Michael Robotham - Bleed For Me

Sienna is being allowed home for a few hours. Her chaperone is a mental health nurse with gelled hair, stovepipe jeans and a skinny black tie. His name is Jay Muller and his handshake - a brief pressure and release - tells me nothing.

‘Call me Jay,’ he says. ‘You’re a psychologist?’

‘Yes.’

‘You’re doing the report on Sienna?

‘That’s right.’

Jay claps his hands together as though he’s won a guessing game. I ask him how Sienna has been coping.

He leans closer, about to share his professional opinion. ‘Sleep is the problem. False awakenings. She dreams of waking up only she can’t move or make a sound. She describes being trapped in her body, unable to call out or press the emergency bell. Then there’s the “screaming” in her head.’

‘Screaming?’

‘It’s more like a rushing sound, she says, but it’s deafening.’

‘Has she mentioned her father?’

‘Nothing.’

‘Can I see her today?’

Jay has a habit of picking at the corners of his lips as though scraping away food encrusted there. ‘I got no problem with that, as long as Mrs Hegarty agrees. I’m taking Sienna back to Oakham House at six.’

On the far side of the parking area, Lance Hegarty leans against the side of a black limousine, smoking a cigarette. Sienna is somewhere inside behind tinted glass while Helen and Zoe are outside the chapel saying goodbye to the Deputy Chief Constable.

Walking up the slope towards Sienna, I prepare to confront Lance. The last time I saw him he was hurling abuse outside the Crown Court.

‘You’ve got some damn nerve, coming here,’ he says, stepping in front of me and pushing his face into mine. His eyes are flecked with tiny red veins. ‘You’re working for the police.’

‘Wrong.’

‘You got her locked up.’

‘I’m trying to get her out.’

Lance spits a gob of phlegm near my shoe.

‘I saw you yesterday,’ I tell him. ‘You were outside the Crown Court. I didn’t have you pegged as a neo-Nazi thug.’

‘I’m a patriot.’

‘The last refuge of the scoundrel.’

Lance doesn’t understand the reference. ‘You know nothing about me.’

‘That’s where you’re wrong. You left school at sixteen and signed to play football for Burnleigh, but a knee injury ended your career. Two years ago you were arrested and deported from Croatia after a World Cup qualifier. Seven months ago you bashed a Pakistani student because you saw him kissing a white girl. You’re a thug, Lance. And you’re a racist. I know you’re angry. You’re pissed off that you couldn’t protect your sisters from your father. You’re angry at yourself because you didn’t stand up to him, the bully, the abuser. But what frightens you most, Lance, is the nagging little voice in your ear that keeps saying you’re just like him.’

Blood rises. Fingers close into fists.

‘I’m nothing like my father.’

For a moment I think he’s going to hit me, but the car window glides down. Sienna’s eyes have a strangely androgynous cast. White headphones are plugged into her ears, leaking a tinny hiss.

‘We need to talk,’ I say.

She nods her head to the beat of the music. ‘I’m sick of talking.’

‘I still have questions.’

‘Nothing matters any more.’ Her voice is flat, almost devoid of emotion.

The window is gliding up. Unless I say something now, I’ll lose the opportunity.

‘I have a message from Charlie.’

The window stops. Sienna pulls the earphones from her ears. ‘Is she OK?’

‘She misses you.’

‘I miss her too.’ Her tongue flicks out and withdraws, moistening her bottom lip. ‘Tell her I’m sorry.’

‘You could tell her yourself.’

Sienna pushes the earbuds back into place, flooding her mind with music. The window glides to a close.

Helen Hegarty has finished saying her goodbyes. The compassion and sympathy have worn her down and I can almost see her mask slipping as she pushes Zoe’s wheelchair towards the car. She wants this day to finish.

‘I was hoping I might drop round to the house . . . to talk to Sienna.’

‘She’s only home for a few hours.’

‘I know.’

Helen glances at the limousine and sighs, ‘She won’t talk to me. Maybe she’ll talk to you.’

I help Zoe into the car, lifting her easily. She puts her arms around my neck, holding me tightly, making it easier for me to carry her. She sits alongside Sienna, taking her hand. Sienna doesn’t react.

Having folded the wheelchair and placed it in the boot, I watch the limousine being driven away, stunned by how much misfortune can befall one family. A crippled daughter. A slain father. A racist son. A child charged with murder. There is no truth in the cliché that luck evens itself out. Maybe in games of chance, but not in real life.

An arm slips through mine, hooking around my elbow. It is such a familiar touch that I expect to see Julianne.

‘I’m so sorry about last night,’ says Annie Robinson. ‘I shouldn’t have turned up like that. I don’t know what I was thinking.’

‘It’s not your fault.’

‘You didn’t call me.’

‘I didn’t call a lot of people.’

‘You’re angry.’

‘It’s been a difficult few days.’

She brushes her cheek against mine. ‘Come and see me. I’ll show you the photograph of Gordon and Novak Bennan.’

Helen Hegarty unlatches the front door and I follow her through to a kitchen that smells of sugar and citrus peel. She is making jam. Saucepans bubble on the stove and sterilised jars rest upside down on dishcloths on the table.

The steam has straightened strands of her hair, which are plastered to her forehead. She wipes her hands and glances at the ceiling. ‘Sienna is upstairs. She’s packing some things.’

‘You’re on your own?’

‘Zoe and Lance have gone into town.’

I climb the stairs and tap gently on Sienna’s bedroom door.

‘Don’t come in,’ she says, sounding startled.

‘It’s me.’

‘Can you come back later?’

‘No. I’ll wait.’

Pressing my ear to the door panel, I hear drawers being closed and a window opening.

‘I really don’t want to talk to you today.’

‘Why?’

‘I’m not feeling well.’

‘I’m sorry to hear that. Let’s talk about it.’

‘I’m getting changed. Won’t be a minute.’

The door eventually opens and Sienna spins away from me, crawling on to her bed and sitting against the wall, drawing up her knees and tugging her dark skirt tight over them. The room is tidier than I remember. The bloodstained rug has gone and the floorboards have been scrubbed clean.

Walking to the window, I glance outside, wondering if someone might have been with her. The garden is below. Sienna used to brag to Charlie about climbing out the window and shimmying down the rainwater pipe while her parents thought she was studying upstairs. A gnarled cherry tree has been cut back so its branches don’t scrape against the wall.

‘It must have been tough today.’

Her shoulders rise and fall.

‘You thought he might come, didn’t you?’

She doesn’t answer.

‘Mr Ellis was never going to come, Sienna. He says you made it all up.’

No answer.

‘Now he’s complained to the school that you’ve been harassing him. He wants you suspended.’

Sienna tilts her face and glares at me. ‘I don’t believe you.’

Behind her head I notice a torn strip of wallpaper curling like a roll of parchment. Beneath is an older layer with nursery rhyme characters. Little Bo Peep is visibly searching for her lost flock.

‘I don’t want to fight with you, Sienna. I just want to understand. ’