by Matt Hilton
Somebody streaked past. Shelley.
Unperturbed by the presence of the knife, she flung herself into Harry, hugging him fiercely, crying in a mixture of dismay at what he’d done, but overall in relief at finding him alive. Numbly, Harry accepted her attention, and was totally unaware when Dom approached and gently prised the knife from his hand. He stared over his girlfriend’s shoulder at where Pete sank down and lay in a fetal ball on the ground. Leah lunged towards Pete, going down on both knees. She pulled his shoulders back, rolling him so he was supported in her lap, one hand cupped around his forehead. His eyes rolled up, seeking her face, and he wheezed out a sibilant exhalation.
‘Oh, shit…’ he groaned.
The material of his jacket was dark with blood, but Leah couldn’t see the wound. She pulled at his zip, yanking open the jacket. Beneath it he wore a pullover and it was drenched. The single puncture through the wool was barely discernable, but the copious amount of blood indicated it went deep and had severed an artery. Leah cupped a hand over it: immediately her hands were slick. Beneath her hand Pete trembled. He placed his hands over hers. Leah slid hers from under his fingers, pressing down on the backs of his hands. ‘Put pressure on the wound. We have to stop the bleeding.’
Pete grunted in inappropriate mirth. He shook his head.
‘I’m not going to let you die…’ Leah looked for help. Everyone else was more concerned with Harry, or their own lives, as they bundled the boy inside the cabin. ‘Somebody! Somebody get me a towel or something.’
‘It’s…it’s no use, Leah.’ Pete exhaled again, this time the sound rattling out. The trembling had grown to a shudder. Inhaling took great effort.
‘No! We’ll stop the bleeding. Get you help.’ Frantically, Leah searched for anyone else. ‘Somebody help! For God’s sake, somebody get back out here!’
Dom appeared in the doorway. He held a wadded tea towel snatched from beside the kitchen sink. He scanned around, seeking any sign of danger, then his gaze lit on Pete.
‘Quickly!’ Leah jerked her head savagely. ‘He’s bleeding to death. Help me, Dom!’
Nodding sharply, Dom stepped out of the doorway. Any animosity he’d shown towards Pete earlier had disappeared. His face burned with emotions: shame, fear, and a feeling of ineptitude.
‘Too…too late,’ said Pete.
‘No. I won’t let you go.’
‘Leah, love, you must. You…you…already did.’
Pete exhaled. There was finality to the sound, as was the sinking weight of him in Leah’s lap.
‘No! Pete? Wake up. Wake up, Pete!’ Leah shook him, touched his face, shook him again. ‘Pete? Pete! Wake up! I’m not going to let you die!’
Dom stood over them, the tea towel held out ineffectively. Tears beaded in his eyes. His sadness wasn’t simply at Pete’s demise, but for everything that had happened in the past few hours. He’d been strong before, driven by anger and a need to avenge Robert, but it had struck him how useless he’d been, and at how he had no control over events when such a terrible accident as this could take another life. For her part, Leah too was beset by conflicting emotions, and similar feelings of ineptitude. When she’d run from Pete, it was with a sense of fear and seething animosity towards him, but she’d come to realise that they were false emotions. She didn’t hate Pete, she only hated how their relationship had been affected by both of them, two individuals who might have felt as if they were drowning, going down for the last time and grasping for any lifeline. Pete’s reaction to losing her was to react with anger, hers to strike and flee in response — neither was right, but of the moment. Leah regretted the way she’d acted, and she could bet Pete had too, but now it was too late to put things right between them. Things would never be right again.
She bent over him, face close to his, her tears unable to wash the glaze from his eyes.
‘Let me help you get him inside.’
She blinked up at Dom. His face was beet red, and thick droplets of sweat dotted his forehead and top lip.
‘He’s gone,’ she said, her voice as thin as gossamer.
‘We couldn’t do anythin’ to help Rob or the others,’ Dom went on, ‘but we can at least take him inside, make him…decent.’
Leah wasn’t ready to go inside. She only wanted to hold Pete. Outside they were all vulnerable though, and there was a tiny part of her brain still working logically: perhaps she was becoming inured to violent death? No. She wasn’t. She was submitting to fatalism. She nodded softy, and began extracting her knees from under Pete’s limp form.
‘Leah,’ said Dom, placing a comforting hand on her shoulder. There was a time when she’d have slapped his hand away, but on this occasion she welcomed it. She needed to feel something living, not the cooling clay of a corpse. She put her hand on his, and wept softly.
‘Leah,’ Dom repeated. ‘When we do go inside, please, remember that this was just a terrible accident. Harry didn’t mean…’
Harry had made the same mistake that Dom had on the beach. Pete being a stranger to them simply meant he must be an enemy, a threat, and their responses had not been driven by reason.
‘I know,’ she whispered. ‘I don’t blame Harry. He must have been terrified. It’s not the boy’s fault…’ It’s mine for letting Pete approach the cabin alone, she thought. It’s mine for running away, getting in trouble, and worrying Pete enough that he followed me to Shattered Rock. It’s my fault, because I slapped Pete. It’s my fault because I was so wrapped up in my own life that I didn’t see how lonely and unloved my fiancé was growing. The self-recrimination could have gone on, stepping back incident after incident until she blamed herself simply because she had been born. But it was the illogical way of grief that sought sense by pursuing the absurd. She might as well blame her parents for loving each other so much that they gave her life.
‘Come on.’ Dom lent her his arm, helping her stand. ‘You go in. I’ll get someone else to help carry Pete inside…if you want?’
‘No. I’ll do it. I’ll carry him alone if I have to.’
Dom still limped from his injury on the beach. He was struggling to bear his own weight without flinching in pain without carrying another man. Leah closed her eyes for a moment, gritted her teeth, and came to a decision. ‘Wait. I’ll ask for Becks to help. There’s no way we’ll manage between the two of us.’
Leah took a shambling step for the open door.
‘If you take his legs, I can—’
The stinging projectiles hit Leah before she could process the boom of the shotgun. Afterwards, she’d never know if a few stray pellets struck her, or if the sharp projectiles were particles of Dom’s skull. As she turned to gawp back at him, Dom teetered for a second over Pete, his face a gaping mess of tattered flesh and exposed teeth, before he collapsed as dead as the man at his feet. Barely twenty feet behind him, having risen from the waist high grasses, the man who’d masqueraded as Jim McBride, aimed a malicious wink at her.
34
Reeling in horror, Leah was caught in flux. Instinct commanded her to take cover, but simultaneously she also wanted to rush to Pete and Dom, and also to launch at their killer and sink her nails into the flesh of his gloating face. There was nothing she could do for either victim, and tearing off their killer’s face was also out of the question, as he broke open the shotgun to pop out the spent cartridge and feed in a live one. Before she made it five feet towards him he’d blow a hole in her he’d be able to see the cabin through. The only sensible option took charge, and she turned and fled for the door. From within the cabin voices screeched at her to take cover. Sanctuary was only a half-dozen paces away but as she fled she expected each step to be her last.
‘Hey, Leah, dunnae fret.’ The killer’s words pursued her, filled with forced joviality. ‘Take your time. I’m gonnae keep you for last, so we’re all alone like things should’a been.’
Despite his words Leah scrambled for safety. Hands grabbed and helped haul her inside the cabin, and it was Hayley w
ho threw the door shut, even as Jenna dragged a chair from under the table and jammed it under the handle.
‘Get away from the windows,’ Leah shouted breathlessly. ‘That maniac still has bullets.’
Watching Pete die only moments ago, Leah was surprised she had the capacity for lucid thought. However, Dom’s brutal slaying had snapped her out of the burgeoning funk, and the wash of endorphins through her body forced her into a fight for survival. Even when she glanced briefly at Harry, who stood round-shouldered and in abject despair, she felt no anger towards him for killing Pete. The boy had also been driven to fight for survival, and it had led him to the awful, though not unforgivable, act of stabbing Pete under the heart. Would she have acted any differently in those circumstances? Right then and there, given the opportunity, she’d gladly stick a knife in the monster outside.
A cacophony of panic ensued, with those in the cabin rushing to find hiding places, but it didn’t matter where they hid, they were still visible through one window or another, or the patio door. The gunman could choose any ingress and pick them off one at a time if he wished. Except, maybe his ammunition reserve was growing low, because he didn’t shoot. The shotgun was double-barreled and he’d only replaced one shell after shooting Dom: it could be that he wanted to keep both barrels primed at all times, or that was the last of the cartridges. One chamber or both were loaded, enough to kill another two of them, but the gun couldn’t get them all. When outside, Leah had been too busy absorbing the horror of the moment to check for the axe, but she had to assume the killer had a back-up weapon for when the shells ran out. They couldn’t fight him with only a bunch of oars and a kitchen knife. They had to find another way to survive.
‘Why are you doing this?’ Leah suddenly hollered.
There was a momentary pause, everyone inside holding a collective breath. Appealing to the murderer wasn’t a strategy any of them had thought of; pleading for their lives was another matter.
The killer had not approached the cabin. He remained where he’d stood after shooting Dom. Yet his voice carried clear to Leah inside. ‘You’re an intelligent woman, Leah. I’m pretty sure you’ve figured things out by now.’
She had a theory.
‘It was you that murdered Mary Jayne Kenner.’
‘I buried her,’ he admitted.
‘Yet she was allegedly lost at sea, right?’
‘You’ve got it. The search concentrated on the water, it’s where she did her work after all. When Shattered Rock was searched, it was only for a living woman who might’ve got lost in the woods, not one dead and buried.’
‘Why did you murder her?’ Leah asked.
‘You keep saying that. I didnae murder her. Mary’s death was an accident.’
‘Then why hide her remains?’
‘Because nobody would’ve believed…that her death was accidental.’
‘How did she die?’
‘She drowned.’
‘I’d have thought she was an experienced swimmer, being a marine biologist…’
‘She hit her head on a rock, went into the water unconscious, so her swimming ability wasn’t a factor.’
‘You were with her when she hit her head?’
He didn’t answer.
‘She didn’t fall,’ said Leah, realising the awful truth, ‘she was pushed. You pushed her, didn’t you?’
‘I loved her.’ He was gruffer, and louder.
‘Did she love you, though?’
‘You’ve seen her bracelet…in fact you have it. Who do you think gave it to her?’
‘That doesn’t answer my question. You wanted her, but was your attention reciprocated?’
‘She loved me.’ His tone was of someone who’d convinced himself of a lie so that it fit his personal agenda.
‘She wanted nothing to do with you,’ Leah said scornfully. ‘I want nothing to do with you.’
Behind her, crouching in the gap between the table and cabin wall, Becks and Effie exchanged gasps of alarm. ‘Don’t antagonize him, Leah,’ Becks whispered, ‘he’s mad enough already.’
Leah held up a hand, begging silence. ‘I’m not antagonizing him, only trying to get him to see the truth. If he recognises how wrong he acted back then, he might stop this madness now.’ She raised her voice so he’d hear. ‘Whatever fantasy you’ve got into your head about you and me, well, it’s never going to happen. You say that Mary’s death was accidental…what about the others? Have you even thought about what you’ve done…how deranged you’ve acted?’
‘Deranged? That isnae a word you often hear these days. But I suppose I should expect big words from an author, eh?’ His voice had changed volume, quieter than before. Leah craned to see through the kitchen window, in a gap below the lowered blinds. He’d moved, but wasn’t approaching the patio door where he’d have a clear view inside; he was strolling in the other direction. She waved frantically to the others, indicating he was moving towards the other end of the cabin. Jenna looked prepared to rush for the patio door, throw it wide and sprint for safety while he was distracted. Leah shook her head, catching Jenna’s eye as she began to rise. She gestured that they should all stay down. The killer had paused, the shotgun wedged under his right armpit. He stared off past the cabin.
‘Hey! Hey, mister!’ Leah’s shout brought him around. His gaze fell on hers where she peeped beneath the slats of the venetian blind. His lips jumped and Leah ducked. Slowly she rose again, and checked through the gap in the blinds. He was watching for her, but the gun stayed down. ‘You must have figured out that rescuers will be coming by now. All that black smoke from Mr McBride’s boat…it’s bound to attract attention.’
‘Aye, I ken. It’s why I can’t allow you all to stay tucked up nice and warm in that cabin. Why don’t you come out and we’ll get things over and done with?’
‘You should leave now,’ Leah told him. ‘You obviously have your boat moored somewhere else. You could be far away before anyone gets here.’
‘You’re assuming I give a shite about escaping. I think you’ll agree there’s little hope for me now. So I might as well have my fun before I’m locked up for the rest of my life.’
Inside the cabin, alarmed whispers were exchanged. The maniac’s plan was to slaughter them all, and then do worse to Leah before killing her too. More than one of them was galvanised to fight him, rather than wait to be picked off one at a time. But Leah begged them all to keep silent with a finger to her lips. Her grief for Pete and the others was like a void in her chest, but the rest of her trembled with outrage. Why had the killer become so obsessed with her?
‘Do I remind you of Mary?’ she wondered. ‘Is that it? You couldn’t have her so you’ve fixated on me instead?’
‘Ha! Are you kidding me? That might be the motive of a killer in one of your trashy novels, but no, you dunnae remind me of my lost love. Jesus, Leah, if that’s the best you can come up with I dunnae have much faith in you having a follow up hit on your hands.’
He didn’t get the irony of his words: if he killed her there’d never be a follow up to her summer bestseller, whether written badly or otherwise. ‘Why me, then? Tell me.’
‘What are my other options? I might be deranged, but I’m not a freak. I don’t fancy wee girls, boys or butch dykes, so you, Leah, are it…or nothing. And after all the bother I’ve gone to, I’m not making do with nothing.’
Leah glanced at each of her companions, going from face to face. In each she recognised a thought that fleetingly went through her own mind. Should she sacrifice herself for the sake of the others? Shockingly none but Harry discarded the idea as quickly as she had. She caught more than one expectant blink from some of the other girls, whereas Harry clenched his fists, and made to stand up. Perhaps he had it in mind to make the ultimate sacrifice in her defence in amends for his accidental slaying of Pete. Except Shelley grabbed him roughly and pulled him down: the girl glared in accusation at Leah, while Harry mouthed dire promises aimed at their tormentor.
&nb
sp; ‘He still intends killing us all,’ Leah said. ‘Even if I give up to him, do you really think he’s going to let any of you go? When you could try to come to my rescue and spoil his fun?’
‘We have to fight him.’ Harry’s pale cheeks were starting to glow with points of colour.
‘No!’ Shelley cried. ‘We don’t. You don’t, Harry. He’ll kill you!’
Harry looked beseechingly at Leah. He had never met Pete Langston before he slipped the knife between his ribs, but he understood Pete’s connection to Leah now. ‘I…I was trying to fight him then,’ he croaked, and gesticulated in the killer’s direction, ‘and I can do it again.’
‘You won’t be able to get near him with a knife,’ Becks said.
Harry shivered in revulsion. ‘I…I couldn’t use a knife again. But give me one of those oars, I’ll go for him, and you lot can make a run for it.’
‘No, we’re safer here!’ Jenna crouched in the angle formed by the kitchen counters and Leah’s abandoned suitcase: out of sight of the killer, but only if he stayed put. She was wide open to a shot through the patio door or the window at the back of the living space.
‘How long until he comes through that door?’ Harry countered. ‘What then? Do we fight when we’re all bunched together and can’t swing our weapons? He’ll be able to take us out two or three at a time with a blast of that shotgun.’
‘We should barricade the door,’ Effie suggested. The chair under the handle wouldn’t stop a hefty kick, and definitely wouldn’t slow a determined shoulder charge. ‘The table, up end it and push it in front.’
Leah shook her head. ‘It won’t slow him.’
‘It’ll help,’ Becks said in solidarity with her partner.
‘It will help,’ Hayley added. She was taking shelter alongside the table, in the gap between it and the small settee. She began shoving the table, but it only moved by increments. She looked at Shelley and Jenna for help, but neither girl moved. Frustrated, she stood, and jammed her pelvis against the table, pushing with her legs. The table juddered across the floor.