Читать книгу Saving Sophie: A compulsively twisty psychological thriller that will keep you gripped to the very last page - Sam Carrington, Sam Carrington - Страница 31

Karen sipped the coffee, her hands wrapped around the mug, the warmth comforting her. Anxiety attack number one of the day had subsided, but more were likely. The very thought of facing the day alone was enough to bring on another. How must Rachel be feeling? An errant husband, her only child dead, her best friend a useless agoraphobic who couldn’t even make it to her side. She tried to recall the coping strategies she’d learned with her counsellor, but somehow, this morning, she hit a blank, not successfully remembering a single one. Ridiculous. Two years of therapy and she couldn’t summon anything? A new wave of panic flooded her mind. Think, think. She took some deep breaths, closed her eyes and envisaged her happy place. There. That was one of the strategies. Come on, Karen, you can do this.

With trembling fingers, Karen picked up her mobile. Rachel’s went straight to voicemail. Ashamed of the relief she felt, she tried the landline. A groggy voice responded.

‘Yeah.’

‘Rach, it’s me.’ There was an audible exhale of breath on the other end. Karen’s free hand clenched and unclenched, waiting for a response. The silence stretched. ‘Rach?’

‘Yeah, I’m here.’ Her voice thick, monotone.

‘How are you doing?’ Stupid question, but Karen was lost. Lost for words, the right words – for the first time in twenty-odd years, she didn’t know what to say, how to say it. She bit on her lower lip, waiting for Rachel to shout at her, to tell her what a dumb question she’d uttered.

‘I need you.’ A low, guttural moan travelled through the earpiece. Then tears. Karen tried to swallow the hard lump in her throat. Tears of her own now tracked hot paths down her cheeks. Her whole body shook.

‘I know, babe, I know.’ She fought with her own inner voice, the one repeating: I can’t do this, I can’t do this. Then she asked Rachel if she wanted to come over. Coward. Expecting Rachel to come to her was downright weak, unforgivable.

‘I can’t drive. I’m in no state … had so many sleeping pills last night … to try and block it out.’

Of course. Karen could relate to that: the need to sleep versus the inability to close your eyes. The desire to slip into unconsciousness, the wish never to reawaken into the nightmare. Would suggesting that Rachel could get a taxi anger her, upset her even more?

The phone slid in Karen’s hand, her palm slippery with sweat. She swapped hands, wiping the dampness on her jeans. ‘I … I don’t know what to do, Rach. I want to be with you, I really do—’

‘I’m on my own here,’ Rachel’s voice, pleading.

‘What about Adam? Surely he’s …’ She couldn’t finish what she’d begun. The memory of her previous call with Rachel returning like a kick to her head: he’d moved in with her. Whoever ‘her’ was.

‘Adam’s been and gone, just did what he thought was his duty to me, then went back to her.’ The bitterness was evident. ‘Karen, this is awful. I’m here alone and the emptiness is crushing me. Please come, Karen … you’re all I have.’ A choking noise, followed by a heaving, distressing cry: her suffering poured into a single animal-like howl.

Karen jerked the phone away from the source of the noise and closed her eyes tight, the horror of the situation threatening to overwhelm her. She tentatively returned the phone to her ear. ‘Rachel, come on, love … I’m here, you know I’m here.’

The quick, staccato dialogue bursting from Rachel’s mouth was difficult to interpret due to the erratic sobs, but one punctuated phrase hit home: ‘What … if it … was Sophie?’

Yes, what if it had been Sophie? Karen’s reaction to her being brought home by the police, the long hours of the night spent worrying about what had happened to her during the missing hours, were fresh memories, but unlikely to diminish over time. But at least she had come home. At least she was safe. Not dead, not gone. Poor Rachel, the memories of this time, this awful, unimaginable event, forever carved in her mind. No new, wonderful memories of Erin to replace them. Ever. What could be worse?

‘I’m so sorry, Rach, I know you’d be here straight away … I’m trying, I’m really trying to get to you …’ She let the insincere words trail, knowing they weren’t entirely truthful.

‘Couldn’t Sophie bring you? You could close your eyes the whole way here.’

Before she stopped to consider her response, she was already speaking: ‘It’s her work week, she can’t bring me.’

The ‘Oh. Right,’ which followed were two words saturated with disbelief. ‘She went to work …’ Rachel echoed.

Karen realised how painful that must be for Rachel. Surely everyone should be too struck with grief to carry on their usual routines? She was sure she’d feel the same. After her attack she had questioned others’ ability to get on with life – why didn’t it stop because her world had tipped on its axis? How could people simply not drop everything and sit with her, help her through her traumatic event? Now, looking back, it had been a small thing in comparison to Rachel’s trauma. She hadn’t ever expected to think that.

What on earth was she doing, sitting here, asking Rachel to come to her? What sort of friend was she? Mike was right to have been angry with her this morning, right to be disappointed. She was a failure.

Her thoughts were brought back to the moment; Rachel’s crying had started up again after her brief reprieve, her words thick with grief:

‘She was my little girl, my beautiful shining light. What am I going to do without her?’ Then anger, a white heat of rage: ‘What monster could kill my baby?’

And, Karen thought, where was this monster right now?