Читать книгу Keep Your Friends Close: A gripping psychological thriller full of shocking twists you won’t see coming - June Taylor - Страница 10

The lanes of traffic filed past and slowed down on the M62, the same cars repeating the same pattern in the roadworks. Karin’s phone was resting on her lap. Its sudden ping brought her out of her reverie. When she saw what Mel had sent her, she laughed. A photo of Will tucking into a plate of pasta, and a message:

BOTH OKAY.

HOPE YOU ARE TOO.

LOVE MEL & WILL

XX

If Mel had chosen to walk by that night after tripping over her outstretched legs, as she sat in her usual spot under the damp stone ceiling of the Dark Arches, Karin might not even be here now. She knew she looked and smelt like rotting garbage, a stinking heap cluttering up the pavement, yet something in Mel had made her stop. She had bent down to ask her name, wrapped a scarf around her neck and given her gloves to put over her freezing fingers, white and numb at the ends. Then she began asking questions: Why was Karin in such a state? How had it come to this?

Some people bothered to do that.

When Mel reached her limit, Karin watched her go, calling, ‘You have a nice night.’ That’s what happened: she was used to it. So twenty minutes later, to see her returning with piping hot coffee and a cheeseburger, seemed like a miracle. Mel also gave her money for a hostel, making Karin promise that she would be sure to find one. Karin didn’t let on that it was too late for that night, but she did use the money for the following one.

‘Is this where I can find you?’ she enquired before abandoning her to the cold again. Karin remembered that question had made her laugh, sitting in this gloomy Victorian tunnel under the railway station, full of shadows, and thunderous noises from above.

‘Yes, this is my current address,’ she replied. ‘The Dark Arches, Leeds.’

A couple of days later Mel came back to see her, took her to lunch in a greasy-spoon, where Karin ate like an abandoned dog. They chatted for a while and when she had finished eating, Mel offered her the spare room in the house that she was renting. ‘It’s in Headingley,’ she said, as if Karin might actually care. ‘Look I can’t bear to see a young girl like you out here on the streets. It’s not right.’

Mel’s kindness stretched beyond the initial trial period of a couple of nights. If Karin could find herself a job, then she was welcome to stay. In the meantime, she let her off paying rent and Karin did some volunteering with the homeless charity, helping out with the Love an Empty scheme. Eventually they asked her to manage the project on Ashby Road. It paid next to nothing and she still couldn’t contribute very much, but Karin always promised to repay Mel.

‘In a year’s time, I should be back on my feet. When I turn twenty-two.’

Mel always said it didn’t matter about paying her back, just to contribute as soon as she was able. That’s why today had felt particularly special. Although Karin did consider giving her more than five thousand pounds, she appreciated that Mel would probably be insulted if she did. However, it bothered Karin that she hadn’t been a terribly good housemate in return, spending most of her time at Aaron’s place rather than in Headingley. So Karin had decided to make it up to her with flowers, meals out, extravagant presents instead; more Mel’s style in any case. Starting next week, she would take her to the new Swank restaurant that had opened down on The Calls. Mel said the other day how much she would love to go there, but could never afford it.

A few months after moving in, she was introduced to Aaron and they had started going out together. It still gave Karin a flutter in her stomach thinking about that, even now. He had come round to fix a temperamental dishwasher – the very same – and an instant spark had fired up between them. Mel teased Karin relentlessly, but without holding back on her concerns over his age. She clearly believed it would fizzle out soon enough. It hadn’t though, which left Karin feeling somewhat guilty.

‘You don’t know anyone who’d be suitable for Mel, do you?’ she asked, twirling her hair round her finger. Aaron’s laughter surprised her, but then she realized the question had come from nowhere. ‘No, I’m serious though. You must know some decent men out of all your work contacts, surely. It’s not like she’s unattractive.’ He gave her a rather noncommittal half-shrug. ‘It’s just I feel bad sometimes about her sitting in the house on her own, when I’m out all the time with you. Hardly see her these days and she’s been so kind to me.’ Aaron gave her another shrug, implying that wasn’t Karin’s problem. ‘You know what she did for me, Aaron.’

‘I’ll have a think.’

She leaned over to kiss him on the cheek.

‘Can’t promise anything, mind,’ he added.

‘No, I know. But she deserves someone nice, that’s all.’

Perhaps Mel’s problem was that she was too good-natured, and people took advantage. Karin was aware that Mel dabbled in internet dating from time to time, but without any success as far as she could make out, and Mel had hinted at some difficult scenarios, people in it for the wrong reasons.

Aaron accelerated and at last they were moving again. Karin turned to him and smiled, sinking her head into the headrest with thoughts of how much she had come to love him these past months and how fortunate she was to have found him.

He was wearing well for a man in his mid-forties, a full head of brown hair, and a pretty good physique through playing squash and sessions at the gym. Not handsome as such, but he had a face that got more interesting with age and to Karin that was preferable to handsome. It wasn’t the crazy, wild passion she had once known, but she associated that with the past in any case, and her adolescence was thankfully behind her now. Louie had been a big part of her initial healing process, and without Louie she would never have survived, but the wild, experimental journey they went on together wasn’t really who she was. It had left an emotional scar, on both sides she didn’t doubt, and she hoped that Louie had also met someone else by now. She closed her eyes to squeeze out the memory, wanting only Aaron to be in her head and to imagine what it might be like waking up to his face every morning for the rest of her life.

She swallowed, telling herself to slow down.

Aaron glanced over. ‘You seem deep in thought,’ he said, giving her hair a stroke.

Karin flushed. The likelihood of him proposing in any case was pretty remote.

Mel had got it wrong.

A sharp pain suddenly jabbed her forehead and she tried to massage it away. If she ever did get married, would she write and tell her mother the news? After the event, obviously. Like Birgitta had done to her. But Karin knew that any letter she sent would only come back in the post unopened. Or perhaps her mother would even go so far as to get the police to return it to her, so they could arrest her at the same time. As her dad used to say, Birgitta’s decisions were set in ice.

‘You sure you’re okay?’

The sound of Aaron’s voice snapped her back into the moment, and Karin realized she had become unbearably hot. Her dress was clinging to her and her scalp felt prickly. ‘Yeah, sorry,’ she said. She lowered the window and stuck her head out, not bothering about what it might do to her hair at this speed. ‘I was just thinking about where we might be going.’

‘You’ll soon see,’ said Aaron, holding her hair down until she came back in again and put the window up. ‘You look amazing tonight, by the way.’

‘Thanks. You don’t look too bad yourself.’

The sharp blast of air seemed to work, and Karin visualized them making plans for the future, getting their first place together. A house with a garden where children could play. A log cabin, and plenty of long grass to run around in and be wild. She would be a good mother. Stay home and spend time with her kids. There would be more than one; an only child was a miserable child. She would wrap them in love and laughter, never abandon or ignore them and definitely never send them away.

And Aaron would make a great father.

But what if he ever did find out? What then? Aaron didn’t deserve to be hurt, not again. His marriage had ended badly. Infidelity, not on his part, followed by a messy divorce.

Karin’s heart began to thump against her chest. She wrapped her fingers round her wrist, something the bereavement counsellor had taught her to do at school to force the positive thoughts through. It was the bereavement counsellor who had explained about the post-traumatic stress headaches too. She said Karin had been through a lot. The strained relationship with her mother. Losing her father. Her stepdad’s suicide. She asked if there might be one incident in particular which could be behind such violent headaches. Karin never told her. Apart from her mother, there were only two people who knew the truth.

Will and Louie.

She trusted Will with her life.

Louie, she was never going to see again.

Karin closed her eyes, trying to hang onto these positives. When she opened them again she registered they were heading north up the M6, the sign for Morecambe having fleetingly caught her eye. ‘Erm. Are we going to the coast?’ she asked, turning quickly to look at the sign even though she knew it would have disappeared by now.

Aaron didn’t pick up on the panic in her voice. ‘We might be,’ he said, a boyish grin spreading across his face.

But the signs repeatedly said Morecambe. And after a while there it was. Marine Road West. She could see it up ahead, a building of elegant white curves. Of all the places to bring her. Why here? It was her birthday, a simple meal in Leeds would have been perfect. Couldn’t they just go back to Leeds? Couldn’t she suggest that? Was it too late to turn round?

They swung into the car park of The Midland hotel, gleaming white in all its restored Art Deco glory, and Karin felt herself shaking. As beautiful and magnificent as it was, she never intended coming back here.

Not ever.

It stood before her now like a defiant ghost, keeper of memories she didn’t want to revive. Karin held onto her wrist so tightly her fingers turned white. She thought she had left all this behind.