My legs are shaking, my knees rubber, but I force myself to stand. The police aren’t yet here but I hope they won’t be long. George and Carly will be out of their minds. Tash too. They’ll likely all come, but for now there is only me.

I’m back.

And I’m not leaving without my son.

Chapter Fifty-Six

George

Now

The screen lights up on George’s phone. Leah’s picture grins at him. He doesn’t need to read the text to know what it will say. His stomach turns.

It’s all come to a head, lightning fast and just as frightening.

Chapter Fifty-Seven

Leah

Now

The world seems to hold its breath once I’m inside Norwood’s grounds. The silence perfect.

‘Archie?’ Fear tears his name from my throat. ‘Archie!’ A flock of birds rises from the trees, black wings beating, cawing out a warning. The back of my neck tingles.

Is someone watching me?

I turn a slow 360. There’s nobody visible but still I feel eyes on me. Waiting to see where I’ll go. What I’ll do when I get there.

It’s easier than I thought to get my bearings. The camp is huge – hiding places everywhere – but Simon will want me to find him. There’s little point to coming back here otherwise. Archie will be in the room we were held in.

Determinedly, I run over to the building where I was once carried inside, gagged and blindfolded, terrified, but the horror I felt then pales in comparison to the horror I feel now. I’d sacrifice myself a million times over to save my child.

The building is gloomy. Darkness swallows me as I step inside. I need a torch. Too late I realize I have left my mobile in the centre console of the car.

I’d been so young when I was here that I wasn’t sure whether I’d know which room had been our prison, but evil is thick in the blackness, beckoning me forward. Broken glass crunches underfoot as I edge down the hallway.

Something touches my face. I stifle a scream and bat it away.

A cobweb.

I can do this.

My body feels like one of the paper dolls Marie and I used to dress up, flimsy and insubstantial. I place my hands on my thighs to reassure myself that my legs are still there, solid and able to support me.

I can do this.

My teeth chatter as I reach the room.

Our room.

In the muted grey light spilling in through the patchy roof, my eyes scan the door. There are six nail holes where the bolts used to be. Crudely painted in faded red on the outside is RIP Sinclair Sisters as though we had died that day. I suppose in a way we had. We had come out of here altogether different children to the ones who had been dragged in. I squint as I search the corridor for a weapon. There’s a wooden post with rusted nails jutting out from its splintered sides.