Girl Number One: A Gripping Psychological Thriller Read online

  GIRL NUMBER ONE

  Jane Holland

  Jane Holland has asserted her right under Section 77 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988 to be identified as the author of this work. No part of this book can be reproduced in part or in whole or transferred by any means without the express written permission of the author.

  This is a work of fiction. Any names of places or characters are the products of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual events, places or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

  Copyright © Jane Holland 2015

  All rights reserved.

  First published by Thimblerig Books.

  OTHER WORKS BY JANE HOLLAND

  FICTION

  Kissing the Pink (forthcoming)

  Last Bird Singing (A Dark Psychological Thriller)

  Miranda

  POETRY

  Boudicca & Co

  Camper Van Blues

  Disreputable

  On Warwick

  The Wanderer (from the Anglo-Saxon)

  Flash Bang: New and Selected Poems

  NON-FICTION

  21 Ways To Write A Commercial Novel

  Jane Holland also writes fiction as:

  Beth Good

  Victoria Lamb

  Elizabeth Moss

  For my brother Michael

  CONTENTS

  Prologue

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  Chapter Twenty-Nine

  Chapter Thirty

  Chapter Thirty-One

  Chapter Thirty-Two

  Chapter Thirty-Three

  Chapter Thirty-Four

  Chapter Thirty-Five

  Chapter Thirty-Six

  Chapter Thirty-Seven

  Chapter Thirty-Eight

  Epilogue

  PROLOGUE

  I know Mummy’s dead. But I have to check. You always have to check, right?

  Kneeling beside the perfectly still body, I stare up through the trees, watching the flash of white trainers disappear.

  I hear a crack of twigs as he makes his way higher up the slope. He’s not really hurrying. There’s no other sound except the nearby stream. Even the birds have stopped singing.

  Maybe he’s going to come back.

  ‘Mum?’

  She does not move when I touch her cheek. Her throat looks red and swollen. I guess that’s where he grabbed her and squeezed. Squeezed until she stopped struggling. Her eyes are wide, staring up into the leafy branches that sway gently above us.

  I should never have run away. Perhaps I could have done something. Perhaps I could have stopped him.

  But Mummy yelled at me, ‘Run, Ellie! Run and hide!’

  Then he grabbed her.

  I ran like he was coming after me too. I ran gasping and crying. Brambles scratched my face, tore at my clothes. Then I stopped, lost and defeated in the unfamiliar undergrowth, and loped slowly back towards the stream. Because where could I go without Mummy? What could I do on my own?

  I’m old enough to understand what death is. I kneel beside her for a long time, leafy twigs pressing painfully into my knees. There’s one bird still singing in the trees above us. Its hoarse repeated cry was like a warning before. Now it sounds like it’s laughing at me. I don’t look up.

  I take her limp hand and squeeze it hard, waiting for her to wake up, to start breathing again, to smile at me and tell me everything will be all right. But it doesn’t happen. It will never happen again.

  ‘Mum?’ I whisper, bending close to her face. ‘Mummy?’

  In a minute, I will drop her hand and run.

  CHAPTER ONE

  I remember what day it is even before the alarm on my phone goes off.

  My eyes are still closed, my mind fighting its way back from the suffocating world of my nightmare. I wait for the alarm tone, aware that it’s coming, the way you know a storm’s on the horizon. The tiny hairs have risen on my skin, one arm angled stiffly above the pillow, the other dangling out of bed as though pointing to the floor. I’m frozen in that position, my body still partially asleep at some level. But my brain is alert and suffering.

  It’s like waking up on a birthday and immediately thinking, today is going to be wonderful, today is going to be special.

  Only it’s the reverse situation. Like a photographic negative. Today is going to be special alright. But it’s not going to be wonderful. It is going to be bad. Very, very bad.

  Something shifts me out of sleep. Memory clicks back into place, as it does every morning, and suddenly I’m properly awake, totally in the moment.

  Ground zero.

  I’ve spent years in therapy, I know what to do when all the colour bleeds from the world. I take a few deep breaths and run through what the doctor used to call my ‘blessings’. The good things in life. This cottage, my job. My friends, the ones that have stuck with me and not fallen away since university. But I still feel the darkness beckoning. Not much, just a vague sensation of …

  The alarm sounds.

  Rolling over, I fumble for my phone, turn off the alarm, swing myself out of bed.

  Deal with it, Eleanor.

  Not bothering to look in the mirror, I drag a comb through my shoulder-length hair, then twist it up into a rough ponytail. No shower yet. That can come later, after my run. It’s not like anyone will see me in the woods. Not at this hour.

  7am.

  I pick up my mobile, check it for new messages. A reminder from Jenny about end of term festivities. I hesitate over it, then flick past. I resent having to think about work when I’m not actually there, which makes marking books a nightmare.

  A late reply from Tris to my text sent just before midnight. By which time I had downed several glasses of rum and coke, and was undressing for bed.

  Planning to run through the woods tomorrow. As a salute to my mum.

  His reply, sent at 1.45am, is terse. Don’t. Not a good idea.

  Chicken, I text back, then press Send.

  Still nothing from Denzil about next weekend, which irritates me more than it should. We’ve dated a few times, in a non-committal way. It’s not like we have any kind of special arrangement. We were so close in school though. I wonder if he finds me boring now that I’m a teacher and no longer lurching from one adolescent drama to the next.

  Vaguely disappointed, I toss the mobile back onto the bed. The woods at Eastlyn are a notorious signal blind spot, so a phone is dead weight on a run there.

  I wriggle into black Lycra shorts and a white tee-shirt with a bold red Nike logo. Drag on my new pair of Mizuno trainers and lace them up. Open my bedroom door. The house is quiet. Hannah must have come home while I was sleeping and gone straight to bed.

  A quick trip to the bathroom. Toilet and teeth. Hands still damp, I tiptoe past Hannah’s room, t
hen down the stairs, carefully avoiding the step that creaks. Since she started to work nights at the hospital, my early morning runs have become an issue and I’m keen not to get into an argument with her again.

  Not today.

  Out in the lane, the air feels sultry and shut-in, the sky drawn tight across the cottage roof. Migraine weather, Hannah calls it. The sun may be shining in our little part of the world but dark clouds from the moors are already on the edge of the valley, promising rain later.

  I stretch out my hamstrings, then swing my arms up and down to warm up. Ten times forward, ten times back. Shrug my shoulders a few times, roll my head slowly round to the left, then back to the right.

  I head off towards the village at a gentle warm-up pace, pretending not to consider which route to take even though there’s nothing else in my head today.

  About half a mile down the lane, the road runs past the gated entrance to what used to be our farm, once upon a time, but is now a partial ruin. Renovation work that was started years ago still lies unfinished, the roof flapping with poorly secured plastic. There’s a thin black cat crouched on top of the old piggery, staring malevolently in my direction, ears flattened on its head.

  I stride out, beginning to run.

  The decision is made, I realise. I’m going through the woods today, not the village. I need to live for the future.

  Mist is rising slowly in Tinker’s Field, obscuring the legs of the black-and-white cows grazing there. Crossing the road that leads up to the village, I pause for a noisy diesel van hurtling down the hill at standard Cornish breakneck speed. WOODS VALLEY GARDEN CENTRE is written on the side in large green lettering.

  The driver’s window is open, music blaring out. Dick Laney is at the wheel, owner of the garden centre, bearded, middle-aged and compact. He’s wearing work overalls, so I guess he’s on a delivery.

  He raises a hand to me. ‘Morning, Eleanor.’

  I nod. ‘Morning.’

  His son, Jago, is in the passenger seat. He was at the local school with me, though we were never close and have not seen each other for ages. He looks at me without smiling.

  When the van has passed, I cross into the sunlit meadow and keep running. The grass half-obscuring the path to the woods has not been cut this year and is almost knee-high now. But I don’t mind, threading my way through with pleasure, flicking the bright, rustling grasses on either side.

  Running is a ritual, and one I’ve grown to love over the years. To be able to shut out everything else in your life for an hour and concentrate solely on your body, your technique, your stamina. That’s the beauty of running. It purges the soul.

  That’s why even on a bad day, on the worst day imaginable, even a day like today, I still need to run.

  There is someone else in the woods today.

  I often get that feeling, to be fair. The sensation of being watched when I run or spied on through windows at the cottage. Like there’s someone out there, keeping me under observation. It’s just nerves, my therapist used to say; a lively imagination playing tricks on me.

  Today feels different though. Like it’s real, not imagined. Today my skin is prickling as soon as I vault the stile from the meadow, before I’m even ten feet into the woods. There’s a physical edge to the sensation of being watched. Like it’s three-dimensional.

  At first I try to ignore the feeling, pumping air with my arms, checking that I’m striking the ground toe-first, not heel-first, the way you’re supposed to.

  I hear a crack of twigs behind me, and glance round, frowning. But the wooded slopes are empty.

  The woods feel unthreatening here, still so close to the meadow and the main road into the village. On sunny days like these, light slips through gaps in the leaves, soft and dappled, to give the woods an almost magical air. I often catch a glimpse of fleeing brown rabbits on these morning runs, or the occasional grey squirrel watching me from halfway up a mossed trunk. Most days, I prefer to skirt the edge of the meadow rather than enter the woods. I often head up towards the moor and enjoy the wide-open vistas there instead. But today is special. And I’ve made up my mind, for better or worse.

  The deeper I move into the wood, the more the air becomes curiously still, maybe even claustrophobic. There is no chukking of alarm from the birds today, no odd rustles in the undergrowth. Even the sound of the stream below seems muffled.

  My mother used to love running in these woods. I don’t remember much about her, and can only picture her face from having studied old photographs. But I know she loved running, and where, because my father used to mention it whenever I went out for a jog.

  Not surprisingly, he always hated me going anywhere near these woods.

  I can understand the pull of this place. The woods nestle secretively beneath the village church, curving round the hill like a dragon’s tail, dark green in the sunlight. The trees stretch for several miles of shady paths, birds clattering among the leaves, and a noisy stream at the bottom. It’s beautiful and peaceful, popular with walkers and runners alike, especially in the summer.

  Another tiny cracking sound.

  All in your imagination. Don’t look to left or right. Head down and keep running.

  My trainers are beginning to squelch in the mud. Last night’s rainfall hasn’t helped the dampness of the woodland paths. But I’m nearly at the dip. The dip is where the path divides, one descending narrowly to the stream, the other broader and more welcoming, rising into sunlight once it hits the road above.

  I push on round the next bend, keeping out of the muddy morass in this shady part of the wood.

  And slither to a halt.

  There’s a sign blocking the path ahead.

  A large metal sign, legs sunk in mud, leaning slightly at an angle, bold yellow lettering on a red background.

  PATH AHEAD CLOSED

  FOLLOW DIVERSION

  The white arrow beneath points downhill towards the stream. The path is narrow and very steep, and I can see from here that it’s badly overgrown.

  I study the metal sign again, my chest suddenly tight. It takes an effort to persuade my fists to loosen, my breathing to slow down. I look around, gauging the stillness of the woods, the solitude. This sign is unexpected, yes. But not even remotely suspicious. I’m doing it again; I’m over-reacting, letting the past win.

  It’s nothing.

  The main path is closed, so I have to take the diversion. I start to run again. Not back the way I’ve come but down towards the stream. Taking the path I haven’t taken in years. The path I still see in my nightmares.

  The path that has always been waiting for me.

  It’s strange how the years have changed my perspective of the place. In my memory, trees crowded this narrow track, branches dipping overhead, leaning in to block my view, some of the trunks rotten and decayed, roots barely clinging to the soil. But the slopes are not as overgrown as they once were. Perhaps as a terrified six-year-old, the trees seemed closer-set, the undergrowth darker and more threatening.

  Further along, the track begins to wander and deteriorate. This is more like the dangerous territory I remember, the lost ground where the worst could – and once did – happen. Here, the edges of the path blur into undergrowth. The earth banks are mossed, riddled with muddied hollows and the tracks of deer. Some of the trunks on the bank are scarred where deer have rubbed against them on their way down to the stream.

  I am light-headed at the risk I am taking. The risk to my sanity. What would Dr Quick say?

  Nothing in life is without risk.

  I no longer see Dr Quick, of course. I decided some years ago that I had outgrown therapy and told her I didn’t want any more sessions. To my surprise she did not push the issue. Perhaps she thought, as I did, that it was time to move on.

  I glance up, startled by a rustling above me and to the right. Catch a flash of white between tree trunks.

  There’s someone else running on the heavily wooded slope above this path. It’s the merest flicker t
hrough shadowy trees: a momentary glimpse into insanity, like a little white rabbit that appears for a second, then vanishes down a rabbit hole.

  White trainers.

  That’s when I lower my gaze, and realise there is something on the path ahead of me.

  Or someone.

  ‘What the hell?’ My heart is galloping and I can’t seem to catch my breath. Panic swells like a balloon in my chest.

  I struggle to clamp it down, to remember my breathing exercises. I know the signs of a panic attack and how to control them. I must be calm and logical, go through the drills Dr Quick taught me. But I can’t seem to reach that state anymore. I’m past logic; I’m locked out of it and into nightmare.

  I slow down, staring.

  The assailant is described as tall and well-built, wearing brown leather gloves, dark tracksuit and white trainers.

  That was the only description of my mother’s killer we ever had. Because a six-year-old was the only one to see him.

  CHAPTER TWO

  I’m running again. Only this time it’s for my life.

  Tree branches slash my cheek, brambles tear at my legs with their sharp green thorns. Stumbling over uneven ground, I plunge to my knees, deep in a patch of tall, deep-green plants, their soft heads bowed around me. For a moment all I can hear is the loud rasp of my breath, the erratic thud of my heart.

  I register pain. There’s a smell of damp, musty leaves in my nostrils now. Something fresh with something rotting.

  I clamber back up with stinging hands and legs. Fumble for a trunk to lean on while I catch my breath. Then I keep running.

  Reaching the village of Eastlyn, the first person I see is the vicar. He’s smoking a cigarette with a hunched air, his Jack Russell running about his feet near the back of the church.

  Reverend Mortimer Clemo is in his early fifties, tall and loose-limbed. Innocuous enough, but I’ve never warmed to him, perhaps because I don’t like churches. His once-dark hair is part silver now, razored round the nape of his neck. He’s wearing black jeans today and the obligatory short-sleeved black shirt-front with white dog collar, plus a pair of muddied wellington boots. His last name, Clemo, is pronounced ‘Kleemo’ in one of those quirks of Cornish pronunciation. It’s a common name in these parts.