No Place Like Home Jane Renshaw (best books to read for beginners TXT) 📖

Maybe alone –

Maybe freezing cold and wet and terrified –

And not understanding why Mummin didn’t come.

‘Are you decent?’ said Lewis from behind the door.

‘Yes.’

He came in and made her sit down on the sofa with him, and he put his arm round her and rubbed at her shoulder.

‘The police –’ she got out.

‘On their way.’

They would search for him, wouldn’t they?

A little boy missing would be their very top priority.

They could probably use Evie’s phone to find her. They could track people’s locations using their phones, couldn’t they? Maybe Lewis was right and there was a simple explanation – maybe Evie had taken him for some reason and left Sarah a note but Sarah had been too panicked to see it –

But why would Evie do that? Why leave a note, when she knew that Sarah was right there in the house?

‘Someone – I’ve been thinking... Someone could have got a la-ladder...’ She stuttered on the word – ‘They could have used a ladder to get onto the roof, and pulled it up, and lowered it down into one of the courtyards, and climbed down and got in that way – I often don’t lock the sliding glass doors into the courtyards, which is so stupid, I know, but they’re secure, they’re safe, that’s what I thought. The house is safe...’

It had always felt safe, with its blank outer walls and its internal courtyard gardens, onto which all the rooms faced. A modern take on a Roman villa; that had been her ‘vision’, as Evie called it.

‘I think that’s pretty unlikely, don’t you?’ said Lewis gently.

He was rubbing comforting circles on her shoulder with his thumb, and it felt so nice, but she didn’t want to be comforted. She pulled away from him, and in the same moment the doorbell jangled.

Lewis stood. ‘They’ve made good time. You wait here in the warm, Sarah, and I’ll bring them through.’ He left the room and closed the door behind him.

She sat on the sofa for three seconds.

She couldn’t sit.

She went to the door and opened it and she could hear their voices and smell the drift of wet salty air, and she could hear Lewis saying, ‘....remitting/relapsing delusional disorder. She’s also severely agoraphobic. She’s very confused.’

‘You’re her GP, sir, is that right?’ It was a woman’s brisk voice.

‘Yes. Dr Lewis Gibson – here’s my photocard ID. I’m going to have to authorise an emergency detention, I’m afraid, under Section Two of the Mental Health Act. I’ll come with you to the hospital – to Marnoch Brae. We can do the paperwork there.’

‘And social services?’ This was a man’s voice, deep and calm.

‘Yes, I’ve called them. An AMHP – an approved mental health professional – will meet us there.’

‘Will she require restraint?’

Sarah barrelled into the hall, she barrelled past Lewis, she grabbed the woman in her bulky black uniform and she screamed at her: ‘My eighteen-month-old son is missing! I don’t need you to take me to a hospital! I need you to find my son! My child who’s missing! Who’s been taken!’

From behind her: ‘She doesn’t have a child,’ said Lewis.

Sarah stared into the policewoman’s carefully blank face.

Had she heard that right?

Or had she imagined it?

When she turned, when she rounded on him, when she said ‘What?’ he repeated it, over her head:

‘She doesn’t have a child.’

And now he looked down at her, his handsome face full of sympathy and understanding and pity.

Why was he saying that?

‘Of course I have a child! Lewis! What –’

‘Sarah.’ He reached for her arm but she pulled away, she backed away, she turned to the policewoman.

‘I have an eighteen-month-old son and his name’s Oliver, Oliver Booth, and he’s disappeared! I don’t know why he would say –’

‘All right, Sarah,’ said the woman, finally, looking at Lewis. ‘Does she have shoes?’

Sarah ran.

She ran the other way, into the kitchen, making for the back door, but she could hear them behind her, the policeman saying, ‘This isn’t helping anyone, is it?’ and she felt herself grabbed from behind and then she was smack down on the floor, her face pressed to the wood-effect vinyl, her arms yanked up behind her back, cold metal handcuffs snapping on her wrists.

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From Jane

Thank you very much for reading No Place Like Home.

It was a new challenge for me to write a whole story from a male point of view, but I loved spending time in Bram’s head – he was in touch with his feminine side, which made it a bit easier! This one was tricky for me, though, in terms of plotting, and would never have seen the light of day if it hadn’t been for Brian Lynch’s expert guidance and help with all aspects of the plot.

I must also thank Brian’s colleagues at Inkubator Books for all their work in preparing the book for publication and giving it the best chance of being read out there in the world. Thanks in particular to Sara J. Henry and Shirley Khan for their detailed editing of the manuscript and to Garret Ryan for working his magic on the marketing side.

For encouragement and support of my writing efforts generally, many thanks to my mum Grace and sister Anne, Auntie Witty, cousins Barbara, Catherine, Mary and Morag, and friends Adam and Ali Campbell, Maria Davie, Jocelyn Foster, Abi Grist and Helen Ure. As ever, my writing friends Lesley