When I got to the vicarage I banged on the door in a frenzy and when Isobel opened it I gave her just three words – ‘I’ll help you’ – then turned and walked off down the path. But when I got to the edge of the village I heard her call my name. I looked round and saw her, all red-faced, running after me.

She asked me why I had a gun and I told her I was off hunting. I felt bad for lying but she couldn’t know the truth. I had to keep her trust.

She told me to meet her at the crag tonight at eleven. I nodded my head. Her face lit up then and she hugged me and told me how grateful she was that I was helping her.

I didn’t need her thanks so I didn’t say anything, just nodded and headed back here and fell asleep under my doss bag until the sound of the old tawny owl woke me up an hour ago.

So Isobel thinks I’m going to help her escape with Steve. But what she doesn’t realize is that I have another plan. I will not let that monster take her away from me. I love her. She is my only friend. And if I’ve learned anything from that liar who brought me up it’s that you will do anything to be with the person you love.

You’ll die for them.

Kill for them.

37

Lisa

I grip the handle and pull at it hard. It’s locked fast.

‘Let me out,’ I cry in a raw, desperate voice. ‘Please, Mark, you have to bring him back. I need him. I need my baby.’

My hands are still gripping the handle. I take them away then start pounding my fists on the door.

‘Please,’ I yell. ‘Please let me out.’

But the silence on the other side of the door tells me that my pleas will not be answered. I turn away, my ears ringing. The darkened room seems to spin around me as I stumble about trying to find my bearings. Then my foot catches something hard. I look down and I can just make out the shape of the torch that I dropped earlier. I pick it up and point it in front of me.

The room is sparse. The walls and floor have been painted white, like some sort of sterile laboratory. The blanket Joe had been wearing when Mark grabbed him is lying where he dropped it by the door. I stoop to pick it up and hold it to my face. It smells of old dust and animal skin. I drop it back on to the floor, nausea swelling inside me.

Then as my brain starts to focus I remember Isobel. I’d put her number into my phone the other day. Patting my jeans, I feel the reassuring bulk of my phone in my pocket. I pull it out and see that, miraculously, it has a signal, though the battery is down to the last bar. I scroll through my contacts until I reach Isobel’s number.