‘Well, she’s not here,’ Nancy told her. ‘But try not to worry. I’ll get Bill to drive to York and wait at the station in case she arrives. She’ll be all right, Jenna,’ she said reassuringly, but Jenna knew they were both frightened
that she might not. Horrific stories of children being assaulted and murdered stormed her mind—and Lucy was still only a child, for all her fifteen years. If only she had tried to explain to her about her parents. If only she had not ignored her demands to know more. This was all her fault, all of it…Rachel, how can you forgive me? Tears blocked her throat, but she was too overwrought to weep.
The sound of the doorbell brought her back to reality. She went to open it and admit Emily Harris. Jenna had met her only once before briefly, but now they were united in a bond that all parents share.
‘Come and sit down and I’ll make us a cup of tea. Has there been any news yet?’
As she spoke the phone rang, and Jenna tensed instinctively, staring at it, unable to pick it up. In the end Emily did it for her, holding the receiver out to her.
It was Mrs Goodman on the phone.
‘The police have just been on to me,’ she told Jenna. ‘Apparently Lucy was picked up by a woman from whom she hitched a lift a couple of miles from the school. She told her that she was on her way home for the weekend and asked to be dropped at the station in Bath.’
Lucy hitchhiking! Jenna’s heart started to thud rapidly. How many times had she warned her? She bit her lip, gripped with foreboding and despair.
‘Unfortunately, no one can remember issuing her with a ticket, although the police suspect it’s a safe bet that she’ll go to London.’
To London, but not to me, Jenna reflected bitterly.
‘They’ll be getting in touch with you, Jenna, to talk to you about Lucy. Of course they’ll do a check on the stations, but it might already be too late, she’s had ample time to get to London now.’
Too late. The most mournful and poignant words in the English language, Jenna reflected hollowly as she put down the phone.
Emily tried to coax her to eat, and sat with her, listening sympathetically while Jenna talked about Lucy. She got out the photograph album and showed her photos of Lucy as a baby, a toddler…always smiling in those simpler sunnier days.
Where had it all gone—the love that had once existed between them? Had she been too busy trying to establish a good standard of living for them? Had she been guilty of neglecting Lucy? Maybe, but surely not of loving her too little? It all came back to her reluctance to discuss Lucy’s father with her, Jenna knew, and bit her lip anticipating the questions the police would ask her. They would have to know the truth of course.
Emily stayed with her while they interviewed her. The WPC and the sergeant with her were not unsympathetic, but with every question asked Jenna felt her guilt increase.
It was gone four in the afternoon when they left. Pulling herself together she managed a wan smile for Emily who was watching her with concern. ‘I can’t forgive myself for not telling Lucy something about her father.’
‘In the circumstances I can see why you didn’t,’ Emily sympathised. She glanced at her watch. ‘I’m afraid I’ll have to go now. But I could come back?’
Jenna shook her head. ‘No. You’ve done more than enough as it is.’
‘Ring me as soon as you hear anything,’ Emily said to Jenna as she left, and both of them knew that she had carefully avoided saying, ‘if you hear anything’.
With every hour that slipped by, Jenna knew the chances of finding Lucy grew slimmer. London was a big city and one teenage girl could disappear in it all too quickly.
At first it was the commonplace things that tormented her: had she any money? Where would she sleep? Would she eat properly? And then her thoughts became darker and more despairing, thoughts of drugs and prostitution filled her tormented mind, thoughts far too horrible to contemplate.
It was then that Jenna cried, weeping all the tears she had suppressed over the long years since Rachel’s death. She felt as alone and frightened now as she had done then, longing for someone to turn to and share her burdens with.
At first she didn’t even hear the doorbell and then eventually it penetrated her misery. Hope flared inside her and she rushed to answer it, stepping back in mute shock as she saw James standing outside.
He followed her in and closed the door behind him. His face looked dark and forbidding, and Jenna was suddenly conscious of her bedraggled appearance. He would know that she had been crying.
‘Jenna, it’s all right. Lucy’s with me.’
She couldn’t believe it. She stared at him in total stunned disbelief and then a bitter tidal wave of anger flooded over her.
She flew at him, hitting him with her fists, anguished tears pouring down her face as she cried bitterly. ‘How could you do this to me? How…?’
‘Hush. Come on, it’s all right.’
His calm, even voice penetrated her shock. She tensed and then shuddered as his arms came round her, drawing her against the warmth of his body, his hand pressing her head into the curve of his shoulder.
‘She only arrived an hour ago, and at first I didn’t realise she’d run away from school. I would have come sooner, but I had to calm her down and get her settled. I’ve left her with Sarah—they seem to have hit it off…’