Joy had quickly followed up with two more strikes, one in Western Scotland and one in Dartmoor the day after, using old dead trees as her canvas. Suddenly there was a media frenzy, with everyone wanting to know who and what The Dark Shadow was.
Alex had quickly helped her to set up a website with photos of her “strikes” and hundreds of people had started contacting The Dark Shadow offering to pay her to come and do something in their grounds. Mainly she had only accepted offers from public places, attracting more visitors to come and see them. And it was only ever dead trees that she carved, bringing life where there was none anymore.
In a matter of months, she had gone from living on baked beans on toast and wondering how she was going to pay the rent to having more money than she’d ever had in her life. She’d paid cash for her second hand Range Rover and had enough money in the bank now to buy her little house outright and still have some left over. But she wasn’t stupid. She knew the popularity of The Dark Shadow would be short lived, people would tire of it, or her identity would eventually be revealed. Although she would still get commissions on the back of the Dark Shadows success, she would never be as popular as she was now once her identity was out there. She had to be careful with her money, make sure she had enough to live on after the frenzy died down. But for now she could enjoy the glory.
In the months that followed, the demand for The Dark Shadow grew and grew until she was doing strikes three or four times a week. The Dark Shadow had gained so much in popularity there were now treasure maps showing where the strikes were across the UK. There was a special geocache website set up exclusively for her pieces, people would follow co-ordinates to find them and have their photos taken with some of the pieces and post them online. There were even T-shirts printed by a company that sold the rather provocative phrase “The Dark Shadow did me last night,” printed across a range of different coloured styles.
The great thing about the secrecy was that although the clients had paid for her services, they never knew when she was going to strike and sometimes it would be weeks after she had carved the pieces that it would be discovered and news of it would hit the headlines. Sometimes two strikes would appear in the news on the same day hundreds of miles apart, leading to more conspiracies about the identity of The Dark Shadow.
As time went on, these conspiracy theories as to the true identity of The Dark Shadow became more and more ridiculous, which just added weight to the intrigue. But none of them suggested it was a five foot girl from some little village in the middle of nowhere. In fact, as some of her sculptures were quite high up, many people believed it must be a very tall man. Though a few tree surgeons had said how easy it would be to get up a tree to carve, using ropes, harnesses and spikes strapped to the feet. She had been slightly annoyed at that – hanging from a harness to cut off a few branches was one thing, but doing so and still being able to carve a detailed, intricate piece was a whole other ball game. Other chainsaw carvers she knew erected scaffolding to do high pieces, but she didn’t have that luxury, she had to be in and out in a matter of hours.
The Dark Shadow had even made international strikes, two in Alaska where it had all begun for her, and ones in Washington, France, Madeira and Spain. That was harder. Strict airport security meant she could never take her own chainsaws on a plane, she had to hire them or ask for her clients to provide the tools in a secret drop off. The Americans loved the secret drop offs, going to a park and placing a chainsaw in a secret location for her to collect, it added to the thrill for them too. For her second anniversary the month before, she had been invited to do a piece in Central Park in New York. For the city that never sleeps, keeping her strike a secret was very tricky, but fun.
Joy looked up at the tree she was about to carve. Her strikes always had to be recced before she carved and she would take photos from different angles so she could plan what she wanted to do. Mostly people gave her a free reign as there were certain things that were beyond her repertoire, but now and again, like tonight, people had specific requests. Tonight it had to be themed around Lord of the Rings. It would be very easy to do an Ent like Treebeard, the talking tree – carve some eyes, mouth, nose, hands and feet and she could be out of there in half an hour. But in her sketches over the last few days, as she roughly drew some ideas, and with the maquettes she had made from plasticine, she had settled on a Ringwraith, a hooded faceless creature, with clawed hands, the evil ones in search of The One Ring. The folds of the cloak would be particularly tricky to carve, and the hands would require some intricate detail. But she needed the distraction of the challenge tonight.
Chainsaw carving allowed her to escape – it gave her control which she so desperately strived for after her attacker tried to take it away from her. The skill needed to control such a powerful piece of equipment with such precision gave her shattered confidence an incredible boost. She felt strong here, amongst the trees. No one could ever take that away from her.
It wouldn’t be long before she had to light her lanterns so she could see what she was doing, but for now she would make use of the fading daylight. She tied her hair back with a bandana and pulled on her safety goggles. She switched on her iPod, and flicked through her extensive collection to find something to drown out the white noise of the chainsaw. Her most recent playlist showed an eclectic mix of Snow Patrol, Westlife, Green Day, Bach, Ed Sheeran, Debussy, Kings of Leon, Guns N’ Roses and Jessie J. But tonight’s mood needed something big – not just to drown out the noise, but her bad mood too. She selected Two Steps from Hell’s epic album Invincible and hit play. She pulled on her ear defenders, picked up her chainsaw and started to carve.
*
Finn woke to a noise from Joy’s side of the wall. A muffled noise, like a scream smothered by a pillow or duvet. He sat up, concerned slightly. It was after two in the morning. Joy had returned from her night job just after midnight, unloaded her boxes and gone straight to bed. He had heard her mumble goodnight to Darcy and then there’d been silence. But now there was a noise, some sort of commotion, a struggle?
Then her voice rang out, the urgency of which sliced through the silence of the night like a knife.
‘Get off, don’t touch me, someone help, HELP!’
Chapter Eight
He was out of bed and down the stairs in a blur. He broke through her front door, vaguely aware that he had smashed it to smithereens and charged up her stairs. He ran into her bedroom, which was in pitch darkness and pain seared through his nose as he was punched hard in the face. As he was still reeling from the attack and trying to see anything through the gloom, his attacker stamped painfully on his foot and then punched him in the gut.
There was silence from Joy and Finn was suddenly concerned by what this bastard had done to her. He slammed his attacker into the wall, pinning him with his weight. To his horror, with his body pressed against hers, he realised it was Joy. He felt sickened by the force he had thrown her against the wall and quickly stepped back, but not before she kneed him hard in the nuts. Stars popped in his eyes, as he doubled over in excruciating agony.
*
Her heart was racing in her ears. Joy quickly turned on the light so she could see her attacker more clearly. There was Finn, crouched over in agony, finding it very difficult to breathe.
‘Finn? What the hell are you doing here?’
He moved slowly to the bed, gingerly sitting down.
She was suddenly overwhelmed with a huge sense of relief and she sat down next to him. She felt tears pricking her eyes and she let her head fall into her hands. Her body was shaking with the fear and adrenaline that had just pumped through her veins.
She knew now that it had been a nightmare. The police visit earlier that day had reignited all those fears and bad dreams that she’d had years before. Finn must have heard her through the ridiculously thin wall and thought the worst.
He would hate her. There’d be swearing and shouting. Maybe if she let the tears come like they were clearly threatening to do, she could p
ersuade him to save the shouting till tomorrow.
To her utmost surprise, when he finally spoke, his voice was gentle.
‘Are you ok?’
She looked at him in shock and was thrown by the tenderness and concern in his eyes. She quickly wiped away the tears that suddenly spilt over her cheeks.
In a move that was so quick she didn’t have a chance to stop it, he suddenly scooped her up and pulled her onto his lap, holding her tightly in his arms. She sat frozen, numb with shock at the sudden show of affection. He started stroking her back and arms in small soothing motions, presumably to try to calm her down. This did nothing of the sort. His hands were warm and strong and at his touch her breath caught in her throat. Where her heart had just been slowing down after the attack, it was now roaring in her ears for an entirely different reason. It took every ounce of restraint not to look up and kiss him.
‘Please don’t do that,’ she said, deliberately staring at a small bruise on her knee and not at him.
He stopped stroking but didn’t let her go. She looked at him. God his mouth was so close to hers and she couldn’t even move back as he was holding her so tight.
‘Do you have any idea what it makes me feel with your arms around me like this?’
He quickly let her go. ‘Scared? Jesus Joy, I’m not going to hurt you.’
‘I’m not scared of you, Finn. But you’re not doing anything to stop my heart from racing. In fact it’s pounding even harder now than it was a few minutes ago when I thought you were trying to attack me.’
His face flickered with confusion for a moment, then he blushed. He deliberately changed the subject and moved on from the fact that he had just unknowingly being pressing all of her buttons.
‘I think you owe me an explanation.’
‘I don’t owe you anything.’
‘You just kneed me in the bollocks after I rushed in here to save you; you damn well owe me something.’
Anger ripped through her. ‘It was just a nightmare. No big deal.’
‘Since the nightmare coincided with the police visiting you earlier, the police visit that made you cry, and since you’re still shaking now, I’d say there’s a hell of a lot more to it than that. Besides, talking it through might help.’
‘What are you, my therapist? You’ve been mean, you’ve repeatedly told me you don’t like me and now you want to be my best friend all of a sudden? I don’t think so. I’m grateful that you would come to my rescue like that, but I’m not about to spill my innermost thoughts and feelings to you.’ She’d already done enough of that about her parents and the farm.
His arms slid round her again, but this time not protective but restraining. ‘Then we’re going to stay here until you do.’
She moved to stand up but his arms tightened around her. She fought against him, but he was a lot stronger and in the end she gave up. He would give up and go home before she gave in, she was damned sure of that. She folded her arms across her chest and leaned back into him.
*
Finn was good at waiting. When he had been filming The Darkness Trilogy, there had sometimes been hours in between takes that he’d had to wait. He was quite prepared to sit there and wait all night if need be, but he was damned sure he was going to get some answers.
He felt her shift to get more comfortable. With his arms so tight around her he could feel her heart beating furiously. What the hell had scared her so much? It made him feel sick to think of her having nightmares and what had caused them.
He eyed Darcy lying on the floor. She hadn’t moved during the fracas, some guard dog she would turn out to be. Unless, recognising Finn’s scent, she knew she wouldn’t have to defend her mistress against him. Long minutes stretched on but he could wait hours if necessary.
He forced his mind away from the warmth of her body next to his, the sweet smell of her and started to think about the garden at the farmhouse and what he would do to it instead. It had just been a patch of grass with a few shrubs when he had bought it, but he wanted it to be a proper garden, one that children could grow up in. He would grow cherry trees along the left hand fence and a forsythia bush at the back that would spread big and out of control across the corner and… she was wearing purple nail varnish on her toes, tiny, sexy little toes… and… and a summer house, painted pale blue with great big comfy chairs and large windows to look out on the garden. …She had fantastic legs, shown off spectacularly in the tiny shorts she was currently wearing. Benches, he could have benches on the patio or some other stylish garden furniture. Her legs and hands were covered in tiny little scars and bruises, similar to the sort he got from gardening, nothing severe, they seemed to be scratches from plants, though he hadn’t seen her do any work in the garden since she arrived. Some kind of large barbeque area, maybe a brick one or one of those ones with the large chimneys. Her breathing on his neck was one of the most erotic things ever. The tree house, maybe he’d paint it or should he leave it natural so it was more in keeping with the oak tree. Her breathing was very heavy now, almost as if…
He looked down at her and realised she had gone to sleep, or at least was pretending to be.
He watched her suspiciously, waiting for a flicker of consciousness, but there was nothing. She was limp in his arms, her mouth parted slightly in sleep. It was safe to say he wasn’t going to get any answers out of her tonight. Not unless he woke her up. But he wasn’t an idiot, as a man he knew it was potentially fatal to disturb a woman whilst she was sleeping. He’d already had one knee to the nuts that night, if he wanted children someday, to play in this fantasy garden with them, he better avoid being kneed in the nuts again.
With Joy still in his arms, he shuffled back a bit. She jolted a bit at the movement and he felt her heart leap as perhaps her dreams fell back into the one she was having before. He stroked her hair, hoping that in sleep he could offer her some comfort.
‘Finn?’ she mumbled, barely awake.
‘Yeah I’m here, go back to sleep, we’ll talk in the morning.’
He lay down with her. The little voice at the back of his head was screaming at him. What was he doing, was he really going to spend the night with her? She shifted slightly, stretching her legs out at his side.
‘You don’t have to stay.’ She snaked her arms round his neck, nuzzling into the side of his throat.
He swallowed and pulled her tighter against him. ‘I’m here,’ he repeated.
‘You’re so kind.’
‘This doesn’t change anything you know.’
‘I know.’
‘I still don’t care.’
He felt her smiling against his neck. ‘I know.’
‘You’re not my type.’
‘That’s fine.’
He kissed her on the head and hours after she had fallen back to sleep, he finally managed to snatch a few hours himself.
*
Joy woke the next day and was a bit shocked to find she was wrapped tightly in Finn’s arms, lying on his chest. That was certainly a turn up for the books. She lay there for a while, enjoying the cosiness, the feel of his chest rising and falling as he breathed. But the intimacy of him absently stroking her hair made her heart swell for him. He liked her, she was sure of it.
She propped herself up on her elbow to look at him, he looked back, his hand still in her hair. ‘Well, this is new.’
‘You scared the crap out of me last night.’
She sighed. ‘You’re not going to let this go are you? What about the fact that we just spent the night together, we could talk about that instead.’
He scowled, though it was less threatening when he was holding her so protectively. ‘It’s been a while since I’ve spent the night with a woman. I’d have to say, this one wouldn’t feature in my top five.’
‘No? What about your top ten?’
She saw him smirk.
She stretched and felt him tense as she realised exactly where her leg was. She carefully removed it from in between his legs. ‘How is eve
rything down there, nothing permanently damaged I hope.’
‘It seems to be ok. Are you going to tell me what I risked never having children for?’
She narrowed her eyes. ‘You know practically everything there is to know about me, I know next to nothing about you. How about you tell me something.
He nodded. ‘That’s fair. You go first.’
‘I’m serious Finn, you have to share something about you too.’
‘I promise.’
She bit her lip, letting her gaze fall from Finn’s face. ‘I was attacked in London, a little over two years ago. I was walking back from a bar late one night to the flat I was staying in with Ed, it was a hundred yards away, so I didn’t get a taxi. I was grabbed and forced into some nearby parkland. Craig Peters, I don’t think I’ll ever forget that name. My god, did I fight back, I punched and stamped and kicked and bit, but he fought back too and he was strong, broke one of my ribs just from one punch. Then he pulled a knife on me and I just froze. He forced me to the ground and I just lay there numb as he fumbled with his jeans. He stank of alcohol, I remember that much. He was clearly very drunk as he could barely undo his jeans. But as I lay there, frozen on the damp floor, I knew that there was no way I was going to let it happen.’ She swallowed a wave of revulsion as she remembered what happened next. ‘As he continued to fumble around inside his jeans, pinning me down with one hand, I reached for him. I offered to help him. He was drunk and horny and was keen to have any sort of help as he clearly couldn’t do anything himself. I slid my hand into his jeans and found what he had been desperately searching for. I grabbed it tightly and twisted until I felt something snap inside. As he howled and screamed in blind agony, I scrabbled up and ran.’
‘You fought back, that was brave.’
‘Or stupid. He had a knife. But I didn’t think about what could have happened, I just thought about what I didn’t want to happen. I didn’t want him to win. Though I suppose he has if I’m still having nightmares after all this time.’
‘It’s only natural that your mind will play it back, it’s your subconscious trying to see if there was anything you could have done differently. It’s how you deal with the nightmares that’s important. Do you hide under the bed crying or do you get up fighting?’
Beneath the Moon and the Stars Page 11