by P L Kane
‘Mitch! Mitch, can you hear me? Are you still there?’
Bella’s voice seemed so far away, because he was trying to process what was happening in the bedroom. He could smell something, a strange smell. Smelled a bit like petrol, but it couldn’t—
Lucy had such a weird expression on her face. One he’d seen before somewhere.
Don’t look so confused.
What a shame you had that reaction last night, because I think it would have been pretty special, y’know?
Best night of your life.
You’d have known it was your birthday, all right!
Mitch dropped the phone, just as he heard the words: ‘It’s Mum. She’s been trying to warn me again. You need to get out of there, Mitch. Lucy … You need to get away from Lucy!’
He moved forward, but suddenly felt so much worse. Felt sick but also weak again.
‘The witch, eh?’ said his girlfriend. ‘Well, she’s too late. I never knew why I hated her quite so much until now, or why she didn’t want to go back. Not until the fog lifted this morning. Until I woke up. Really woke up.’
‘Lucy, wha—’
‘You see, I couldn’t really remember anything …’
That was dangerous: Lucy remembered everything.
‘… about where I came from, why they sent me away. Why I was rejected – except I wasn’t. Never really knew what my mission was. I just knew when I met you, I had to look after you.’
‘I don’t—’
‘Understand? You should do, they did it to you too. When you were younger. Planted the seeds … It was so that damned sixth sense of yours didn’t pick up on it, so you wouldn’t suspect. And I do love you, Mitch. Truly I do! That was the real reason why … Oh, it was so hard to let you go, let you go back. But I get it now. I think. Unless …’ She paused. ‘It might have been that final push to make you go, because I wanted you to stay. Or to be there, with you, with them, when it happened. Only I couldn’t. I had to stay here, in case … In a way I’m glad they failed, because I wanted to be the one to do it anyway. Had this need inside me, though I didn’t really know what it was. Thought it might be marriage, a family. But it was our real future, Mitch. I wasn’t rejected, I’m important. And so are you! This is our destiny. It always was.’
‘Mitch? Mitch, talk to me!’ The phone sounding like it was a million miles away, a million years …
Mitch clutched his stomach, groaned loudly.
‘Not feeling so great? That’ll be what I put in your breakfast, in your coffee. I distracted you – in the best possible way – until it had a chance to work.’
‘Work … Lucy, what have you …?’
‘You make me sound like some kind of heartless monster.’
‘I was always the fail-safe, you see. In case things went wrong. You didn’t think we met by accident, did you?’ She laughed. ‘Nothing ever happens by accident. I was drawn to you and—’
Mitch was crawling along the bed, it felt like so much of an effort. ‘Luc … Lucy, please.’
‘Forgive me, I’m savouring the moment too long, aren’t I? Need to get on with it. Might not be your birthday, might not be the hottest day, but it’s close enough. This needs to be done, you do understand, don’t you?’
‘Mitch! Mitch! Answer me!’ Bella! Oh God, Bella … ‘Just wait there, hang on! I’ve rung for the—’
‘It needs to start anew, we need to be reborn. All of his … the true believers.’ Lucy looked insane now, eyes wide, smirking. He’d just about made it to the end of the bed when she brought out the matches, freed one. ‘Then it’ll all be all right. You’ll see. It’ll—’
Mitch used the last of his strength to throw himself off the bed, grabbing Lucy, trying to grab her hands before she could strike that match. But she was so much stronger than him, might even have been without the drugs: fanaticism fuelling her actions now. He was hanging on to her as much as anything, even as she backed off. Backed towards the doorway, out onto the stretch of landing there. It looked for all the world like they were dancing, but not in circles, not round and round mumbling, chanting.
That bit didn’t seem to matter, Lucy just needed to set him alight. Kill him. Then that spark would light the—
Lucy was still stepping back, carrying his weight. He was losing his grasp on her wrists, only holding on now because he knew if he let go, she’d—
Then suddenly Lucy had wrenched free and he was dropping to his knees, totally naked in front of her. Too weak to even get up. Mitch tilted his head, saw her raise the match to strike it. ‘I love you so, so much,’ she told him, taking one last step back.
One too many – because she was tripping on something, falling. Trying to get her footing again, but failing miserably because she was at the top of the stairs. The matches from the box flew into the air, as Lucy fell backwards. Fell back and back. There was a massive thump as she landed.
Then a meow, and Mitch saw why she’d lost her footing. Saw what had tripped her, as Cat strolled over and was about to rub itself against him, then sniffed Mitch and turned her nose up at the smell.
Was extremely good at hunting and …
He just about had enough energy to crawl to the edge of the top step and look over. There she was: Lucy. Although there weren’t a huge number of steps, she’d fallen awkwardly, landed at the base of them, her head twisted in a way it really shouldn’t be, her tongue sticking out of her mouth. Mitch didn’t need to check her pulse to know she was dead. Felt a mixture of emotions: loss, grief, relief.
It was then and only then he heard the sirens, just like the night outside the barn. Heard the sirens as he started to pass out, everything going black. Knew they’d break in, find her, find him. That it was finally, truly over this time. Knew also that when he woke up again, it would definitely be in a new world.
Born again, rising up. From the darkness …
And into the light.
Epilogue
A light.
In the night-time, the darkness. A light in the woods, but not actually in the woods. Somewhere close by, not far away from the clump of trees. The village that had taken this area’s name was ashes now, same as the barn. Not even the rain had stopped it. Nothing left. Ripe for development, which meant that at some point all this might start again. That more might see the wisdom of worshipping the Great Flame.
Denied on this occasion, there would be other opportunities. In time, always in time.
But if anyone had been around that night, they might have been able to trace the light back to its source. Back through the woods, to the cave system. A fire burning deep inside it that some said had been burning since time began and would never burn out. A legend. A myth.
A promise yet to be fulfilled.
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Keep reading for an excerpt from Her Husband’s Grave …
Prologue
He’d been looking for something else when he made the shocking discovery. The grisly, stomach-churning discovery that would change everything …
He had been walking along, here on the beach, looking for treasure no less – buried or otherwise – if you can believe such a thing. And he did, had done all his life. Believed the tales his father had told him about this place when he was young, about the smugglers and the pirates. Loved it when his old man had read Treasure Island to him at bedtime when he was little.
Jeremy Platt had only recently moved back to the area, partly to keep an eye on his ageing dad now that the man’s wife, Jeremy’s mum, had passed away; partly because his own marriage to Alice – who he’d met at college in the nearby town of Mantlethorpe – had fallen apart. Now, here they both were … alone, together.
They’d joke about it sometimes, over a pint in their local, or a game of dominoes, though their laughter would fade quite quickl
y. But at least they had each other, the roles reversed from when Jeremy had been little; now he had to read to his father because of his failing eyesight. Something that had put paid to the old bloke’s hobby of amateur writing, and one of the reasons why he liked to stand at the window with those binoculars, looking out over the sea. Or had done, until a couple of days ago.
Until the heart attack.
Jeremy had been the one to make the discovery then too, calling round early because he couldn’t reach him on the phone; all the while telling himself it was just lines down because of the storm. Instead, finding him collapsed on the floor, phone off the hook after clearly trying to reach it and ring for help. Jeremy had rung for an ambulance instead, straight away. They’d whisked him off to hospital, and there had followed an anxious few hours, waiting to hear the worst.
When the doctor came out and told Jeremy his dad had stabilised, he’d almost hugged the fellow. ‘What he needs now, more than anything, is rest,’ the physician had said to Jeremy, ‘and time to recover.’ He’d been allowed to sit by the bedside, even though Mr Platt Snr was still pretty out of it – wires running in and out of him, like some kind of robot. And Jeremy had cried, watching him, realising just how frail he was for the first time. How he might lose another parent before long.
To be honest, he’d come here today to give himself a break more than anything. The hospital had promised to call if there was any change and he could be back in no time.
So here he was, on said beach, looking for excitement, looking for treasure. Just like his old man had promised. All part of a hobby he’d taken up, something to occupy his time while he looked for – and had failed so far to find – work in the area. So, with what was left over from the redundancy package and his share of the marital savings, he’d treated himself to a metal detector.
Jeremy had often spotted people wandering up and down the sands, sweeping those things from left to right, and thought it looked like fun. Well, you never knew what you might find out there. The guy in the shop, that fellow with the beard and cargo trousers – front pockets bulging, so full Jeremy wondered how he walked without falling over – had done nothing to dissuade him. Had been a self-confessed expert on the subject, happy to give him lots of tips … Not to mention sell him the best detector on the market, or so he claimed: the Equinox 800 with the large coil, perfect for places like beaches.
It had continued to rain off and on since the storm, and that made for perfect conditions as far as detecting was concerned. ‘When everything’s wet,’ the bloke from the shop had told him, ‘it soaks into the ground and helps you spot anything that’s deeper down. Ground’s had a drink, see?’
He’d also advised Jeremy not to be in a rush, to expect lots of trash. ‘Ninety-five per cent of what you’ll find,’ cargo guy had said, simultaneously showing him how to swing the machine – not too fast and not in great arcs, ‘it’ll be junk.’
He hadn’t been wrong. In the months he’d been doing this, Jeremy had found enough bottle-tops to pebbledash a house, old-fashioned keys, the backs of watches, tin cans, safety pins, bits of shiny metal that looked like mirrors …
However, he’d also found enough to encourage him to carry on: toy cars (a couple of which had actually ended up being collectors’ items); an old whistle once (which he hadn’t dared blow, recalling an old ghost story he’d read in his teens); a few lighters; a couple of rings; and, though they weren’t doubloons as such, quite a few pound coins that must have fallen out of wallets, purses or pockets. The point was, he had fun while he was doing it – and at the moment he needed that, needed to take his mind off things. Off his dad lying there in bed looking like C-3PO.
He stopped when the beeping in his earphones intensified. Jeremy stared at the screen in front of him: 12 … 13 … no, 14! A pretty good reading, he thought, pulling the ’phones from his ears to wear them around his neck. Bending and taking out his trowel from his pack, he placed the detector down and began digging in the spot it had indicated. What would it be this time – a gold chain perhaps? Down, down, and further down …
Jeremy stopped when he saw the metal, couldn’t help grinning to himself. The last few bits of sand he dug out with his gloved hands, fingers clawing, eager to see what it was he’d uncovered.
He stopped when he reached it, plucked the item out and held it up in front of him – where it glinted in the early morning sun. His smile faded. ‘Just an old ring-pull,’ he said to himself, the kind you wouldn’t get these days because they were fixed to the lid. Sighing, he bagged it anyway, to stop another hunter from making the same mistake – and to keep those beaches clean, of course. They were a far cry from what they’d been when he was a kid, or indeed when his father had been a boy, and Jeremy wasn’t even sure they deserved the name Golden Sands that had been given them now, their colour dull even when it hadn’t been raining.
But it was as he’d contemplated this that he spotted it. Something in that dull sand, along the beach. Something not that well buried at all, sticking out in fact – just ripe for the taking. He looked around him, the beach deserted – though to be fair you wouldn’t really get many tourists on this stretch of it anyway. They’d stick to the main beach for swimming and so they were closer to the pier and shops. Grabbing his stuff, he clambered to his feet and started over. He couldn’t be sure what it was really, but it was glinting.
It was metal. It was gold … Golden at any rate.
Didn’t even need his detector this time, which was real irony for you. All that sweeping, all that beeping. The closer he got the more he saw of it, some kind of strap … a watchstrap! Looked like it belonged to an expensive one, too. Just a bit of it sticking out, but there it was.
Jeremy got down again, started to uncover the find as he had done with the ring-pull. He hadn’t been digging for long, perhaps only a few seconds, when he pulled back sharply. It was a watchstrap all right, with a watch attached. But there was skin there too.
And a wrist.
Swallowing dryly, he moved forward again. His imagination surely, eyes playing tricks on him. He dug a little more, pulled back again.
There was a hand attached to that wrist. A human hand.
Jeremy hadn’t uncovered much of it, but he could tell now – and though it was at an angle, it looked for all the world like a much dryer version of The Lady in the Lake’s hand reaching up for Excalibur. Except there was no sword to catch. And this was no lady’s hand.
He scrabbled backwards again, felt the bile rising in his mouth. That was a body, no doubt about it – and his mind flashed back to when he and his mum used to bury his dad when they went on the sands (might be burying him for real soon, a little voice whispered and he promptly ignored it). But surely nobody would have done that by accident? Left a relative here, especially in this isolated spot.
Jeremy frowned, then reached into his pocket for his mobile. Began to dial a number.
There you go, that same voice had told him, you wanted excitement. An adventure. He shook his head again, shook those thoughts away too.
‘Yes, hello,’ he said when the ringing at the other end stopped and a voice came on the line. Not asking for an ambulance this time, because it was far too late for that. Instead: ‘Yes, could you give me the police please.’
PART ONE
Golden Sands acquired its name because the first people to settle there were struck by the colour of the beaches. The sands, a vibrant golden shade, remain some of the most impressive and cleanest in Britain. Located on the east coast, not too far from Dracula country and only a hop, skip and a jump from places like Redmarket and Granfield – which is why it remains a popular holiday destination with people who live in those localities – it is a family-orientated town (population of around 12,000, who live there the whole year round … lucky souls!).
For those history buffs among you, Golden Sands was once known as a smugglers’ cove and notorious pirate haunt – you can still ride in the galleon that departs from the harbour at t
welve o’clock, midday, and which will take you all around the bay area. Some also say that Golden Sands got its name because those same smugglers and pirates used to hide their treasure in caves or indeed on the beach itself, which is why it attracts its fair share of divers and treasure hunters, keen to uncover a welcome surprise.
Chapter 1
Why did she put herself through this, time and again?
She had no idea. No, that wasn’t true. She knew exactly why she came here: to learn; to document; to look for hidden clues that might help with future cases. With hunting people like this – those who did so much harm. But that wasn’t the main reason, was it? As Robyn Adams made her way down this corridor, having already gone through the various security checks so far, she thought once more about the why of it. The real reason.
And that reason was to see if she’d been right.
Robyn caught a glimpse of herself in some security glass as the guards escorted her, noting how tired she looked. Her blonde hair, which was streaked through with more and more silver these days, was yanked back into a bun, but that was still doing nothing to stretch and conceal the wrinkles that had appeared over the course of the last couple of years or so. Wrinkles that coincided with taking this job on, not that it was – had ever really been – her real job. More of an extra-curricular activity that the university allowed her to partake in, the kudos they got for having someone like her on their payroll more than compensation enough; all those mentions in the academic papers she had published, those stories in the newspapers. As long as she kept up with her lectures and marking, they were happy enough. And as long as she was helping the police to put away the bad guys, their government funding was also more or less assured.
It had been a total accident, how she’d ended up working for the cops. She’d been at a charity event to raise awareness for cancer research, representing their faculty, and due to her lack of a plus-one had been placed at the table for dinner next to a man who introduced himself only as Gordon, which for most of the evening she’d assumed was his first name rather than his last. He was about ten years older than her, but wore it well, even with the dyed hair – had aged better than she was doing recently, that was for sure – and at first she thought he was trying to chat her up. He’d asked about her work, taking more of an interest than she usually expected people to, especially at an event with free wine.