by Chris Ewan
‘Tell me about Rebecca, Mum. Tell me why you hired her.’
She drew a halting breath, one that seemed to teeter on the edge of tears. But when she finally spoke, her words punched a hole clean through my heart.
‘Because your sister asked me to,’ she said.
*
Mum handed me a small piece of card, pale yellow in colour. Printed on the front of it in a modest black script were the words Rebecca Lewis, Wilton Associates. I turned it over. Rebecca’s contact details were listed on the back.
‘Your sister gave this to me,’ Mum said. ‘It was just a day before the accident.’
The accident. I had a problem with the way Mum and Dad kept calling it that. As if somehow Laura’s foot had slipped off the brake and on to the accelerator. As if her hands had turned the steering wheel towards the cliff edge against her will.
‘She was standing right here,’ Mum said. ‘Right where you are now.’
I really wished she hadn’t said that. I could almost picture some ghostly outline of Laura’s body occupying the same space as my own. My feet covering the same square of carpet. Lungs breathing the same air.
Mum had taken me through to her office. It was a small, brightly lit room just to the side of the home’s main entrance. It was furnished with an ash-blonde desk and matching cabinets. There was no clutter. No mess. It was the first room that prospective clients – usually the middle-aged children of future residents – were shown into when they came to view the facilities.
I pressed a fingertip against the corner of the business card. The same card Laura had touched. Close to a month ago.
‘What did she say exactly?’
Mum raised a hand to her chest. ‘It was your sister’s second day visiting. She’d spent most of the first day in bed, remember? She’d looked exhausted, poor love, and I’d told her to rest. I think she surprised herself by how much she slept.’
‘She’d been working too hard.’
‘That’s what I told her. And the next day, she was a little dizzy. She barely ate any breakfast. Looked a little lost. I thought it was the tiredness catching up with her. She came and found me in here and I told her to go back to sleep. But she said she had to go out. There were things she had to do.’
‘What things?’
‘I don’t know. She was being quite guarded. But then, she always was. That was just Laura.’
It used not to be. Not when we were growing up. Not when her laughter had filled our home. It was her job that had changed her. Her high-powered career. There’d been distance between us because of it. And not just because she was so committed to getting ahead – at the expense, it had seemed to me, of leaving us all behind – but also because I’d felt that she’d looked down on me for the choices I’d made. Not going to university. Learning a trade. I’d done it because I’d wanted to focus on my road racing – perhaps go professional one day – but Laura never understood that. She’d treated me as if my whole life was one huge missed opportunity.
I didn’t say any of this to Mum. I never had.
‘And then,’ Mum said, pointing a finger at Rebecca’s business card, ‘she pulled that out of her pocket. I could tell she was nervous about giving it to me. She fiddled with it for a long time. But when she told me what it was . . .’
Mum gazed down at the telephone on her desk. Shook her head.
‘She told you it was for a detective agency?’ I asked.
‘She said she knew Rebecca and that she’d trust her with her life. Those were her words, Rob. Her life. And I knew right then that I wouldn’t want to hear any more. But she made me listen. Asked me to promise.’
‘Promise what exactly?’
Mum looked up. There was a vacancy in her eyes. A loss. As if she was letting slip another small piece of her daughter that she’d been fighting hard to hold on to. ‘She made me promise that if anything happened to her, I’d call Rebecca. And when I asked what she meant by that, she wouldn’t say. She wouldn’t explain.’
Her words rocked me. I fell silent. I was afraid that if I pushed too hard, Mum would fall apart right in front of me. That the subject would be closed off for ever.
‘Did she say how they knew each other?’ I asked, in a quiet voice.
‘She said they trained together. At Laura’s work.’
‘Her work?’
‘Yes, at the bank.’
I thought about that. I supposed it was possible that Rebecca had been some kind of financial investigator. Maybe later she’d branched out.
‘When did you contact Rebecca?’ I asked.
‘Not until after the funeral.’
‘And how did she react?’
‘She was surprised. Confused. I had to explain who Laura was. She made me describe her.’
‘Didn’t that strike you as odd?’
‘I almost hung up the phone. I really hadn’t wanted to call that number. Your father was completely against it. I’d been putting it off for days. After what Laura had done . . .’ Mum gulped air, like a diver about to swim to the very bottom of the ocean. ‘I hadn’t wanted to believe anything else could have happened to her. Understand? I could cope with the grief. The shame. But Rob, love, I knew I couldn’t handle the hope.’
She searched out my eyes and I did my best to lock on to hers, as if somehow I could raise her up out of the darkness I’d led her to.
‘But then,’ she said, ‘the funniest thing happened. Rebecca told me she’d take the case. She said she’d start work on it right away. And she said she wouldn’t charge us, Rob. Not a single penny.’
Chapter Eighteen
Lukas had stayed hidden inside the van. He’d been lucky. It had only occurred to him halfway through the journey that he could find himself trapped if the man decided to lock the van when he arrived at his destination. Lukas had listened closely to the noise of a door opening and closing. The sound of the man talking to his dog. But there’d been no electronic blip from a car key. No mechanical thunk. Instead, he’d heard footsteps on gravel, moving away from him. Then nothing at all.
His leg was stiff, pulsing with a deep, relentless ache. He stretched. Winced. Stretched some more.
He slid on his buttocks towards the sliding door and his fingers groped for the latch. It was awkward to reach from his sitting position. He compressed it – a muffled click – and a blade of daylight sliced through the gloom.
Lukas pushed his face into the gap. He was in a sunny yard. A minibus was parked close by. He reached for his gun and used the barrel to ease the door aside so he could hang his head out. A large house was off to his right, three storeys in height, with a glass conservatory on the front. There were a lot of windows, but nobody appeared to be watching him. He could hear coarse engine noise – a generator, perhaps.
Lukas lowered himself to the ground, favouring his good leg. He nudged the door closed behind him and edged around the rear of the van. Another building, this one much closer. It was some kind of converted barn, timber-clad, with a set of double wooden doors right in front of him and a conventional doorway further along. The double doors were unsecured and Lukas was about to investigate when he heard footsteps on gravel, hurrying towards him.
The big man in the sling came into view. Lukas flattened himself against the van, body rigid, the gun down by his thigh, his finger tightening on the trigger.
But the man entered the building without looking in his direction.
Lukas was unsure what to do. The man was dangerous, he was certain of that. But it wasn’t safe out in the open and he couldn’t stay in the van. If Lena was here, he should try to find her. That was what Pieter would do.
Right now, he wished he could switch positions with Pieter. Lukas was no bodyguard. No hero. He was good with computers and gadgets. Capable of following Mr Zeeger’s instructions without asking questions. Prepared to leave his home at a moment’s notice and live in close proximity with Mr Zeeger’s daughter for as long as necessary. Clever enough to know that the assignment
he’d been given by Anderson wasn’t strictly legal and that he wasn’t in a position to contact the police. But that didn’t mean he was equipped to handle this.
Whatever this was.
He limped towards the double doors. Set his ear to the wood. The timber was solid and he couldn’t hear a thing. He prised an opening and inched forwards into the unknown.
A garage workshop. The concrete floor was painted a pale blue colour, the walls a glossy cream. Something touched his face and he raised his arm in defence, but it was only a set of biking leathers hanging from a rail.
A scratched wooden workbench extended to his right, covered in tools and machinery. There were colourful posters on the wall of men on motorbikes and some kind of trophy cabinet below them. Down on the floor, the component parts of a motorbike had been laid out on a canvas sheet. The bike looked as if it had been in an accident. The frame was dented and heavily scratched and the front forks and wheel were buckled and bent out of shape.
Lukas backed away and bumped into the handlebars of another motorbike. It had no wheels and was balanced on a metal frame. Two more bikes with a matching colour scheme – black, with orange flashes – were assembled towards the end of the garage, beyond a stack of spare tyres. The tyre rubber was smooth and jet-black, fresh from the production line.
Lukas hobbled towards a wooden door at the end of the room. The door gave no indication of what lay behind it. Not reassuring. But not something he could ignore.
He was going to have to open it.
*
By the time I got back to my place, Rocky could barely summon the energy to greet me. He’d conked out at the top of the stairs, his head hanging limply over the riser, and I had to step over him. Time was running short. Rebecca would arrive to collect me soon. I went into my bathroom and swallowed a couple of painkillers, then washed my face one-handed – something that was harder than I might have expected – and was just drying myself with a towel when I heard movement downstairs.
‘Grandpa?’
He didn’t answer me. I could have sworn someone had come in through the door.
‘Grandpa, it’s OK. I could use your help getting dressed.’
I listened closely, waiting for him to shuffle into view, but he didn’t appear.
I kicked off my shoes, then squirmed out of my jogging trousers and went in search of a pair of beige chinos hanging at the back of my wardrobe. Getting them on wasn’t easy but I managed it in the end, opting to go without a belt. I stuck with the shirt I was already wearing, then pushed my feet into some brown leather shoes that could have done with a clean but weren’t going to receive it. I checked my watch. Still a few minutes. I scooped up Rocky’s bed in my good arm and walked through to the lounge to nudge him on the backside with my toe.
‘Come on, Rock. Sleepover time.’
He staggered to his feet and stretched his back, groaning loudly. Then he bundled down the stairs in what could have passed for a fall and sniffed hard at the base of the door leading into my bike workshop.
‘Cut it out,’ I told him, following a lot more steadily. He was squatting on his forepaws, pressing his nose against the gap. ‘Hey. I said cut it out.’ I opened the front door. ‘Go on. Go find Grandpa.’
Finally, a command Rocky was happy to obey. He bolted through the yard and made his way up to Grandpa’s room long before I got over there myself.
Grandpa was playing it innocent when I entered, sitting in his armchair with Rocky by his feet, acting as if he’d been labouring over one of the puzzles in his crossword book for most of the afternoon. He was holding his magnifying glass close to the page, gripping a biro between his lips. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve seen him holding this pose. When we were kids, Laura and I used to try and help him with the clues, but our suggestions were always way off the mark. Eventually, he’d grow frustrated with us and hand the book over, telling us we could tackle one of the puzzles in the back. We’d do exactly that, filling squares with the right number of letters but completely the wrong answers, until we were forced to invent words of our own devising to get anywhere close to completing the thing. If Grandpa minded, he rarely said, and sometimes I used to picture him late at night, turning to the back of his puzzle books and chortling at the rude words and exotic phrases we’d scribbled down.
I dropped Rocky’s bed on to the floor beneath the window and watched him clamber across it, pawing at the foam until he had it just how he liked. ‘OK if Rocky stays with you tonight?’ I asked Grandpa. ‘I have to go out and I’m not sure what time I’ll be back.’
Grandpa set his magnifying glass down on the crossword book. His eyes glimmered with mischief. ‘That detective sure is pretty.’
‘It’s not like that, Grandpa.’
He winked. ‘Would be if I was your age, my boy.’
I didn’t doubt it.
‘Make sure Rocky sleeps in his own bed this time, will you?’ I said.
Even Rocky rolled his eyes at that one. I’m not sure why I bothered. We all knew Rocky would be snoring the night away curled up on Grandpa’s toes.
*
Lukas was spooked by how close he’d come to being caught. He’d barely opened the door from the garage and glimpsed the staircase on the other side when the man had called down from above. He’d jerked backwards. Lost his grip on the door handle. Watched in terror as it tapped against the frame.
He’d expected the man to investigate – to find him crouched below the porcelain sink, his ruined leg poking straight out from his hip – but nothing had happened until the furious drumming on the stair treads. Footsteps followed. Slower this time. And then there was a rasping, rustling noise at the base of the door. The dog. Sniffing the air for him.
An odd calm had crept over Lukas then. Relief at being caught. An end to his botched rescue attempt. But no, the man had addressed the dog in a sharp tone and the front door had opened and closed.
Was it a trick? Was the man still there? Lukas spent so long waiting that he was sure he’d blown whatever opportunity had come his way. But when, at last, he gathered the courage to crack open the door, he was surprised to find that the hallway was empty.
The staircase was carpeted and steep. Lukas approached it at a stoop, then dropped his backside on to a tread. He laboured up, one step at a time, the weighty handgun pointed down at the front door.
Perhaps the man in the sling really was gone. Perhaps he’d find Lena, after all.
Chapter Nineteen
Rebecca was running late. I’d been standing outside the care home for ten minutes, asking myself if meeting Erik was a good idea or a terrible mistake, when she swung the Fiesta into the driveway and slewed to a halt in front of me.
I opened the door and climbed inside. ‘We’re going to be cutting it fine,’ I said. ‘What kept you?’
She shook her head. ‘Directions first. Tell me the fastest route.’
I had her turn right out of the care home and then I led her down beyond the Quarterbridge roundabout – one of the most famous points on the TT course – until she was accelerating hard along the A road heading south. If traffic was on our side, I thought we’d just about make it to the airport for 7 p.m. What I was less sure of was how I felt about the woman who happened to be driving me.
Mum had said that Rebecca had taken on the investigation into Laura’s death on a cost-free basis. From what Rebecca had told me, she’d been working on the case for a fortnight already. And now she was helping me look into the situation with Lena, on what I assumed were the same terms. Why was she doing it, I wondered? What was in it for her?
I looked across, searching for clues. A pair of dark aviator sunglasses concealed her eyes and she was focusing hard through the windscreen at the road ahead. Her fingers flexed and tightened around the steering wheel. She chewed her lip and shook her head at the ponderous speed of the passenger bus in front of us, then consulted her side mirror.
‘Who are you?’ I asked. ‘Why are you helping me?’
‘They said you’re not charging them anything.’
She dropped her head to one side, lowered her chin and pulled out around the bus.
And immediately swerved back in again.
A minicab had been coming straight for us. I braced my palm on the dashboard. Gritted my teeth. I like to race motorbikes. I enjoy the sensation of speed, the thrill I get from grazing my knee on a sweeping curve at well over 100 mph. But I didn’t appreciate Rebecca’s driving style. Not one bit.
‘Oops,’ she said.
‘Are you going to answer my question?’
Rebecca adjusted her hands on the steering wheel. ‘Which one? First, you wanted to know why I was late picking you up. Now you want to know why I’m doing this.’
‘Both. But you can start by telling me why you agreed to look into Laura’s death.’
Rebecca turned to me and I saw two shrunken versions of myself in the dark lenses of her sunglasses. It made me uncomfortable. She should have been concentrating on the road. The rear of the bus was only metres ahead.
‘Call it a favour to your sister.’
‘You knew her?’
‘In a way.’
I felt myself sag. I wasn’t sure what I’d expected her to say. Was even less sure which outcome I’d have preferred.
‘Can you watch the road?’
Rebecca turned back to the windscreen and immediately veered out around the bus. This time, the road was clear. She overtook on the wrong side of a safety bollard. The bus driver wasn’t impressed. He let her know it by leaning on his horn.
‘You’re a really awful driver,’ I said.
‘Just making up time.’
‘Are you going to tell me about Laura?’
‘Later, OK?’
‘She was my sister, Rebecca.’
‘I know that. And we’ll talk. I promise. But we don’t have a lot of time, and there are some things I need to tell you.’