Folly

by Stella Cameron

  He leaned against the back of the seat and crossed his arms. ‘You don’t think much about how other people feel, do you?’

  ‘Yes, I do,’ she snapped back, tempted to pull over. But she couldn’t bring herself to tell him to get out in awful weather, with no transportation and the traffic works barriers and signs lining the verge leaving nowhere safe to walk. ‘Tell me what put a bee in your bonnet, Will. You know I care a lot about you and Cathy. One of the reasons I bought the Black Dog was because I knew you’d be great managers, and because I didn’t want you to leave. You love the place.’

  ‘And you wanted Lil to—’

  ‘Lily,’ Alex interrupted. ‘My mother goes by Lily and always has.’

  ‘Lil’s a good barmaid’s name,’ he said, and she felt rather than saw him sneer. ‘And that’s what Cathy and me called her. We gave her a job when no one else was keen to take a young woman with a history like hers.’

  ‘That’s enough.’ Alex’s cheeks burned. She felt sick to her stomach and shaky. ‘You don’t know my mother’s real history and even if it was what you’re suggesting, who would care? Now or then? She’s good at whatever she decides to do. Anyone with a suitable job would have hired her. Would you like me to find a bus stop for you?’

  Breath whistled through his teeth. ‘I’m in a lousy mood, is all. Cathy’s mooning around over the life she should have had. Came from money, y’know.’

  ‘So I heard. She seems happy to me – at least, most of the time. With everything in the village so upside down I think it’s been hard for her. She’s a quiet person.’

  ‘You don’t know anything about her, but no matter. You could be right. We’ll turn off before long. We won’t get all this messing about on the back roads.’

  He leaned forward again, gripped the dashboard.

  Alex glanced toward him. He seemed to be watching for whatever turn off he wanted.

  Her mobile rang. She picked it up from between the seats and answered. ‘It’s Tony,’ a wonderfully familiar voice said.

  ‘Hi Tony.’ She gathered her thoughts for how she could signal that something might be wrong here. ‘I’ve got—’

  Will’s right hand clamped her shoulder painfully. He shook his head, pointed to himself and mouthed, I’m not here. His face was red and sweaty.

  ‘Hi, Tony,’ she said. Her dry mouth made her cough.

  ‘What’s up?’ he said, quite softly, as if he wondered if she had company.

  ‘The roads are pretty rotten but I’m taking it slowly. Road works everywhere. Why they don’t try to get this stuff finished before winter, I’ll never know.’

  ‘Where’s your sense of adventure?’ he said, but there was something forced about it. ‘I wanted to make sure you’re OK, Alex.’

  Will passed a forefinger across his throat, indicating for her to get off the phone. To her horror, he pinched the sensitive muscle in the top of her shoulder and she almost hissed in a sharp breath.

  ‘Yes,’ she said into the phone, completely flat.

  Tony fell silent. She heard the sound of an engine and knew he must be in his Land Rover.

  ‘You shouldn’t drive and talk on the phone,’ Alex said. ‘Sorry, I forgot you have hands-free and I know I ought to get it. But I’ve learned to improvise. If traffic’s heavy I can have both hands on the wheel and talk at the same time.’ It was the closest she could get to telling him what she intended to do.

  ‘Is someone with you?’

  She didn’t answer.

  ‘OK. Please stay calm, sweetheart. I’ll get you.’

  ‘Sounds like fun. I’d better concentrate. I’ll see you later.’ It wasn’t easy to keep fear out of her eyes and off her face when she looked at Will, but she managed and tucked the mobile into the door armrest without turning it off. ‘Nice to have someone care about you. It’s been a long time.’

  ‘You ought to be careful around young Harrison.’ Will laughed, an unpleasant sound. ‘It’s a shame not to control the few things you can do something about.’

  ‘What does that mean?’

  ‘There’s more to our vet than most people think. That’s all I’m saying. Not that it matters.’

  ‘Will, what’s wrong? Whatever it is, I’ll try to help you.’

  He narrowed his eyes at her and she felt his hatred. Why would he hate her?

  ‘You’re nothing,’ he said. ‘Nothing better than me, anyway. Maybe not as good. Think about that. You come from nothing but you managed to get your hands on things that don’t belong to you. I’m going to change that. Take a right here.’

  ‘Here?’ He’d indicated something no bigger than a lane. ‘What’s it called?’ she asked loudly.

  ‘Doesn’t matter. Do what I say – it’ll be a shortcut for us.’

  ‘I don’t think so, Will. It’s going off in the wrong direction.’

  ‘Do as I say.’

  A pine cone hit the windscreen and she swerved, flinching.

  ‘Concentrate. When we get where we’re going I’ll tell you a story. You’re never going to believe it.’ He laughed and the sound made her sweat.

  She started the right turn. ‘Look, there’s a llama farm up here,’ she cried, laughing and coughing at the same time. She cleared her throat and all but screamed, ‘Who has a llama farm? Have you ever been to a llama farm?’ as if it were the funniest thing she’d ever seen.

  THIRTY-SEVEN

  The four men in the Volvo didn’t need a warning to remain silent. Tony had put his hand over the mobile and the others read horror in his face. Lamb took out a notebook and pen and began to write, then put a note in front of O’Reilly, who nodded.

  He showed the note to the other two. ‘We’ve got to hang on to Alex but get off the speaker from our end. I can do that and listen.’

  Silently, Tony gave the man his phone. Lamb slid on a headset and attached a wire to the mobile. He made some adjustments and said, ‘Now I can hear them but they wouldn’t hear us. We’re off at this end.’

  ‘Where are they?’ O’Reilly drove fast, while Tony prayed they wouldn’t have to deal with a zealous police stop. ‘Can’t use a light or siren,’ O’Reilly added, as if he read Tony’s mind.

  ‘They can’t be far from Bourton-on-the-Water but Will told her to turn off.’

  ‘Turn off where, man?’ O’Reilly said. ‘They’re headed for the A40.’

  The rare sound of car horns blared all around them. A path had begun to open as vehicles swerved out of the way.

  ‘Alex is shrieking about something,’ Lamb said. ‘Laughing?’

  Tony’s stomach turned over. ‘Is she still shouting about a llama farm?’

  ‘Yeah … No, not any more. She doesn’t know where they are … He keeps telling her to just drive.’

  ‘She was trying to let you know where she was,’ James Harrison said. Like Tony, he leaned forward to grip the seat in front of him. ‘Llama farm? You know anyone with llamas? Treat any?’

  ‘Will’s losing it,’ Lamb said, looking at Tony. ‘He hates her.’

  ‘I don’t care what—’

  Lamb’s upheld hand shut Tony up.

  ‘According to him, if she’d kept her nose out of it he’d have been all right. The money had started coming again. It was more than I ever hoped for. I’m quoting Will here. That silly bugger Leonard found where that piece of filth, Cornelius Derwinter, kept an account he used to keep current with what he owed me.’

  ‘Owed him,’ James Harrison scoffed.

  ‘Psht!’ Lamb’s hand went up again. ‘The fool had started paying up again – took him a bit but he got the picture in the end. Either he paid me or I let everyone know about his sainted father. That slag of a wife of his, snooty bitch, she was on my side whether she wanted to be or not. She wasn’t having her crown tarnished. It was beautiful. If bloody Edward hadn’t come back from the dead, showing up at the Black Dog and wanting to do his holier-than-thou revelation of the truth so he could throw forgiveness around, we wouldn’t be here now – as lo
ng as you took the hint you weren’t wanted and cleared out. Uppity cow.’

  ‘Code,’ O’Reilly said, driving between two lorries with flapping canvas sides. ‘Sounds like code.’

  ‘I want to get my hands on him,’ Tony said, and didn’t even close his eyes against being turned into a lorry sandwich on a non-existent lane. ‘No more doubt it was Edward.’

  ‘Think about llamas,’ his father shouted. ‘And listen to me. Graham Cummings wasn’t Graham Cummings. He was Cornelius Derwinter’s boy.’

  ‘For God’s sake, Dad. Are you serious?’

  ‘Never more serious. I always wondered if Will had anything to do with Edward being sent away. A sort of payoff because Cornelius had his two sons and had even taken away the one Will thought was his. I heard Will try to say Edward pushed the little boy but he wasn’t like that. It would never have happened – and he was almost catatonic by the time I got to the river. And nowhere near where Graham had fallen.’

  ‘Shit,’ O’Reilly muttered. ‘That’s what this was all about. Will being cuckolded and turning it to his own advantage. Perpetual payoff. What kind of a man does that? If he’d killed Cornelius I might have got it, but all this?’

  ‘Listen,’ Tony’s dad said. ‘Will wasn’t to know what could happen if he left a young wife alone in a cottage up on the Derwinter estate. Cornelius had a reputation. After his wife died … well, with or without Cathy’s willing participation, she became pregnant but nothing was said. That’s how I pieced it all together. Cathy as good as admitted it to me at one point. It was obvious Will never knew until the accident, and given that there was never any sign of another pregnancy with him and Cathy, it could be he’s sterile. That drives some men mad. It wasn’t until the lad hit his head and drowned that it came out, and then it was only by chance I overheard what I did. When I got there Cornelius Derwinter had the boy’s body in his arms and he was crying over him. I heard him say, ‘My son, my son.’ Will heard it, too. I’m sure he didn’t know before that. But it was obvious he got it then. He looked at me and I saw it in his eyes. It was never mentioned again. Next we knew, Will and Cathy were in the Black Dog – it belonged to Cornelius, like most things around here.’

  Signs for the villages of Upper and Lower Slaughter came up on the left.

  ‘Llama farm!’ Tony yelled. ‘I’ve seen it. Back there. We’ve gone past the bloody thing.’

  ‘Oh, fuck!’ O’Reilly checked his rear-and side-view mirrors. ‘Hold on. Use the light, Bill. Can’t risk the siren.’

  Lamb lowered his window and slapped a light up top. O’Reilly leaned on the horn. Oncoming traffic in the other lane reacted slowly, a van driver hitting his brakes, then speeding up again. Two cars after him did the same thing.

  A motorcycle tried to get off the road and hit an orange and yellow barricade, sending splintered wood and metal flying and workers leaping for a ditch.

  ‘Pay attention, you stupid gits!’ Lamb yelled. ‘Something’s changing in Alex’s car, boss. He’s yelling at her so loud I can’t hear a word. He’s threatening her, I can tell that much.’

  THIRTY-EIGHT

  ‘Fucking bitch,’ Will bellowed at Alex. ‘Give that to me.’ He reached across her for the phone.

  She punched at him. ‘Stop it. I’ll go off the road.’

  ‘We’re going off the road anyway. Give that to me.’

  Punching him again, crying out, Alex veered to the left, hit a broken branch loaded with snow. The load cascaded in front of her and she drove blind, the wipers pressing a film of instantly frozen snow against the windscreen.

  Will slugged her across the jaw, snapped her head around and grabbed at the phone again.

  He slammed a hand over hers on the wheel and tried to ram a foot down on her boot to press the brake. His jacket slid up and a piece of steel handle gleamed in his back pocket. A knife.

  She was dead. She knew she was dead.

  With her left hand, she managed to close her fingers around her coffee mug. The drink wasn’t scalding but it was hot enough when it splattered into his eyes.

  Will screamed and went for his knife. The blade, curved, evilly pointed and double-edged, ridged on one side, shot out.

  A bloody gash opened across Alex’s knuckles.

  She didn’t pause.

  Her seatbelt responded to a single jab with a thumb and she was out of the Land Rover in one motion, snatching the phone on the way.

  She had no time. No time to save herself. Fighting, batting at laden branches, sliding down a bank, tripping over hidden tangles of undergrowth, Alex threw herself away from the vehicle.

  Losing him was the only escape she could think of. If she ran along the road she would be clearly in his sight. They hadn’t passed another car on this rutted way that was barely more than a lane. On the open she’d be an easy target.

  With every stumbling step, every painful, wracking breath she took, a space on her back, between her shoulder blades, prickled and burned. The hunting knife, switch blade, whatever the horrible thing was, could hit there and sink in, go through her entire body like a hot wire through butter.

  A spatter of scarlet drops sprayed the snow.

  Her hand. He would see the blood and follow, like a trail of murderous breadcrumbs.

  With a couple of tugs, the scarf around her neck came loose and she wrapped it around her fist, held the injured hand up while she stumbled on. One foot after another sank into the soft drifts.

  It was like climbing through crusted meringue. Slow, slow, slow, and her thighs already ached from the rush of adrenaline and the cold she met with each move.

  The incline threw her forward, struggling to keep her balance, wading. More trees awaited her at the bottom of the steep bank and she pushed through the first cross-hatched twigs and limbs, flinching at the barrage of wet sticks that struck her face.

  Her heart beat harder but easier. She might have lost him. Not a sound came from behind her. The coffee could have done more harm than she hoped. Closer and closer together, the trees rose from uneven ground she couldn’t see. Rocks caught at her feet and thorns tore through her jeans to scratch her legs.

  She heard sounds now, but they came from her breath and her rasping throat.

  If she was calm, she could move silently through all this.

  Alex swung around, searched behind her. His feet wouldn’t make more noise in the snow than hers did and the snapping, cracking cacophony around her head was no different from what was happening to him.

  He was back there, Will, getting closer because he was stronger.

  He would hear if she vomited. Alex forced herself to stand still in a small copse of skinny ash trunks and sucked air deeply through her mouth until the sickness passed enough for her to think. And she listened.

  Nothing.

  Tears sprang, stinging her eyes. Please let her have lost him. She had no idea where she was. She could walk into anything as long as she moved blind like this.

  But she had to go on.

  A shattering crack sounded. Not close, but back there. It could just be the weight of snow breaking a branch,

  The next barrage of breaking limbs took only seconds to reach her. She had the lead on him but she hadn’t lost Will.

  Here and there, where the woods had shielded the ground, she saw dark patches and ran from one to another, dashed on until she burst, abruptly, into an open space – on the edge of another snow-camouflaged ravine.

  Alex changed direction and ran left, along the rim of the gully. She ran until more trees scattered the slope, and launched forward, using branches to hold on to and control her downhill charge.

  She fell, cannoned head-first and rolled, arms flailing.

  Winded, she found her feet and staggered on, hugging her aching middle.

  The next fall landed her in a throbbing heap inside a hollowed ditch overhung with the edge of a bank where runoff had caused the earth to break away.

  Alex pressed a hand over her mouth. Black flecks burst before her eyes
. Passing out wasn’t an option. Driving in her heels, she pushed backward into the hollow until she was completely under a ledge.

  Not a ledge but earth and debris caved into the mouth of an old culvert with an icy coat over the opening where dripping water had frozen. Dimly, Alex saw a shiver of light through the blue-white veil and spread a hand on a knobby, hard surface.

  The light would come from the other end of the culvert.

  If she could get inside – it was as big in diameter as she was tall – there was a chance Will would never find her. If he did, there were two entrances, which also meant two exits, and she was more agile than he was.

  Alex listened intently. Her hand throbbed, deep and hard, but it was too cold for the blood to drip from the scarf.

  Ice spiked her eyelashes and coated much of her face. Every move felt like a decision but when she looked at that shimmer on the ice curtain, a rush of hope gave her strength.

  She chose what looked more like a piece of broken concrete than a rock and smacked it against the ice.

  The noise was dulled but still she drew her neck down into the collar of her coat and waited.

  Should she accept Will, his knife, and no hope out here? Or risk the noise to get into a culvert where she might have a chance?

  Alex battered at the ice and swallowed a sob when it cracked and a hole opened the size of a fist. The beating of her heart in her throat shortened her breath, but she hacked faster and the hole grew bigger.

  A jagged slice of ice broke away. The smaller, the less obvious the opening she made, the better. She didn’t hesitate to shove a booted foot through the space and squeeze inside. The freeze deadened an odor of rot but she still gagged, held her nose and breathed through her mouth. And she prayed the smell of death came from nothing more horrifying than rodents.

  THIRTY-NINE

  Not one of them could have expected an a-hole driving a combination mega lorry and construction-sized cement mixer to opt for committing mass murder – even though he would die pulling it off.