As olive branches go, I’ll definitely take a spoon.
‘You sure?’ I say.
‘I don’t give away strawberry thickshake lightly,’ Naomi replies, ‘especially not at the Deck – and especially not at linner-time.’
I dip the spoon and swallow a bit of the gooey ice cream mix. I even get a small dark chocolate chunk – Naomi really knows what she’s doing when it comes to anything ice cream related.
Something strange happened after I came out of the river that final time. I closed my eyes as I lay on the bank and, when I woke a short time later, I was hungry. In the way I once knew for certain that I’d died, I knew then that I needed food. I’m not sure I can explain it better than that. You know what you know. You believe what you believe.
Since then, my skin has regained much of its colour. I’m almost looking back to my old self – and I can eat again. I’ve had everything on the Deck’s menu in the week since it all happened with Jim… including the four-bean burger. Ash sorted it especially for me, even though it’s no longer the special.
For the record, it contains kidney beans, green beans, butter beans and pinto beans (I don’t know what they are). Not a baked bean in sight.
‘What did you do to your finger?’ Naomi asks.
I hold it up to show the small clip over the end. ‘The doctor said it was broken, so he reset it. They gave me something to help me sleep and I was out for fourteen hours. It was amazing.’
Naomi doesn’t ask how I did it, probably assuming it was while fighting off Jim. I’m the centre of attention in the village, with so many stories going around about me that I can’t keep up. The truth is, it was broken when I fell off the shed roof. It was only after I got out of the river the final time, after I woke up from my nap on the riverbank, that it started to ache.
‘Do you want to know what actually happened with Jim?’ I ask.
Naomi has another spoonful of the thickshake.
‘I want you to know that I had already forgiven you for kissing Ben,’ she says. ‘It’s not because you nearly died, or because of what happened to your brother. It was before that. It’s because you’re my friend and, however many years down the line, neither of us will even remember Ben’s name. We’ll still be friends, though.’
I open my mouth but she cuts me off. ‘And don’t say you’re sorry again. I get it.’
‘Okay.’
She leans in, the hint of a mischievous smile creeping across her face. ‘So… what did happen?’
I tell her most of what occurred. Stumbling across Melek in the woods, going to the newsagent, finding Helen’s body, being confronted by Jim, Melek trying to be my hero, running and then ending up in the river. I leave out the part about Sarah.
Naomi oohs and aahs while continuing to eat. When I finish with me on the riverbank, she slides the rest of the thickshake across the table towards me. The ultimate act of friendship.
‘I still don’t understand how you escaped,’ she says.
I shake my head. ‘Me either. I think Jim might have slipped in the river, perhaps hit his head on a rock?’
Naomi eyes me sideways. It’s not convincing but what else can I tell her?
‘Is that what you told the police?’ she asks.
‘What else is there to tell? I don’t know. One minute I was trying to get away from Jim in the river, the next I looked back and his head was under the water.’
She nods, acceptingly. It’s a shame I have to lie but she wouldn’t believe the truth. I’m not sure if I believe it. Seeing Sarah feels like a dream. There was something about the way she pressed her finger to her lips that still haunts me, though in a good way. It’s comforting. I’m not sure I’ll ever forget it.
‘How do they know it was Jim who killed Helen?’ Naomi asks.
‘They found indents in her neck that matched his fingerprints. They also found the hammer in the river that had Jim’s fingerprints and Melek’s blood.’
‘They think he killed Sarah as well?’
‘I guess.’
She whistles low. ‘Wow… all because of your mum.’ She stops and then wafts her hand. ‘Sorry – I didn’t mean it like that, I—’
‘I know what you meant,’ I say.
Naomi takes a moment and then stands, straightening her skirt. She looks from me to the counter. ‘You reckon that Ash guy’s not that bad…?’
‘He’s harmless. He just has a strange way to him. Ask him something about movies. He loves it. You’ve probably got a lot in common.’
Naomi peers between us again and then shrugs, before marching to the counter. I watch her, in awe that she still wants to be my friend after everything. The past few days have blurred by, with police interviews, hospital appointments and needing to be there for Mum and Ollie. This is the first time I’ve seen Naomi since Rebecca let on about Ben and me. It feels as if none of that happened. Little things become insignificant when big things come along.
Naomi says something to Ash behind the counter and he smiles – really smiles and then laughs. She laughs too and it’s not long before she’s heading back with two thickshakes.
‘I figure this is a three-shake kinda afternoon,’ she says.
I stick to the strawberry and chocolate chunk one. She doesn’t even bother with a straw, going directly into hers with the spoon.
‘How’s Ollie?’ she asks.
‘Back at home. Not himself, obviously – but he’s still talking about going to uni. It’ll be a new start where nobody knows him.’
‘He can reinvent himself.’
I nod. ‘I hope he does. Once they told him Jim was dead, he told the police that Jim had threatened him in the police station cells. They were reluctant to release him at first but found one of Helen’s hairs under the back seat of Jim’s car. At his house, there was a small key to access the kit room at the college. They had no reason to keep Ollie in – plus they were too busy fielding queries about why they hadn’t looked at Jim in the first place.’
Naomi nods along. ‘And the Hitcher turned out to be a hero. I bet the village biddies didn’t expect that.’
I smile but say nothing. The memory of talking to Melek in the woods, of hearing how peaceful he was, is too much. He saved my life but lost his own.
I realised days later that Melek never answered one of my questions. I told him that Eleanor meant shining light – but he never told me, or didn’t know, what his own name meant. Luckily, there’s Google for that. There’s Google for everything. It might be a coincidence but there’s very little I take for granted nowadays – and Melek can be translated as ‘angel’. He didn’t react when I asked him if he was my guardian angel and I’m still not sure why I had that thought in the first place. What I do know is that he was in the right place to save me when I needed saving.
Naomi senses I don’t want to talk but shuffles around our shakes until there’s a caramel one in front of me.
‘There are Creme Egg bits in there,’ she says. ‘They keep them in the freezer at the back so you can have them all year round.’
I shovel a spoonful of caramel Creme Egg thickshake into my mouth and it’s wonderful. I can smell it, taste it, and the world is alive again.
‘Is your mum okay?’ Naomi asks.
‘Not really. She keeps saying she loves me – and Ollie. Hard to complain. I don’t know how she kept it all together. Want to know the strangest thing? Well, perhaps not the strangest, but…’
‘Go on.’
‘Jim left her everything in the will. After everything that happened, she owns his house, his car – everything. She says she doesn’t want it but I don’t know. It’s too weird.’
Naomi puts down her spoon and leans across the table. She takes my hand in hers and it’s cold. Ice cream cold. The best kind of cold.
‘I’m glad we’re friends again,’ she says.
‘Me, too.’
She nods towards the door and I turn to see a man entering, sandals with socks pulled up past his ankles. I don’
t need to say anything because Naomi’s grin says it all. It’s so nice to be able to give the piss again.
In the week that has passed since I awoke in the river, I’ve wondered how much of it was true, or how much is down to my stunted memory. Was I ever really dead, or was it my imagination? Could I have really gone five days without food or sleep? Did the necklace from my grandmother somehow protect me? Was Melek my guardian angel? Did I really see Sarah in the river? Did she put her finger to her lips and then take that bracelet back?
Ultimately, I don’t know – so I decided my dad was right all along. Or almost right.
Life is a lot like a well-made sandwich. The two ends are kinda boring and what matters is all that fancy stuff in the middle. What he forgot is that sometimes those sandwiches are triple-deckers and that, every now and then, you get two goes at all that fancy stuff in the middle.
If you were hooked by The Death and Life of Eleanor Parker,, you'll love The Girl Who Came Back, a totally absorbing psychological thriller with an ending you won't see coming. Get it here!
The Girl Who Came Back
Thirteen years ago Olivia Adams went missing. Now she’s back… or is she?
* * *
When six-year-old Olivia Adams disappeared from her back garden, the small community of Stoneridge was thrown into turmoil. How could a child vanish in the middle of a cosy English village?
* * *
Thirteen years on and Olivia is back. Her mother is convinced it’s her but not everyone is sure. If this is the missing girl, then where has she been - and what happened to her on that sunny afternoon?
* * *
If she's an imposter, then who would be bold enough to try to fool a child’s own mother – and why?
* * *
Then there are those who would rather Olivia stayed missing. The past is the past and some secrets must remain buried.
* * *
An absorbing and gripping psychological thriller that will have you holding your breath until the final page.
* * *
Order now!
Hear more from Kerry
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Also by Kerry Wilkinson
Standalone novels
Ten Birthdays
Two Sisters
The Girl Who Came Back
Last Night
* * *
The Jessica Daniel series
The Killer Inside
Vigilante
The Woman in Black
Think of the Children
Playing with Fire
The Missing Dead
Behind Closed Doors
Crossing the Line
Scarred for Life
For Richer, For Poorer
* * *
Short Stories
January
February
March
April
* * *
The Andrew Hunter series
Something Wicked
Something Hidden
* * *
Silver Blackthorn
Reckoning
Renegade
Resurgence
* * *
Other
Down Among the Dead Men
No Place Like Home
Watched
A letter from Kerry
If you want to keep up-to-date with all my latest releases, just sign up here. Your email address will never be shared and you can unsubscribe at any time.
* * *
I don’t know how much of my work you’ll have read over the years. I’ve dabbled through genres and tried a few different things. I never wanted to write the same type of book over and over. It feels a bit safe. A bit easy. A bit boring.
The initial idea for this came while I was working on one of my ‘regular’ crime books in the Jessica Daniel series. I liked the thought of someone investigating their own death and it eventually became this ghostly-supernatural-teenagery-crimey-wimey-coming-of-age story that you’ve hopefully just finished.
With books, movies, TV shows and probably most kinds of entertainment, one of the first things anyone wants to know is the genre into which things fit. It’s neat and tidy if something can be labelled in a certain way. Easy to market and know the target audience. Look at how many reviews or posters say things like, ‘It’s Die Hard meets Mean Girls!’ (which sounds amazing, by the way). Everything is compared to everything else. If you like Die Hard and/or Mean Girls, you might like this new movie (which still sounds amazing). It would definitely star The Rock… or Chris Pratt! (I love Chris Pratt).
Anyway, I never knew if The Death and Life of Eleanor Parker would be published because I never had a good answer to the question of what, precisely, it is.
Is it a crime book? Sort of. Is it a coming-of-age tale? Kind of. Is it a supernatural story? Maybe.
I figure that, probably above anything else I’ve ever written, this book is whatever you, the reader, want it to be. All I tried to do was write something I hoped would be interesting. I really hope I succeeded.
On that note, please do leave a review on your platform of choice. As ever, it’s the best way us authors have of getting our work out there in front of new readers. It’s people like your very selves who have enabled me to find audiences in countries like Canada and Australia, where nobody had really read my stuff before.
Thanks to, in no particular order, Claire, Natasha, Nicola, Kim and Noelle for their help with this.
If you’re wondering where the idea for Tape Deck comes from, I was listening to a lot of Frank Turner’s Tape Deck Heart at the time. The album has nothing to do with the diner I thought of – but did provide a name. Oh, and Frank Turner is great. On the day I am writing this letter, I am literally off to watch him tonight.
If you want to ask me anything, you can email me through kerrywilkinson.com – or at facebook.com/kerrywilkinsonbooks – I try to reply to everyone but sometimes that pesky spam filter grabs your legitimate emails, while allowing through ones trying to make me slimmer. Perhaps someone’s trying to tell me something?
Cheers for reading,
Kerry
Last Night
An absolutely gripping psychological thriller with a brilliant twist
Order here!
* * *
It’s the early hours of the morning and Rose Denton wakes up behind the steering wheel of her car. She’s off the road, through a hedge and in a field.
* * *
There’s blood on the windscreen and bonnet – but it’s not hers and there’s no sign of anything or anyone she might have hit. The last thing she remembers is being in a hotel on a business trip but now she’s miles away.
* * *
Back home and her daughter’s boyfriend is missing. The last thing he did was argue with Rose over money. He left no note, no text, no clue as to his whereabouts.
* * *
The police have questions – and so does Rose’s family. But those are little compared to the ones she has for herself.
* * *
What happened last night? And, perhaps more importantly, does she really want to know the answer?
* * *
A totally addictive psychological thriller which will keep you turning the pages until the final dramatic twist.
* * *
Order here!
Two Sisters
A gripping psychological thriller with a shocking twist
They told us he had been missing for nearly two days, that he probably drowned. They told us a lie.
* * *
Megan was ten years old when her older brother, Zac, went missing among the cliffs, caves and beaches that surround the small seaside town of Whitecliff.
* * *
A decade later and a car crash has claimed the lives of her parents.
* * *
&nb
sp; Megan and her younger sister Chloe return to Whitecliff one summer for the first time since their brother’s disappearance. Megan says it’s to get her parents’ affairs in order. There are boxes to pack, junk to clear, a rundown cottage to sell. But that’s not the real reason.
* * *
Megan has come to confront her family’s past after receiving a postcard on the day of her parents’ funeral. It had a photograph of Whitecliff on the front and a single letter on the back.
* * *
‘Z’ is all it read.
* * *
Z for Zac.
* * *
A totally gripping psychological thriller that will have fans of Louise Jensen, Sue Fortin and The Silent Child absolutely hooked.
The Death and Life of Eleanor Parker_An absolutely gripping mystery novel Page 26