Praise for Into the Darkest Corner
‘Check the locks on your doors and windows and surrender to this obsessive thriller.’
Karin Slaughter
‘This intense, gripping account of domestic violence and its aftermath is utterly unputdownable. A stunning debut.’
S J Watson
‘Haynes’ powerful account of domestic violence is disquieting, yet unsensationalist. This is a gripping book on a topic which can never be highlighted enough.’
Guardian
‘A psychological thriller packed with tension and suspense. The author bravely tackles some difficult issues: domestic violence and obsessive compulsive disorder. This is a debut of such strength you have to wonder if Haynes is the next Minette Walters.’
Rhian Davies, CWA John Creasey Dagger judge
‘A very impressive first novel. The pain and frustration of OCD is brilliantly evoked and I winced every time Cathy embarked on yet another ritual. The contrast between Cathy’s two lives is cleverly drawn and the hesitancy in her new relationship is very believable. This is a fantastic personal read with plenty for a reading group to discuss.’
NewBooks Magazine
‘Within ten minutes I couldn’t put it down, and when I got to the end the first thing that I did was to turn back to the beginning again.’
The Bookbag
‘A tense and thought-provoking debut novel with dark moments. Its portrayal of obsession will send a shiver down your spine.’
Shotsmag
‘A compulsive thriller with sufficient twists and plot turns to keep the most action-avaricious of readers satisfied. Haynes treats the subject matter of domestic violence delicately and with gentle self-assurance. Hers is clearly a name to watch.’
Bookgroup.info
‘Compelling and disturbing. This book is disquieting, believable and has a realistic twist.’
Mystery Women
‘This beautifully dark and disturbing novel is, amazingly, the first book by Elizabeth Haynes. It is seamlessly put together and the clever juxtaposition of chapters from the present and the past keeps the reader on the edge of their seat. It’s impossible to guess the ending of the book and the storyline digs deep into your psyche, teasing you and tempting you to check that your own doors and windows are locked and secure. I love this book. Elizabeth Haynes is a very talented new face in the murky world of crime fiction and definitely a name to look out for in the future. Very highly recommended.’
Eurocrime
‘This psychological thriller is fast-paced and chilling, with a realistic twist. The impact of OCD and Post Traumatic Stress Disorder on victims of abuse is sensitively handled and believable. Lock all your doors and settle down for one of the most gripping reads of the year!’
Pamreader
‘A nervy, heart-racing page-turner. It’s a one-sitting, impossible-to-put-down kind of book.’
Bookrambler
‘Domestic violence, OCD and murder in a book that exerts a nerve-shredding grip on the reader, with a sympathetic heroine and a truly loathsome baddie.’
Crimetime
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For David
Table of Contents
Praise
Title Page
Dedication
One
Two
Three
Four
Five
Six
Seven
Eight
Nine
Ten
Eleven
Twelve
Thirteen
Fourteen
Fifteen
Sixteen
Seventeen
Eighteen
Nineteen
Twenty
Twenty-one
Twenty-two
Twenty-three
Twenty-four
Twenty-five
Twenty-six
Twenty-seven
Twenty-eight
Twenty-nine
Thirty
Thirty-one
Thirty-two
Thirty-three
Thirty-four
Thirty-five
Thirty-six
Thirty-seven
Thirty-eight
Thirty-nine
Forty
Forty-one
Author’s Note
Acknowledgements
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About the Author
Copyright
One
It was there when I opened my eyes, that vague feeling of discomfort, the rocking of the boat signalling the receding tide and the wind from the south, blowing upriver, straight into the side of the Revenge of the Tide.
For a long while I lay in bed, the sound of the waves slapping against the hull next to my head, echoing through the steel and dulled by the wooden cladding. The duvet was warm and it was easy to stay there, the rectangle of the skylight directly above showing the blackness turning to dark blue, and grey, and then I could see the clouds scudding overhead, giving the odd impression of moving at speed – the boat moving rather than the clouds. And then, that discomfort again.
It wasn’t seasickness, or river-sickness, come to that: I was used to it now, nearly five months after I had left London. Five months living aboard. There was still a momentary shock when my feet hit the solid ground of the path to the car park, a few wobbly steps, but it was never long before I felt steady again.
It was a grey sort of a day – not ideal for the get-together later, but that was my own fault for planning a party in September. ‘Back to school’ weather, the wind whistling across the deck when I got up and put my head out of the wheelhouse.
No, it wasn’t the tide, or the thought of the mismatched group of people who would be descending on my boat later today. There was something else. I felt as though someone had rubbed my fur the wrong way.
The plan for the day: finish the last bit of timber cladding for the second room, the room that was going to be a guest bedroom at some point in the future. Clear away all the carpentry tools and store them in the bow. Sweep out the boat, clean up a bit. Then see if I could cadge a lift to the cash-and-carry for party food and beer.
There was one wall left to do, an odd shape, which was why I had left it till last. The room was full of sawdust and offcuts of wood, bits of edging and sandpaper. I’d done the measurements last night but now, frowning at the bit of paper, I decided to recheck it all just to be on the safe side. When I had clad the galley I’d ended up wasting a load of wood because I misread my own measurements.
I put the radio on, turned up loud even though I still couldn’t hear it above the mitre saw, and got to work.
At nine, I stopped and went back through to the galley for a coffee. I filled the kettle and put it on to the gas burner. The boat was a mess. It was only occasionally that I noticed it. Glancing around, I scanned last night’s takeaway containers hurriedly shoved into a carrier bag ready to go out to the main bins. Dirty dishes in the sink. Pans and other items in boxes sitting on one of the dinette seats waiting to be put away, now I had finally fitted cupboard doors in the galley. A black plastic sack of fabrics and netting that would one day be curtains and cushion covers. None of it mattered when I was the only one in here, but in a few hours’ time this boat would be full of people, and I had promised them that the renovations were almost complete.
Almost complete? That was stretching the truth a little thin. I had finished the bedroom, and the living room wasn’t bad. The galley was done too, but needed cleaning and tidying. The bathroom was – well, the kindest thing that could be said about it was that it was functional. As for the rest of it – the vast space in the bow that would one day be a bigger bathroo
m with a bath instead of a hose for a shower, a wide conservatory area with a sliding glass roof (an ambitious plan, but I’d seen one in a magazine and it looked so brilliant that it was the one project I was determined to complete), and maybe a snug or an office or another unnamed room that would be wonderful and cosy and magical – for the moment, it worked as storage.
The kettle started a low whistle, and I rinsed a mug under the tap and spooned in some instant coffee, two spoons: I needed the caffeine.
A pair of boots crossed my field of vision through the porthole, level with the pontoon outside, shortly followed by a call from the deck. ‘Genevieve?’
‘Down here. Kettle’s just boiled, want a drink?’
Moments later Joanna trotted down the steps and into the main cabin. She was dressed in a miniskirt, with thick socks and heavy boots, with the laces trailing, on the ends of her skinny legs. The top half of her was counterbalanced by one of Liam’s jumpers, a navy blue one, flecked with bits of sawdust and twig and cat hair. Her hair was a tangle of curls and waves of various colours.
‘No, thanks – we’re off out in a minute. I just came to ask what time we should come over later, and do you want us to bring a lasagne as well as the cheesecake? And Liam says he’s got some beers left over from the barbecue, he’ll be bringing those.’
She had a bruise on her cheek. Joanna didn’t wear make-up, wouldn’t have known what to do with it, so there it was – livid and purplish, about the size of a fifty pence piece, under her left eye.
‘What happened to your face?’
‘Oh, don’t you start. I had a fight with my sister.’
‘Blimey.’
‘Come up on deck, I need a smoke.’
The wind was still whipping, so we sat on the bench by the wheelhouse. The sun was trying to make its way through the scudding clouds but failing. Across the other side of the marina I could see Liam loading boxes and carrier bags into the back of their battered Transit van.
Joanna fished around in the pocket of her skirt and brought forth a pouch of tobacco. ‘The way I see it,’ she said, ‘she should keep her fucking nose out of my business.’
‘Your sister?’
‘She thinks she’s all clever because she’s got herself a mortgage at the age of twenty-two.’
‘Mortgages aren’t all they’re cracked up to be.’
‘Exactly!’ Joanna said with emphasis. ‘That’s what I said to her. I’ve got everything she’s got without the burden of debt. And I don’t have to mow any lawn.’
‘So that’s what you were fighting about?’
Joanna was quiet for a moment, her eyes wandering over to the car park where Liam stood, hands on his hips, before pointedly looking at his wristwatch and climbing into the driver’s seat. Above the sounds of the marina – drilling coming from the workshop, the sound of the radio down in the cabin, the distant roar of the traffic from the motorway bridge – the van’s diesel rattle started up.
‘Fuck it, I’d better go,’ she said. She shoved the pouch back into her pocket and lit the skinny cigarette she’d just managed to fill. ‘About seven? Eight? What?’
I shrugged. ‘I don’t know. Sevenish? Lasagne sounds lovely, but don’t go to any trouble.’
‘It’s no trouble. Liam’s made it.’
With a backward wave, Joanna took one quick hop-step down the gangplank and on to the pontoon, running despite the boots across the grassy bank and up to the car park. The Transit was taking little jumps forward as though it couldn’t wait to be gone.
At four, the cabin was finally finished. A bare shell, but at least now it was a bare wooden shell. The walls were clad, and the berth built along the far wall, under the porthole. Where the mattress would sit, two trapdoors with round finger-holes in the board gave access to the storage compartment underneath. The rest of it was pale wood in neat panelling, carved pine edging covering the joins and corners. It would look less like a sauna once it had had a lick of paint, I thought. By next weekend it would be entirely different.
Clearing away the debris of my most recent foray into carpentry took longer than I thought it would. I had crates for the tools. I hadn’t bothered to put them away since I’d started work on the bedroom, months ago.
I lugged them forward into the bow, through a hatch and into the cavernous space below. Three steps down, watching my head on the low ceiling, stowing the crates away at the side.
It was only when I made the last trip, carrying the black plastic sack of fabric from the dinette and throwing it into the front compartment, that I found myself looking into the darkest of the spaces to see if the box was still there. I could just about see it in the gloomy light from the cabin above; on the side of it was written, in thick black marker: KITCHEN STUFF.
I had a sudden urge to look, to check that the box still had its contents. Of course it did, I told myself. Of course it was still there. Nobody’s been down here since you put it there.
Stooping, I crossed the three wooden pallets that served as a floor, braced myself against the sides of the hull, and crouched next to the box. kitchen stuff. The top two-thirds of the box was full of rubbish I’d brought from the London flat – spatulas, wooden spoons, a Denby teapot with a crack in the lid, a whisk, a blender that didn’t work, an ice cream scoop and various cake tins nested inside each other. Below that was a sheet of cardboard that might, to the casual observer, look sufficiently like the bottom of the box to deter further investigation.
I folded the cardboard top of the box back down and tucked the other flap underneath it.
From the back pocket of my jeans, I took out a mobile phone. I found the address book and the only number that was saved there: GARLAND. That was all it said. It wasn’t even his name. It would be so easy to press the little green button now and call him. What would I say? Maybe I could just ask him if he wanted to come tonight. ‘Come to my party, Dylan. It’s just a few close friends. I’d love to see you.’
What would he say? He’d be angry, shocked that I’d used the phone when he’d expressly told me not to. It was only there for one purpose, he’d told me. It was only for him to ring me, and only when he was ready to make the collection. Not before. If I ever had a call on it from another number, I wasn’t to answer.
I closed my eyes for a moment, for a brief second allowing myself the indulgence of remembering him. Then I put the screen lock back on the phone so it didn’t accidentally dial any numbers, least of all his, and I shoved it in my pocket and made my way back to the cabin.
Two
Malcolm and Josie were the first to arrive, at six. It was an unofficial arrival: they stopped for a chat and didn’t leave again. I was on the deck tipping the ice I’d just got from the cash-and-carry into a big plastic crate, and Malcolm heard the chink of beer bottles from his narrowboat. Seconds later he was chatting amicably from the pontoon about this and that, three bottles of French red wine tucked under one arm.
‘We’ve got loads more if you run out, Genevieve,’ Josie said, when they came aboard. ‘We went to France last weekend. Stocked up for Christmas, you know.’
‘I thought you didn’t drink wine,’ I said, handing the bottle opener to Malcolm so he could crack open his first beer.
‘Don’t, really,’ Malcolm said. ‘Dunno why we bought so much of it, tell the truth.’
I’d cleaned up as much as possible. It could have been better, but the worst of the mess was out of the way, and the galley wasn’t looking too bad. Maureen had given me a lift to the cash-and-carry and I’d taken a taxi home, with two crates of beer and several bags of ice, jumbo packets of crisps, and a large block of cheese that had seemed like a good idea at the time. I wasn’t very good at party food, to be honest – but at least there was plenty of alcohol.
Josie had brought garlic bread wrapped in tinfoil. ‘I thought it could go on your stove,’ she said.
‘I wasn’t going to light it. I think it’s going to be roasting with lots of people in here.’
Malc
olm, the designated expert in the room who had provided advice on living aboard more times in the last five months than I could remember, snorted. ‘You’ll freeze in the night if you haven’t got your stove on.’
For a moment we all stood contemplating the wood-burning stove that sat on large tiles in the corner of the main cabin. It wasn’t cold now, but Malcolm had a point – not good to be lying in bed at four in the morning, freezing cold.
‘I’ll light it, if you like,’ Malcolm said at last. ‘You ladies go up on deck and admire the sunset.’
On the way past the galley I took hold of the bottle opener and, as I opened two bottles of beer, not as cold as they should be but cold enough, Josie said something about leaving the man to build his fire. ‘He loves it. We were going to have central heating put in at one point but he kept putting it off and putting it off. He even starts piling up logs in the summer, just in case it gets a bit on the chilly side. One of these days he’s going to chop down one of the trees on the rec.’
I looked down and along the pontoon to the Scarisbrick Jean, the narrowboat Malcolm and Josie shared with their cat, Oswald. Not long after I’d moved in, I had heard them talking about ‘Aunty Jean’ and for a while I’d thought they had a third person living on the boat with them, until I realised that Aunty Jean was their affectionate name for the boat itself. A friendly name. Maybe I should think of a pet name for mine.
The first time I saw the boat, I knew it was the one. It was above my price range, but my finances had seen a recent improvement and as a result I was looking at boats I’d previously discounted. It needed work, but the hull was sound and the cabin was bearable. I could just about afford to buy it and do the renovations for a year or so, provided I budgeted carefully and did the work myself.
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