by A. S. French
‘Are you okay?’ The bleeding hadn’t stopped, and Laurel’s face had turned into an unpleasant shade of light red where she’d struggled to keep the blood from her eyes.
‘It’s just a small cut; I’ll be fine.’ Astrid wasn’t too sure, noticing the tremor in Laurel’s hand as she placed it on her cheek to wipe away the blood. She peered at her, searching for stability but finding slight traces of shock in her pupils.
‘We have to get somewhere safe; she might need medical attention.’
The mystery man ignored Astrid’s words and kept driving. Outside the window, the sign for the M25 heading south whizzed past them.
Laurel handed Astrid the keys to the handcuffs. ‘You need these.’
Astrid smiled as she pressed her fingers into her wrists. ‘If you don’t tell me where we’re going, I’ll kick the doors out and we’ll jump.’
The car hit sixty miles an hour, but she didn’t care. His heavy sigh echoed in the back as she caught the smell of a recognisable aroma.
‘We have to avoid the toll roads, so it’ll take longer than it should; about ninety minutes. Will she be okay?’
Laurel had drifted into sleep, her chest rising and falling in a constant rhythm. Astrid removed the last of the blood with the sleeve of her previously white shirt. She knew Laurel would be okay with a bit of rest, laying her head on her lap in the back of the car. She returned her attention to the driver, his body odour and breath revealing his identity to her.
‘Is this revenge for your sister, Frank?’
14 Drive
She stared at the back of his head while Laurel slumbered in her lap. Frank Delaney had one hand on the wheel while the other removed the mask. He sped past a police car on the motorway without a care in the world. Astrid peered into his grim reflection in the mirror and wondered if she’d have to thank or kill him.
‘They’d get suspicious if I slowed down.’
‘Is this a kidnapping or a rescue?’
‘You’d rather be in the back of that van?’
His laugh annoyed her. She stared into the dark through the window, catching the occasional glimpse of road signs and the countryside.
‘You should head to the centre of London.’
‘Are you crazy?’ Delaney weaved past a lumbering truck and glared at the driver.
It’ll be just my luck, he’ll crash after getting me out of that van.
‘I need to get to my sister’s house as soon as possible.’
The gloom inside her head was as oppressive as the weather battering the car. He slid the vehicle across the road and into the outside lane. If he was trying to keep them inconspicuous, he wasn’t doing a good job.
‘Your sister hates you. Why would you want to go there?’
Astrid observed his face in the rearview mirror, all scrunched up and wrinkled like a used potato skin.
‘It doesn’t matter why. You need to do it before I drag you into the back with me and we end up smashed in the middle of this road.’ Her voice was calm, quiet against the howl of the wind outside.
‘Don’t be stupid. It’s the first place they’ll be waiting for you. You need to be smart now. You can’t go back to your previous life until we get this sorted.’
He was right, but she didn’t like it. ‘I didn’t kill Cara.’
‘I know,’ he replied. ‘That’s why I broke you out.’
She leant closer to him, hands ready to spring around his neck if they needed to, no thought given to the fact he was driving at sixty miles an hour.
‘If that’s the case, why visit my cell?’
The perspiration dribbled down his head as the sweat living under his armpits escaped into the air.
‘You’re clever, the best the Agency has, apparently, so you tell me.’
He appeared to be enjoying himself, which she found disturbing. Attacking the van was reckless and reckless people got you killed.
‘You set yourself up with a nice alibi, showing the Agency your anger, pretending to hate me. Nobody would suspect you for this after that performance.’ His foresight and planning impressed her.
‘I wasn’t pretending. I hate you with every bone in my body for what you did to Cara.’ His face in the mirror turned red.
‘Why break me out then?’
‘Because you’re the only one who can discover who killed Cara, and you can’t do that in the deepest sub-basement in an Agency prison. Once in there, you wouldn’t see the light of day until ready for hip replacements and a nurse to wipe your arse.’ They picked up speed as his tension increased and the weather paid a visit, rain bouncing off the tarmac and attacking the car with relish. ‘I’d do anything for Cara, even this.’
When she and Cara had been together, Astrid had thought they made for strange siblings: Cara’s fragility and lack of confidence contrasting with Frank’s self-assurance and vitality. But Astrid dismissed their differences as nothing more than two people brought up in the same household taking diverse personality paths in life. Astrid had her experiences with Courtney to understand how easy that could be.
Frank Delaney loved his dead sister so much he’d do anything: attack an Agency transport; risk his career and his freedom. And work with somebody he hated. Astrid thought of the love she had for a child she’d never really met. She’d enjoyed that fleeting moment in the park, but she needed to ensure Olivia was safe. Now she was free, wasn’t her niece’s safety more important than her own?
Lee shifted in her lap and Astrid hoped she wasn’t concussed. Her wound had stopped bleeding, seemingly only a scratch. She stroked Laurel’s hair and gazed at the crucifix hanging around her neck.
‘Why did you force Agent Lee to come with us?’
Would the Agency view Laurel as a victim or a fugitive?
‘She’ll be useful. She’s not as innocent as she seems to be.’
With that vague comment from their saviour, Astrid glanced outside the window as the sign to Crawley disappeared behind them.
‘What makes you think I didn’t kill Cara and the others?’
She wondered why he’d take her side. He laughed as the rain grew heavier and danced across the road.
‘You’re not so sloppy. You wouldn’t leave such an obvious piece of evidence in the hotel room in Prague. The Agency has plenty of video footage of you in Europe; it’s not complete, sometimes they can’t track you, but you’re just another Brit tourist abroad.’
He splattered his sentences with the occasional harsh cough, threatening to chuck his lungs all over the floor.
‘So why the sham with Davis? Why dump me in the cell and get those idiots to interrogate me? And what’s happened to Director Cross?’
‘Cross disappeared, and nobody knows where. I assume none of them tried too hard to find him. He had plenty of enemies in the Agency, and Davis took his position before anybody could react. I think she hates you.’
‘I’d never met the woman until I walked back into the building. What have I done to make her hate me?’
Delaney laughed like a drunken hyena. ‘Who knows with you, Snow? You have a knack for upsetting people.’
She didn’t argue, more concerned about their immediate future. ‘Where are we going?’
There was enough grit in her voice to lay a driveway. Astrid hadn’t forgotten his refusal to answer the question the first time she’d asked. She scrutinised the bald spot on the back of his head and the scratch marks across his neck. They looked like they’d come from human fingernails. Laurel murmured something unintelligible in her lap.
‘We’re heading to the other side of Crawley, to the Delaney family home.’
His words made Astrid remember Cara again.
‘I’m sorry about your sister.’
‘Why?’
She thought it a strange question.
‘I’m sorry because she’s dead.’
It was something which shouldn’t need saying, but she did anyway.
‘She was dead inside once you broke her heart. You weren
’t sorry then.’
He appeared ready for an argument.
‘What happened to you, Frank?’
‘What do you mean?’ His eyes never left the road, but he glanced at her in the mirror.
‘You were a rising star in the Agency, and Director Cross had big plans for you. You were handsome, charming and had a physique men envied and women admired. And now look at you, stuck behind a desk, overweight, with bad skin and poor hygiene. Changes like that don’t happen without a trigger.’
‘Shit happens.’ His blood-red eyes stared at her in the mirror.
‘Apparently.’
Is that my future? Now I’ve allowed emotions into my life.
Thoughts of Olivia consumed her, skirting around the periphery of her mind until she let them in; welcomed them in. The world passed by outside as Astrid considered how soon she’d be able to get back to her niece. To make sure Olivia was safe. It was her priority, but she appreciated her effectiveness would be limited until she dealt with her problems, which meant relying on Delaney whether she liked it or not.
He drove on; with so much tension in his fingers Astrid thought he’d snap the steering wheel in half. Maybe he’d scratched the back of his neck so hard, he’d drawn blood in an agitated state?
‘What did you do before you joined the Agency, Frank?’
Cara had never spoken much about him, but she knew they were close. She found positive family relationships to be curious things, mythical creatures like dragons and monsters. And then she remembered that monsters were real, and they lived within families.
‘I signed up straight from university.’
Of course, he did. Something else he undoubtedly resented about Astrid, if he needed any more reasons: the girl recruited from prison; the runaway.
‘What did you get your degree in?’
Looking at him, she guessed it would be something like sociology or journalism. The weather worsened, the road turning into a night river, water jumping off the wheels as Delaney pushed the car even harder.
‘Media studies.’
She didn’t contain her laughter. Her body rocked so much, Laurel spluttered into consciousness, lifting her head with a jerk.
‘Where are we?’ She rubbed at her eyes. ‘Why am I in your lap?’
‘Don’t worry, Agent Lee, I’m only looking after you; nothing untoward happened.’
‘What?’ Laurel stammered.
‘Laurel, have you met Agent Delaney?’ Astrid’s smile was mischievous. Lee regained a measure of control and stared at the man in the driver’s seat. ‘He told me how his extensive familiarity with eighties teen movies got the Agency recruiters begging him to join. He hasn’t said why he got so large and putrid.’
Disapproval was etched across Laurel’s face, giving it a stern Victorian look, which Astrid didn’t like. It ruined her pretty eyes and transformed those touchable cheekbones into tight canals of harshness.
‘Is this why people fall out with you: because of your obsessive need to belittle others?’
‘Oh my dear, you ain’t seen nothing yet.’
Astrid stretched her legs, the ache in her bones from the recent physical exertion attacking her with renewed vigour.
‘Why am I here?’ Laurel glared at Astrid, but the question was for Agent Delaney.
‘You’ll help us find who killed my sister.’
He gripped the wheel as they slowed because of the traffic ahead.
‘And how will I do that?’
Laurel put her seatbelt on, dragging it across her chest and shifting in the back. The car didn’t move, allowing Delaney the opportunity to turn and peer at the junior agent.
‘You’ll tell Snow everything you forgot to say at her sham of an investigation.’
Laurel lifted her hand to her scalp, feeling the scar. Astrid wondered how the three of them would last more than twenty-four hours without tearing each other apart.
‘Would you care to enlighten me as to what he means?’ she said to Laurel.
Agent Lee placed her fingers on the cut before glancing away from Astrid’s scrutiny.
‘Davis told me she’d discovered something about you and Cross, something secret.’
Laurel’s voice was calm but hesitant, her fingers shaking as dried blood peeled off her head.
‘Would you like to elaborate?’ There was only one secret she shared with George.
‘I don’t know any more. Davis wouldn’t tell me the specifics, only it was treacherous, and you and Cross would be locked away because of it.’
Weariness seeped through every word, and Astrid empathised with how tired Laurel seemed. She relaxed into the seat as the darkness drifted by and wondered if that’s why George had disappeared. Did he realise the Agency was on to them?
Was that why the Reaper had framed her?
It had unnerved me, realising how much the act of murder increased my libido. The last night in Berlin, my mind and body high on the adrenalin, I’d scoured the city’s most salacious spots. Money burnt in my pocket when I picked her up at a bar so run-down, it was amazing the walls hadn’t collapsed. She claimed she was twenty-five, but it was a lie; the wrinkles on her face and neck throbbed like rings inside a dead tree. It didn’t matter; I just needed a sexual release.
‘Let’s go back to your place,’ she said with a cloying voice. A smile revealed several rotten teeth. I laughed and told her no, I wanted to do it in the alley behind the bar. She didn’t seem opposed to the idea, no doubt having done the same thing many times before. So we stumbled outside, high on speed and the smell of gasoline, stepping over broken bottles and used needles. I pushed her against the wall, hands over her breasts, my breath burning into the back of her head.
‘Do what you want to me,’ she said. I grinned at the invite I didn’t need, my fingers clawing for the tops of her legs. Somewhere behind us, a dog barked while a police siren screamed in the distance. I hoped they were rushing towards the river and my earlier adventure.
And that’s when my hands stopped creeping downwards and headed in the other direction. They were around her neck, my mind wondering where the plastic was as my fingers worked without their usual release. My nails dug into her flesh until the blood congealed underneath them, only stopping when a drunk came crashing out of the bar and landed at my feet.
As I let her go, she spat up a mixture of blood and phlegm. We stared at each other, both recognising what I was; what I’d become. She fled with a face consumed by terror, all bulging eyes and quivering lips. It was only as she disappeared from the shadows that I recognise I’d orgasmed.
‘What an interesting development,’ I said as I headed away and thought of her again; dreaming of the one I hated.
15 Our House
Twenty minutes later, Astrid squirmed in the seat, fingers fidgeting with the seatbelt she wasn’t wearing.
‘What’s the name of the village where your house is?’
The sound of silence was interrupted by the rain bouncing off the car as he got them closer to their destination.
‘Pease Pottage.’ His eyes were fixed on the road.
‘How did a media studies degree help you become one of the country’s secret weapons, Frank? Did your intimate knowledge of British TV soaps make you a wiz at the Agency? Or was it your specialist knowledge of terrible Britpop music that got you the cosy desk and lifestyle?’
Astrid couldn’t control her thoughts, her mind rambling in all directions, heading towards images of Olivia and Lawrence until she pushed them towards her current saviour. Delaney ignored the questions.
‘It won’t be long now.’
They passed a motorway station, then on to Horsham Road. Delaney drove past a pub and stopped at the bottom of the street.
‘Don’t you live in London?’
Astrid couldn’t imagine having to do this commute twice a day.
‘This is the family home. Our parents lived here. And then Cara did after you dumped her.’
Astrid wondered at what po
int in their new partnership he’d stop reminding her of what had happened to his sister. She stared at his face, his inability or refusal to hide his hatred, and she understood he’d never stop reminding her.
They got out of the car, the early morning darkness transformed into the new day as the street lights sputtered at their arrival. Neighbourhood cats crept along the edges of the pavement, eyeing the visitors with scrunched faces and grave suspicion. Delaney strode up the drive, and they followed him.
Astrid glanced at Lee. ‘How are you feeling?’
Laurel forced a smile through her sleepy face, the tiredness evident on her weary features as eyes drooped and words dripped out in a querulous tremble.
‘Don’t worry; I’ll be fine.’
She didn’t look fine to Astrid. Laurel’s skin had lost its sheen as soon as Delaney rescued them, while the cut on her head had turned into a violent shade of purple around its edges.
The rain ceased pounding the land, leaving a bouquet of fresh water and dampness drifting around them. Some of nature’s tiniest creatures crawled along the ground and skittered into the muddy grass. Astrid gazed at the house through a fresh mist. It was separated from the others on the street, but had the same appearance as its concrete brothers and sisters: long and narrow with a garage on the side, it stretched back like a giant shoebox. It was three storeys high with a small attic at the top, a conservatory as an extension. Astrid glimpsed its dirty windows as they approached the door. The front garden was pierced with weeds, looking like the poor relation to its neighbours with wild bushes, impressive trees and vividly coloured flowers.
Delaney slipped the key in the lock and pushed the door open. It was the smell that hit Astrid first, an overpowering aroma of detergent and cleaning fluids. She couldn’t see anything clean as dust lay over every surface like grey snow. They stepped over a pile of mail cascading across the floor, a paper infestation ready to creep through the rest of the house. He threw his keys onto a side table and strode towards the kitchen.