The Missing Woman: Utterly gripping psychological suspense with heart-thumping twists Read online

  The Missing Woman

  Utterly gripping psychological suspense with heart-thumping twists

  Georgina Cross

  Books by Georgina Cross

  The Stepdaughter

  The Missing Woman

  Available in audio

  The Stepdaughter (available in the UK and in the US)

  Contents

  Prologue

  I. Present

  1. Erica

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Facebook Group Post

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Facebook Group Post

  Chapter 12

  Facebook Group Post

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Facebook Group Post

  Chapter 15

  Facebook Group Post

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Facebook Group Post

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  II. Twenty-Five Years Ago

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  III. Present

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Facebook Group Post

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  IV. Two weeks earlier

  Chapter 34

  Chapter 35

  Chapter 36

  V. Present

  Chapter 37

  Chapter 38

  VI. Two weeks earlier

  39. Sabine

  VII. Present

  Chapter 40

  Chapter 41

  Chapter 42

  Chapter 43

  Chapter 44

  Chapter 45

  The Stepdaughter

  Hear More from Georgina

  Books by Georgina Cross

  A Letter from Georgina

  Acknowledgments

  To my mom, dad, and sister.

  We’re the four Pilgrims.

  Prologue

  “Sabine!” The voice screams after me, a menacing threat hollering through the woods.

  Branches tear at my arms, their sharp points ripping at my clothes and hair. If I stop to look at my body, I’ll see blood.

  But I can’t stop, can’t worry about the slashes in my skin because they’re getting close—too close. They’ll find me. They’ll strike me down and then…

  My heart hammers against my ribs, my tongue dry, until all I can taste is fear. I lunge forward but it’s hard to see in the dark.

  Another branch whacks my face, a painful slice to my cheek, and I twist around, stumbling, the ground rising and falling beneath my feet, every root threatening to upend me.

  I slam into something hard—my ankle smashing against rock, a horrible crack, and I catapult forward, my body hurling through the air until I’m splayed flat on my stomach, my hands skidding through wet leaves and dirt gathering beneath my fingernails. A cry pitches from my mouth.

  But that’s not the only sound. Branches crack in the distance. The heavy footsteps of whoever’s coming after me.

  Somewhere above the trees, fireworks. I used to think fireworks were so pretty…

  Get up! Stand! I scream at myself, struggling to rise to my feet. Fear is taking hold, exhaustion too, and my frantic breathing fills my ears. But I need to keep going.

  Find help. Move forward. Save yourself, Sabine. My thoughts repeat inside my head.

  Another look up at the night sky.

  You are not going to die in the dark.

  Part One

  Present

  One

  Erica

  Saturday, the pool

  There they sit. On one side of the neighborhood pool, Sabine and her crew with their monogrammed towels and teal tumblers with initials emblazoned on the sides. Hers reads SLM for Sabine Lorelei Miller, on the off chance someone could accidentally pick up her wine spritzer. Everything monogrammed: the calling card of Southern women.

  It’s hard not to notice the three women lying side by side on their lounge chairs wearing matching green sun visors, their hair pulled back into ponytails: Monica’s hair jet-black; Sabine, a honey-blonde; and Carol, a natural redhead. Even their personalities have corresponding hair colors.

  Their street is called Honors Row. Not my street, theirs. We live in the same neighborhood but orbit in entirely different circles. Those other women, as we call them. They’re beautiful, everything I look up to. And I used to want to be like them, to have their money and happiness, to live and laugh and play, enjoying perfect marriages. But not anymore.

  My daughter closes the pool gate behind me, a metal clang that hits sharply against the post and my gaze snaps away from Sabine and back to the present, my family’s Fourth of July celebration at the pool.

  Our group squeezes onto the patio: me and my two kids, hot and sweaty from dragging our bags across the asphalt parking lot, and my best friend Tish with her five-year-old son, Charlie. Charlie’s cheeks are blotchy pink from the heat with his arms shoved into a pair of swim floaties.

  “Erica, grab this, will you?” Tish asks me, off-loading one of the kids’ pool noodles so she can readjust her grip on the rolling cooler. One of the wheels is turned sideways against the pavement and I make a mental note to replace the cooler soon.

  Jostling the noodle under my arm, I feel it slip, my hands loaded down with three canvas bags and car keys dangling from my fingertips, and nudge the noodle in the direction of my eleven-year-old daughter. Lydia takes it without saying a word; she’s too busy scanning the pool for friends.

  I look too. The pool is packed and who can blame everyone for coming out? There’s a reason why July in Huntsville, Alabama is called Hell’s Front Porch. Situated at the base of the Appalachian Mountains, our neighborhood takes shelter in the shadow of Monte Sano at night, our homes stretched across the sweeping valley. But during the day, and especially during the summer, nothing but heat.

  Blinding sun beams off the concrete, the water glaring an electric blue, and I bob my head once to let my sunglasses drop from my forehead to cover my eyes. The oversized thermometer on the clubhouse wall shows the temperature holding steady at a heatstroke-inducing ninety-five degrees. It’s five o’clock. Three more hours until sunset.

  The main reason we’re here is the fireworks show tonight. The July Fourth holiday where we can stay at the pool and watch Roman candles dazzle the night sky, our faces tilted upwards as we clap and cheer. Every year, our neighborhood pulls out all the stops and this summer will be no different. The fireworks are said to be bigger than the last spectacle with everyone invited to the party—so long as you’ve paid your membership dues. The membership fees, I admit, I’ve spent months saving up for.

  A group of children line up to have their faces painted. They’re donning American flag swimsuits and holding popsicles melting in the sun. The clubhouse manager strolls past wearing a blue-and-white sundress and she calls out, “Happy July Fourth!” as we tell her the same.

  Everyone is so cheerful and I know I’ll remember this moment. A freeze frame in time before the fireworks fill the sky.

  Tish walks ahead, her long blonde hair hiked in
a messy bun, tiny wisps curling around her forehead. We follow, and so begins the process for us to find a place to sit. A table would be best, lounge chairs even better, but so late in the day and with the fireworks show scheduled for this evening, we’ll settle for a single chair if we’re lucky.

  Halfway around the deck, sweat is dripping behind my ears and Taylor, my youngest daughter, who’s seven, pulls at her ponytail that’s slick against her head. Our flip-flops beat a rhythmic rubber thwacking sound across the concrete as we move steadily through the crowd.

  Tish side-steps a crying child, swim diaper ready to bust. A man sunscreens his son from head to toe, the kid puffing out his cheeks to hold his breath. Music pumps from the club speakers, surround sound blasting a Today’s Hits playlist while kids shoot down the water slide, each child hollering louder than the last as mothers at the bottom scoop away their paddling toddlers.

  Tish spots a solitary chair and she rushes over, plunking down her bags as if planting a flag. I hurry to throw my stuff down too before surveying our area, the four by six patch of concrete we’ve commandeered for ourselves. More sweat pools along my hairline, and I reach back, twisting the knot at my neck tighter.

  Another look at the towels littered at our feet. One chair. Five people.

  But Tish is on the move. She’s spotted a seat a family doesn’t appear to be using anymore and asks in the polite voice I’ve heard her use during countless budget meetings at work if we can have it. The woman says yes, without so much as looking up from her magazine.

  Tish drags the chair over. “Beer me,” she says.

  With a grin, I pull two Blue Moons from the cooler and slip them into koozies, tossing the twist caps into my bag as we take long, deep sips. But before us, our brood is growing antsy, ready to bolt, and I set aside the bottle and hand Tish a can of SPF 50.

  We go to town, coating our children with sunscreen, paying extra attention to the tender skin below their eyes, especially Charlie’s freckly nose. Lydia insists on doing her own and carefully runs a sunscreen stick up and down her face with the precision of someone who has been experimenting with my makeup at home. She snaps the cap back in place, done.

  Tish and my two kids are close, just as I am with her son, Charlie. She’s practically an aunt to my children, having known them since they were small with Tish being an almost constant fixture in our lives. She and Charlie live just around the corner and come around often. We’re both divorced so we also have that turmoil in common. And we work at the same aerospace and defense contractor, jobs we fell into after years of government proposal work, even though these days, I find I’m growing increasingly bored. Something lately has left me distracted.

  Taylor shimmies to escape my clutches, her arms covered with white-streaked sunscreen I’m attempting to rub in.

  “You’re good,” I tell her and her shoulders relax, but then I apply one more blast to the back of her neck and she shrieks, “Quit it!” with a gap-toothed smile.

  I swat my daughter playfully on the butt and smack the back of Charlie’s legs too. “Get out of here. Go swim,” I laugh.

  The younger two scamper toward the shallow end, water toys clutched in their hands. Lydia runs in search of friends near the diving board.

  And I sit back, letting out my breath, willing for the peace to come. But I didn’t know how short-lived that would be.

  Two

  Sabine Miller stands up. That’s not a big deal, everyone stands up from their chair now and again to go to the bathroom, buy something from the clubhouse café, walk around and talk to friends—but she’s leaving before the fireworks. She’s pulling her white coverup over her shoulders and slipping it down her waist, sliding one foot into her flip-flop and then another, collecting her magazine, drink cup, and car keys before saying something to Monica and Carol. Her friends motion for her to sit back down.

  She gestures to the parking lot and then somewhere in the distance, maybe her home. The women scrunch their faces, but Sabine lifts her cooler as if assuring them she’ll restock their drinks and will be right back. Carol shakes her tumbler—it’s empty—and Monica cracks a joke that makes all three of them laugh.

  Monica and Carol are wearing nearly identical two-pieces, the kind with a twisted bandeau top that shows off their toned stomachs and sculpted arms. They do enough Pilates and walk enough miles around Green Cove to earn their bodies, Sabine too. Most mornings, I see the three of them power walking toward the nature preserve while I’m on my way to work, their ponytails and green visors bobbing in unison. I’m lucky if I can squeeze in a jog on the weekends.

  I look away and plop down beside Tish. She hikes her foot on the chair and frowns at the Dark Raven nail polish that’s chipping on her toes.

  The sun is boiling on our heads and since we aren’t lucky enough to secure an umbrella, the sweat is spreading across my lower back and into the cotton of my coverup, the material sticking to my skin. But I know we’re content to sit for a little while longer. We do this every time—get the kids in the pool first before finishing our beers and jumping in the water.

  A deep-bellied laugh catches my attention and I look up. It’s one of the dads, Tom Humphries, making a cannonball splash in the deep end. Tom sells enough real estate to keep a home on Honors Row, his immaculate front yard awarded the recent Garden of the Month with his wife, Genevieve, responsible for sending the Green Cove newsletter every Sunday with the precision of a schoolteacher. Her latest email announced an increase in homeowner’s dues, the money supposedly essential for maintaining the grounds and all six miles of painted fence. But I’m almost positive it’s paying for the upkeep of the waterfall entrance at Honors Row. Genevieve stretches out on a chair, her perfectly pedicured toes pointing in the sun.

  I also spot Jeff Maddox, my neighbor from two streets over. He’s kneeling at the edge of the pool helping his daughter with her float. When he sees me, he waves awkwardly and I wave awkwardly in return.

  We went on a date once, Jeff and me. It fell flat, the highlight of the night being a shared plate of chicken curry at a local Thai place. Making conversation with Jeff was like trudging through mud. Talking about the weather might have been easier or perhaps lawn care, as I see him cutting his grass every weekend.

  After that, I told Tish, no more dating neighbors. It’s bad enough we might run into each other at the pool but driving past each other or bumping into one another at the grocery store too?

  We started using dating apps instead and with much better success. Tish met someone who lives about twenty minutes away in Harvest. He’s divorced with kids about the same age as Charlie. But he freaked her out recently, talking about second chances and getting remarried. Tish assures me they’re taking it slow. And I’ve just started seeing a guy named Terry. We messaged a little bit last week before going on our first date. I’m hoping we’ll be able to meet up again next weekend. Terry is divorced with no kids and sells software for a tech company. At least he laughs at my jokes which is something Jeff Maddox couldn’t manage to do.

  I hear the bounce of the diving board and it’s Lydia, ready to jump, fingers pinched against her nose with one arm raised above her head. She comes down with a splash and when she surfaces, she spins toward me, her eyes blinking away the water as she smiles. I cheer and Tish looks up, clapping too.

  A shout from across the deep end—it’s Carol. She’s cupping a hand to her mouth and calling to her daughters to, “Flip off the swan!” before reaching for Sabine’s arm and gripping it tightly, insisting she watches before she goes.

  Carol’s daughter hoists her body up and over the swan inflatable before rising to her feet, steadying herself for one moment, two, before pushing off to a front flip, the float shooting behind her and skimming across the water. The girl breaks free to the surface. “Good girl!” Carol shouts, and her youngest daughter scrambles for a turn.

  Monica says something to Sabine which prompts both women to smile at Monica’s sons floating lazily on nearby rafts, nei
ther of them lifting their heads at the commotion. Sabine doesn’t have children.

  Sabine hikes the cooler bag higher on her arm and blows the women a kiss, her wrist showing off a slew of silver bangles, one with a bright blue charm. Sunlight beams off the charm with a flash. Her friends blow a kiss back but it’s rushed. They’re turning their heads to watch the next girl jump.

  Sabine shifts where she stands. She wants to say something, her eyes pinched, lips parting, as if a thought is charging swiftly across her brain. But the moment passes and her face goes still. Her friends are no longer paying attention.

  She looks down at her feet, at the water. Across the pool. Our eyes lock.

  And I catch my breath, my body halting in position. But I don’t look away.

  It’s a coincidence, that’s what it is. I’m in her line of sight. She’s staring at something in the distance, someone standing behind me or the new row of crape myrtles planted behind the gate.