by NC Marshall
Was this really all there was? Or had Jess been purposely trying to hide something? Maybe she was scared Matt would somehow gain access to her account, so she covered her tracks. Maybe she had used her mobile phone to contact this man, but there was no way of knowing. Her phone had been thrown free during the fall and had been found by the police. It had been shattered into pieces, laying at the bottom of a salt water rock pool which had rendered the phone totally unusable and its data unsalvageable. Maybe I just had to admit that for once in her life, Steph had got it wrong, and the relationship between Jess and this man had been purely platonic?
“Do you want another cup of tea?” shouts Kate from the opposite side of the kitchen, where she’s busy washing dishes and cleaning down the kitchen work surfaces. I can smell the strong smell of bleach coming from her direction. She’s probably not wanting to interfere too much with what I am doing. I can fully understand why.
“Yes, please,” I shout back, rubbing my temples that are now beginning to ache from looking at the computer screen for so long. I start to tap my way through the e-mails Jess had most recently opened, and hand Kate my mug from the last cup of tea she had made me, for a re-fill.
Still nothing. I’m just about to give up and shut down the program when an e-mail catches my eye, which had been sent out a few weeks before Jess died. I must have missed it when I first looked. It’s been sent by a travel agency based in the city. I assume it’s just a promotion, or some sort of deal, as I know Jess had booked holidays through them in the past. But then I see that there is a booking reference number attached to the title. I open it, and it blinks onto the screen.
The e-mail is for Jess, and thanks her for her custom. It has an attachment on the bottom, which I swiftly double click to open. It’s a booking confirmation for two one-way flights to Perth International Airport, Western Australia. The e-mail states that it was departing on 11th January from Heathrow. I don’t understand—that was the day after Jess died, but her name is down as one of the passenger’s travelling. Confusion sets in further as I read the remainder of the e-mail, which says that the airline tickets had arrived at the travel agency and would be posted out to the address given at the time of booking. Where had the tickets gone to? She surely wouldn’t have had them delivered to her house.
The room starts spinning as I stare at the screen in front of me. I narrow my eyes to adjust my focus, almost wishing that I hadn’t started poking into my sister’s past. I inhale and hold my breath, realising Steph had most likely been right about Jess having an affair. And it looks like she was prepared to leave the country, her family, and everything she knew to be with this man. I stare hard at the second passenger’s name as if trying to erase it permanently, as if it didn’t exist: Mr Adam Walker. I wrack my brains trying to place the name, but I know that I’ve never heard it before now. Jess had never mentioned it, and it doesn’t even sound familiar. I don’t know who this man is. But one thing is for sure. I’m going to find out.
Chapter 19
“Can you slow down a bit, please?” says Kate. She’s looking straight ahead at the road, and she has her hand wrapped twice around the seat belt. Her grip is so tight, her knuckles are starting to whiten.
“Sorry,” I say, perhaps a bit too bluntly, as I release the pressure on the accelerator under my foot. The car instantly starts to slow.
Kate unravels her hand from the belt, and flexes her fingers in an attempt to regain some circulation, and looks at me. “I know you’re in a hurry to get there, but you have two passengers who would like to get to the city in one piece.”
“Eh?” I look at her in confusion, then quickly acknowledge she’s referring to the baby as the second passenger. She’s right—I'm acting careless and selfish. I release my foot some more so that I hit the speed limit I should have been sticking to all along.
“Do you even know what you are going to say, when you get there? Do you think they’ll still have the booking on file?” she asks.
“I don’t know,” I reply, “but we’re going to find out soon.”
I park the car and head towards the travel agency. Kate jogs to keep up with me. Fury rages inside me as my pace quickens. I don’t even know what I’m going to say once I’m inside yet, but I’ll think of something. That e-mail is the only lead I have to find out who Adam Walker is.
*
I burst through the door of the travel agency, briefly pausing in the doorway to try and compose myself. Stay calm, stay calm. Kate follows me in a couple of seconds later. She is pink in the face and out of breath.
“God woman, are you trying to kill me?” she whispers.
The shop is so quiet you could hear a pin drop. I ignore Kate and step forward towards a young girl who is busy speaking on the telephone. There are shelves surrounding us, stacked with glossy holiday brochures, the majority of them displaying exotic and tempting destinations on their covers. I wish I were here to book a holiday today. Escaping to a faraway land with no troubles or worries sounds very appealing right now.
There are no other agents in sight, and we are the only customers. I loiter at the front of the shop until the girl finishes her telephone conversation, and don’t even wait for her to invite me over before taking a seat opposite her at her desk. Kate quickly follows me and takes another. She picks up a brochure that is sitting open on the desk and flicks through its pages, trying to look discreet.
“Hi, how can I help?” The girl asks, turning her swivel seat towards me. She is young, probably only about eighteen. I hope she’s new to the job and inexperienced enough not to know about restrictions surrounding data protection policies.
The girl is dressed smartly in a royal blue suit with a blue and pink scarf tied neatly around her neck. I take a quick glance at her name badge, which is pinned to her uniform jacket.
“Hi Melanie,” I say in a sickly sweet tone. I can’t even look at Kate, because I can imagine the look on her face after hearing my false voice. “I am hoping you can help?” I continue, as I put my right hand over my left to conceal my wedding band.
“My boyfriend and I booked a flight to Perth, Australia, quite a while ago using this agency. We didn’t make the trip because my boyfriend fell ill.” I’m trying really hard to sound convincing, but the truth is I’ve always been a crappy liar. I wet my dry lips and continue.
“It’s just... we’d like to book again for next year, but neither of us can remember which airline we booked through, cause we priced quite a few,” I add quickly. “We’d like to go directly through the airline this time because my boyfriend is a frequent flyer and he can get air miles easier that way.”
Melanie looks a little puzzled. I’m not sure if what I have just said is even true, I’d blurted it out quickly, without thinking the details through.
The girl types something into her system, and a new screen comes up on her computer.
“I don’t know if it’ll be on the system anymore, if it’s from a while ago,” she says, sounding uncertain. I can’t believe she's actually fallen for what I’ve just told her.
“We hold records for up to a year that we can access here... I think.”
“That’s great,” I say brightly, “It was booked for January, so it should still be there.”
Melanie nods, “Do you still have a booking reference number?” she asks.
“Yes,” I answer quickly, getting out my phone and giving her the reference I have from the e-mail I forwarded to myself. I read the numbers out loud and the girl taps them into her computer as I speak.
“Yes,” she says, “it’s still here. Can you confirm the lead passenger’s name and birth date?”
I give her Jess’s full name and date of birth, along with Adam’s name as the second passenger, She puts in the information and waits a few seconds.
“I’ve got it,” she announces, sounding quite pleased with herself. “The flights were booked through Qantas. I can get you some prices if you’d like. We did give you an exceptionally good deal the las
t time. It might be worth it.”
“No, it’s okay, we are just looking at options at the moment,” I state, wondering where to go next in order to convince her to give me the information I need. But Kate, as always, is already miles ahead of me.
“Actually,” says Kate, in a loud and assured tone of voice. “My husband and I are looking at going to Mexico for our tenth wedding anniversary in the new year. Do you have any brochures that I can take home for my husband to take a look at? We’ll probably pop back here at the weekend and book up,” she adds casually.
“Oh yes,” Melanie says, sounding pleased. I feel guilty for allowing Kate to give the poor girl false hope of a sale, but needs must and at this moment in time, I’m all out of other options.
Melanie stands and turns her back to us, walking towards the back of the shop where the long haul destination brochures are situated.
Kate already has a piece of paper in her hand as she snatches the girl’s pen from the desk and leans towards the computer screen to read the address that the tickets had been posted to. I look around to make sure the shop is still empty. It is. Kate keeps the girl talking as she squiggles down the address from the screen.
“My friend was telling me that Riviera Maya is fabulous,” she shouts over to Melanie as she pops the address into her handbag, returns the girl’s pen to the desk and straightens herself in her seat. She times it perfectly, just as the girl turns back around and returns to us with a few brochures tucked under her arm.
I look at Kate and shake my head in sheer disbelief.
“Oh yes, it's lovely. We have a lot of hotels in that area,” she says, totally oblivious to what we have just done.
“Fab!” replies Kate.
“Well, just let me know when you are ready to book.”
“I will,” Kate smiles.
“Is there anything else I can help you with?” Melanie asks hopefully as we stand to leave, and she hands the brochures over to Kate.
“No thanks,” says Kate. “We’ve got exactly what we came for.”
Chapter 20
Jess
I sit alone, quietly watching the waves smoothly rolling onto the shore, one by one in perfect rhythm. Their pale blue and turquoise tones look alive and sparkle like glitter as the sun bounces off them. I bury my bare feet into the soft, warm sand and squint my eyes against the dazzle of the water as I try to spot Adam. At first I can’t see him, but then I catch a glimpse of his head bobbing on the surface as he powers through the ocean, effortlessly swimming parallel to the shore. His strong arms propel him through the choppy waves like a knife through warm butter.
I rub my arms as a gust of wind suddenly hits me. It’s late afternoon, and the wind is picking up strength like it sometimes does at this time of day. It feels cool and refreshing against my bare skin on yet another blistering hot day in Western Australia. The beach is unusually quiet today, with only a handful of people walking along its shoreline.
I stand up, shaking the sand off my shorts, and wave towards Adam, beckoning him to come out of the sea. We need to make tracks if we want to go and look at this apartment. The real estate agent is meeting us there soon, but Adam insisted on coming down to the beach for his daily swim before we go. It’s a daily ritual he rarely misses.
He is a keen swimmer, powerful and fearless. Living so close to the coast since he was a child has given him a connection to the ocean that I could only ever dream of. I'm not confident in deep sea water. Although, I love the beach and could easily sit watching the waves for hours, unaware of the time slipping by. The sea has always seemed like a master of disguise to me. Attractive and alluring one moment, then sinister and unpredictable the next.
My fear stems from back when I was sixteen. I had been at the beach with Matt and decided to go for a swim. It had been a beautiful hot summer’s day and the water was so enticing that I couldn’t resist. Matt watched me from the shore as I waded further into the cold water, until I was out of my depth and could no longer feel the sea bed beneath my feet. Not long after I began to swim, I started to get into trouble and couldn’t fight the strong underwater current I had leisurely swum into.
I struggled against it for what seemed like forever. As I was pulled deeper under the waves, I tried to shout and scream but I couldn’t. Its force was immense. Then, out of nowhere, I felt I sharp jerk and was thrust forwards through the waves, then lifted into a strong pair of arms, which held me tightly until I was safely back on the beach. I was so upset and distraught by the experience that I've never swum in the sea since. I don’t think I ever thanked Matt for saving my life that day.
Adam spots me waving to him and holds up a thumb in the air. He instantaneously changes his direction, swimming back towards the shoreline where I now stand waiting. I walk into the water, allowing it to wash over my feet. White foam bubbles around my bare toes, and I wince as the waves temporarily pick up strength, sending salt water washing up my legs. It hits the tattoo on my thigh that I recently had done, it stings slightly until my skin gets used to it.
Adam pushes himself out of the deep water so he can walk. He moves slowly, pulling back his wet hair from his face, then adjusting his long black board shorts enough for me to see his thigh muscles flexing tightly as he walks. His tan is deep, and his skin glistens where thousands of beads of salted water are clinging to its surface. He comes closer, quickly grabbing me around the waist, lifting me off my feet, then placing me back down. I trip over his foot clumsily and fall backwards, pushing me further out into the shallow water. I laugh and take his hand as he helps me back to my feet.
“We’re going to be late,” I say, playfully pulling on his arm with all my strength. I soon start to lose my patience when he refuses to budge an inch, and I have to resort to using two arms to try and move him. With his feet firmly rooted in the sand under the water, he pulls me backwards, moving me closer to him, his arms around my waist once more. I link my hands around his neck and he kisses me passionately. I’m powerless, just as I always am whenever I’m with him.
I hold onto him tightly as he moves us out into deeper water. My heart begins to pound as I feel it circling round my waist. I know that he won't take me any further out, he is aware of my fear. I wrap my legs around his body, pulling him closer, feeling his heart beat increase and his breathing deepen, losing myself in him, wanting him badly.
He runs his hand down my neck, brushing my breast underneath my thin camisole top. I gasp as he kisses me again—his touch is hot. I arch my back as it lingers on my skin. His hand runs slowly down my body, stopping at my thigh, gripping it firmly. Every one of my nerve endings is alive with excitement as he reaches his hand under the leg of my shorts and plays teasingly with the elastic of my underwear. His touch is gentle as he continues, rubbing his thumb along the material, and sending my pulse racing. It takes every ounce of determination and willpower that I have to pull away from him. When I do, my body screams out in protest.
“Come on, we really have to go,” I say breathlessly, walking into the shallow water until I am once again on dry land. He lets out a big sigh and follows me out of the sea, grabbing my hand and putting his arm around my waist as we walk up the beach towards the steps leading to the road. He pulls my head towards him and plants a gentle peck on my hair as I pass him a towel to dry off.
“I love you, Jessica Lawson,” he declares loudly, kissing me again.
I smile and look up at him, his bright green eyes burning into mine as if they’ve found a crack in my soul and are now soaking deeply into it.
“I love you, too,” I whisper back.
Chapter 21
I hold the piece of paper in my hand, and enter the address Kate had written on it into my Sat Nav. I’m sitting in the car outside of Josh’s school where I’ve just dropped him off. I know roughly where the area that the airline tickets had been sent to is, but don’t have the confidence to choose the right route to get me there without assistance. I tap my fingers nervously on the dashboard as the devi
ce searches for the address, and it soon brings up the details for me to accept. I press a green button and the address details flash up, along with a map and timescales. It says it will only take me forty minutes to get there. I start the ignition and begin to follow the instructions that the computerised voice gives me. God, I hope I’m doing the right thing.
I drive for roughly half an hour before the Sat Nav tells me my location is approaching. I make the right turn onto a new looking estate. The houses all look small, but neat and tidy in their identical rows. I soon approach a sign on a corner of the street that I need to be on, and turn onto it, looking for number sixty-two. I count down the figures until I suddenly spot it, on the end of a row of terraced houses.
As I pull up, I can see that the front garden is neat and tidy. A few children’s toys litter its corners and there is a white four by four parked on the drive, which is good. Hopefully someone’s home. Was this where Adam was living? There had to be some sort of link if Jess had the airline tickets sent here. I get out of the car and hope that this wasn’t a fool’s journey and a waste of my time.
I approach the front door and gingerly press on the doorbell. I move back off the porch step as I see someone coming down the hallway, through the frosted glass panes in the centre of the door. A dog barks loudly and I hear the muffled sound of a woman shouting at it to be quiet.
A petite woman opens the door. She holds a blue tea towel in one hand and has the other behind her back, trying to keep a lively black and white border collie from escaping through the open door. She steps outside onto the porch to join me and closes the door behind her.
“Sorry,” she says, nodding toward the dog, then looking back at me. “He gets a little excited when people come to the door.” Her accent is Australian, so I have an inkling that I have the right house. Steph had said that the man Jess was with that night in the restaurant had been Australian; surely that’s not a coincidence.