding chap, everyone knows that. That’s why his fall from grace was so dramatic. There was this fantastic family man, who would do anything, anything to protect his family. But then, you’d know better than anyone, Martin – You know he would. You’ve got the evidence in that scar around your neck.’

Frankie’s eyes flit down again to the fuel can that he’s gripping and loosening at his side.

‘You killed Charlotte,’ Martin says flatly. ‘You and him.’

‘Me?’ His hand flies to his chest like he’s some second-rate actor. ‘No, dear me, no. I was having far too much fun with Charlotte to want to kill her.’ He smiles at Frankie. ‘And you, lovely girl. I was just beginning to have a bit of fun with you. Remember the bathroom? “You’re so beautiful,” he hisses, giggling. “I just love seeing you naked.” The sniggering breaks into a throaty laugh. ‘Christ! The look on your