Charley (12 page)

The flashes stopped. I opened my eyes to see Tom standing beside me, his face sick with worry. I looked at him, the palms of my hands pressed against the side of my head, my eyes watering.

Tom took a piece of crumpled tissue from his pocket. ‘Here, use this.’

‘Thanks,’ I said wiping the tears away.

‘Are you okay?’ he asked.

‘Just give me a moment,’ I said, screwing up the piece of tissue. I looked hard at him. ‘Scared?’

‘Well, yeah,’ he whispered. ‘You don’t look very well, Charley. Perhaps we should stop?’

‘I’m used to it,’ I said.

‘Did you see anything?’ he asked.

‘I saw the train just as Kerry would have done. It was like I was lying right in its path as it raced towards me.’

‘Has that ever happened before?’ he asked me.

‘Yeah, but not so intense.’

‘How do you know it was Kerry’s eyes you were looking through?’ he asked.

‘Who else could it have been?’ I said.

‘I don’t know,’ he said. ‘Did you see anything else?’

No sooner had Tom spoken, than something new happened. It was as if his car was flashing with bright white light.

‘Do you see that?’ I breathed, walking back towards his car.

‘See what?’ he asked.

‘Your car. Look at your car, Tom.’

‘What about it?’

‘It’s sparkling,’ I murmured.

‘Sparkling?’

‘Yeah, like it’s been showered with glitter.’ I held my hand up in
front of my eyes to stop them from being blinded by the bright white lights that popped and glimmered all around it; they looked like a million swarming fireflies. ‘It looks beautiful.’ I had never seen anything like it before.

‘Charley, there are no lights,’ Tom said from behind me, and just like before, his voice faded away, as if snatched by a gust of wind.

I continued towards the car, one hand held over my eyes, the other stretched out before me.

Flash! Flash! Flash!

Tom’s car wasn’t there any more. In those rapid, fleeting pictures inside my head I saw another car. It was white. The passenger door was open. There was the sound of someone pleading – Kerry – it was Kerry I could hear.

‘Please let me go!’ she sobbed.

Flash!

I saw hands yank her by the wrist from the passenger seat. I felt a spike of pain in my own wrists, as if invisible fingernails were cutting deep into my flesh. Another blinding snapshot of her face. Her pretty eyes pleading with him. Another burst of white. Fingernails clawed at the side of the car. I saw her fingers scraping away the paint with a sound like metal scraping over ice. Goose flesh ran up my back and I felt sick. Then, the flashes and bright lights disappeared.

‘Charley?’ Tom said.

‘Whoever brought Kerry up to this place, parked right here,’ I said, pointing at his car.

‘How can you be so sure?’ he asked.

‘I saw lights round your car and in them images of a different one. I couldn’t be sure of the make, but it was white. I saw Kerry being dragged from it. I saw her scratch at it with her fingernails. Get someone to check under Kerry’s nails.’

‘For white paint?’ Tom said.

‘Yes,’ I said. ‘I saw it. The paint would have come from his car.’

Tom reached into his coat pocket and pulled out his notebook. I turned back to look at Tom’s car but it just sat there in the gloom beneath the bruised sky. There were no more lights – or so I thought. In the hedgerow, I saw them again. They were neon white, the size of pound coins, blinking on and off as if trying to grab my attention.

I walked around the back of Tom’s car and headed towards them. ‘Can you see the lights this time?’

Tom looked up from his notebook. ‘What did you say?’

‘You can’t see them, can you?’

‘See what?’ he asked, coming towards me. ‘More lights,’ I whispered.

They hovered around a gap in the bushes and nettles. I went towards it, and my head jerked to the right. More flashes. Mud. Puddles. Kerry’s dirty trainers being dragged through them. I opened my eyes, pushed the undergrowth apart and the lights disappeared as quickly as a set of Christmas tree lights being switched off.

A narrow path spiralled into the gloom on the other side of the bushes.

‘I found this earlier,’ Tom whispered behind me. ‘It leads to …’

‘Shhh,’ I said. ‘Don’t tell me.’

‘Sorry,’ he said.

I made my way up the path, more lights appearing in the distance, as if showing me the way. All the while my head thumped, as if my heart was inside my skull instead of my chest. Every few feet the flashes would shatter like shards of glass inside my head, each one a picture of Kerry being dragged through the undergrowth. She cried out, her shrill voice all around me.

There was music too – faint – in the distance. Ellie Goulding singing
Burn
. Kerry’s phone lighting up the night.

‘Please let me call my mum,’
Kerry called out.

‘Shut up, you silly little bitch!’
the man spat.

My blood felt as if it had turned to ice in my veins. The vision’s clarity took my breath away. I felt it deep inside, and my mind screamed in trauma. This was much worse than I had ever felt it before.

I opened my eyes to see the building with its tumbled down chimney.

‘This is the place I saw,’ I gasped, not knowing how I should be feeling. Like Tom said, I would never have known this place existed if I hadn’t seen it in those flashes. What I’d seen was real.

My head hurt, but not as bad as before. The pain was a dull thud, like toothache. The lights that blinked on and off all around the house eased the pain. I didn’t understand why, but whatever the reason, I was grateful for it; although they couldn’t take away my feeling of shock.

Being able to stand before the ruined house showed me what I saw in my flashes was real, but it didn’t fill me with joy and relief. I felt as if my skin was peppered with goose flesh even though it felt hot. It was like I was burning from inside out. Was it because I was standing so close to a place I had seen in my flashes?

The world swayed then swam back into focus again. The very air around me felt charged with static electricity. I felt sick, as if I’d gone around too many times on a merry-go-round.

In my flashes, the tiny, derelict house hadn’t been illuminated by bright white lights that flickered all around it. It was like the house was trapped in a snow globe, and every so often, some invisible force took hold of it and gave it a good shake, causing a snowfall of light to shower down all around it.

‘Do you want to take a look inside?’ Tom asked me.

‘Yes,’ I said, slowly making my way towards it. The air fizzed in my ears. I felt unsteady on my feet.

As I moved closer, the lights began to dim, flicker out. I looked up as the last of them winked out, and all I could see was the endless murk of the winter sky.

The doorway to the house looked like a gap in a row of front teeth. I made my way towards it. With Tom at my side, I reached the opening, then paused; something felt different, wrong.

The flashes had been so vivid this time, so much so that they shook me to the core, but inside I felt an emptiness, as if I had lost something.

I waited for the flashes to come again but in my heart, I knew they had gone.

CHAPTER 15

Tom – Tuesday: 12:06 Hrs.

‘
W
hat’s wrong?’ I asked.

Charley stood before the open doorway of the house, kneading her temples with her fingertips. ‘The flashes …’

She looked bewildered, like a child who’s lost sight of her mother.

‘What about them?’ I said.

‘They’ve gone,’ she said, screwing her eyes tight.

‘Gone where?’

‘How should I know?’ Charley shot a glance at me, lowering her hands and folding her arms across her chest. ‘It’s not like they go anywhere … but I feel different somehow, hollow.’

‘But you said they had gone.’

‘I know what I said,’ she glared, looking as frustrated as I felt. It
was like we had got so far and now the information had dried up.

‘Can’t you
see
any more?’ I asked. ‘Aren’t any more pictures going to come through?’

Charley looked lost somehow, disturbed. ‘I’m not some kind of freaking tap that you can turn on and off!’

Her hair blew about in the nagging wind. Nearby tree branches screeched and the hanging door of the house slammed closed. Both of us flinched backwards. It was like it was telling us there was no more to be seen – no more secrets to be given up. Charley shivered, with fear or the cold I couldn’t be sure. She looked lonely, even though I stood just feet away.

I fought the sudden urge to go to her, wrap my arms about her slender frame and hold her tight. I couldn’t. She was a potential witness to a crime. Witness? Crime? Who was I trying to kid? I couldn’t be sure of either. The only thing I could be sure of was that if I was caught with Charley anywhere near where Kerry Underwood had died, my feet wouldn’t touch the ground as Harker kicked my arse out of CID.

‘I’m sorry,’ Charley said. ‘The flashes have stopped.’

Or had they ever really been there?
I wanted to say, but that would’ve just been cruel. But I couldn’t help thinking it as I stood and looked back at Charley. Slipping my notebook into my pocket, I didn’t know who was kidding themselves more – me or her? Charley, for believing she could see what had happened to Kerry Underwood or me for even entertaining the idea.

Lowering my stare, I said, ‘C’mon, let’s get out of here.’

‘Why?’

‘You said your flashes had stopped, so what’s the point?’ I said, maybe a little harsher than intended.

‘So you’ve finished using me, is that it?’ Charley said, her green eyes bright with anger. No, it wasn’t anger I could see, it was hurt.

‘It’s not like that …’

‘Then what is it like?’

‘I should’ve never brought you out here,’ I said. ‘C’mon …’

‘You don’t just get to walk away, Tom,’ she snapped. ‘If my flashes were still shining brightly in my head you wouldn’t be going anywhere right now, you’d be standing there scribbling away in your little notebook. Taking down every little thing I told you.’

‘I’ve heard enough,’ I said.

‘Enough of what?’ Charley asked. ‘Enough of me telling you how it is, or just enough of
me
?’

Taking a deep breath, I looked at her. ‘Any other time, any other situation, I couldn’t imagine myself ever having enough of being with you, Charley. But it isn’t like we’ve met in some bar or out with friends. We met stomping all over a crime scene for Christ’s sake. Don’t you get that? Don’t you see I could get in the shit for bringing you within a mile of this place?’

‘So why did you?’ she yelled, screwing her hands into fists. Before I’d had the chance to defend myself, she said, ‘Look, don’t even bother trying to explain, Tom. It looks as if my dad was right about you. You did just want to use me. I should’ve listened to him.’

Charley turned, and hurried away.

‘Hey!’ I yelled. ‘Where are you going?’

‘Home,’ she called, sounding as if she was crying.

I went after her. ‘Let me give you a lift.’

‘I’d rather walk.’

‘Charley!’ but she was gone, disappeared amongst the hedgerows and bushes.

I forced my way through the undergrowth. I had brought her out here so it was down to me to make sure she got home safely. Reaching the dirt track again, I looked left and right but she was nowhere to be seen. ‘Charley!’ I called out again, but there was no reply.

I sat in my car, the engine idling. Should I go in search of her? I wanted to, I was worried. I tried to push away thoughts of Kerry
Underwood being dragged along the dirt track. Was there a killer out there? I only had Charley’s word that there was and the train driver’s description of how he had seen Kerry lying in an odd pose between the tracks. There was still a chance that the killer was Jason Lane, and he would have no reason to harm Charley.

The temptation to just go home, climb into bed, pull the blankets over my head and forget about her was huge. But I knew in my heart as soon as my eyes were closed, I would see Charley, lighting up the darkness of my mind. I drove out of the narrow lane and back onto the country road. I had several hours to kill before my nightshift started and they seemed to stretch out before me like a desolate road.

I would go back to my flat, but not yet – I needed to clear my head. As if on autopilot, I drove down the country roads towards the coast. As I drew near to the jagged cliffs that dropped away into the ocean, the wind buffeted the side of my car. I drew to a stop on a flat piece of ground. Grass flecked with sand blown up from the shoreline lay on either side. Seagulls squawked overhead as they circled high above, their beady black eyes constantly in search of food. I could hear the waves crashing against the granite rocks below.

Settling back in my seat, I switched on the CD player.
I Will Wait
by Mumford and Sons seeped from the speakers. I adjusted the volume so the music became nothing more than a distant soundtrack to my thoughts. Charley was the first to fill my mind. If I were to be honest, she hadn’t left it since she had marched away in tears. Could I blame her for being upset –
angry
– with me?

No, not really. I had used her in my own way and I couldn’t deny that. It wasn’t as if I wanted to intentionally hurt her, but I had done all the same. That’s what happened when you were trying to prove yourself – people had the habit of being stepped on and squashed. Isn’t that how anyone reached the top of their profession? I should know, I had seen my own father climb over enough
people to become a partner in the firm of lawyers he worked for.

He had been relentless in his pursuit of being the most notorious defence lawyer in London. I stared up and watched the seagulls, remembering how my father had never wanted me to be a police officer. He had wanted me to join the firm – but there had been another firm I’d rather be a part off. I had never been able to understand how he defended some of his clients.

To most right-thinking people their guilt was obvious, but my father would fix me with his stare and tell me that everyone was entitled to a defence – that those he represented had a voice. But the victims had a voice too. I couldn’t help but remember how my father had chuckled when I’d told him I wanted to join the police service. I could still him laughing now, and I turned up the volume on the CD player sandwiched into the dashboard of my car.