Title: The Secrets We Keep
Author: A J Wills
Chapter 1
CATHY
A creeping rot of unease twists in the pit of my stomach. Something dreadful has happened. I just know it has.
We've spent the last few hours scouring the estate behind the house, looking in the places where Annie could be hiding, and contacting all her friends and their parents. But it's been an exercise in futility. There's no sign of her.
She's vanished.
Gone.
Missing.
Now I’m left with a gut-wrenching, insidious, hollow feeling of utter despair and helplessness that no parent should ever have to experience.
Nobody teaches you what to do if your child goes missing. They didn't cover it at our antenatal classes. There are no helpful posters on the walls at the GP surgery or useful cut-out-and-keep articles in those glossy magazines for parents. And when the topic does crop up on Mumsnet, it's never with any actionable advice, just a load of frantic parents winding each other up into a frenzy about something that will probably never happen to them.
I never thought it would happen to us either, and I have absolutely no idea what I'm supposed to do.
'We should be out there, looking for her. Not sitting around waiting.' Kit jumps off the edge of the sofa where he's been perched for the last five minutes, his foot tapping furiously, chewing his fingernails down to the skin.
The house aches with emptiness. We're so used to Annie filling it with her noise. Singing and chatting incessantly. The TV on too loud. Her feet thumping up and down the stairs.
'The police said we should wait for them to arrive,' I say, my stomach tight.
Time ticks perilously slowly. It seems like hours ago that I made the call to report my daughter missing. I couldn't believe how calmly and dispassionately the woman took all my details, asking whether we'd had any arguments at home and if we'd tried to contact Annie's friends to check whether they'd seen her.
Do they think we're stupid or something?
'Did you tell them she's only ten?' Kit asks.
'Of course I did,' I snap back.
'So why aren't they here yet?'
'I don't know.'
'Didn't you explain how serious it is?'
He's pacing up and down now, his shoulders hunched up to his ears, hands shoved into his pockets. A bundle of nervous energy.
'For god's sake, Kit, sit down, will you? You'll wear a hole in the carpet. She said they're sending someone. I'm sure they're on the way.'
'And what are we supposed to do in the meantime? Sit here and make polite conversation? Kick back and watch a film?'
I hate it when he gets like this, all antsy and sarcastic, taking it out on me when he knows full well this is not my fault.
'They'll be here,' I tell him. 'There's no point getting worked up about it. It's not going to help.'
I always thought Kit would be good in a crisis. He's usually so calm and collected, the person who keeps his head while everyone else runs around flapping and clucking. But he's wound up so tightly tonight, it's infectious. I just about held it together when I dialled 999, but his agitation is getting under my skin, ratcheting up my own anxiety.
I've always looked up to Kit and defer to him on most things, maybe because he's older than me. A lot older. Not quite old enough to be my father, but not far off it.
Before him, I'd been through a string of unsuitable boyfriends, all too immature and self-obsessed to amount to anything more than a bit of fun. There was something different about Kit. At forty-two, he was fifteen years my senior, but the age difference barely registered. I was attracted to him because of his relaxed selfconfidence. Not arrogant or cocky, but a man happy in his own skin. He had nothing to prove to himself or anyone else, and that was utterly alluring.
It was entirely by chance that we met. One of those weird quirks of fate. I'd travelled into Canterbury to meet up with a friend for lunch and happened to be walking past the register office at the precise moment Kit was passing in the opposite direction. I might never have looked at him twice, other than for a young couple getting married who needed two witnesses. Kit and I were in the right place at the right time and, much to our mutual amusement, we were dragged off the street to assist with the formalities, like something out of a Hugh Grant movie.
Afterwards, Kit asked me to join him for a drink. He told me he'd only popped out of his office to grab some lunch. It became his little joke, telling anyone who wanted to know how we met it was the most expensive sandwich of his life. One drink became several and when he finally realised the time and had to rush back, I happily gave him my number.
We were married within the year, and I fell pregnant with Annie, our little miracle, four years after that. She came as a surprise to us both. Kit already had grown-up children of his own from a previous marriage and I'd been told by doctors it was highly unlikely I'd ever conceive again. So when I did, unexpectedly, I had no way of knowing how he was going to react.
I was terrified of telling him, but I had nothing to fear. Kit was delighted, although I think more for my sake than at the thought of being a father again. I cooked him his favourite meal and when he asked me how my day had been, I placed the plastic pregnancy stick in the middle of the table.
'What's that?' he said, glancing at it briefly, like he didn't know.
I waited.
'Are you... ?'
I nodded. 'Pregnant.'
'Are you serious?'
'Look for yourself.'
'But... how?'
'I thought after two kids you might have worked that out,' I laughed.
'Yes, but I mean - I thought you couldn't, you know, after... ’
'I thought so too.' I was only nineteen when I'd first fallen pregnant. Too young to be a mother. I still don't know what went wrong, only that there'd been “complications”.
'Darling, that's wonderful news.' He pushed back his chair and hurried around the table to hug me.
'Are you sure?'
'Am I sure what?'
'Are you sure you're happy? We've never not talked properly about having a baby.'
'Of course I'm pleased. I know how much this means to you,' he said.
Nine months later, and after a textbook pregnancy, I nearly gave birth in the café. My waters broke while I was chatting by the counter to Fiona, my friend and co-owner. She had to shoo the customers out to close up early and drive me to the hospital.
I couldn't reach Kit on his mobile, but I left a message between my contractions as we drove, praying he'd make it on time.
They wheeled me straight into a delivery room where I gulped down great lungfuls of gas and air. Fiona stayed with me, gripping my hand, until finally Kit made it. He'd cut it fine, but he crashed into the room seconds before Annie was born.
'It's a girl,' he announced, his face beaming with joy. 'And she's perfect.'
I lifted my head to see, sweat pouring off my brow. Gingerly, the midwife placed her on my chest. And in that exquisite moment, I thought my body was going to explode with happiness and love.
Her face was red and wrinkled and she was grumbling like she was working up to scream. Kit was right, she was perfect. The miracle I never thought would happen.
'She has my eyes,' Kit said, leaning over us both. He planted a delicate kiss on the top of her head.
'Have you thought of a name yet?' the midwife asked.
'Annie,' I said without hesitation.
Kit and I had discussed names a few times but hadn't been able to agree.
'Really?' he said. 'Annie?'
'It was my grandmother's name,' I explained to the midwife. 'My father's mother.'
I didn't tell Kit that Annie didn't have his eyes. It's what fathers always think. Annie had my father's eyes. They're an identical shape, like almond teardrops.
I wish he could have been there to share that moment with us. He would have been so proud. And he'd have loved having a granddaughter.
But now she's gone and it's like my whole world is disintegrating. Again.
'Call them back and find out why they're taking so long,' Kit grumbles, running stiff fingers through his hair.
'I can't call them again. I told you, they'll be here any minute now.'
'This is killing me. I can't stand it,' he says.
I know what he means. I feel it too. We're in limbo, a hellish purgatory between our old, happy life and this new reality. I wish I could click my fingers and magically make Annie return. To make everything go back to normal. The three of us together without a care in the world. That all seems like a distant hope right now.
Maybe I should try calling again. Perhaps I didn't make it clear how serious this is. But how much more serious can it get than a ten-year-old girl going missing in broad daylight on her way home from school? The town should be flooded with search parties and dogs and bright lights by now. What the hell is keeping them?
'I'm going out again,' Kit growls, turning on his heel, heading for the hall to grab his coat and boots.
'Don't go,' I plead. 'They'll be here any second and they'll want to talk to you too. I don't want to be here on my own with them.'
He shakes his head. 'I can't sit around here doing nothing.'
'Fine,' I say, throwing up a hand in exasperation. 'Go, then.'
And then there's a sharp tap at the door and we both freeze, staring at each other, blinking.
Synopsis
A missing girl. A family under suspicion. And a trial by the media.
It’s only a short walk, but when ten-year-old Annie Warren fails to return home from school, her parents, Cathy and Kit, are frantic with worry.
The police and local community launch a massive search, but with every hour that passes, hopes of finding Annie alive fade.
Meanwhile, a hungry press pack descends on the town, sensing a big story brewing.
Among them is Yannick Kellor, an ambitious local TV news reporter determined to make his name delivering a career-changing scoop.
But he’s not the only one digging into the Warrens’ past and suspicions soon surface that maybe Cathy and Kit know more about what’s happened to their daughter than they’re letting on.
Because little girls don’t just vanish into thin air, do they?
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