‘THEY CALLED HER GONE GIRL’

“It just went from one nightmare to the next”
- DENISE

Some days the joy of watching their 14-month-old daughter Olivia discover the brilliant colours in a blossoming flower or notice the trilling of a nearby bird nearly overwhelms parents Denise Huskins and Aaron Quinn, enveloping them in what Denise calls “our happy little bubble”. Other days something as mundane as seeing a security-surveillance camera can trigger panic, giving them an unwelcome feeling of being watched. And they both know that one day they will have to tell their daughter the shocking story of what happened to her parents before she was born: how they were attacked and terrorised in a bizarre kidnapping plot – then accused by authorities of making it all up. “When I was kidnapped, I didn’t know if I was going to live to see another day,” remembers Denise. “I just wanted to go back to my life. And then to have people attacking you on social media, the whole Gone Girl label – a whole persona was placed on me that had nothing to do with who I am.” Adds Aaron, “With PTSD and therapy, it gets easier. But it doesn’t ever really get easy.” Now the pair are telling their heartrending story in the new book , exclusively excerpted here. From the first terrifying moments of their ordeal on March 23, 2015 – when they were awakened around 3am in Aaron’s Vallejo, California home, bound with zip ties, drugged and blindfolded in what they were told was a well-organised, coordinated