“I don’t know.”
“I think you do. Sometimes you need just a little push.”
He stood up and took off his jacket. He leaned in close to her and said, “Alison.”
“Yes, Dan.”
“Just going for a wee.”
She laughed, shook her head. “What a charmer.”
He glanced back as he headed for the toilets. Once alone in the cubicle, he let her words sink in. She was right, of course. He would regret this for the rest of his life. The idea of living in a semi in the suburbs, working like a dog to pay off an impossible mortgage, raising kids. He wasn’t ready for that. He didn’t want it. Alison was a wise woman and she knew how women thought. She was right. Beverly wanted a wedding and a family, who played the role of groom and then father was immaterial. She just needed a stooge.
When he got back to the table, he took another sneaky look at Alison. He took in her shining hair and low cleavage. In fact, every opportunity he had his eyes flicked over to her cleavage, or hair, or face. The main course arrived and they ate in comfortable silence until his phone bleeped on the table. A text.
“That’ll be Beverly,” said Alison. He looked at who the text was from.
“You must be a mind reader.”
“No,” said Alison causally. “I just texted her myself. On your phone. As you.”
He read the text from Beverly. What the hell does that mean, Dan? Are you dumping me?
“Read the one above that I sent.”
Beverly. I’ve been having a good hard think. We really need to talk, and I mean properly, about where our futures lay. I’ll ring you tomorrow, but this is important.
“Fucking hell, she’ll go nuts!”
“I know.”
“Alison. This is so…bad. Texting while pretending to be me is really not on.”
“Dan, I’m opening the cage door for you. All you need to do is walk out.”
The phone began to ring. Beverly’s name came up. Alison snatched the phone from him and rejected the call. She put the phone back on the table.
“You have a chance to get out of this. Lovely red Thai curry by the way.”
The phone rang gain. He picked it up and looked at it then switched it off. “I’m taking you out, not ruining our night by arguing with her on the phone.”
They finished their dishes and perused the dessert menu. He tried to get her to open up about her own life to help block out the nagging worry in his head about Beverly. Dan asked her if she’d been to the same comprehensive school as him, but she’d been to a convent school. He asked her about past boyfriends and she dodged the question with humour, stating that they’d been a succession of broken hearts but none of them had been hers.
When they left the restaurant, he was no wiser about her past than he had been when he’d first met her.
They listened the radio on the way back, and she knew all the words to “Jumping Jack Flash” and sang them loudly while laughing. He wondered if the Prosecco had gone to her head.
Back at the house, he poured them a whiskey and they sat on opposite chairs by the light of the fire. Again, he wondered if she was a bit drunk. Her legs curled under her on the sofa, and she preened her hair back from her ears as she talked.
“I’m going to miss this house, Mr. Hepworth.”
“I’m not. Full of dark memories.”
“It needs work. This gloomy colour scheme needs changing. She was a bit too fond of beige, your mother was. That’s the bleak religious personality coming out. No, I think some kind of red flock wallpaper, velvet dark scarlet curtains. Wood effect floor tiles. The kitchen would look great with pale or magnolia tiles and a black range. If I owned this house, I’d really do something with it.”
“Well, Widdowson’s got it now,” he reflected gloomily.
“He hasn’t got it yet. Nothing’s set in stone, Dan. What if Widdowson died? Someone tried to off him in this house.” She sipped her whiskey. “Fingers crossed, second time lucky.”
“You really are bad,” he laughed.
“Are you mad at me for texting Beverly?”
He shook his head. “No, I love you for it.”
She raised her glass and downed it in one. “Well,” she said brightly. “I’m ready for bed.” She stood up and so did he. She headed for the stairs, and he instinctively followed her.
“I suppose it is late,” he said as they reached the bottom of the stairs. “I’ve got a long journey tomorrow.”
“Right,” she said, her eyes searching his face. She had one foot on the first step. “Better go up then. To bed.”
She didn’t move. Dan was suddenly aware he was only a few inches away from her. There was a tension separating them. A tension that needed to be broken.
Paralysed, he didn’t move. His mind was spinning, his gut churning, afraid of the moment yet wanting it more than anything. Almost a minute passed. Dan didn’t act.
The moment deflated instantly when she said with obvious disappointment in her eyes. “Well, see you tomorrow then,” and padded upstairs with unnatural speed.
Dan went into the living room, flopped down on the sofa, and clutched his whiskey.
“You idiot,” he said to himself.
The moment was there. She wanted him to kiss her, but he’d just stood there like a scared teenager. The moment was lost, gone forever. It wouldn’t happen again. Tomorrow he’d be leaving and, in all likelihood, never see her again.
The smouldering wood on the fire cracked its last. He heard moving about upstairs. If he’d kissed her, he could be in that bed with her now, sharing beautiful moments, betraying his fiancé and losing himself in Alison. Instead, he was alone in the living room, frost inching across the window panes, cursing himself.
A soft knock on his door woke him. He looked at the clock glowing on the bedside. It was two in the morning. There was only one other person in the house and she didn’t wait for a reply before entering. He fumbled for the bedside light and almond light shone out from the lamp like a soft beacon.
Alison slid onto the bed, sitting over him on the right-hand side. His eyes moved down her body. She was wearing a dark, purple basque which caressed above the hips and squeezed her chest. She came in very close to him.
“You are very slow on the uptake,” she said, a finger stroking her face. “I lay there for an hour waiting for you to come in. I got fed up.”
“Sorry,” he said. “I know…at the bottom of the stairs…”
“Well, you can make it up to me now.” She popped open the top of the basque and her pale, full breasts touched his shoulder. “I wore this underneath the dress. I thought you’d appreciate it and as for these two…well…you spent half the night staring at them.”
All worry emptied from his mind. He leaned forwards and took the left nipple into his mouth, teasing and sucking before moving onto the right.
“That’s it,” she breathed. She let him touch, lick, suck, and fondle her breasts before pushing him back down in the bed. Her lips touched his and he felt his skin prickle with warmth, as if his blood were suffused with microscopic soft needles caressing the inside of his capillaries. He drew her nearer and their tongues locked in a hungry embrace.
She withdrew and sat over him. With a very sexy, wicked smile, she pulled back the covers of the bed.
“And what do you think this is?”
“That’s my penis,” he joked.
“Best not talk,” she chided. “You’re not very good at bedroom conversation.” His back arched as her extended fingers caressed his erection. “And is this all for me?”
“All yours.”
Alison repositioned herself and before he knew it, she was caressing the end of his penis with her tongue before fully taking it into her mouth. Her lips moved up and down the shaft as she phallated him.
Beverly never did this. They’d done it once and she’d moaned that it tasted odd. Sex was always brief and passionless. Alison
was an expert at this, teasing him to the point of ecstasy then releasing. He wondered about her experience with men again, but this train of thought crashed abruptly as she caused more pleasurable explosions to fire his brain.
“That’s it, enough now.” She was clearly excited herself as she abducted her girth to straddle him. “I’m so wet, Dan, I can’t wait any longer. Just stay there…just…” She lowered herself down onto him and groaned. She rode him, her nails digging into his chest, her kisses becoming more violent. She cried out in pleasure and so did he. She made him cry out in pain as she bit his neck. She locked tongues with him and bit his tongue.
She cried out as she came and kissed him violently again. Her eyes met his as she rode him, her intention to make him cum. He could feel it. It was going to happen.
She bit his neck again, taking his flesh in her teeth the moment she drew the semen from him. He cried out so loud that the old guy who lived a mile away at Two Farm Road would probably have heard him.
He finished and she lay over him, both of them breathing hard. Her kisses tender now, loving.
“I knew you could do it,” she gasped, gently kissing his ear. “I knew it.”
Thirty-Seven
“I’ve got better things than come to church at ten o’clock on a school day, Widdowson.”
Jason Hereford strode up the aisle towards the small group who were all seated in a circle within the chapel. He noticed the word had been erased from the wall above the altar area where Widdowson normally preached. Jason studied the motley group of tired looking people seated just before the stage. He recognised them all. Jackie O’Shea, Angela Teal (the weirdo), Dennis Gillits in his wheelchair.
“I should have taken assembly this morning. The head thinks I’m cracking up as it is. This won’t look good.”
“Sit down and shut your mouth!” ordered Widdowson. He stabbed his finger towards the chair. Teeth clenching at the chastisement, Jason sat down. “Right. You know why I’ve called you here today. It seems like our blackmailers have moved things up a gear and are physically attacking us now.”
“And what are you doing about it?” cried Gillits, his voice high-pitched and hysterical.
“If you’d keep quiet, I’ll tell you.” Widdowson gave him one of the glares he reserved for Sunday mornings when he’d just made a salient Biblical point. “I’ve had Gould on the case. He’s come up with nothing. At first, I thought Daniel Hepworth might be behind this. He’s been living in London and had the time, planning and resources available to him, I think. He certainly has the motive.”
“Did you try and drown him as well when he was a kid?” Jackie O’Shea said with a cynical drawl. “Or was that just his sister?”
Jason suspected she’d been drinking, even at this hour.
Widdowson ignored her and carried on. “His motive being that his mother left the house to me. He’s very sore about this and thinks if he can dredge up the past, then I’ll relent and give him the house. I’ve, at last, persuaded Gould to go up there to have a word with him. However, what makes me doubt he had anything to do with it is the fact he has nothing against any of you. He doesn’t even know about what went on at St. Brendan’s.”
“He does,” said Jackie. “My mate works up the care home where Prendergast is. He visited last week.”
“This has been going on for more than a week!” snapped Hereford. “And you’ve got to face it. This goes deeper than any petty squabbles over who left who a bloody house. Brendan, this is personal.”
“Well, who else could it be? Gould turned this town upside down, went far beyond his duty to me to drag out any information from this parish. Local criminals, councilors, shop owners, even pensioners who’d once worked up at St. Vincent’s. He’d bloodied his hands on all of them and come up with nothing.”
“Then why didn’t he make Hepworth his first port of call?” spat Hereford.
“I think I know.” Jackie O’Shea let the sneer open her top lip to expose her blackened teeth. “Gould and Hepworth have history. I heard the rumors back in the day.”
Angela Teal coughed. Attention focused on her. “This isn’t a person. This is a spirit.”
Jason wanted to laugh, tell her to shut the fuck up, but he didn’t because he knew she had a point, as did everyone else in the room. “Pastor, you’re a man of God. Don’t you believe there’s something evil happening?”
“Him? A man of God? Give me a break,” laughed Jackie, her toothless cackle hitting the high ceiling.
“I will remind you, Jackie, to keep a civil tongue in your head,” Widdowson said in a low threatening tone like he always did when he wanted to intimidate.
Hereford decided it wasn’t happening, not today, and spoke up. “And let me remind you, Pastor, that you said you’d keep what we did secret, that if we bent over and took it in the ass like a bitch from you, then you’d keep that file out of the hands of the law. Well, looks like someone knows. Our secret is out so our deal is over. I’m not going to be your bitch anymore. You can fucking swivel for it.”
“Do not speak profanity in a house of God.”
“This isn’t a house of God. It’s a house of shit. Hepworth was right when he called you out at his mother’s funeral. Whatever hold you had over us is lost because someone knows and they’re using it against us, and there is nothing you can do to stop it.”
Widdowson was silent. He knew Hereford was right.
“What do they want from us?” said Gillits. “Perhaps we could come to some arrangement.”
“Oh no,” O’Shea spoke up. “There’s only one thing they want. Revenge. They won’t be happy until we’re in the ground. The other night, when I got a visit, I saw Nigel Wright as plain as day. He was standing. He could see me and he fucking hated me.” All of them shifted uncomfortably in their seats, all except Widdowson. “Dennis, you told me you saw Stephen Shell. Angela here was sure it was Shelly. Connor Pendred is up at Berrymoor doing his nut because he thinks he can see someone in his room. Patrick Finn, I’ll bet. I know it sounds mad, but they’re coming to get us. This is a warning of that, and there ain’t a single thing we can do about it.”
The group were stunned into silence. After a couple long, heavy minutes, Widdowson spoke.
“You have all tormented and tortured some of the weakest people in this town. Perhaps the Lord wants to punish you. As you say, there’s nothing you can do to stop it. I apologise that I cannot help you, but this is clearly in God’s hands now. You must ask him for mercy.”
“You think God’s going to save you, Widdowson?” Jason allowed himself to snarl the next sentence, all pretense at politeness finally eradicated.
“I’m not the guilty one here,” he said.
“You fucking half drowned Lindsey Hepworth on a weekly basis,” Jackie laughed humorlessly.
“I did the Lord’s will. Helped a poor backwards girl attain a sense of God’s mercy, Jackie.” He took off his glasses and folded them. “You are all sadists and perverts who deserve what you get. I, however, I have done nothing wrong.”
The incredulous silence filled the entire chapel.
Thirty-Eight
Dan woke with sunlight streaming into his eyes. Blinking, he looked at the bedside clock. It was eleven o’clock. He was supposed to be halfway down the motorway by now. He was supposed to pop into the office to discuss his return to work this afternoon and he imagined his boss would want him to start back the next day.
None of that would happen. He looked over at Alison sleeping beside him, breathing softly. He looked around the room. This had been the spare room but was now her room. They’d decamped to here from his cold attic room and recommenced the lovemaking until they fell asleep exhausted.
Her eyes fluttered open and she smiled at him. Even before she woke, she began kissing him and he felt himself becoming erect.
“Are you going to London today?” She said.
“Nope.”
“Good. Listen, wh
y don’t you make us a drink and some toast and bring it up here.”
“Then what?”
“What do you think?” She kissed him, biting his lip teasingly. “We need to decide what to do. Practically, I mean. But not yet. Tea and toast. Chop chop.”
“There’s something I need to do first.”
“I know.”
He got out of bed and headed downstairs. Dan put the kettle to boil and looked out the window. Frost had whitened the fields across the valley. The sun was streaming and the whole scene looked like the front of a Christmas card. As the kettle boiled, he stepped out of the house and stood looking out across the fields in just a pair of sweats and a t-shirt. The morning was completely still. Somewhere in the valley below a fire burned, creating a thin stream of smoke which slowly drifted skywards. He’d brought the phone with him and dialed the number before he chickened out. After two rings her voice cut in as icy as the scene before him.
“Well?”
“You read the message.”
“Are you calling it off? Are you dumping me?”
Guilt welled up in his throat, almost propelling the words, “No, of course I’m not. I still want to marry you. I’m just having a few doubts.” He forced them back down, trying to stay focused on saying what he needed to say instead. He had to do this. No matter how hard it was or how much he sounded like a bastard, he needed to do this. This was his one chance.
“That’s about the sum of it.” He surprised himself with how cold he could be.
“But what about the wedding? The invites are printed, the venue paid for.” Sobs choked her words. “The dress, I’ve had a fitting.”
“Did you want me to wait until after the wedding to do this?”
“No, but you could have done it sooner. Before all this started. Before my family began working so hard to put it right.”
Ow, that hurt. And she was right. If he hadn’t been so gutless then it would have never got this far.
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