** For authors notes, disclaimer etc. see chapter 1
Ghost Writer –11/?
"Robbie you drive." Jean sighed throwing him the keys to her estate car which had already been loaded with everything they needed to take with them.
"Ok are you sure? You know where…." Robbie began before Laura nudged him firmly and shook her head as Jean got into the back of the door and closed the door apparently not having heard a word he said.
"Just drive Robbie when we stop for lunch she'll probably take over, she needs some time to collect her thoughts." She said quietly as James nodded.
"She's right Robbie." He agreed glancing into the car where Jean was sitting, her seatbelt already on, staring into space. "Laura you get into the front with Robbie I'll get in the back with her. We need to stop her dwelling too much I she starts to shut off we've no hope she's our link to the farm if she stops talking we're screwed and she's at this nutters mercy and I for one won't let that happen."
"Let's get on the road." Robbie sighed as the others opened the doors of the car and he paused to look at his friend the anger he had already been feeling multiplying as he did. The previous twenty four hours had ben relentless in their on-going horror for her and he was even more determined than ever that they should get to the bottom of whatever it was and give her back her life whatever that took.
"Jean how did your grandparents end up living at the farm? Was it ever a working farm when they were there?" Laura asked when they had been driving in silence for twenty minutes and the city was almost behind them.
"Huh? Oh yeah the farm." Jean sighed straightening up in the seat trying to pull her thoughts together as James reached across the gap between them and laced his fingers with hers. "No it was never a working farm when they lived there. They bought it after my mother and my aunt moved out. My grandfather bred canneries they wanted somewhere he'd have more space to do it on a bigger scale when he retired. They bought the farm house because it came with three outbuildings, the surrounding fields that used to be crop fields had been sold off to a neighbouring farmer for grazing land."
"It sounds wonderful, so you and your sister spent summers there?" James picked up. He knew what Laura was trying to do. If they could get Jean to just talk about her time there something might come out that she hadn't realised she remembered.
"Yeah my parents both worked, when the schools broke up for the summer they dropped us off and we stayed with them. I love it, some of the happiest times of my life when I was a child were there. My grandfather and I had always been close and I used to help with the birds. Paula tolerated it but she would always have rather stayed at home. She hated leaving her friends but within a week she'd fall back in with her group of friends in the village and it was great. Then when she started dating Joe Watson it was like a death in the family every time we had to leave again. We'd get home and for a couple of weeks it would be letters every day then she'd go back to school and fall for some new boy there. Paula was never short of attention and she'd forget about Joe until the next summer then it would all start again."
"But you never had a boyfriend at the farm at the farm you said last night. I know you were younger but didn't you want to find someone down there?" Robbie asked glancing in the rear view mirror as he did noting the fact that they seemed to be being followed by a small white can. Switching lanes he slowed down a little trying not to alert the others as the van stayed in the lane they had been in and passed them. Breathing a sigh of relief he scolded himself for being so easily rattled as Jean laughed at his question.
"Robbie not only was I the youngest but Paula always got more attention and it didn't bother me. Summers for me where about spending time with my grandfather, the friends we had there and trying to read as much as possible. I was determined at that age to go to university then change the world. The last thing I was thinking about was dating." She smiled as James looked at her contemplatively.
"Just because you weren't interested doesn't mean someone wasn't interested in you though, we've seen the photos and not just the one's he's been sending but the ones you had last night too. You were just as beautiful then as you are now I can't imagine anyone who was in your company not falling for you." He finally said ignoring Robbie's teasing about how she was already sleeping with him he could drop the charm offensive.
"He has a point Jean, maybe there was someone who liked you that you turned down, or who admired you, maybe even loved you, from a distance?" Laura agreed as silence fell again and Jean thought through what they'd said. She'd been over and over it all in her mind when they'd had a similar conversation the previous night and she still couldn't think of anything or anyone that fitted the bill.
"There's no one I can think of and if there was someone quietly lurking in the background they were doing it extremely quietly because I didn't pick up on it."
"Yeah well considering the boy wonder there was besotted with you for years and you didn't notice we'll not put too much store in your ability to pick up on the signs of unrequited love." Robbie laughed trying to keep the atmosphere light as he scanned the road the uneasiness he'd been feeling earlier returning as he was sure he saw the same white van a couple of cars behind them. "What about the student who helped your grandfather out. McCrea was that his name?"
"He was 19 by the last year we were there I wasn't even 16 yet when my Pappy died and the farm was shut up. He was friendly but I don't think he ever saw either of us as anything but kids. He wasn't even around much that final summer because even before Joe's parents split they were having trouble and his dad really fell apart. Pappy sent him over there two days a week to help Mrs Watson out, then there were some rumours that the farm wasn't the only thing he was helping her with and he left the village. Nick wasn't interested in me, he thought of me as a little sister, Paula too, his romantic interests seemed to lie elsewhere but I don't believe that either I told you it was only a couple of years later that he came out and told his parents and friends he was gay and he's been happy ever since."
"That just leaves the twins what where they called?" James asked as Laura tried to take in all the new information she was hearing. Not having been there on the previous evening there was a lot of new names flying around and she wasn't sure she'd ever get them straight in her head.
"Peter and Mathew Baker, I don't know, I doubt it I mean I suppose it's possible but…"
"We're being followed." Robbie interrupted as they turned off the motorway onto one of the smaller A roads and he watched the white van swerve out of traffic to follow.
"What? Where?" James snapped turning in his seat as Jean did the same gripping his hand a little tighter.
"That white van has been on our tail since we left Oxford. I changed lanes earlier and he bolted but within ten minutes he was behind us again." Robbie replied his eyes darting from one side of the road to the other as he finally spotted the turn off to a small side street up ahead. Speeding up and heading straight for it he gripped the steering wheel a little tighter. "Hold on tight I'm going to try to lose him."
"Robbie be careful!" Laura said quietly as they reached the turn off he veered suddenly off the wheels screeching in objection as they heard the van skid as the driver tried to follow them causing the traffic behind to stop in a chorus of squealing breaks and blaring horns.
"Bastard! He's still behind us Robbie." James shouted as they headed down the road that was actually turning into some sort of winding country lane that made speed dangerous. "We've got to either lose him or isolate him so we can find out who the hell he is."
"Yeah I know I have an idea." Robbie replied as he saw the perfect place to head next and said a silent prayer that they could make it without hitting another car or wrapping their car around a tree in the process.
