If only my little car had Satnav. I could jump off the motorway and find a petrol station then get back on further south. But my map is out of date and I can’t risk getting lost. The sky is grey and heavily pregnant with snow. I need to keep moving and get home before the weather worsens. I don’t want to get stuck on the motorway and I don’t have spare money for a hotel or even a cheap bed and breakfast.
The services slip road approaches and my fingers twitch towards the indicator. Should I chance it? I need the toilet. Rather desperately, now I’ve thought about it. Tension has dried my mouth so I need a drink too. I think longingly of a cold, sparkling coke. Despite the tantalising image I drive past the entrance, my stomach churning and knotted with tension under my thick coat. I can’t get too near other people.
So much blood.
Before I drove away from the cabin I cleaned my face and hands as best as I could with wet-wipes from the glove box and shoved the stained wipes into an old carrier bag. but I couldn’t get the blood off my blue jeans and navy sweatshirt, and I didn’t dare hang around long enough to change my clothes. I just grabbed my few belongings and ran to the car. I’m sure I smell of blood.
What I need is a pay-at-the-pump petrol station. Maybe one attached to a supermarket with a toilet near the entrance so I can slip in unnoticed. I scan the countryside from left to right hoping to see a building complex with a blue and red Tesco sign but there’s nothing except miles of brown fields and skeletal trees. I realise it’s a terrible idea anyway. I need to pay with cash or my card will be traced and I can’t use cash at the pump. I check my cheap pay-as-you-go phone again to make sure it’s switched off. I’ve watched plenty of police dramas and I know how they track people via their phone signals.
The traffic increases the further south I get, but I ease into the slow lane and stay behind a lorry while I examine my face in the rear-view mirror. There are still traces of blood around my reddened nose and dark circles are forming under my eyes. By tomorrow I’ll have a pair of comedy shiners. Not that there’s anything comedic about this situation. There are also crusts of blood in my hair, dark red patches, visible against the fairness.
If I find a quiet place to stop I can get my make-up out of my bag and try to hide the injuries with some heavy-duty concealer. I’m usually good at covering marks left by fists but this one may not be so easy to hide.
Without warning my eyes fill with tears again. They’re tears of anger as well as fear now. Disappointment is in there too. Crushing disappointment. Because none of this is my fault. None of it.
The road blurs and I blink rapidly. It’s dangerous to cry while driving, especially on a motorway. I turn the radio up, hoping some music will calm me down but Bryan Adams starts singing, Cuts like a knife, and I snap the radio off abruptly. How could it all have gone so badly wrong? Why is my life so shit?
Manchester is only five miles away now and I think I have enough petrol to make it, after all. I could return to my rented room and pick up my old life as though nothing has happened. I didn’t tell anyone I was going to Scotland because who would I tell? People at work can be bitchy so I prefer to keep to myself. I reach the junction but instead of turning off I put my foot down and pass it by, the road ahead of me suddenly holding greater appeal.
A fresh start. That’s what I need. A new life as far away as I can manage. There’s nothing to keep me in Manchester. I’ll go back to Mum’s in Milton Keynes and get a temporary job so I can save up for a place of my own somewhere different. London, perhaps, or maybe Bristol. Supermarket or shop work is usually easy to find. I might need to work long hours and live in one room, but I’m used to that.
A sign on the verge informs me it’s another 200 miles to London which means Milton Keynes must be about 150 miles away. I badly need petrol now. I’ll take the next exit off the M6 and drive around looking for a garage while there’s still some light then try to find my way back onto the motorway. But it’s another ten miles to the next junction and the red light has been on a while. Fuck. I should have got off sooner.
Chapter 2
February | DI Paton
Detective Inspector Dave Paton disconnected the call to his mobile and looked at his son who was pulling on his coat. This wouldn’t go down well.
‘I’m sorry, Tommy, we can’t go bowling today after all. Something has come up at work. I promise we’ll go next Saturday instead.’
Paton couldn’t deny the shiver he’d felt across his skin when the Chief Inspector said a murder victim had been discovered, and he couldn’t quite decide if it had been alarm or excitement. He longed for a case to challenge him and help him get promotion. Something that would prove he was capable of being the senior investigating officer. After all, he was forty-eight now and if he didn’t achieve this soon it would be too late in his career. With the demands his family placed on him he’d never had the opportunity before. Would this be his chance?
Tommy paused with one arm in
