No Way Out

check if he had parked it straight. That was the least of his worries.

He looked around and wandered round too. Then he saw it: a red Ford Mustang. Was it Andi’s? Or just another like it. It was the only one in the lot. He raced over to it and looked at it. There was no obvious sign that it was hers. But equally none that it wasn’t.

It has to be, he told himself.

But was she about to do what he thought she was about to do? And how long ago had she got here. It was a long walk to the bridge. And when he last saw her, she wasn’t exactly dressed for running.

Is there still a chance? Can I get to her?

Certainly there hadn’t been any incident’s on the bridge recently because otherwise this whole area would be bustling with activity — not to mention gawking members of the public.

He looked round at the bay. To his left the sun was low in the sky but still above the horizon.

He sprinted towards the bridge, up the slope, chugging away breathlessly. He hadn’t put on rolls of fat, like some men his age. Nevertheless he was no longer a young man, and although he could run, he felt it in his lungs, his heart and the sinews of his thighs.

He was panting and hunched with cramp in his ribcage when he got onto the pedestrian walkway of the bridge. But he didn’t know whether to be relieved or worried when he saw Andi walking the same path, almost staggering, as she receded from him in the distance.

All he knew was that he wanted to sprint towards her, but his legs wouldn’t let him.

Wednesday, 2 September 2009 — 19:30

“Looks like it,” said Gene, taunting him right back. “Maybe you shouldn’t have escaped. Maybe you should have brazened it out.”

“No, they still had me for the attempted rape on…” He half turned to indicate the terrified young woman on the bed. “But if the last DNA sample was actually from you — and if you knew that — then how did you figure it out?”

“It was the coincidence that got me thinking. You see the very fact that Bethel ID’d the picture of the young Elias Claymore on the cork board at the rape crisis center was itself interesting. I knew the rapist couldn’t be Claymore, because of the age factor. But still, it had to have a reason. There had to be a cause. And the obvious cause was the son that I gave up — the son that Claymore never knew he had. That also made the match of the Y-chromosomal DNA somewhat less of a coincidence. It meant all of a sudden that there was a causal explanation.”

“So now we both know. What about my father? Does he know?”

“I didn’t tell him.”

“Why not?”

“I had to see you first. I had to speak to you.”

He shrugged his shoulders.

“And am I what you expected?”

“When I gave you up, I didn’t expect anything. I was only thinking of myself.”

“Well at least you’re not a hypocrite. But what about now?”

“I knew you raped Bethel… knew you tried to rape Martine-”

“Still intend to,” he cut back almost under his breath. The contempt was manifest in the quiet, off-the-cuff tone.

“Look, I admit that I wronged you. I could make excuses and say it’s because of what your father did to me, but — yes — I still wronged you. But Martine didn’t. All she did was defend herself when-”

“You don’t get it do you? What Claymore did was part of his nature. It’s in a man’s genes. It’s part of their nature. Men try to reproduce their genes. And the stronger men succeed.”

“But not by rape.”

“They don’t need to. In the animal kingdom the concept of rape is meaningless. The males fight amongst each other to establish superiority and then the females go naturally and willingly with the strongest males. The weaker males get the leftovers. Its only in the human species that women look for other things like sympathy and kindness and wealth. A female animal doesn’t want a good provider, she gathers or hunts for the food herself. She just wants strong genes to bind with hers to make sure that her own genes survive in her offspring. Even in the human species, most women know that the best provider isn’t necessarily the best biological father for their children. That’s why they marry rich men and then cheat on them with hunks from the street. Adultery’s as natural for a woman as it is for a man.”

“You’ve been reading the wrong books.”

“Books are one of the few things they give you behind bars. Some cons toke. Some work out. I read books.”

Wednesday, 2 September 2009 — 19:35

Claymore was sprinting along the pedestrian walkway as fast as he could, trying his best to keep Andi in his line of sight. But his heart sank when she arrived at the southern suspension tower. For at that point, he saw her moving off the walkway and round the tower, onto the observation platform behind it. That — and a similar platform at the northern suspension tower — were the points where suicides jumped off.

He arrived at the suspension column in time to see Andi clambering over, apparently with a bottle of gin or vodka in her hand. He felt a knot in his stomach as terror swept over him. If he shouted out to her, he would frighten her. If her decision was final, it would make her jump. If she was still undecided, it would take her by surprise and might very well startle her and cause her to lose her grip. If he rushed her, it would also frighten her.

He stood there frozen with indecision, his feet stuck to the ground beneath him. As she completed her climb to the other side, she held on with one hand as she took a swig from the bottle.

And then she saw him.

For a second his heart went into his mouth as he thought this was the end for her. But instead, she simply smiled.

“Oh hi Elias?” she said, in what sounded a bit like a little girl voice.

He looked at her still feeling helpless, and yet in some way liberated from fear by precisely that sense of desperation. Behind him the sun was setting making her squint, so he couldn’t tell if she had been crying. Was she sad? Lost? Already too far gone?

He looked around. There were plenty of cars on the bridge. But here, behind the suspension column, they were virtually concealed from public view. And at this time, on a baseball day, there weren’t many pedestrians about. They were, effectively, alone.

He had to reach out to her in the only way he could. But now the “only way he could” meant not with his body, but with his mind… with his words.

“Andi don’t do it!”

She was smiling. But he couldn’t tell if it was from her mood or the setting sun in her eyes.

“What do you want?” she asked hesitantly, putting the bottle down on the ledge and holding on with both hands now.

“Don’t do it… don’t jump.”

She half turned her head and looked round at the water 220 feet below.

“Why not?”

He tried to take a step forward, but she released the grip of one of her hands, as if warning him of how easy