Welcome To Wherever You Are

by John Marrs

  ‘Where is Matty now?’ Tommy asked Declan softly.

  ‘I put him in our room.’

  ‘Okay, well you come with me to the lounge and I’ll be back in a minute.’

  After leading Declan to the sofa, Tommy made his way up the corridor to remove any trace of Jake from the hostel. He opened a cupboard door and grabbed a roll of plastic bin liners, deciding to hide Jake’s belongings in the alley dumpster for the following day’s collection. Then he would change the booking register so it looked like Jake had checked out midway through the beach party and continued with his travels.

  But as he approached Jake’s room, the normally locked door was ajar.

  CHAPTER 92

  Michael drove the first leg of his journey with Savannah for six hours straight, while she slept by his side in the passenger seat.

  She used the handbag Michael had taken from her room as a pillow, and every so often, he placed two fingers on her wrist to check her pulse or turned the radio off just to hear her breathe – a sound he wasn’t sure he’d ever hear again after she vanished from his life.

  When he’d bundled Savannah into his car, he’d briefly but gently informed her that Jane was a private investigator employed by Savannah’s father to track her down, befriend her and bring her home. Savannah was unsure whether it was that awful information or the sedatives in her bloodstream making her feel queasy. Most people have never been drugged once in their lifetime, she thought, and here she was with two incidents under her belt, each with differing end results.

  A purple and orange patchwork of light began to illuminate the sky as the sun appeared from behind the hills ahead. Michael stretched out his fingers as straight as he could manage. They were healing nicely, he thought, although his orthopaedic hand specialist warned him they might never function as fully as they once did. Michael was grateful his university tutors had shown understanding about the ‘car accident’ that had rendered him useless as a potential surgeon, and for them permitting him to change courses when the following semester began.

  The rush of fresh air coming in through the window finally woke Savannah. She stared at Michael, still in disbelief, like a child meeting Father Christmas.

  ‘It’s really you,’ she croaked. ‘I thought I was dreaming.’

  ‘Drink some water,’ he smiled, and passed her a bottle.

  ‘Where are we going?’

  ‘Well, I figured we could start in Arizona and we can decide from there.’

  Savannah had so many questions, she wasn’t sure where to begin. ‘How did you know where to find me?’

  ‘Girl, you hid yourself well.’

  CHAPTER 93

  Tommy held his breath and nervously opened the door to Jake’s room.

  Inside it was empty of Jake’s belongings, leaving just a stripped bed. Tommy realised Jake must have survived his fall, returned to the hostel before him and cleared out.

  ‘You’re alive,’ thought Tommy, and let out a long sigh of relief. He covered his face with his hands, rubbed his sore eyes and let out a deep breath.

  Tommy had teased Jake for being a neatness freak and always keeping his belongings packed away in his rucksack, but now he understood Jake was preparing for a moment just like this; for when his past and his present collided and he needed to escape them both.

  Tommy’s eyes looked around the room for any trace of Jake and focused on an open locker. From inside, he removed a silver bracelet and a scrap of paper.

  ‘What we are never changes, Tommy,’ it read, ‘but who we are never stops changing. Remember me better than I am. Jake.’

  As much as he hated Stuart Reynolds, a significant part of Tommy was already missing Jake. Now he understood that Stuart’s death wouldn’t have brought him any closer to closure, but Jake Bellamy’s purpose in Tommy’s life was to help set Tommy free. But in doing so, it meant Jake had chosen to keep running, forever trapped in a moment of madness from his past.

  Tommy turned the bracelet over and read the engraving, ‘Don’t look back.’ He wouldn’t, he promised himself. Then he slipped the bracelet onto his wrist to remind himself how one reckless moment can change everything you thought you knew about yourself.

  *

  Twenty minutes after Tommy dialled 911, an ambulance arrived outside the hostel’s entrance to take Matty’s body away to Santa Monica’s UCLA Medical Center.

  Declan followed the stretcher on which his friend’s body lay from their room, along the corridor, down the stairs and into the back of the vehicle.

  Many of the other guests who’d returned from the beach party quickly sobered up at the sight, and stood in a silent line of respect as one of their own embarked on his final journey.

  CHAPTER 94

  Savannah couldn’t take her eyes off Michael as he drove.

  The only thing that looked different about him was a concave scar in the centre of his forehead, and she shuddered when she recalled the sound her father’s mallet had made when it collided with Michael’s skull.

  She listened intently as Michael drove and explained how he’d searched for her everywhere he could think of back in Montgomery, Alabama, but to no avail. Then, just when he was about to reluctantly give up, he received an unexpected email from Savannah’s sister Roseanna.

  He agreed to meet the desperate-sounding girl in a busy shopping centre where she tearfully revealed everything she knew about the whereabouts of her sister in Los Angeles, gleaned from flirting with one of her father’s young assistants. The boy explained that Reverend Devereaux had put up a $250,000 reward to find his daughter, and several private detective agencies were fighting to be the first to bring her home. They’d all begun at the Montgomery Greyhound station where she’d purchased a bus ticket to LA using his credit card.

  There were more than 400 hotels of varying size in the city, and with her father freezing her bank accounts, her hunters assumed all Savannah had in her possession was the money she’d stolen from his wallet. And as that wouldn’t stretch far, she’d need a place to stay that was basic and affordable.

  That narrowed the field down to around 120 motels. One agency’s team was deployed to the city to visit all the cheap dives and boltholes with photographs of the missing Savannah, but with no success. Another hired a personality profiler who normally tracked down serial killers to build up a picture of her likely pattern of behaviour. Based on her hobbies, talents, skills and qualifications and a need to keep a low profile, they narrowed her potential line of work down to three cash-in-hand jobs where few questions were asked – waitress, prostitute or exotic dancer. And at the Flesh For Fantasy strip club, they’d found their target.

  The Reverend showed no loyalty to any of those hunting his kin, and was happy to pass on updates from one detective agency to another. So one tried the softly, softly approach and paid one of Savannah’s colleagues a $1,000 tip to drug her water bottle with Rohypnol. But when Savannah realised something didn’t feel right, she hurriedly left the changing room and then fell into the path of a stranger’s car. The next morning Savannah had disappeared, quitting her job.

  It took four more weeks before another detective located her, dancing at the Pink Pussycat Club and residing in a backpacking hostel. Savannah constantly surrounded herself with people either at work or in the hostel, making her a hard target to pick off. But Reverend Devereaux was an impatient man and sent his own team, all guns blazing, to swipe his daughter from the street. No one involved anticipated that Savannah might be armed and just how ready she was to fight back.

  So when that plan backfired, a persuasive British private detective heard on the grapevine about the bounty and asked the Reverend to give her a chance. And when he agreed, Janet Davies became Jane Doherty. She wormed her way into Savannah’s life with a fabricated backstory and a plan to befriend the girl, win her trust and lure her out of her comfort zone.

  ‘Your dad got wind that Roseanna was seeing his employee and fired him,’ continued Michael, ‘so hearing Jane had that
day just moved into your room in the hostel was the last piece of information your sister could get, and I never heard from her again.’

  Savannah shook her head, worried about her sister and feeling foolish and gullible for desperately wanting to trust Jane.

  ‘It’s okay,’ Michael reassured her, sensing Savannah’s sadness. ‘You weren’t to know.’

  Michael explained he’d arrived in Los Angeles six days earlier and begun following Savannah and Jane from a safe distance, waiting for the moment when he could approach his girlfriend on her own and lead her to safety. On several occasions he considered just bursting his way into the hostel and finding Savannah, but he couldn’t be sure if Jane was working alone.

  When he’d followed Jane to the house in West Hollywood, he contacted the real estate agent from the number on the board outside and was told the house was being rented on a three-month short-term contract. So Michael knew he must act quickly. And although he abhorred violence towards women, Jane would be the exception to the rule. The moment she’d opened the front door thinking it was the Reverend’s team, he’d knocked her out cold.

  Savannah was scared that if she took her eyes off Michael even for a moment, he might disappear and she’d wake up to find herself caught in another of a series of nightmares that seemed to plague her life. He kept glancing to his side to return her gaze.

  ‘It’s all going to be okay, you know,’ he smiled, ‘you, me and the baby, we’re going to be just fine.’

  Savannah smiled at Michael and moved her bag from beneath her neck, placed it in her lap and stretched her arms and legs out and yawned.

  Then she slowly slipped her hand inside the bag, and before Michael could stop her, she pointed a gun at his temple.

  CHAPTER 95

  It had been a long night for Jane, gagged and tied to the chair in her lounge.

  She ran through the range of escape methods that her military training had taught her, but the stranger who’d burst though her front door that night and taken her by surprise with a right hook had made an impressive job of securing her. She cursed herself for resting on her laurels once she had Savannah sedated.

  The cuckoo clock above the fireplace revealed it had been almost six hours since she’d watched helplessly as a man she assumed was the one her employer had referred to as ‘black Satan’ carried Savannah out of the house. The two dozen times she’d heard her mobile phone ring also told her the Reverend would be furious at not receiving his promised update.

  Suddenly the front door handle turned and Jane watched as three men entered, each as broad shouldered and burly as the next. They glanced around the hallway and up the staircase before they spotted Jane. The tallest of the trio approached her and ripped the gag from her mouth. She drew in a long, deep breath.

  ‘Where is she?’ the man asked gruffly.

  ‘Someone came and took her. Now untie me, we need to move fast.’

  Instead, the man cocked his head and stared at Jane, then took a mobile phone from his pocket and dialled.

  Jane couldn’t hear what he said to the person on the other end of the phone but she guessed who he was reporting to. And when he drew a gun from the back of his trousers and screwed a silencer to the end of the barrel, Jane knew what he’d just been ordered to do.

  CHAPTER 96

  Declan stood with his back to the window, staring at Matty’s empty bed.

  Matty’s unzipped sleeping bag still bore the impression of his lifeless frame, and he could smell his friend’s knock-off Tommy Hilfiger aftershave lingering in the bathroom. Declan turned around and lowered himself onto his bed, and lay back. His pillow felt lumpy, so he put his hand underneath and removed the well-fingered Travel America guidebook that had inspired many of their excursions. He opened it up to a folded page and out fell Matty’s silver crucifix. He smiled, kissed it and placed it over his head and around his neck and tucked it inside his T-shirt. He noticed a packet of photographs had been left too, but he couldn’t bring himself to open them just yet.

  ‘Declan, are you in there?’ came Tommy’s voice from the other side of the door.

  Tommy tentatively entered and saw a Declan he hadn’t met before – a man with the demeanour of a beaten dog.

  ‘I think this is for you to watch.’ Tommy smiled awkwardly and handed Declan his digital camcorder before giving him privacy. Declan pressed play and Matty’s face appeared across the tiny screen.

  ‘Hey, eejit. Well if you’re watching this then you know where I am. I’m sorry I didn’t say goodbye. I tried, but as you said, you weren’t ready to hear it. You know, I don’t think I’ve ever thanked you for being my best friend. I wouldn’t have lasted as long as I did if you weren’t there to kick me up the arse and force me to live whatever time I had left. So, thank you. Be happy, Declan, enjoy your life, and don’t waste time thinking about me, okay? I’ve had the best time I could have possibly had, and that’s down to you. You’re my man.’

  With a smile and a final wink, the screen turned to black.

  For the first time since he’d discovered Matty’s body, Declan curled himself up into a tight ball and allowed himself to cry like he’d never cried before.

  CHAPTER 97

  ‘Oh my God,’ said Nicole, gobsmacked by the events of the night Tommy had just relayed.

  Nicole sat in the hostel courtyard listening as Tommy spoke from the heart for nearly two hours. She wrapped his hand in bandages to protect his broken knuckles as he left nothing out, from the aftermath of the accident that killed his brothers; his family’s treatment and blame of him; his failed attempt at university; his brief stint in the army; his separation from Sean; how he developed feelings for Jake before realising who he really was; and their final confrontation She understood why Tommy hadn’t raised the alarm when Jake toppled over the railings at Santa Monica pier. But if it was Eric who had fallen, she wouldn’t have tried to find him.

  For a moment Nicole allowed herself to think about Eric languishing behind bars and how she would probably spend the rest of her life living in fear that he might return. She shook her head to shake the bad thoughts out.

  ‘Just how bad a judge of characters are we?’ she asked. ‘Me with Eric, you with Jake.’

  ‘We make quite a pair.’

  ‘So what are you going to do now?’

  ‘Well, I’ve put it off for long enough, so I’m going to call my parents later, and then I’m going to start making plans to continue my travels properly. I’ve been here for too long, it’s time to stand on my own two feet and really see the world before I return home. Jake’s still running, but I feel like a free man now.’

  Nicole nodded. She understood the desire to travel, but now she wanted to plant some roots, and Mrs Baker’s money would allow her to do just that with the hostel.

  ‘Do you mind if I tag along?’ a voice behind Tommy began. He frowned, then turned his head, and a huge smile spread across his face when he recognised who was speaking.

  ‘Alright mate,’ continued Sean, as Tommy leapt to his feet and the two friends hugged. ‘Mum said you called, and I was just up the coast so I thought I’d drop in and say hello.’

  ‘You couldn’t have picked a better time,’ replied Tommy.

  ‘Have you found your beach then?’

  ‘No, I found something better than that, but it’s a long story.’

  ‘So what’s new?’

  Tommy glanced at Nicole and the two began to laugh at the absurdity of their week.

  ‘Oh, not much,’ grinned Tommy, ‘just the usual.’

  CHAPTER 98

  ‘What the hell, Savvy?’ began a panicked Michael. ‘Why are you pointing a gun at me?’

  ‘Pull over to the side of the road,’ Savannah replied coldly.

  ‘What are you doing?’

  Savannah cocked the trigger. ‘Don’t make me ask you again.’

  Michael did as he was ordered and directed the car towards a dirt verge.

  ‘Now give me the keys and get out,�
�� Savannah demanded. Michael obeyed and she followed him out of the car. She stood two metres opposite him with the gun pointed directly at his head.

  ‘Savvy, what’s going on?’ Michael pleaded.

  ‘How did you know I was pregnant?’ Savannah asked slowly.

  Michael hesitated. ‘Your sister said you told her.’

  ‘No, she didn’t. Now I’ll ask you again. How did you know I’m pregnant?’

  ‘Rosanna told me the last time we spoke – really, she did,’ continued Michael, swallowing hard.

  ‘When I called Rosie, I didn’t say anything about the baby. You said the last she heard about me was just as Jane moved into my room. At that point Jane didn’t know about the baby either. So if you haven’t spoke to Rosie since, then the only way you could know is either through Jane or the mighty Reverend himself. So which one are you working for?’

  Michael’s mouth moved but his throat suddenly felt dry.

  ‘Which one?’ Savannah repeated, more firmly.

  ‘Your father,’ Michael eventually replied.

  ‘Why would you do that to me?’

  Michael looked as his feet, unable to meet Savannah’s gaze. ‘The $250,000 reward . . . that’s a hell of a lot of money, Savannah. I told him I could bring you home for less, so he told me everything Jane and the other PIs had found out.’

  ‘And did Jane know my father had pitted you all against each other?’

  ‘I don’t think so. He doesn’t care how you come home, whether it’s me or her – it doesn’t matter, just as long as one of us managed it—’

  ‘So you sold me out.’ Savannah interrupted.

  ‘Yeah, I did,’ Michael replied, his tone becoming angrier, ‘but then you were the one who ran away and didn’t tell me where you were going. All I knew was that my fingers were busted, I have a fucking dent in my head and my girl didn’t want anything to do with me.’