House of Shadows by Nicola Cornick Read Free Book Online Page A

sure because there was Flo to console and there were her own fears to fight. The longer Ben was absent, the more those shadows grew like monsters, the fear that Ben would never come back and she would be alone again, totally alone this time, like they had been after their parents had died, only so much worse …
    She fought back the panic. It was important to keep busy. She needed to make breakfast for Flo, then they could both take Bonnie for a walk, and by then Ben would be home …
    But Ben had not come back by lunchtime when Holly drove down to the deli to fetch sandwiches, nor was he back by three when they came back from another walk in the woods with Bonnie. All day Holly had felt her anxiety rising and squashed it down relentlessly, but it grew inside her, filling the empty spaces, filling her mind so she found it almost impossible to concentrate on anything. When she heard a car coming up the track towards the mill she had to restrain herself from running outside to see if it was Ben.
    ‘It’s Mummy!’ Flo had none of Holly’s reticence and had bounded up from the painting they had been doing to rush out of the door, Bonnie at her heels. Holly followed them more slowly. She and her sister-in-law had always had a brittle relationship. Ben had been a link between them, but now he was missing, and Holly felt suddenly wary.
    Tasha, looking as elegant as though she was stepping onto the catwalk, slammed the door of her little red sports car and came hurrying across the gravel on her vertiginously high heels.
    ‘What the fuck is all this about?’ She demanded without preamble, meeting Holly by the gate. ‘I’ve had to come all the way back from Spain! Where is he, the stupid bastard?’
    Holly blinked. Tasha seemed to notice Flo for the first time and bent down to pick her up. ‘Hello darling.’ She held Flo and her sticky painting fingers a little bit away from her. ‘Don’t worry, sweetie, I’m here now.’ She gave Bonnie a vertical pat, designed as much to push her away as greet her. Tasha was not a pet person.
    ‘Let’s go inside,’ Holly said.
    ‘I don’t want to stay,’ Tasha said, taking off her sunglasses and fixing Holly with her big blue eyes. ‘I’m going home to Bristol. I’m not hanging around here waiting for Ben to turn up when he feels like it. Have you got Flo’s bag?’
    ‘It’s not packed,’ Holly said coldly, ‘since you didn’t let me know you were coming.’ She was too exhausted for tact. She and Tasha had never been close; she had tried to like her sister-in-law but it had proved very difficult.
    ‘Sorry.’ To Holly’s surprise Tasha seemed to deflate all of a sudden like a pricked balloon. ‘I really do appreciate you coming down, Holly, and looking after Flo. But I’m just so bloody
angry
! It’s just not on for Ben simply to walk out on all his commitments—’
    ‘Wait.’ Holly put a hand on Tasha’s arm. ‘What do you mean? Surely you don’t think he’s just upped and gone?’
    ‘That’s exactly what I think,’ Tasha said fiercely, scrubbing at her eyes. She pushed the dark glasses firmly back down on her nose. ‘He was spending all his spare time down here. He’s probably got another woman, for all I know.’
    ‘He was doing family history research,’ Holly protested.
    Her sister-in-law gave a look of such searing scorn that she blushed.
    ‘Yeah, and I’m Marilyn Monroe,’ Tasha said.
    ‘I don’t believe it!’ Holly said. She was so outraged she forgot that Flo was listening, taking it all in with her blue eyes wide, so like her mother’s. ‘Hell, Tasha, you
know
Ben would never do a thing like that! He’d certainly never leave Flo alone! And besides, where would he go? He’d never disappear without telling anyone!’
    ‘You mean you think he’d never vanish without telling you,’ Tasha said, a hint of pity in her voice now that set Holly’s teeth on edge. ‘Oh Holly …’ She shook her head. ‘I know you think the two of you are