Private London - James Patterson [76]
Hannah shook her head, dragging the back of her right hand across her eyes. Tears streaming down her cheeks.
‘Why would anybody do something like that?’ she asked.
I didn’t reply. I knew exactly why Annabelle Weston had done it. She had taken an already vulnerable young woman and made her even more emotionally wrecked. So she could build her up again and make a tool out of her.
It’s what cults did, it was what oppressive regimes did. Break down a person’s personality, their individuality and mould them into becoming part of a machine.
‘So he never did any of those things?’
‘No,’ I said. ‘You were in a heightened state of suggestion. She led you down a series of thoughts that weren’t your own to a conclusion that was entirely hers.’
‘It was so long ago, I was thirteen. I couldn’t remember exactly, because …’ She trailed off.
‘It’s what she was counting on. You had all those bad feelings because of what had happened to your mother, parts of what had happened on that day you recall. She let you think that the abuse had occurred but you had driven them out of your memory because you couldn’t face them.’
‘It’s called False Memory Syndrome, Hannah,’ said Sam. ‘It’s a form of brainwashing.’
‘She used me.’
The sadness in Hannah’s voice was heartbreaking – or it would have been had I not thought of Chloe.
‘You had deep-seated issues with your father, which she exploited. Abandonment issues, betrayal issues. You had a lot of anger. In your eyes he was responsible for what happened to your mother, after all, and at thirteen years old things can seem very black and white in moral terms.’
‘He was to blame! He refused to pay the ransom. It was peanuts and he did nothing!’
‘He thought he was doing the right thing, Hannah. He hired Jack Morgan,’ I reminded her.
‘Who got there too late!’
‘He saved you.’
‘Maybe I’d have been better off dead.’
‘No, you wouldn’t. Jack Morgan didn’t have the resources back then that we do now. He was on his own.’
‘Then my father should have gone to the police.’
‘Do you know what the statistics of surviving a kidnapping are, even if the ransom is paid?’
Hannah shook her head.
‘They’re not good, Hannah. Your father took the national line: you don’t deal with terrorists.’
‘They weren’t terrorists.’
‘They held a gun to yours and your mother’s heads and threatened to kill you if he didn’t pay the ransom. You got a better word for what they did?’
She looked down at the floor again. Taking it all in. Annabelle Weston had been like a second mother to her. Except that she had been betrayed all over again. She looked up, her face wet with tears once more.
‘I believed her.’
‘I know, Hannah. And she’s going to pay for it, I promise you.’
‘And you always keep your promises!’
‘I try.’
‘You promised to look after me.’
‘And it’s what I’m doing. You have the truth, Hannah. You have that, at least. What you do with it is up to you now.’
Hannah nodded, straightened herself and looked at me with something like determination in her eyes.
‘Okay,’ she said.
Chapter 98
‘THE FIRST TAPE you made you were play-acting, the second time you weren’t. What happened?’
‘Annabelle …’ Hannah caught herself, the name seemingly tasting like ash in her mouth. ‘She kept me at her flat. She came back excited with the news that my father was flying over.’
I nodded. It was pretty much as I had deduced.
‘She made some calls. Soon after that some people came.’
‘Who?’
‘I don’t know. A woman in a burka and two men with her. But they were deferential to the burka woman. They were like bodyguards.’
‘And what did they say?’
‘I don’t know. They all spoke in Arabic. At least, the women did. The men said nothing. Then they tied me up, properly this time, and left me in Annabelle’s study. She didn’t talk to me again.’
‘And there was nothing else you can remember?’
‘When they arrived the women hugged. It was a long hug, not as though they had just met. It seemed more than just a greeting.’
‘Like lovers, you mean?’
Hannah shrugged, pink spots of colour brightening her cheeks. ‘Maybe,’ she