Harry nodded.
Michael pushed Harte back out of the truck, then followed him along the castle wall until they were level with the back of the caravan where he’d seen Lorna.
“This the one?”
“Yep, in here,” Harte said. He gestured for Michael to stay back in the shadows, then crept across and lightly tapped on the window next to where Lorna was lying. At first she didn’t respond. He wrapped his knuckles on the glass a little harder, cringing at the noise, and after a couple of seconds she sat up and looked around. She moved with more urgency when she saw his face at the window. He gestured for her to come outside.
“Wait there,” she mouthed. She disappeared, and Harte could hear her talking to someone inside. After a delay, the caravan door opened. He could hear her voice more clearly now, telling someone she needed to go for a piss. The other person—it sounded like Mark Ainsworth, he thought—gave her permission but told her to be quick. If he was supposed to be acting as a guard, then he was a pretty ineffectual one. Lorna shut the door behind her then ran around to the back of the caravan and dragged Harte over into the shadows behind the remains of another crumbled interior castle wall. Michael followed.
“Bloody hell,” she said, “did you parachute back in here, Harte? I thought you’d run out on us again.”
“Just taking a leaf out of Driver’s book. Best to slip away and wait until it’s safe to come back.”
“It’s hardly safe now.”
“I know that, but this was the right time to do this.”
“That’s not what you said earlier,” Michael interrupted. “He’s been whinging like an old woman. I’m Michael, by the way.”
“Lorna,” she said. “Hey, are you the one with the baby?”
“Hopefully.”
“Save the small talk,” Harte said, his stomach still churning with nerves. “We need to get everybody out of here.”
“And how exactly are we going to do that?”
“Our man Harry’s waiting in a truck over the way,” Michael explained. “We’ll get everyone who wants to leave loaded into the back of it, then get the gates open and get the hell out of here, hopefully before anyone else has realized what’s going on.”
“Simple as that?”
“Hopefully.”
“Are you all in this caravan?” Harte asked.
“Mostly,” Lorna replied, “there are a few more next door. But there’s a problem.”
“What’s that?”
“Guard dogs. At least one in each caravan.”
Harte looked at Michael anxiously. “Do we take them out?”
Michael looked equally unsure. Dealing with dead bodies was one thing, but fighting a fellow survivor was a different matter altogether.
“Stay back here and give me a couple of minutes,” Lorna said. “I’ve got an idea.”
39
“You took your time,” Ainsworth said as Lorna returned to the caravan. He sounded half asleep. Maybe if she’d waited a little longer he’d have drifted off completely and they might have all been able to walk out unchallenged, she thought, regretting her clumsy entrance. Her heart was pounding and the palms of her hands were clammy. She didn’t know if she could go through with this.
“Sorry,” she said, slipping back into character. “I didn’t mean to take so long. I was just thinking…”
“What about?”
“About you, actually. I was thinking about how rude I’ve been to you recently. How rude I was in the kitchen earlier. I’m sorry.”
“You’ve got nothing to apologize for,” he said, sounding shocked and yet surprisingly honest. “It was me. I can be a real dick at times. I kind of forget myself sometimes, you know, especially with all this shit going on around us.”
“I know.”
“So you don’t need to apologize. Okay?”
“Okay. Thanks.”
She watched him watching her. Poor dumb bugger didn’t have a clue what to say next. He could talk the talk when it mattered, boring everyone senseless with stories about his irrelevant fifteen minutes (more like fifteen seconds) of fame on TV last year, but he wasn’t the sharpest tool in the box by any means. Lorna knew that Ainsworth wanted her—she’d known it for ages. She also knew that he’d never expected to be having a conversation like this with her in a hundred years.
“Look,” she said, “I feel really bad. I want to make it up to you, but there are too many people in here. Do you think we could go somewhere else and talk?”
“Sure.”
“I think I got the wrong impression earlier.”
“In h gave you the wrong impression.”
“It’s just that it’s hard to know what to do for the best these days, isn’t it? And like you say, with everything that’s happened here today, everyone’s on a knife edge. The stakes are so much higher now, you know? You put a foot out of place or say the wrong thing to the wrong person at the wrong time and…”
“I know,” Mark said. “I feel the same. Especially with Jas. It’s like I’m treading on eggshells all the time. Don’t say anything, but I’m starting to think he’s losing the plot.”
“He’s struggling, just like the rest of us,” Lorna agreed. “Hey, I kept a bottle of wine hidden away in the kitchen. It won’t help against the cold, but if you fancy a glass…?”
“Or two?”
“Or three?”
He moved toward her and she started back down the steps. She led him quickly across the courtyard, both of them frantically looking from side to side, checking no one else was around like a pair of kids sneaking out after being grounded by their parents. They stopped outside the cafe door.
“Have you still got the keys?” she asked. He rummaged in his trouser pockets and pulled out a bunch of keys. He started looking through them, holding up one at a time until he found the one which fitted the lock. Hands trembling with nervous excitement, he unlocked the door and pushed it open, then did the same with the door into the kitchen.
They’d barely got inside before she was on him. She shut the door behind her, then wrapped her arms around him and kissed him hard. Dumbstruck, for a moment he forgot how to react. It had been so long since he’d had any physical contact like this. The kiss took Lorna by surprise too, and for a few seconds she forgot herself. The warmth of holding another person close … the softness of their lips … the moisture and heat which passed between them … Basic pleasures had all but been completely neglected since the day everyone had died. How long had it been since either of them had felt anything like this?
“Bloody hell, Lorna,” he said in a momentary gap between her frantic kisses, barely able to control himself.
“Put something up at the window,” she told him. “We don’t want anyone looking in on us.”
He kissed her again, then reluctantly pulled away and did as she asked. He was hard and he adjusted himself, struggling to think straight, his belly burning with desire. He managed to block the narrow strip windows with dish cloths, chopping boards and empty boxes, doing all he could to cover up the gaps as quickly as possible.
“I wasn’t expecting this,” he said as he worked, suddenly feeling incredibly emotional but doing all he could not to show it. “I didn’t think you felt this way…”
“Funny how things work out,” she replied, leaning up against a stainless steel work unit and watching him. He looked ack over his shoulder as she undid the zip on the heavy winter coat she seemed to be permanently wearing these days. With no real heating anywhere in the castle other than the classroom, everyone wore as many
