Disappeared: MANTEQUERO BOOK 2 by Jenny Twist Page B

visit their village in February?
    Alison answered as best she could, except for the last one, of course. She said it was a holiday for schools in England and she felt she needed to brush up on her Spanish.
    After a while, the barman, who was called Rafa, Alison discovered, came to join them, bringing with him a whole carafe of wine and a huge plate of bread, cheese and ham, which Heather attacked with gusto.
    The evening began to settle into an atmosphere of almost maudlin’ bonhomie - one old chap leapt to his feet and burst into a particularly mournful flamenco song and the rest clapped and stamped their feet. Alison joined in with the rest of them, although she wasn’t particularly fond of flamenco singing, preferring the guitar playing and dancing.
    It was several hours later when somebody said he’d better be going and that seemed to act as a signal for the rest of them. People reluctantly scraped their chairs away from the table and got up to leave, pulling their coat collars up against the cold night air.
    “Wait a minute,” Rafa said, “Who is going to the top barrio? You, José, and you, Paco. You’d better walk these girls home.”
    “No, really, we’re all right,” Alison protested, but Rafa silenced her. “Nobody is all right,” he said, “and especially not your fat friend. Get her indoors and make sure you lock all the windows and doors. And do not open them for anyone, anyone at all, until the sun comes up.”
    Alison felt a thrill of fear. These are just superstitious peasants, she told herself. There’s nothing to be afraid of. But, even so, as they walked back up the street, accompanied by the reluctant José and Paco, she found herself looking over her shoulder all the time and seeing things in the shadows. There was very little street lighting and it was easy to imagine things flitting about just on the edge of her vision. Twice she thought she saw a young man with a wide-brimmed hat, carrying a bag. But when she looked again there was nothing there.
    She kept hearing things as well. A man’s voice calling, “Juno, where are you? Beautiful, my beautiful goddess, where are you?”
    And over and over again, “Beautiful, so beautiful.”
    She was glad when they got to the house and she bid goodnight to their reluctant chaperones and closed the door on the disturbing night.
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     

IV
     
    Alison slept fitfully. She kept thinking she could hear someone scrabbling at the window and once or twice she was convinced she saw a face peering in. It’s my imagination, she told herself - a tree outside with its branches rubbing against the glass. Moonlight in the branches forming a pattern that looks like a face. But she didn’t – quite – believe it.
    The older part of her brain, the part that knew nothing of logic, knew there was someone out there trying to get in - someone scratching on the window-pane. And, right on the edge of her hearing, she could hear a voice calling, “Let me in, Juno. Let me in.”
    By the small hours she had reached such a state of panic that she was ready to run from the room. She lay on the bed, filled with pent-up energy and fired up ready to go. She had a vivid memory of lying in her room as a child, knowing that something was under the bed and that if she could just get to her parents’ room she would be safe. But it was a long way across to the bedroom door and it would catch her before she could escape.
    She felt like that now. If she could just get to Heather’s room, be with another human being, everything would be all right.
    She tried to persuade herself that she stayed where she was because of her iron will and strength of character, but really it was because she suspected that whatever it was out there had already got into the room, was waiting for her to move, waiting to pounce.
    When she finally slept, it was to dream of running down dark, cobbled, twisting streets, pursued by a man wearing a big hat, calling after her.