Claire Moss - Then You Were Gone

Could you leave the one you love?

Mack was that guy, the one who had it all. The looks, the charm and that twinkle in his clear blue eyes. Yet, after those first few moments of meeting him, Simone just knew he was the one. Four days ago, Mack told Simone he loved her – and then disappeared without a trace.

Now Simone is forced to question everything she ever knew about Mack – and whether it was all a lie. Determined to find him before the trail goes cold, she’ll do anything to uncover the truth. But how do you find someone who doesn’t want to be found?

And what if his secret is best left buried…

Then You Were Gone

Claire Moss

Copyright

HQ

An imprint of HarperCollins Publishers Ltd.

1 London Bridge Street

London SE1 9GF

First published in Great Britain by HQ in 2015

Copyright © Claire Moss 2015

Claire Moss asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work.

A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.

This novel is entirely a work of fiction. The names, characters and incidents portrayed in it are the work of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or localities is entirely coincidental.

All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins.

E-book Edition © June 2015 ISBN: 9781474036474

Version date: 2018-09-20

Claire Mosswas born in Darlington, north-east England, in 1977.

She has worked with books and the written word all her adult life as a bookseller, librarian and novelist. Having always been an avid reader of popular fiction, she struggled to find women’s fiction set in the north and containing characters concerned with issues other than beauty and credit cards. Eventually she decided she would have to write it herself. Then You Were Gone is her third such novel.

Claire Moss is married and lives in North Yorkshire with her husband and two young children.

Many people have helped this book become what it is. I would particularly like to thank Victoria Oundjian, Charlotte Mursell and all at HQ Digital for superb editorial feedback and an excellent cover. Also Eve White, all at Thirsk Write Now and everyone else I have bothered. Lastly to all of my lovely family and friends for their support.

For Andrew

Contents

Cover

Blurb

Title Page

Copyright

Author Bio

Acknowledgement

Dedication

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

Excerpt

Endpages

About the Publisher

Chapter One

Sane people do not call the police because their boyfriend has not texted them for four days. And Simone was pretty certain she was still sane. She also knew that it was probably best not to call the police even if the boyfriend was not answering your phone calls or emails. She did not know if he would answer the door to her as she had not gone as far as calling round to his flat to test him out.

She knew what a sane person would say, if a less-than-sane friend asked their opinion on this situation. She knew what she would say if anyone, sane or otherwise, asked her opinion. She would tell them that people sometimes avoid other people because that is easier than telling them the truth. People sometimes avoid other people even when they are in a relationship with that person, because they are in too deep, or they get scared, or they change their mind, or get a better offer. Grown adults, particularly ones who live alone and often work alone, sometimes need time to themselves and they should not have to justify that need to anyone. Even their girlfriend, if they have one, and if both parties are one hundred percent agreed that she is definitely his girlfriend.

So it was possible Mack was avoiding her. It was likely , from a dispassionate point of view, that he was avoiding her; that was what any other sane person would tell her was happening if she had been feeling sane enough to ask them their opinion.

But this was Mack. This was her and Mack. He would not play games with her, any more than she would with him. Simone was sure of it. But she was sure in such a way that she still did not feel able to go round to his flat, just in case she did find him peering round the curtains with his back pressed to the wall trying to pretend to be at the newsagents. Or, worse, she might find him there with someone else, someone younger and prettier, someone with perfectly plucked eyebrows and highlighted hair, someone more his usual type.

Simone tapped her nails against the back of her phone. It was Saturday morning and she had not seen Mack since Monday evening. He had met her from work and they had gone to see a band at Scala. Mack had been quiet, drinking a bit more than usual, talking a lot less than usual and once the band had finished he had rushed off home without inviting Simone to come back with him. She had known the band would not be his sort of thing – fiddles and foot stamping and clear-voiced, shaggy-haired female singers – but she had dragged him along to many similar gigs in the past and he had always put on some kind of pretence that he was finding the experience tolerable. She could have invited him back to her place, but she did not. A man in a mood is best left to come out of it in his own way. She had learned that, if nothing else, over the years.

And then on Tuesday he had texted her to cancel their planned meal out on Friday. He was away for work until Thursday, which she knew to be true, but now the tone of his absence had shifted away from ‘miss you’ and ‘can’t wait to see you again’ towards ‘not sure when I’ll get back, might be too tired to come over’. He would cancel the restaurant, the text said, and be in touch before the weekend. And then, at the end of the message, there it was. The thunderbolt. The reason Simone was seriously considering calling the police – or at least seriously considering the possibility of seriously considering calling the police. For at the end of the message, Mack had written, I love you x .

It was the first time either of them had said anything like that to each other. And a man like Mack – Simone was fairly sure she knew what kind of a man Mack was – would not have said that, or anything like that, as a throwaway line, a place-holder to keep her on-side until he returned from whatever tryst he was headed off to. And she was sure – nearly sure – that he would not have said that and then immediately disappeared from her life. At least not on purpose.