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But no, I realise as I sit impatiently in the traffic queue staring at the lanes of equally frustrated drivers, deep down, I know that my mother was not looking for me.
‘Fuck!’ I scream, banging my fist on the steering wheel. Then I hear the wail of sirens behind us. Cars edge over to the left as much as is possible in the queue of traffic, me included, to allow the two police cars to pass, shortly followed by an ambulance and a fire engine. There’s a turning a few yards ahead to my left and, when the car in front eases back into line, I drive up with two wheels on the pavement and squeeze past to get out of this jam. I have no idea where the side street will take me, but at least it’s movement.
Further down, I spot some waste ground beside the end of a row of terraced houses, where several cars and a couple of vans are parked. I pull over and check the map. It shows I’m only a short walk from Hammersmith Tube station. At this point, I don’t care what happens to the car – if it gets a ticket or towed away – so I drive in and park it in a spot at the back of the area and lock it up, walking as fast as I can to the station.
Half an hour later I emerge from the Underground at Leicester Square. I feel sick at the normality of everything going on around me – the flashing advertising, the masses of people, the noise, the tourists, the car horns blaring and bicycles weaving through the traffic. But I block it all out, instinctively heading in the direction I need to go. I once knew this area well, knew all the places to hang out, where to get cheap booze, the spots we used to sell the wraps of cocaine to anyone desperate enough to take it off our hands. I remember how we’d sold our souls to save up enough money – the Great Escape, we’d called it. And then she’d died because of it. Because ofme.
I don’t want my daughter even close to becoming a part of that, I remind myself as I push through the endless tide of people rushing along the street as I head down Shaftesbury Avenue. Though I realise that she already is.
Once or twice over the years I’ve dared to look at the Cloisters on Google Street View, though it took half a bottle of wine and being completely alone in the house to do so. It was a perfect storm of emotions triggering a sense of almost wanting to self-harm that had driven me to it those couple of times. And I’d felt nothing as I stared at the grim building, its ugliness and black-framed windows, the many storeys reaching up to the sky revealing nothing of what went on inside. As if I’d never set foot inside the building at all.
I’d even switched back in time on the maps view, looking at how the street around it had changed over the years – a couple of sex shops coming and going, a Chinese takeaway, some new paving in the alley. Different figures were in each view, all with blurred-out faces, and I’d zoomed in, looking to see if any were familiar, if I could spot Darren’s skinny frame or Luba’s plumpness or Vaughn’s stooped appearance. Or even recognise the haunted posture of a recent recruit. Though at the time, I had no idea if the Cloisters was still operating. There’d never been any signs outside. Only those who knew,knew.
And it looks exactly the same now as I stand at the end of Winlow Court, hardly daring to go down the dingy passageway, as if there’s a force field at the end stopping me. I pray to God that if Belle has headed here, that a force field stopped her too. Now I’m here, I have no idea what to do. Do I press the entry buzzer, pretend I’m a client and go in? Then what? Or do I stake out the passageway, watch and wait, see who comes and goes? Either way, none of that is actually finding Belle. I don’t even know for sure that she’s in London. I try calling her phone again but, as I expected, the line doesn’t connect.
It’s as I’m standing in the alley, my arms hanging uselessly by my sides, that I see a face at the third-floor window of the Cloisters – a girl’s face with dark hair and searching eyes. She peers down at the street below, catching sight of me as I stare up at her. For a moment, our eyes lock and for all the world it feels as if I’m staring back at myself. I hold up my hand, as though I’m reaching up to her, letting her know that I’m here, that I’ll help her, but quick as a flash, she darts out of sight again.
‘It wasn’t her,’ I whisper, trying to convince and calm myself. ‘It wasn’t Belle.’ I’d recognise my daughter’s face anywhere and, even from this distance, I know it was another poor soul inside that building. That doesn’t mean I don’t want to rescue her, too, though. As if I’m rescuing myself. It’s what I’ve always done – and then Leanne and Kate are on my mind again – the need to intervene, to help.
I force myself to walk further down Winlow Court, though there’s nothing court-like about it. At the other end, a refuse truck has pulled up, its reversing beeper cutting through the air. Several men wearing hi-vis jackets manoeuvre industrial-sized bins towards it to be emptied. Just normal life going on – and I remember it all well. The stink in summer of the rotting food as we left the building on one of our jaunts around the city, the punters lurking, looking shifty and nervous if it was their first visit, the brief sense of freedom as we escaped the area for a few hours. I don’t know why we kept going back time after time, or why we didn’t run to the police, a homeless shelter, or beg a stranger to get help for us. Anything. It was as if we were tethered by a cord to the place, or a long length of elastic that only stretched so far, always returning us to the nightmare within if we dared stray too far.
No, not a cord, I think as I stand directly outside the black front door. It was stronger and tougher than that. It was amentaltie. A leash of safety, of status and uniqueness. Without it, without being one of Vaughn’s girls, part of his seedy underworld with his branding on our thighs, we knew we were nothing. Life at the Cloisters offered us protection, a dirty eminence, an identity that we were proud of. We believed we owed our lives to him. And some of us sacrificed them.
‘Hello…?’ a voice says.
I stare at my hand. My finger has pressed the buzzer without me even realising.
‘Hi,’ I find myself saying back. ‘I…’ My voice trails off. I can’t do this.
‘Hello, who’s there?’ The voice is soft and kind, a woman.
‘I’m…Is…’ I take a breath. I need to say something that will get me inside without raising suspicion. ‘Sorry,’ I say. ‘Wrong place. Sorry to bother you.’ And I walk briskly on down the passageway, only to come to a sudden stop at the other end when a shiny black Range Rover pulls up, blocking my path. The suited driver gets out and opens the rear door, waiting as a passenger emerges – a nurse, dressed in a pale uniform and flat shoes with her sandy hair rolled into a knot at the back of her head. The driver brings her a walking frame from the boot of the vehicle and the nurse helps someone else get out, making sure they have a good hold of the frame. The driver closes the door.
And that’s when I see Vaughn standing there, bent over the frame, his feet shuffling as he moves forward. He’s about ten feet away from me and I can almost smell him, almostfeelhim, as the memories flood back. I feel sick and my limbs start to shake. His head is almost devoid of hair now – just a few wispy strands of silver sprouting from his waxy baldness. A crisp white shirt hangs off his bony shoulders and his pale-grey trousers look as though they’ll fall down at any moment. He was never a big man, but somehow he always commanded a regal presence, terrified us into believing he was our ruler.
Looking at him now, all I see are his weaknesses, his vulnerabilities, as the nurse cajoles him forward. Vaughn snaps vitriol at her as she says something to him, making her recoil as she gently leads him towards the entrance of the Cloisters.
And then they pass by me, with the nurse giving me a quick look in the hope I will step out of the way. My mouth falls open, desperately wanting to say something – perhaps to warn her, perhaps to shoot vitriol of my own at him. Instead, I just stand there and accept the glare Vaughn gives me as he shuffles by. I don’t fail to notice the way his eyes flare with something as he sees me, the way his old mind struggles to make the link between now and the past. But it doesn’t. Finally, I turn and run back the way I came with absolutely no idea where I’m going.
CHAPTER FORTY
MOLLY – THEN
Molly wondered if she would die today. She’d woken with an unnerving sense of peace inside her body, as though sombre classical music was flowing through her veins instead of blood. A beautiful, slow cascade of violins and piano drowning her soul as if each note was preparing her for the afterlife. It couldn’t be any worse thanthislife, she thought, rubbing her eyes.
‘That was some dream,’ she said, sitting up, realising that’s all it was. She’d smoked a ton of weed last night and put away half a bottle of vodka. She scratched her legs, peering under the sheets. There was a patch of skin weeping and red raw from the bleach.
She heard a noise. Hannah was puking in a bucket, leaning over the side of her bunk. The morning sickness hadn’t let up all this time. Some women had that, they’d learnt a few days ago from Vanessa. Vanessa had recently burst in on Hannah, who was completely naked in the bathroom, and had figured out what was going on when she’d seen her expanded belly. That there’d been no abortion at all. That it wasn’t just too much food, as they’d all believed.
At first, she was annoyed at being kept in the dark, but then she’d promised to keep the secret, though as she’d rightly pointed out, it was only a matter of time until Darren or Luba found out. ‘An actual, like, real-live baby in the house is a dead fucking giveaway, if you ask me.’ They explained how it wouldn’t get that far, that Hannah was going to run away before the birth.
‘I died in it,’ Molly said, getting out of bed to help her friend. She was wearing her pants and a vest top. ‘In the dream.’
‘I’m dying now,’ Hannah said, peering up. She spat into the bucket, wiping her mouth, and lolled back on her pillow. ‘Didn’t even have any booze,’ she said. ‘It’s not a hangover.’
‘Hormones,’ Molly said, going up to her. She put her arm around her and cradled her head. ‘My poor honey,’ she crooned, holding her close, gently sweeping her hair off her face. ‘But today’s the day you’ll be a step closer, Han,’ she whispered, getting up again and pulling on her jeans. ‘Not long now and you’ll be out of here.’
There was still the matter of deciding where, exactly, Hannah would be going once she escaped. Molly could only help her up until the moment she left, and then she was on her own. They’d discussed Molly going with her, of course, but were still deciding about that. Losing two girls at once would send Darren into even more of a meltdown and, if they were caught, the repercussions would be way worse, not to mention how life would become unbearable for the others. Molly would be needed here for a while to protect them, somehow talk Darren round and make up a believable story about Hannah, perhaps telling him that she’d gone to care for a sick relative and would soon be back. ‘Once the dust has settled in a few months,’ Molly had convinced her, ‘then I’ll join you. We can live together – just us and your baby. You’ll be OK.We’llbe OK.’
