The Face of Clara Morgan: a gripping and chilling psychological suspense thriller Read online

  The Face of Clara Morgan

  J.A. Baker

  Copyright © 2021 J.A. Baker

  The right of J.A. Baker to be identified as the Author of the Work has been asserted by her in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.

  First published in 2021 by Bloodhound Books

  Apart from any use permitted under UK copyright law, this publication may only be reproduced, stored, or transmitted, in any form, or by any means, with prior permission in writing of the publisher or, in the case of reprographic production, in accordance with the terms of licences issued by the Copyright Licensing Agency.

  All characters in this publication are fictitious and any resemblance to real persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.

  www.bloodhoundbooks.com

  * * *

  Print ISBN 978-1-914614-10-1

  Contents

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  Prologue

  The Beginning of the End

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Before the End

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  The End as it Happens

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  Chapter 35

  Chapter 36

  Chapter 37

  Chapter 38

  Chapter 39

  Chapter 40

  Chapter 41

  Chapter 42

  Chapter 43

  The Present – Two months after the End

  Chapter 44

  Chapter 45

  Chapter 46

  Acknowledgements

  A note from the publisher

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  Also by J.A. Baker

  Undercurrent

  The Cleansing

  The Retreat

  The Other Mother

  Finding Eva

  The Uninvited

  The Woman at Number 19

  The Girl I Used To Be

  In The Dying Minutes

  Looking For Leo

  ‘The face is a picture of the mind with the eyes as its interpreter.’

  — Marcus Tullius Cicero

  * * *

  ‘Nothing in the world can be compared to the human face. It is a land one can never tire of exploring.’

  — Carl Theodor Dreyer

  Prologue

  The noise ricochets around the room, silencing everyone. Time passes. An endless stretch of nothingness, the world in a lull.

  His heart thumps, a thick resonant pounding, amplified a hundredfold in his head as it hammers away beneath his breastbone. His breathing roars in his ears, blood gushing through his veins making him hot, restless, dizzy. The room spins. A scream from somewhere behind him cuts through the momentary hush, loud and visceral, followed by a collective gasp and the growing murmurs and whimpers of terrified teenagers. Blood pools beneath the writhing body at his feet.

  Girls cluster in the corner, limbs hooked around one other in a protective ring, heads dipped, limbs rigid with fear. Sobs filter through the tight knot of bodies, low at first before building into a crescendo, each driving the other on. Distress fuelling distress.

  ‘Fuck. Fuck!’ His words echo; eerie and disembodied, cutting through the whispers and groans, cutting through the screams. It’s not his voice, doesn’t even sound like him. And yet it is. There is a distance between his actions and thoughts, a cognitive separation, his primeval reflexes kicking in as he goes through the motions. Some part of his brain is functioning, helping him through this, while his conscious self has backed into a corner, huddling there, numb and frightened, a whole gamut of emotions whirring inside his brain, slotting and spinning – terror, self-preservation, fear and disgust, colliding and crashing.

  He drops the weapon, kicks it away toward the wall and stares at his hands as if they belong to somebody else. Maybe they do. He can’t think straight. Everything is skewed, the world tilting on its axis, time expanding and contracting, reality a slippery thing, dancing away from him, hiding, putting itself out of reach. He tries to grasp at it but it floats and falls, like a stray feather, weightless, too delicate to catch, to be pinned down and held tight.

  No energy. He is suddenly weak, every part of his body sapped of strength, his ability to breathe reflexively an onerous task. The floor sways, sloping and see-sawing. He swallows, rubs at his eyes, takes a juddering breath, swallows again.

  He didn’t mean to do it. Or did he? It was an accident, that’s what he keeps telling himself. Things got out of hand. He had no choice. Look what happened only seconds earlier. They needed to stop this, to get help in this room.

  He needed to stop this.

  A sob escapes. He stifles it with his fingers, the palm of his hand cold against his warm wet mouth. She’s dying. Dear God, she is dying. And now he is dying too, the twitching body at his feet. The bleeding battered body, all life draining out of it as the pool of thick crimson spreads, creeping ever closer to him, almost touching his shoes. He pulls his feet away, revulsion and shock rippling through him. It wasn’t his fault. He had no choice. Something had to be done. Somebody had to take charge.

  The quivering body suddenly becomes still, arms and legs immobile. No more thrashing and squirming. No movement at all. It lies there – eyes closed, lines of fear and confusion etched into its features.

  There’s no escaping from this, no way out of this unholy mess. So many witnesses. So much blood. He can smell it – that metallic tang of damaged flesh. The cloying odour of near death. It’s everywhere – clinging to his clothes, sticking to his skin. He can’t shake it.

  More screaming, a thunderous noise from outside; voices shouting, fists hammering on the door demanding to be let in. The table and chairs jamming it shut rattle and shake; sharp angular noises that cut through his thoughts, jarring his senses, forcing him into the moment. Then people inside throwing things aside, tables scraping, chairs toppling. The door handle being turned. A change of air pressure as the door is flung open.

  The room takes on different dimensions. Fear pinballs through his veins, sparks of terror heating up his cold clammy skin. His stomach roils as he stares down at the lifeless bodies, the spread of sticky blood congealing on the floor, a reminder of what he has done. What they both did.

  He casts his eyes downwards, his gaze moving back to the shotgun. All around him has stilled, the world slowing to a stop as he
shuffles forward and leans down, grabbing at the weapon with trembling hands. It’s the only way. He can’t go to prison for this. He wouldn’t survive in there. He may as well be dead.

  More screams from behind him, next to him, above him as he slumps to the floor and rests the gun against his body, the muzzle nestled under his chin. The cold metal is a release. He shivers and sighs, his eyes flickering as a sense of release pulses through him. This is how it has to be. It’s his only option now. No other way. He’s ready for it, welcomes it even. It’s a way out, a journey to a place of darkness where nothing and nobody matters.

  His vision blurs, his head pounds as he places his finger on the trigger, lets out a deep breath and closes his eyes.

  The Beginning of the End

  1

  Nina knew this was going to happen, could feel it coming. Ever since her baby boy slithered out of her body all those years ago, purple and bruised after a difficult forty-eight-hour labour. Ever since she held his tiny body, swaddled in blankets, his diminutive features scrunched up as he let out an ear-splitting scream that could shatter glass, she knew.

  As well as the all-encompassing love that settled on her like a warm glow as she sat in the delivery room, aching, exhausted, blood still trickling out from between her legs, she felt a twinge of doubt. That overwhelming sense that things were going to be tough, problematic. That the path ahead would be rocky. She was young; full of love for her newborn, yet also so full of fear, of apprehension.

  Fatigue had settled into her bones. If she was allowed to sleep for a hundred years, she couldn’t imagine ever feeling refreshed, back to how she used to be. Her body was different, her mind full of worry. Still is. She once read that a difficult birth is indicative of a difficult child, that one follows the other just as surely as night follows day. The words of that article never left her, always creeping back into her mind during the trying times, the dog-tired times, the days that left her wondering if it was all worth it. All that pain, the bone-aching exhaustion, the endless sleepless nights spent tossing and turning, worrying that something dreadful was going to happen, that he would make it happen. Her boy.

  And now it has.

  Or at least, she thinks it has. Her world is askew; out of sync, a dizzying, sickening shift from normality that only she can sense. She swallows, grips the receiver tightly, perspiration forming on her upper lip. She feels cold, needs to sit down. Just for a second, to rest her aching bones, her muscles that are knotted with worry. The floor is soft beneath her feet, spongy and unstable, the beat of her heart beneath her sweater a heavy pendulum that bangs against her sternum, thump thump thump. It makes her light-headed and queasy, forcing her to take stock and start thinking clearly. She can do that. Or at least she thinks she can.

  ‘Nina? Are you still there?’

  The voice is distant. Disconnected from her reality. She has slipped into another world. A world full of darkness and sharp edges. A world that is cold and unwelcoming.

  She doesn’t want to be here. She wants to turn back time, to not listen to Sally’s voice. She wishes she had never answered the phone. She could pretend that none of this is happening. That life is normal. As normal as it has ever been. Not Sally’s type of normal. She could never achieve that. No, of course she couldn’t, but the sort of normal that she is used to. The sort of normal where the laundry basket is permanently overflowing and her son’s bedroom looks like a bomb has exploded in there. The sort of normal that they as a family have become accustomed to – a house full of noise and movement. A house full of loud voices and unanswered questions. She just wants that back. With all its worries and anxieties and disquietude, the most recent event worsening their lives even further and fragmenting things to shattering point, it is still better than this. Better than feeling sure and yet at the same time, unsure. Better than experiencing a tug of dread at not knowing what may lie ahead.

  The iron sizzles, reminding her that it is still switched on. A drip of water pops out of a hole on the underside and runs down the metal plate, steam hissing as the trickle evaporates leaving a tiny cloud of mist in its wake.

  She leans forward, switches it off, feels the heat of the steel and closes her eyes, wishing she could rewind, be the person she was ten minutes ago. Even scrubbing the kitchen floor, disinfecting the sink, wading through the mountainous pile of ironing that never seems to lessen, is better than this. Anything is better than feeling like this. The uncertainty. The certainty. The anxiety and trepidation. The release of so many years of pent-up worry about her child. It has all come to this point, this jagged knife-edge that is dangling perilously close to her face, repeatedly jabbing at her, reminding her that heartache and terror is never far away.

  ‘Nina, don’t take my word for it. You need to ring the school. I just thought you should be informed, that’s all. I’m trying to get in touch with as many parents as possible. The ones we know, that is. Our little friendship group. Dane might not be caught up in it. I just wanted to keep you in the loop.’

  Might not be caught up in it.

  Those words say it all. The possibility that he could somehow be involved looms large in Nina’s mind. She knows it. Sally knows it. Dane is a law unto himself. Always has been. She has tried to combat his escalating behaviour, his non-conformist ways, but she has been a lone voice whistling in the wind, her wisdom and advice obliterated by the oncoming hurricane. And now it is here, ripping apart their fragile existence. The storm is finally upon them and there is nowhere to hide, no shelter in sight. If she thought yesterday and the day before was bad, this piece of news takes misery and desperation to a whole new level.

  It’s Rob that he listens to. Always has and probably always will. And therein lies the problem. She wonders how many of her so-called friends within that group of tight-knit parents will remain by her side when this all comes out, when it is over and the dust settles and the grisly truth of their tattered life emerges.

  ‘Right,’ she finds herself saying, her voice ethereal and without substance, a solitary sound that ricochets inside her head like a bullet bouncing off stone. ‘I’ll ring them. Ask what’s going on.’

  ‘They’ll probably be busy. Be prepared for a long wait before you get through now that word is getting round.’ Sally pauses, her voice dropping in volume. ‘Nina, as I said, I only rang to keep you updated. I didn’t want you hearing it from somebody else. Please don’t worry. It’s probably something and nothing. I’m your friend. I just thought you should know, that’s all.’

  She’s right. Sally is always right. Always calm and measured. Always one step ahead of the game, able to control things, to keep her little household in order. Everything in shipshape fashion. Her boy won’t be involved in any of this. Sally with her perfect family and well-behaved children. Sally with her wonderful husband and argument-free house. She has never lain awake at night wondering where it all went wrong. How it all went wrong. Who her husband is with, where he is. With a family who toe the line, never questioning her methods or judgement, a quiet peaceful home, a malleable husband and high-flying progeny, Sally has it all.

  Nina sits, takes a deep breath, tells herself to stop it. Her thoughts are uncalled for; ill-timed and judgemental. Her imagination is in overdrive, her nerves frayed. Sally is a good person. A decent human being. Sally is her friend. Nina has a wonderful house, one that many of her friends could only ever dream of owning. But that is all it is; a house, not a home. There is little else to draw people here except its size and sheer magnificence. The absence of love within these walls is a crushing sensation that she feels every single day. The last few days have proved how pointless it all is – the money and status, the widescreen TVs and sleek sports cars. Nina has nothing. She is an empty being, devoid of all the things other people keep stored inside. The things that give people momentum, pushing them forward, giving them the confidence to face each day with a smile on their faces – love, security, ambition. She has none of those.

  ‘Thanks for letting me
know. This is all a bit of a shock, isn’t it?’

  ‘It really is. Not what you expect to hear at all. Thing is, since this new head teacher came along, the kids don’t have their phones with them, so it’s not as if we can even ring them. All the mobiles get put in a locker until break time. Anyway, I’m sure the police have everything in hand.’

  ‘I’m sure they do,’ Nina says, chewing at the side of her mouth, tugging and nibbling until a sharp crack of pain causes her to stop, her vision misting over as an eye-watering ache sets in and a thin oily streak of metallic-tasting fluid fills her mouth.

  ‘I’ll see you later then.’ Sally sounds distant now.

  Nina wonders if she is regretting her actions, wishing she had never made this call. It feels like a warning, a pre-emptive strike. What if Dane is involved? What then? She has no set script in her head, nothing prepared to help her deal with this scenario. She feels lost, alone on a choppy sea with no land in sight. She did this with her actions over the weekend. This is all her fault. She set this thing in motion and now look what has happened. Look what she has done.