I SEE YOU an unputdownable psychological thriller with a breathtaking twist by PATRICIA MACDONALD (fb2 epub reader .TXT) 📕

in the normally sunny room. She was staring out the window, though it was really too dark to see anything but shadows.

‘Babe,’ he said.

Hannah did not turn around. If it had not been for the bandages wrapped around her head, Adam would have wondered if perhaps he was in the wrong place, if this woman sitting in the gloom was someone other than his wife. But Sydney did not hesitate. She cried out and rushed over to the wheelchair and tried to clamber up onto Hannah’s lap.

‘Sydney, no. Stop that,’ Adam exhorted her. ‘Mom’s had a lot of stitches.’

Now that he had reached her, Adam could see that, though she said nothing, despair was written on Hannah’s face. She did not cry out at the child making herself comfortable in her lap. She grimaced but wound her arms protectively around Sydney.

‘How’s my girl?’ she whispered.

‘I miss you,’ said Sydney.

‘I miss you too. But Pop says you’re staying with Miss Kiyanna and Mr Frank. Is it fun staying there?’

The child nodded sadly.

‘You like them, don’t you? Kiyanna and Frank are nice, aren’t they darlin’?’ Adam asked the child gently.

‘I want Mom,’ she insisted. ‘And you, Pop.’

Hannah looked up at her husband, puzzled. ‘Where are you staying?’

‘I’ve been sleeping here,’ he said. ‘They let me have a bed so I would be here when you woke up.’

Hannah reached out and clutched his warm, familiar hand. ‘I should have known,’ she said.

‘Tell you what,’ said Adam to Sydney. ‘Why don’t you come over here and sit? I brought this so you could watch a story. You want me to put Clifford on?’ he asked, referring to the series of books and videos about a Big Red Dog that Sydney enjoyed. He pulled a small-screen DVD player from his pocket. ‘You can watch Clifford while I talk to Mom.’

He tried to lift Sydney off of Hannah’s lap but she began to kick and cry out, ‘No. I won’t.’

‘Don’t kick, sweetheart,’ said Hannah. ‘It hurts.’

Sydney put a pudgy hand up to Hannah’s cheek. ‘Sorry,’ she said woefully.

‘It’s OK. You go look at your story. Everything’s OK. I’m right here. I won’t leave. Go on now.’

Reluctantly the child obeyed, and allowed herself to be stationed in the corner of a nearby sofa, the small screen clutched in her hands.

Adam came back and sat down beside Hannah.

He looked worriedly at his wife. ‘What’s the matter, babe? You looked better when I saw you earlier this afternoon. Did something happen?’

Hannah nodded. ‘Yes. I spoke to the police,’ she said.

‘How did that go?’

Hannah looked back out at the darkening day. ‘They had a surveillance video of the accident.’

‘If you can call it an accident,’ Adam observed grimly.

‘Right,’ she said faintly.

‘Did you . . . did they ask you to look at it?’

Hannah nodded. ‘I looked at it.’

‘No wonder you’re shook up,’ he said. ‘I’m sure that had to be traumatic just seeing it unfold when you’re helpless to stop it.’

‘That’s not why,’ she said.

Adam frowned. ‘Why, then?’

‘The person who pushed me was on the tape. They kept referring to my attacker as “the guy in the hoody”. But I was able to see the face . . . Just for a second.’

‘And . . . ?’

Hannah turned her head and looked her husband squarely in the face. ‘The police asked me if I recognized him. On the off-chance this attack might not have been random. I said that I didn’t have any idea who he was.’

Adam did not reply but looked at her and felt himself dreading what she was going to say next.

‘That was a lie, Adam. I only saw her face for a second, wearing dark glasses, her hair covered up. But it didn’t matter. It was her.’

‘Jesus,’ he breathed. ‘Are you sure?’

‘I’d know her anywhere.’ Hannah gazed at him hopelessly. ‘My own daughter pushed me in front of that train.’

Adam hung his head. ‘Oh, God.’

‘How am I supposed to live with that?’ she said.

‘Oh my God. I don’t know,’ he said. They were silent for a minute. He clutched her hand, which lay limp and unresponsive in his. Sydney, who was lying across the lounge on a sofa, laughed out loud at something on her screen.

Adam sighed. ‘This means she found us. She must have seen the YouTube clip. And figured it out from there.’

‘Apparently,’ said Hannah. ‘She must have been watching us. Waiting.’

‘Did you tell them anything? The police?’

Hannah looked at him bleakly. ‘No. How could I? You and I are fugitives. Kidnappers.’

‘I know,’ he said.

‘She must have been watching the house,’ said Hannah. ‘She must have followed me to the subway.’

‘I suppose so,’ said Adam.

‘You haven’t been back there, have you? To the house?’

Adam shook his head. ‘As I said, I’ve been sleeping here. And Sydney’s been at Kiyanna’s.’

Hannah nodded and sat clutching the arms of her wheelchair, staring out into the night descending on the Philadelphia skyline. ‘You can’t go back there.’

‘What do you mean?’

‘To the house. You have to avoid the house.’ She glanced over at Sydney, who was lying on her back, enjoying the show on her screen. For a moment her gaze softened. Then, she pressed her lips together in a determined line. ‘I’ve been thinking, ever since I saw that surveillance tape.’

‘Thinking what?’ he asked warily.

‘My being in the hospital. This is an opportunity.’

‘An opportunity for what?’ he asked.

Hannah reached over and grasped his hand. She looked at him earnestly. ‘Adam, Lisa doesn’t know how my recovery is going. She knows I’m here, obviously. She put me here. And it’s been on the news. All she has to do is call the hospital to check on my condition. They wouldn’t let her speak to me, of course, but