He stopped and looked at his feet. ‘What you did, seven years ago,’ he said. ‘I haven’t forgotten it.’
‘Look…’ she said. ‘The others… they didn’t mean the things they said. They were just being stupid, mucking around.’
‘They meant every word of it,’ said Barney. ‘That day… it changed everything for me.’ He stared at her again, a flush rising up his smooth skin.
Kate’s phone suddenly went off. It was Francis. She really needed to tell him about Lucas. Fill him in properly.
‘Barney… can we maybe chat a bit later on? At the bar, maybe? After your act tonight..?’
He shrugged and nodded. ‘Sure. It can wait. I need to get to the kid’s theatre now, anyway.’
‘Thank you,’ she said, patting his arm. ‘Sorry… I’ve really got to go.’ She scrambled up the path, picking up Francis’s call just too late and trying to return it, suddenly awash with guilt. Her brother was meant to be having a relaxing weekend away and instead he was dealing with his sister stumbling across yet another murder victim.
‘Sorry, Fran, I’m on my way,’ she said. ‘Are you still in the pool tournament?’
‘No, I’m playing pinball in the Buntin’s Bear Arcade,’ he said. The pings and chimes in the background bore this out. ‘Just checking nobody else is dead yet,’ he added, chirpily.
‘No, all still alive when I last saw them,’ she said. ‘I’m on my way over to you. Stay put.’
She stalked quickly across the grassy stretch, skirting the molehills as rain began to spatter across her face. Glancing back, she could no longer see Barney. She should try to make time for him later; he obviously needed to get something off his chest.
She approached the hedge that bordered the campsite, trying to marshal some kind of plan… see Lucas… share what she knew… see if he could dowse some answers… take their findings to the Suffolk police and help them locate the killer… then maybe have time for a swift drink at the bar and take in the evening’s cabaret with Barney before getting around to that proper conversation she was now determined to have with Lucas.
It sounded like a plan of sorts. She’d rather stay here and see it through than drive home right after the second police interview at two. She wasn’t surprised Bill had bailed; he was probably regretting getting drunk and taking Nikki to bed. Nikki was great, but very needy around Bill.
A dark figure stepped out of the hedge and grabbed her.
23
It was a mistake. And he paid for it. One moment he was hunched under the bushes and the next he was flat on his back with her knee on his throat.
‘Kate… for fuck’s sake!’ he gurgled.
Her hard expression melted into eye rolling exasperation and she took her knee off and released his airway. Note to self, Lucas — Kate Sparrow is a black belt in martial arts and not afraid to use it.
‘What the hell, Lucas? Why would you do that?!’ She crouched down next to him, looking slightly guilty. ‘Have I hurt you?’ she said. ‘Sorry — but if a guy comes at me and tries to grab me, he gets what’s coming to him.’
He got into a sitting position, rubbing his shoulder which had hit the ground the hardest as she’d swept the feet out from under him with some kind of roundhouse kick. ‘I wasn’t trying to grab you,’ he croaked. ‘I just wanted to tap your arm and get your attention without anyone else noticing.’
She shrugged. ‘Well, you got it.’ She glanced around. ‘And there’s nobody else around.’ She looked very un-Kate in her strappy white summer dress and sandals. It was quite discombobulating. He’d seen her entirely unclothed once before, but that really hadn’t been the time to marvel at the pearly glow her skin seemed to give off; the warm spicy scent that emanated from it. And now wasn’t the time either, he reminded himself.
‘It’s someone close to you,’ he said. ‘Whoever’s behind the deaths of your two friends. They’re close. That’s why I wanted to get you on your own if I could.’
Kate helped him up. ‘Come on,’ she said, and led him deeper into the thicket of hawthorn and crab apple trees which screened them from anyone wandering past on their way to or from the beach. A few steps in, she turned and looked at him. ‘Do you know where they are now?’
‘I’m not sure of exactly where… or exactly who,’ he said. ‘But do you know someone who drives a white Audi A6 hybrid?’
‘Oh shit — that sounds like Bill’s car,’ said Kate. ‘Why? Where have you seen it?’
‘It’s parked about a mile down the road, hidden behind some trees on the back road to a golf course.’
Kate blinked, trying to take in the meaning of this. ‘How… how did you connect with it? I mean… you’ve never met Bill, have you?’
‘I don’t know,’ he said. ‘I might have seen him in the bar last night. Was he the gay guy or the one up on stage with you?’
‘Up on stage,’ said Kate, looking bleak. ‘Shit… are you saying you think it’s Bill?’
‘I’m not saying that. I don’t know.’ Lucas hesitated. His readings were all over the place and he was jangly and anxious. In truth, just being within a few feet of Kate was enough to make him jangly and anxious, which didn’t help at all. He took Sid out of his shirt and allowed the pendulum to drop and hang still between his thumb and forefinger. He tried to bring on the dowsing state, but it wasn’t easy to summon it with Kate so close by and — wait. He realised, belatedly, that Sid wasn’t refusing to co-operate because Kate was here. He was refusing to let Lucas detach from her. Of course. On this occasion Kate was one of the connections… she was a link.
He reached
