The dreadful irony of causing someone’s death while trying to conceal another death we hadn’t caused…I’d been wrong when I thought things couldn’t get any worse.
“Yes, I understand. I’m sorry, I didn’t realise. I’m sure it was fine earlier. It must have just gone on the way here this evening.”
But unfortunately, the officer wasn’t going to leave it like that.
“Given the time of night, I’m considering whether I should let you drive the car on to your destination in that state or have it taken away.”
I closed my eyes. This couldn’t get any worse. I had to press my hand against my mouth to prevent myself from being sick or crying. Zak was silent, waiting for the police officer to come to the decision that could make all the difference to whether we slept in our own beds that night or never saw them again.
“On this occasion I’m going to let you drive on.”
I wanted to kiss him. I could hear the relief in Zak’s voice as he thanked him.
But it wasn’t over.
“You’ll need to get it fixed first thing in the morning. You are not allowed to drive the vehicle until you’ve done so. I’m going to issue you with two tickets. The first is for the light. You need to get it stamped by your garage during the next seven days and brought into the station to show the work’s been done.
“The second is for you to produce your licence, insurance details and MOT certificate also within seven days, so you can do that at the same time. If you don’t the prosecution process will begin. Do you understand?”
“All right, that’s fair. Thank you.”
I sat rigid, waiting. As Zak was about to open the driver’s door to get back in the officer called, “And don’t stop on the hard shoulder again unless it’s a real emergency. I should be giving you a ticket for that as well.”
“Right. I’m sorry, thanks.”
As Zak sank into the seat he blew through his cheeks and slumped over the wheel. He fumbled for his inhaler and took a long drag.
“Thought we’d had it,” he said between puffs.
“What kept you? I thought you weren’t coming back,” I told him.
He started the car up and manouvered it out towards the road.
“I wouldn’t do that to you.”
“But you thought about it, didn’t you?”
He coloured and dropped his gaze. “Yeh. Sorry.”
We kept checking the mirror to see if the police were following us. Surely it had been obvious I was a nervous wreck? The way they’d appeared so suddenly made me certain they’d do so again at any moment.
Zak was fuming about living in “a fucking police state” and saying we’d have to change direction now.
“You gave him Stuart’s name,” I said after a moment, trying to keep my voice level.
He shrugged. “I could hardly give him mine, could I? I doubt Stuart’s car’s insured for other drivers. Anyway, he’s going to report the car as stolen, remember? Hopefully not while we’re still in it.”
After a few moments I said, “So you’re not insured to drive this car. But you do have a driving licence, right?”
He shook his head and laughed “Emily, we have a body in the boot and you’re worrying about whether I have a licence? Look, I can drive for God’s sake. We’ve got this far haven’t we? I have had a licence before, it’s just, well, I’m sort of banned.”
“Sort of banned?”
“Only for a year. Bit of an accident coming over a hill - I hit a queue of cars at the top and they all went into each other like dominoes. But look if you’d rather take over please be my guest…”
I shook my head. “I can’t.”
“Right so you’re stuck with me, aren’t you?”
We drove on until we reached some services where Zak filled up the petrol again. The lighted windows looked so inviting. It made me think of being very young travelling with my family to stay with my relations, snuggled in our sleeping bags with the back seats down. What would they say if they could see me now?
“Can we go in?” I said. “I’m desperate for the loo and I’m so cold.”
He sighed. “Better not be seen together. You go. But keep your face down in case they have video cameras.”
I was afraid of him falling asleep at the wheel, so I bought two coffees on my way out and nursed mine between my knees for the next few miles. We left the motorway and drove for some way on an A road. We came to a crossroads and after a few moments of indecision he chose a smaller road.
We drove across miles of moorland and in and out of small towns and villages. We followed a series of narrow lanes with high hedges surrounded by darkness. I could make out sheep and gorse and trees.
After miles and miles we could see the sea like a cold, grey metal sheet. We drove through more villages and small lanes and eventually followed a sign to a headland. Zak drove through the car park and ignoring the boundary rammed the car up over some grass. We bumped along a track and across more grass. The car protested but he floored the accelerator and we ploughed on.
“This’ll do,” he said at last, cutting the engine.
Silence filled the car. I tried to work out how far we’d have to walk back to find any sort of civilisation if we were to leave the car here. We sat for a while on the cliff top to make sure we hadn’t been followed. My heart slammed against my ribs as though I’d been running. The only sound was our breathing and the waves booming. The wind rocked the car so hard I thought it might blow it over. I was trying not to remember my dread of heights.
I described my idea of moving the body into the driving seat and pushing the car off the cliff as though The Man Who Was Looking For Fitz had driven it over. Zak sat very still, thinking about it.
“Hmm,” he said at last. “I think the important thing is to get the car as far away from the body as possible. A car’s going to draw attention and will be linked back to Stuart immediately whereas a body might take a while to get washed up and then identified. Anyway, we’ll need some means of getting away from here.”
When I opened the door, the wind tried to rip it off. It tore at our hair and clothes and filled our lungs with salty air. Below us the sea was thundering against the rocks, sending up towers of spray, ghostly white in the moonlight. We staggered round to the boot, pressing our bodies against the wind. I really didn’t want to see inside but at the same time I couldn’t wait to get rid of the burden.
The face was turned away, the body in a foetal position, much as it had been in the basement. Thank God for the darkness and the fresh wind. I could almost kid myself the cargo was and always had been inanimate.
Zak leaned in and shovelled the body up into his arms. “Help me with the feet.” They kept getting caught.
I didn’t look at the face this time. Somehow, we got the body out of the car. Zak heaved it towards him in an embrace and walked – or dragged – it over to the cliff edge which now seemed much further away. I was terrified he’d lose his footing or be blown off the overhang.
“Check there’s no one around,” he panted.
I strained my eyes. Only dark nothingness for as far as I could see. The sky was sprinkled with stars and I wondered how I could appreciate beauty at a time like that.
I looked back at Zak and the backpack man. The pair stood there locked in each other’s arms like a couple of lovers. They shuffled closer to the edge of the cliff, toppled dangerously, then one pitched forward. I watched it fall. The body tumbled through the air, almost beautiful, the arms spread out like wings. The jagged rocks and the sea rose up to take him.
I waited for the smash as it hit the water. It didn’t come.
Zak sank to his knees. He raised his hands to the sides of his head.
“Shit.”
He rocked forward. I thought for a moment he was praying but he kept looking back over the edge as if he thought he might have been mistaken. I looked too, going as close to the drop as I dared. My head lurched as I saw the problem. The body was still there, no
t even halfway down the cliff.
“Have to leave it,” I shouted above the wind. “Come away from the edge.”
“No, no we can’t. I’ll have to —”
“Don’t be stupid. You’ll die.”
He wiped his hand over his mouth. His breathing was all over the place and his face was twisted with fear.
“Zak, you’re not going to. Please don’t.” I grabbed hold of him but he shook me off.
Slowly, he started his descent. He shouted something back up to me but it was lost in the wind. I watched, frozen in horror as his feet slipped from under him a couple of times and he perched on perilous ledges, grasping crumbling bits of rock. The wind was whipping his hair and clothes, trying to tear him away from the cliff.
Every time I looked down my stomach roiled and my head spun. My brain felt as if it was sliding around. It took ages for him to get to the body and the wind kept pulling but somehow he reached the crumpled figure lying on the outcrop.
Pressing himself back against the rock Zak kicked hard. Then again and again, putting all his weight into it. The violence shook me even though I knew the body was past feeling anything. Eventually, after several attempts the corpse dislodged and rolled over the edge. This time it hit the water. But how was Zak going to get back up?
For the second time that evening I was terrified and alone. I prayed over and over to a God I’d long since abandoned to get me through this nightmare. I kept looking round, expecting to hear sirens and see a barrage of blue lights. Was I going to have to answer for this on my own? I hadn’t realised up until then that it was possible to feel this scared and not die.
“Shit.” I jumped at the panic in Zak’s voice. I heard a skittering and a splash as rocks fell.
My head swam as I crawled on my front to the edge. I was almost dragged over just looking. I could just make out Zak’s shape in the darkness, swinging, scrabbling, sliding.
“There’s nowhere to hold,” he shouted.
I could see a ledge just above him to the right, but he couldn’t get a grip. He was fighting against the wind. His face was frozen in panic, his feet flailing at the rock. I stared down past him. The moonlit sea was thrashing against the dark rocks. No sign of the body. I looked back at Zak – if I didn’t do something he’d go the same way.
“Wait,” I shouted.
“No – it won’t work,” he yelled back, a note of resignation in his voice. “There’s no point you…”
Ignoring him, I inched down one level, sending more stones bowling down to the sea. I’d never been so scared. This was crazy. Surely, we were both going to fall? And be found close to the body which police would obviously work out had been transported in the car we’d left at the top. After all our efforts such an ignominious end. I almost gave up.
But something took over, a voice that told me to shut up and concentrate, and somehow, eventually, I managed to reach the ledge above Zak.
I anchored myself around a piece of rock that jutted out from the cliff, and held out my waivering spare hand for him. My teeth were rattling too hard for me to speak but even if I had he probably wouldn’t have heard with the waves so loud. He grabbed my hand and I screamed at the ripping sensation as he hauled himself up, but the wind swallowed my voice. From the ledge we managed to scramble back to the top, hugging the rock and guiding each other’s feet, trying not to let ourselves think about how the wind could pluck us off at any moment. At last we flung ourselves down on the short grass at the top.
We clung to each other for a long time. I could feel his heart banging against my chest. He was laughing and crying, and his chest was heaving. Around us, the light had changed. The sky had a pale blue band and the caves on the other side of the cove were visible like blank staring eyes. The water rippled like fish scales. In the growing light there was no sign of the body.
“Come on,” he whispered. “We’d better get going.”
Back at the car he spent a while fumbling around inside the boot.
“What are you looking for?”
He checked under the car but eventually said, “Nothing. Just making sure. Come on, let’s go.”
I looked back once, hugging my arms around myself and then walking around to the passenger side. I had no idea what the future held. I’d crossed a line and it was impossible to imagine ever being able to get back.
Chapter Six
Driving away, I was sure the police would be lying in wait for us in the car park at the start of the headland. I held my breath as Zak swung the car back down the bends in the road. So many of them. I wanted to tell him to hurry but I also knew we couldn’t afford to draw attention to ourselves or risk an accident by speeding.
“How’s your shoulder?” he asked after a few silent miles.
It was the first time the pain had really registered. “Hurts like hell.”
“You saved my life back there.”
I couldn’t help smiling. “Don’t be so dramatic. Keep your eyes on the road.”
But I’d surprised myself. Amazed myself, actually. The sad thing was I’d never, ever be able to tell anyone about the one heroic thing I’d done in my life without risk of imprisonment.
“Thanks,” he said. “I won’t forget.”
Eventually we rejoined the motorway but instead of coming off at Bristol continued north and eventually headed off to the east. I was increasingly nervous about Zak’s driving. He’d strayed over the cat’s eyes more than once and his face had a fixed expression. Still, with the sky brightening I knew we couldn’t afford to hang about.
“That thing about the sect,” I said, hoping talking would keep him awake.
He shrugged, apparently happy to talk about something other than the obvious. “Anything seems normal to a child doesn’t it? We lived in a big old manor, about thirty people including us children.”
“And what did you do?”
He pulled a face. “Normal stuff really – or it seemed normal anyway. At weekends we hung around town centres giving out leaflets and asking for money. Some people went to work and we had meetings where people gave testimonies about their experiences and we meditated. The little children were given jobs like polishing the fruit and cleaning the shoes. Then as we got older we helped with the DIY and the gardening. They didn’t like asking for outside help.”
So that explained his practical skills. “But what did you believe?” I asked.
“The usual – peace, love and understanding. Giving up your worldly wealth to the cause – you couldn’t join unless you did that. Of course, the guy at the top was driving round in a Bentley and shagging anyone who took his fancy. Nobody else was allowed to sleep together.”
“So, this man – was he your father?” I asked trying to keep up.
He grinned. “Doubt it – he was paler than Stuart. But I didn’t even know who my mother was until the day we left.”
I digested this. “How could you not know?”
“They didn’t have a concept of family the way most people do. Thought it was an unnatural construct imposed on people by the state. All the women looked after the children and you weren’t allowed to know who gave birth to you. Funnily enough I always thought it was this other woman called Blue. I liked her. She spent the most time with me and I felt safe with her. She had dark skin, and hair a bit like mine. It just seemed to make sense.
“But on the last day Rosa came and told me she was my mum and I could either leave with her or get put into care. It was quite surreal – she was the person I’d had the least connection with. But suddenly we were this cosy little unit in the outside world we didn’t understand. I’d never even watched television.”
It explained why he never joined in when the rest of us reminisced about Rainbow, Rentaghost, Carrie’s War or Grange Hill.
“That must have been weird.”
He nodded. “She’d been living in the sect since she ran away from home as a teenager. No qualifications, no work experience. Didn’t have a clue about finance. We took the boa
t over to Dublin and moved in with her parents at first where she’d grown up but that didn’t work out – too much resentment built up on both sides. Eventually we were given a council flat but getting used to each other was the hardest thing. Those first few years were very difficult – I found it hard to settle and she found it hard to fit in. She had no idea about discipline, so we rowed all the time. We’re closer now.”
I shielded my eyes from the sun, which was starting to rise above the fields.
“Sod it,” he said, “we’ll have to get a move on.”
I was thrown back against the seat as he stamped on the accelerator. But somehow tiredness got to me in the end and I must have drifted off. I woke up with a sick feeling and a horrible ache in my neck.
“Where are we?” I said, choking on the thick fug of his cigarette smoke.
“Sandy.”
“Where’s that?”
He lifted his shoulders. “Fuck knows.”
We circled the town a few times until we found some wasteland at the edge of an industrial park. Again, we waited to see if anyone was following us.
“Got everything?” he asked as we got out of the car.
He searched the ground for a suitable stone. I jumped at the sound as he smashed the rear window on one side, then the other. He stripped off his upper clothing, revealing his skinny frame covered in goosebumps.
“Get back,” he said, replacing his sweatshirt. “Right back as far as you can.”
“Do you know what you’re doing?”
“Yes.”
I didn’t ask. He’d obviously thought this all out at some point. From a distance I watched him reach into the glove compartment and take out the bottle that he’d bought at the garage earlier. He soaked his T-shirt with the whisky, spread it out on the back seat and took out his lighter.
“Run.”
At first nothing happened. I was thinking about fireworks and how you should never go back to them and I had a sudden vision of that boy’s face after I’d thrown the rocket back at him.
Who was I kidding, thinking tonight’s events were so different from the rest of my life? I’d been bad before. Something in me, however much I tried to blank it out, felt a magnetic pull towards trouble.
The Suspects Page 7