Runaway Girl by Casey Watson

Author:Casey Watson
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: HarperCollins Publishers
Published: 2016-07-31T04:00:00+00:00

I didn’t. I looked everywhere I could imagine Adrianna could conceivably be waiting for me. I checked Muffins, the main reception and the A&E reception. I checked the little place with the vending machines round the corner from A&E. I checked the coffee bar that was on the far side of the main reception, plus the newsagents, the WRVS shop and the paved area outside that sternly said ‘No Smoking’ but where, late at night, I knew patients sneaked down and smoked nevertheless. Then I walked out to the car park, hoping that by some miracle she’d be out there, wandering around, looking for my car.

She wasn’t. So when I reached it I clicked the remote and opened it, slung my bag on the driver’s seat and ferretted about in it for my mobile.

Mike’s phone rang several times before he answered, and I used the time to keep scanning the car park.

‘What’s up, love?’ he said, sounding concerned. I generally tried not to phone him at work.

‘It’s Adrianna,’ I told him. ‘She’s disappeared.’

‘What? How could she disappear?’

‘That was precisely my question.’

‘What – from the ward? I thought you’d arranged a time to pick her up?’

‘I had. And they said she’d gone off to get dressed, ready. And then – pfft! – she disappeared.’

‘You sure you’ve checked everywhere? Sure you didn’t miss each other on one of those corridors?’

‘No. At least, I don’t think so. Why would she even leave before I got there? The plan was that I’d come up to the ward and fetch her, wasn’t it?’

‘So maybe she got confused …’

‘I don’t know, Mike. I just have this feeling …’

‘What feeling?’

‘I don’t know. I just don’t think she would have done that. She’d have waited for me. Why would she wander off on her own?’

‘Assuming she has. Couldn’t she just be in the toilet or something?’

I explained about the knitting woman, who’d been pretty clear that Adrianna had gone off to the disabled toilet to get dressed. ‘And never came back again,’ I finished.

‘Because she then went straight down to meet you,’ he said. ‘That makes sense. That’ll be it. Perhaps she got it wrong. Why don’t you go back to reception and ask them?’

‘I suppose,’ I said. ‘I’ll do that. Oh, but Mike, why do I have such a bad feeling about this?’

‘I have no idea,’ he said. ‘Why do you?’

‘I don’t know. I just do. She’s not stupid. Why on earth would she go rattling round the hospital?’

‘I have no idea,’ he said again. ‘To grab a coffee? To make a phone call?’

‘She doesn’t have any money.’ And as I said that, the thought soothed me. But the feeling was only momentary. I didn’t actually know that at all, did I? ‘I’ll go back in,’ I told Mike. ‘Have another rootle around.’

‘Okay,’ he said. ‘Keep me posted. Don’t worry, love. You’ll find her.’

‘I hope so,’ I said when I rang off.

I didn’t.

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