it. Whoever it was, he would strangle the truth out of the bastard if anything had happened to Ellie.
He kept his eyes fixed on the figure who was retreating towards the back of the barn, as if drawing him forward. A stray beam of sunlight pierced the dusty gloom and he saw there was another ladder at the far end, descending from the hayloft and providing an escape route. Nobody was leaving until he knew what had happened to Ellie. He had to get there first. He had to cut off the escape. He started to run across the hay strewn floor.
His feet pounded on the thin board of the loft as the figure disappeared further into the shadows ahead of him. But he was gaining on the bastard who’d taken Ellie. His heart lurched as his right foot landed hard and met with no resistance. There was nothing beneath him. His leg disappeared into a void, and his momentum drove him forward. With arms flailing uselessly in the air, he couldn’t stop himself as his left foot followed his right into nothingness. He lunged sideways to try to reach a solid piece of floor, but there was only hay covered cardboard. He caught one final glimpse of sunlight illuminating the triumphant smile on a face that he recognised as his body crashed through the opening.
46
On her journey to the police station, Ellie had dawdled all the way and still got there quickly. Now she was trying every short cut she knew to get back to the village, but time was racing by. Of course, her blackmailer would never be expecting her to turn up. It wasn’t her they wanted. It was Sean.
The instructions had been clear. Send ‘lover boy’ to me at the old Haslett’s Farm at eight pm. Ellie knew who they meant, but had to be sure.
‘What do you mean? Who are you talking about?’ she’d asked.
There had been a sneaky laugh from the other end of the phone.
‘How many lovers have you got, Ellie? Little Miss Perfect? I want the one you were with on Friday night. The one you sneaked out to meet.’ Another nasty giggle.
How could they know so much? Ellie was sure nobody had seen her with Sean, and she certainly hadn’t told a soul about it. She nearly told Georgia when Sean turned up on Saturday night and left that bloody rose in the fridge - but she would never have named him. Of that she was one hundred per cent confident.
Whoever her blackmailer was, he was a clever sod. Ellie was the only person who could be relied upon to lure Sean to a secret assignation in a remote place. Initially, she hadn’t been intending to involve him. She had planned on going herself to find out who was playing with her mind and threatening her children. But then Sean had sent that text, and this time his intentions were explicit. So she had done exactly what she had been asked to do - she’d sent ‘lover boy’.
Ellie would be there too, though, and the blackmailer wouldn’t be expecting that. But why Sean?
She looked at her watch. It was three minutes past eight, and she was still five minutes from Haslett’s farm. She was driving as if the devil were at her back.
Five minutes became ten as Ellie was stuck on the back road behind a herd of cows. She wanted to pip her horn and drive right through them, but she knew what the farmers round here were like, and this one in particular would be more likely to try to slow the cows down if she did that. She closed her eyes in frustration.
Finally, she was moving again. The turning was just up ahead, and she took the corner too fast, nearly ending up in the hedge. Shit. That was close.
Sean’s car was there; she could see it parked at the front of the farmhouse. But there didn’t seem to be anybody else. She slammed the brakes on right behind his car and got out.
Silence.
She walked towards the front of the farm, but it was clear that there was nobody inside. She would be glad when she found him - there was something ominous about the quiet. There wasn’t a breath of air, and even the birds seemed to have stopped singing.
Suddenly the stillness was ripped apart. Ellie heard a brief shout of fear, followed by a terrible scream of agony. Then the silence returned as quickly as it