Anna’s mind was thumping out of control as she steered a course from Bromley to Camberwell in the pool car. This time her destination was not The Falconer’s Arms. It was King’s College Hospital, which was less than half a mile away from the derelict pub.
Her beloved Tom had been rushed there five hours ago in an ambulance, having been found badly beaten and unconscious in the street.
After regaining consciousness, he had given them Anna’s number, but the A and E department hadn’t been able to get through to her so they’d contacted MIT.
Walker said that whoever he spoke to at the hospital had told him that Tom was in a bad way. His condition was serious, but thankfully not critical. He hadn’t yet been interviewed by the police and he hadn’t managed to describe what had happened to him.
According to the hospital, he was alone when the ambulance arrived to pick him up, but since waking he had been asking the same question over and over: ‘Where’s Chloe?’
Anna had tried ringing her daughter’s mobile but it kept going to voicemail. She’d got the same response from her home phone and Tom’s too. An icy fear was therefore flooding through her body and her heart fluttered in panic.
‘Please let my baby be all right,’ she kept saying out loud to herself. She couldn’t lose her daughter again.
Before leaving the Rossi house, Anna had instructed Benning and Moore to take Jacob’s parents to the mortuary. And she had asked Walker to pass on Chloe’s description to all units so that they could look out for her.
Now as she drove with the blue light flashing, she tried to rein in her terror and not to assume the worst. But that was easier said than done without knowing the answers to the many questions that were prodding at her brain.
If Chloe wasn’t with Tom, then where was she? And why wasn’t she answering her phone? Had she been by herself all night? Was she also lying injured somewhere?
With her mind in such turmoil, Anna was finding it hard to concentrate on the road, but she needed to because although the night was over there were ongoing disturbances across London. Many streets remained blocked to traffic, while others were made treacherous by broken glass and other debris.
She was forced to avoid East Dulwich because rioters were on the rampage along the busy Lordship Lane. A Co-op convenience store had been looted before being set on fire and a police officer had been repeatedly beaten after he was dragged from his patrol car.
Anna prayed that her daughter hadn’t been caught up in the carnage, and that she was somewhere safe. She was only twelve, after all. Far too young and immature to be by herself at a time like this.
Anna wanted to believe that Tom was asking where Chloe was because he was dazed and confused, not because he didn’t know. Hopefully he’d be more coherent when she got to talk to him and would remember what had happened after he’d picked Chloe up from the house.
If he still didn’t have a clue as to her whereabouts, then Anna’s only option would be to embark on another anxious search for her daughter.