Deep Water

by Mark Ayre

  Deep Water

  An Abbie King Thriller

  Mark Ayre

  AFS Publishing

  To dad

  For always being the first person to buy my books (and sometimes also the last)

  Contents

  Get a Free Copy of Crossfire

  By Mark Ayre

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  Chapter 35

  Chapter 36

  Abbie King Returns…

  Get exclusive Abbie King material

  Thank you for reading

  The Abbie King Thrillers

  About the Author

  Get a Free Copy of Crossfire

  Meet Abbie King.

  Pick up your free copy of Crossfire, an Abbie King prequel novella, when you join the Mark Ayre Readers’ Group.

  Get your copy at: http://markay.re/readersgroup

  SUMMARY

  Meet Abbie King.

  A single-minded, ruthless defender of the innocent, Abbie is unable to turn her back on someone in need.

  So when Abbie takes a late-night stroll and spies two men breaking into a bungalow, she follows them inside and saves the young homeowner’s life.

  Abbie believes this will be the end of her involvement. But actions have consequences. And Abbie's interference soon gets her caught in the crossfire between a corrupt businesswoman and a deadly gang responsible for multiple armed robberies.

  The stakes are high. Abbie was never supposed to become involved in this particular battle. But now that she has, she'll see it through to the end.

  Even if it kills her…

  Get your free copy of Crossfire at: http://markay.re/readersgroup

  By Mark Ayre

  Abbie King Thrillers

  Crossfire (novella)

  The Stranger

  Deep Water

  Miss No One

  The Hide and Seek Trilogy

  Hide and Seek

  Count to Ten

  Ready or Not

  Adam and Eve Thrillers:

  Fire and Smoke

  Lost and Found

  Cat and Mouse

  Lock and Key

  Cloak and Shield

  Hope in Hell

  James Perry Mysteries

  The Black Sheep’s Shadow

  All Your Secrets

  Standalone

  Poor Choices

  One

  Heart pounding, lungs straining, Abbie woke from her nightmare at exactly midnight. Blackout blinds rendered the darkness in her room almost complete. Regardless, Abbie closed her eyes as she took control of her breathing and allowed her heart to settle. As best she could, she pushed the latest stranger’s face from her mind.

  Without looking, Abbie reached out and clicked on the bedside lamp. The soft glow revealed her battered and bruised copy of The Stand, the phone her employer had given her, and the phone she should not have had. The illicit phone she collected, unlocked, checked. No new texts. Weakness had her rereading the last message.

  Looking forward to it. Good night. x

  Locking the phone, closing her eyes again, Abbie used meditative breathing to control her emotions, to stop anger taking over and convincing her to smash both phones, and possibly the lamp, into so many pieces beneath her hands and her heels.

  Life wasn’t fair. There was no time to dwell on that fact. The face Abbie had tried to push away returned, bold and clear. The frightened eyes and blood matted hair blotted out all else.

  Abbie rose from bed and went to shower.

  Another stranger had less than forty-eight hours to live.

  It was time to go to work.

  Five hours and one strong black coffee later, Abbie parked in a deserted concrete strip carpark that overlooked a narrow beach and vast ocean. The air was sharp, cold. The first breath hurt, but after that, each deep draw was invigorating, offering an energy boost and decluttering the mind. The sound of the sea lapping the sand helped. Like white noise. The squark of numerous seagulls, the sight of them soaring over the water, sand, land, would have topped off the experience. Alas, two hours before sunrise, the birds were sleeping. Only wind swept across the sky.

  Below Abbie, on the beach, a little to the west: voices. Unlike with seagulls, you could always guarantee some segment of humankind would be awake, regardless of the hour or conditions.

  Past experience said Abbie's fastest route to the stranger of her dream was to find people, to go looking for trouble. If this town was anything like the others, trouble would be easy to find.

  Crossing the carpark, Abbie descended a set of narrow stone steps onto the sand. Luckily she was here for business rather than pleasure. The cold, wet winter had packed the sand tight. In the darkness of pre-dawn, Abbie might have mistaken the surface for concrete had she not known where she stood. Building castles and digging holes would be out of the question. Fine by Abbie. It would be easier to run or fight on the hard surface than on fluffy, shifting sand. Abbie suspected it would not be long before she was required to undertake at least one of these activities. That expectation, too, came from past experience.

  Looking west, Abbie spied silhouettes lying, sitting and standing in the sand, about a quarter-mile from where she stood. A few miles further than that, the beach ended with a rock face, atop which stood a large house not quite big enough to be called a mansion; large enough to be considered a severe eyesore for anyone who lived in the homes just north of this section of south coast.

  Crossing the sand, keeping close to the wall which rose up to actual concrete, Abbie approached the dying embers of a party that must have kicked off almost twelve hours previously. Beer cans and cigarette stubs littered the beach. At its height, as many as fifty young people, ranging from their mid-teens to mid-twenties, must have crammed onto this small section of sand, breaking curfews and numerous public order and decency laws. In the last couple of hours, most party-goers would have sloped off to warm beds, alone or with temporary or permanent partners. Only the dregs remained. Those who had passed out, or who were still too drunk to notice the cold or care the numbers had dwindled, and those who had found themselves unable to wait to become intimate and were content to do so on the sand, rather than at their parents' houses or in a hotel or car.

  Approaching what remained of the previous night's festivities, Abbie's heart panged. It always did in the presence of young people enjoying a responsibility-free youth. It was not that Abbie wished she could have spent more time getting drunk and making bad decisions on a cold, wet beach; she mourned the loss of her freedom, her baby, her younger sister. Deplorable members of humankind had taken all three from Abbie during the latter years of her adolescence.

  She grew closer. The party-goers became distinguishable as more than human shapes. Abbie saw three passed out drunks, splayed like dead bodies on the hard sand, and two shameless couples performing acts that would have given Abbie's mother a heart attack had she been around to s
ee them. A group of three guys chucked a can of beer in a circle, laughing and jeering when one of their number missed or dropped the can and flinched in expectation of an explosion which never came. What remained was a group of five—two girls, three boys. They noticed Abbie when she was ten feet away. One of them, a scrawny teenager with greasy, shoulder-length hair and a flat nose, rose as she approached and moved to block her path.

  "Hey, girl," he said. "How you doing?"

  His expression was supposed to be seductive or alluring. It made him look simple. Abbie wondered if he knew he was parroting the catchphrase of Joey from Friends but didn't care to ask. Ignoring his question, she examined again those who surrounded her. She couldn't see that any of them offered the trouble she sought, but she had followed the people. Never before had doing so steered her wrong.

  "Man, you deaf or what?" Greasy Hair continued.

  "First girl, now man," said Abbie. "Aside from switching gender, it's interesting you would go with those two rather than girl and boy, or woman and man. Does that say more about you or society? What do you reckon?"

  Greasy opened his mouth, changing his look from simple to gormless. He had no idea what to say. It didn't appear he had been able to process Abbie's comments.

  "You're young," said Abbie. "Some advice for when meeting new people in future: guess a gender, then go with something a bit more respectful. Mr or Sir; Ma'am or Miss. Adjust if they offer a title or name. This'll seriously improve people's first impressions of you. You've probably heard how important those are."

  The guy stuttered a little, half turned to the group from which he had hailed, then twisted back to Abbie. Even in the dark, it was clear he was blushing. Looking at the group, Abbie noted it comprised two couples. The four individuals were each a few years older than Greasy. When Abbie shamed their odd-man-out, they snickered. They enjoyed his discomfort.

  Guilt entered Abbie's system. Her prophetic dreams, which revealed someone who would soon be dead without her intervention, never put Abbie in a good mood. In this instance, an exceptionally long journey and the need to cancel her second date in five years (and first attempt to add a dusting of normality into her bizarre and miserable life) had further soured Abbie's disposition, which was never that sunny in the first place.

  Seeing the laughter of Greasy's companions and his obvious discomfort and embarrassment, Abbie took a breath. She reminded herself he was a kid who, as yet, had done nothing to indicate he deserved anything other than cordiality. Besides calling her girl, then man.

  "Rather than formal titles," she said, "why don't you call me Abbie?"

  "Abbie?" he said. Following her previous diatribe, Greasy clearly expected another cruel trick designed to embarrass him.

  "That's right," Abbie said. "It's my name. I assume you have one? Your parents probably gave it you. Why don't you tell me?"

  "Um, Charlie?"

  "Are you sure?"

  He nodded. Suddenly Abbie felt like a teacher, and him a nervous student, afraid of getting into trouble but unsure how to handle one on one kindness.

  "Okay," she said. "Lovely to meet you, Charlie. Now I think an exchange of facts might be in order. We each say something interesting about ourselves, then consider the ice broken. I'll go first." She cleared her throat. "I'm secretly a mega Busted fan. You know the boyband from the mid-2000s? I'm obsessed. Most people find that surprising. They expect my guilty pleasure to be something nasty like kicking puppies or being a lawyer."

  Charlie was staring. Abbie was obviously out of practice at making people feel comfortable because the boy looked utterly lost. When Abbie took a step towards him, he flinched.

  Pressing on regardless, Abbie said, "Your turn."

  "I'm… I'm…" Charlie's eyes widened. Abbie saw he had forgotten every detail about himself. If she'd asked for his surname, he would have had to call his mother to find out.

  "Can I guess?" she said. Closing the space between them, she lowered her voice, cutting the duo of couples from the conversation.

  Speech now seemingly beyond him, Charlie nodded.

  "Hitting on women doesn't come naturally to you. You've never felt cool, nor been part of the in-crowd. However, the foursome over there are cool, and for some reason you can't fathom, they want to hang with you. That's great if you can get over the teasing, right? You're the constant butt of their jokes, but at least you're part of the gang. Anyway, you've seen the chance to prove you're as cool as them. You spot a woman twelve years your senior. You think she's attractive; hot, even—thanks, by the way. You think, wouldn't it be impressive if I hit on her? That will make these cool cats respect me. Great idea. You stand and hit me with some line that's so not you, and that, of course, is where it falls apart. Because, and here's a good saying, something to remember, things always fall apart when we try to be someone other than ourselves."

  Charlie stared. His face showed first confusion, then resentment. That was okay. Abbie hadn't expected him to take her words well. She expected him to lie to himself and her. To reject her comments with something nearing anger.

  He didn't disappoint.

  "You don't know," he said. "They're my friends. We all make fun of each other—"

  "Save it," said Abbie, raising a hand. "Advice is free, follow up discussion costs two hundred pounds an hour. Now, a question for you—"

  "Get lost," said Charlie.

  Before he could storm off, Abbie put an arm around his shoulders and turned him from his so-called friends.

  As Abbie's hand squeezed his shoulder, as her hip pressed against his side, Charlie's breath caught in his throat. He flushed as though Abbie had ripped open his shirt and thrown him into a bed. Charlie clearly had little experience with the opposite sex.

  Ignoring his reaction, Abbie pointed up the beach, further west, towards the eyesore house. About twenty yards from where they stood, the smooth wall that marked the beach's end became uneven rock. Another twenty years along, the jagged rock seemed to split, creating an opening almost a metre wide. What sounded like a human cry had drawn Abbie's attention to this crack.

  "That hole in the rock," she said, pointing. "How deep does it go? Scale of zero to ten. Zero being groping couple grazing elbows; ten, a near-endless tunnel leading directly into hell. Or Australia."

  Charlie followed Abbie's finger to the rock. Behind him, Abbie saw members of the foursome shifting. Okay then. She was onto something.

  "It's nothing," he said, his tone and eyes revealing it was everything.

  Abbie gave his shoulder a comforting squeeze; lowered her voice a little further.

  "If something is going on which makes you uncomfortable, now's the time to speak up. Whatever it is, I can help."

  As their eyes met, Abbie saw Charlie's desire to escape the situation in which he had somehow mired himself. That did not mean she would be able to persuade him to speak.

  "Whatever it is," Abbie repeated, "I've dealt with something like it. Opening up to me won't get you in trouble. It's the smart play."

  "Who are you?" he whispered. He tried to stuff authority into his voice, but he was frightened. Abbie wasn't fooled. Nor would a toddler have been.

  "I was just a stranger, passing through," Abbie lied. "Now I'm an interested bystander, wondering if I need to change into my guardian angel costume. I think you'd like it; it has wings."

  Charlie stared. Back to not knowing what to say. Abbie gave his shoulder a final squeeze.

  "I heard a yell. Is someone in danger? You don't need to say anything. We can go old school code. Blink once for yes, twice for no."

  Still, Charlie said nothing. He did shake his head. Abbie sighed.

  "What part of the blinking code confused you? Its simplicity is what's made it such an enduring system." Abbie raised a hand. "Doesn't matter. I think you're lying. I'll be disappointed if my journey to yonder crack reveals you're complicit in some nefarious activity. Last chance to give me something useful."

  Abbie didn't wait long. In the boy's eye
s, his posture, his expression, she had already learned all she needed to. Charlie would not willingly give her anything of use.

  "Lovely to meet you," she said. "Final thoughts; consider the company you keep, stop trying to impress others before you've worked out how to be content with yourself, and, most importantly, wash your hair more than once a fortnight. In the battle to get a nice young lady to date you, personal hygiene is your first and most important weapon."

  There was more shifting behind. Without looking, Abbie knew two of the foursome had moved from bums to feet. Without hearing Abbie and Charlie's conversation, they suspected what was going on. Patting Charlie on the back, already knowing what would happen next, Abbie stepped away from the teenager in the direction of the crack.

  Within three seconds, a guy said, "Hey." Abbie didn't quicken her step. Five seconds later, a woman was walking on her right, a man on her left. Both were in their mid-twenties.

  "How's it going?" said the guy.

  Abbie said nothing. Did nothing except resist the urge to roll her eyes. Was this guy honestly going the false small talk route? Why not jump straight to tackling her and be done with it? At least that would give Abbie an excuse to fight back.