Your Guilty Secret Read online

  Contents

  Lara King Official Website

  Ryans-world.com

  August 26th 2018

  August 23rd 2018

  Ryans-world.com

  August 26th 2018

  August 23rd 2018

  Ryans-world.com

  August 26th 2018

  England, July 2004

  August 23rd 2018

  August 26th 2018

  England, July 2004

  Ryans-world.com

  August 26th 2018

  Ryans-world.com

  August 26th 2018

  August 23rd 2018

  Lara King Official Website

  England, July 2004

  August 26th 2018

  Ryans-world.com

  August 26th 2018

  England, August 2004

  August 23rd 2018

  August 26th 2018

  England, July 2004

  August 23rd 2018

  Ryans-world.com

  August 26th 2018

  England, December 2004

  August 24th 2018

  Ryans-world.com

  August 27th 2018

  England, December 2004

  Ryans-world.com

  August 27th 2018

  England, December 2004

  August 25th 2018

  August 27th 2018

  England, December 2004

  Ryans-world.com

  August 26th 2018

  August 27th 2018

  England, July 2004

  Ryans-world.com

  August 27th 2018

  England, December 2004

  August 26th 2018

  Ryans-world.com

  August 27th 2018

  London, December 2004

  August 26th 2018

  August 27th 2018

  London, December 2004

  Ryans-world.com

  La Times Online – Breaking News: Body Found

  August 29th 2018

  Lara King Official Website

  England, December 2004

  Ryans-world.com

  August 31st 2018

  Ryans-world.com

  September 1st 2018

  Ryans-world.com

  September 2nd 2018

  Ryans-world.com

  September 3rd 2018

  Ryans-world.com

  September 3rd 2018

  Ryans-world.com

  September 6th 2018

  Ryans-world.com

  September 6th 2018

  September 6th 2018

  Ryans-world.com

  September 6th 2018

  Carys Lockwood. Interview with the LA Times

  Nicknacksays.com

  Acknowledgements

  About the Author

  Copyright

  Asia Mackay. To many more years

  of friendship and laughter . . .

  Lara King Official Website

  Status: Unpublished

  August 26th 2018

  1500hrs

  Now is your chance. Grab it whilst you can. Take a long look at my face. I hope I am how you imagined. I can’t shoulder the burden of your disappointment. Not today. So, let’s start with my skin. Is it as flawless as it looks on those pages? My hair – the shine – I try hard with that, although I suspect right now it might be looking matted and lifeless.

  Lara? Lara? Over here! Look this way!

  I know. You’ve rarely seen me like this. I’m normally dressed so beautifully. My hair blow-dried, my make-up perfect. I’m sure you know already, that even if I’m going for the au naturel look it takes a lot of preparation. Day in, day out. Normally I call the shots. But after everything that’s happened today, I need to be told what to do. Conor had had to ring me, just before the press conference.

  ‘It’s OK,’ he had said. ‘Listen to me, Lara. I’m handling the media. But for now, do as I say. I’ve asked Lily to bring everything you need.’ And so I had done as I was told. Lily arrived soon after, with a change of clothes for me.

  We had been led to the back of the police station into a room with three wooden chairs and a pine-coloured table. There was a mirrored wall too. It crossed my mind I was being watched. But then again, I was always being watched. I had taken off my workout gear and put on a pair of jeans, fingers unable to grasp the buttons.

  ‘Here.’ Lily had squeezed my hands. ‘Stop. Let me.’ She had pulled tight my waistband but then I saw her hands were trembling too. Lily, who could handle anything. I then shook out my hair and took off the remnants of my make-up with a cleansing wipe. It was at this point I was barely able to breathe, sweat trailing down my face. We had walked out together, Lily and I, side by side.

  And now, it’s time. I watch you, necks stretched high, camera phones tracking my face. Please. Don’t judge. Just listen carefully to what I am about to tell you.

  I know you’ll care. You’ve always taken mine and my daughter’s lives in your hands, and your hearts. Most of you anyway. Some of you dismiss me. You might pretend you’ve never seen any of our reality shows or clothes ranges. Dissected mine and Matthew’s pap shots in the showbiz pages. ‘Lara King? She’s famous for nothing.’ That’s where you are wrong.

  Before I go any further, I need to say something to you all. I’m still getting to grips with the fact that this is my reality, but I hope you realise this is true life too. That the lines between fact and fiction are no longer blurred. That this is not a show piece for the glossies. It’s not some new storyline for the latest television show I may be appearing in.

  I watch the trail of lights, immortalising the image of me in cyberspace. A montage for you to watch, on repeat. Record. Click. Upload. ‘Look who we saw today!’ you might write. ‘Much prettier on camera.’ Or perhaps you’ll be kind. Say how pretty I am in the flesh. And you might even remark that you are surprised I’m quite tall. Most of us are shorter in real life. And so it goes on. Of course you’ll probably assume – just like everybody else that is walking past – that the world’s media have been called here today because I’ve got a new product to launch. A perfume, perhaps. Notes of jasmine. Something citrus. Fresh and light.

  But then you’ll peer closer, and as the sun stings your eyes, you’ll just about be able to see the redness around my lower lids, my hands shaking as I grip the microphone. And then you’ll see Matthew next to me, that familiar blond hair and green eyes, his tanned arm behind my back and you’ll be comforted by his presence – after all, you’ve welcomed him from Australia so generously. You’d be awed even. A gasp. A hand gripped around your friend’s arm. ‘Oh my God. Look who it is. Oh my God.’

  But then you’ll wonder what on earth is going on. You might even be a little frightened when you see my face. It’s at this point I think of Ava’s nanny, Joan. How am I going to tell her what’s happened? The sag of her features as I detail the events of the day. The way she will push back the curls behind her ear, softly, as though her hair might break if she touches it too hard. And then, the things she will say to me afterwards.

  I watch as the police usher you all away as we’re about to start. I see you at first bewildered and then angry, as though you have a right to my life. Which, I suppose, you do. Or parts of it, anyway.

  And so it begins.

  Silence other than the rasp of my breath and the click-click of cameras. A magnified screech, as my lips touch the cold metal.

  ‘Hello.’ I clear my throat. ‘Hello. Thank you. For being here.’

  I watch you on the pavement, heads turned towards me. You know something is wrong now, I can see it in your faces. But savour this moment because you don’t know, just yet, quite how bad things are going to get. Or how your daily lives will be wholly consumed with what’s happened. Yes, and I mean al
l of you. None of you across the globe will be immune, no matter how you try.

  I’m so thankful for those I know will help out. My cheerleaders. But then the memories of today start unfolding in my mind, clawing and strangling my brain. And as the world around me sharpens into an almost unbearably bright Technicolor light, I lift my face to you.

  Are you ready?

  Today, I need you to put yourselves in my shoes. I want you to imagine what I’m going through. Shut your eyes if it helps. Careful, though. You might want to steady yourselves.

  Today, I need you to see me for who I really am.

  A mother. A human being. A person with flaws.

  Today, I’m not the Lara King that you think I am.

  Ryans-world.com

  Entry: August 26th, 1600hrs

  Author: Ryan

  Guys, I’m here. Right near the spot where she disappeared. Well, as close as we’re allowed. The forensics, they’ve taped off an entire area. They’re on their hands and knees sweeping up tyre tracks and it’s looking like something out of the Burning Man Festival. I’m standing about three yards from the Sky News van. You might even be able to see me if you switch on the TV now. I’m wearing a white T-shirt. Denim cut-offs. I’m waving. See me? Look closely, because I’m not sure you’ll be able to hear much of the report. The noise, you see. The helicopters with heat-seeking equipment, flying over the canyon droning in and out of earshot.

  There are dogs too, sniffing around for little Ava King. I saw them in the distance, over by the police cars. Their noses were pressed into a small pink cardigan and then they were ushered out into the rocks. ‘Go. Find her, Cyrus,’ I heard one policewoman yell. I saw her fingers, crossed tight behind her back.

  They’ll be sniffing out a sweet scent, I reckon. Almonds and coconut milk. She looks like she’d smell like that, doesn’t she? Pure and perfect and so innocent. Although I have to keep reminding myself that I don’t know actually know her IRL.

  They’re really working those animals, though. They’re crawling around the place, going down the ravines, under rocks, mouths foaming white in the heat. The police are scraping the ground with sticks, shouting her name and you have to think that if she’s got lost around here, they’ve ploughed enough resources into giving her the best hope of being found.

  Everyone’s here too. The public, I mean. Like, thousands and thousands of people. Already. It’s fucking crazy and the media vans, they keep screeching up along the road, clanking around to see where they can set up their big satellite dishes, and who can slick on their frosted pink lipstick the fastest.

  We’re all suffocating with the heat but people are giving out free bottles of water and sandwiches and stuff. ‘Feeding the five thousand.’ That’s what I heard one person say.

  The most screwed-up thing is that I reckon when she disappeared there was no one around. For miles and miles. It’s endless here. Some of the view obscured by trees and bushes. I’m looking down now at all the shrubs, a patchwork of grey, brown and green. Six years old and all alone. Her heart must be going batshit in her little chest.

  All this shouting and screaming isn’t gonna be of any use though, not if someone’s taken her. She won’t be anywhere near here. That’s what I heard the Sky News woman say. Apparently Lara reported hearing a car drive off.

  Women, men, children, they’re all weeping, shouting, ‘Ava, Ava.’ Flies buzz all over the place, their thick black bodies pressing themselves right in my ear. But I’m sure she’s OK. She said so, didn’t she? Lara. She said in her press conference that she was sure her little girl was fine. That she was clinging on to hope. It’s weird, cos they don’t look like they think she’s fine. They’ve blocked all the roads and I heard some detective shouting about the interstate. Three hours he was saying. If we don’t find her in three hours.

  Then what? I wanted to shout. Then what?

  Anyway, they want me to speak! On camera! Imagine that. Me, the school geek always behind my computer and now I’m racking up traffic like a shit-storm and I’m going to be on live TV! Holy shitaake!

  OK, so guys, I’m going to be your number one destination throughout the investigation. Check here first for all the latest and I promise you, I’ll be here with all the exclusives. You all know how much I love Lara and Ava. I’m devastated but I’ll do my best to be a good gatekeeper.

  Anyway, gotta drink some water. My mouth is so dry. Be right back after. Tune in.

  Here with the latest updates on missing Ava King, brought to you by Lara and Ava King’s number one fan.

  Twitter: @ryan_gosling_wannabe

  August 26th 2018

  1530hrs

  What would you do if your child disappeared into thin air? I mean, what would you really do? You might pound the pavements screaming their name, breath sour with fear. Air escapes you.

  And when you get home, escorted by the police, you might fall into the arms of your husband or wife or a member of your family. Slamming your fists into their chests, your knees dropping to the ground. Pleading. With who, you don’t really know. And then with a renewed vigour and a sense of hope, you’d go out again. Back to where your child disappeared. You’d watch as the police knocked on surrounding doors and took witness notes and because you were there, in the action, you might feel you were doing something. Anything.

  You might consider me for a minute when I tell you that my child has disappeared, yet despite the world’s gaze on me, I have absolutely no control over where I look for her. I cannot open the front door to our home in The Hidden Hills. I cannot press the pattern of small, shiny gold buttons that remotely open the huge iron gates, with the hand-carved wooden sign on it. Los Palisades. I cannot use my thumbprint to access the extra security we had installed.

  If I could, I might for a moment sweep my gaze across the lawns for any sign of her – my eye line darting in and around the uniformly cut grass, the luscious, rare rose blooms spilling down from the clean lines of our house – even though we were miles from where she disappeared. I’d still glance over to the pool – as I always did. A habit I’d been unable to relinquish from before she’d learned to swim. The clench of my stomach just until I reassured myself, two or three times over, that there was no small body, face down in the softly lapping turquoise water.

  I would then race down our cobbled drive, lined with newly buffed cars. I’d curse the palm trees forcing me to weave my way around their silvery trunks. I’d ignore the burn of my lungs. The way my legs would barely be able to hold me up. I’d run, purely because I’d be incapable of driving. Or perhaps it would kick-start my senses afresh. And I’d try and think back to where it had all started, my throat swollen with the catch of my breath.

  I’d try and revisit that moment we’d left the house, water bottles under our arms. Me, in workout gear despite having no intention to exercise. Her in a navy sundress, embroidered rabbits across the collar. Silver Superga trainers. Her face tilted up to mine, scrunched up against the sun.

  ‘Treat day,’ she’d said. ‘Can you believe it? Just you and me.’

  I’d think about this as I tried to remember, left or right? Which way had I manoeuvred the car?

  Had I thought about the paps as I normally did when we left the house? Had I planned my whole route along the backstreets, where they might not be lurking, eyes scanning for my number plate? The way their lenses followed me, like snipers. Or had I just driven aimlessly, enjoying the day panning out ahead of us, with nothing to do. No one to see. Just me and my daughter. But I can’t remember the ins and outs of my thoughts from this morning. If I had known what was going to happen, I’d have taken more care to engage with my inner monologue. To remember the way I’d felt a little impatient as Ava had kicked at the tyres of our car before she’d climbed into the back seat. The slight twist of her front tooth as it pushed its way through her gums.

  I’d have looked carefully at the way her body was formed. The soft roundness of her stomach. The fine, blonde hairs travelling down her tanned
arms.

  But of course, I never thought that today would end up like this. I do, at other times. Think the worst. Catastrophise. But there was something so perfect about the way today had been panning out. Just me and her. A special treat. Ice cream. It was the first day in a long while I’d felt able to breathe.

  That in itself should have been the first sign of things to come.

  It was Detective Mcgraw who sat me down in the police station and told me that he was driving me straight home and that I had to stay indoors. Those green eyes of his, continuously locked onto one focal point a fraction above my right shoulder. White face, a fine tracing of freckles smudged across his top lip.

  ‘I need to be out there though. Looking for her. She’s my daughter. Please. There must be a way?’

  ‘I know. And I’m sorry. We can’t risk hampering the investigation. Thousands of people are out there, looking. And so we need you to stay inside your house.’

  I knew he was right. That it was for the best. You see, I wanted you to be looking for her, without distraction. Surely I had learned by now – stay out of view in times of trouble. After all, a wrongly placed smile, a casual lift of my eyebrow could set you off, and that’s not what I need right now.

  I’m getting ahead of myself. I suppose I should tell you the things that happened less than six hours earlier. Just after we had pulled out of our drive, sun beating down through the windscreen.

  I’ll tell you as much as I can remember. The same details I told Detective Mcgraw in my oak-panelled study after he’d told me they’d taken my computer and mobile phone. We’d sat, me at my desk with my leather in-trays and stationery drawers all in straight lines in front of me. He was opposite me, in an ergonomic swivel chair that kept twisting from underneath him.

  ‘I’d planned a special day out,’ I told him. ‘Just us. It’s such . . . It was such a beautiful day,’ the words spill out my mouth.

  ‘Any reason for the outing? An occasion, perhaps?’

  ‘Yes. It was my way of saying thank you. For the way Ava behaved for the announcement. Did you see it?’

  ‘I read about it.’

  ‘She had been so good,’ I continued. ‘So I told her that I’d take her out.’