50/50 Killer (34 page)

'But I've told you everything I remember.'

'I know you have.' Be patient with him. 'And you've done well. But we need to go a little further.'

He shook his head at the prospect. I stared at him impassively. In our last conversation, we'd talked about the game the killer played, and he'd asked me:
So I betrayed Jodie?
There was no definite answer I could give to that, not even now, but deep down Scott knew the truth. And he'd had a couple of hours alone to dwell on it. His mind was telling him to keep his back to what happened, and now here I was, threatening to make him turn round.

'If we don't find Jodie soon,' I said, 'there's a good chance we won't find her at all.'

'But I don't know. I can't remember.'

I was sympathetic, but there was almost a petulance to him.

'What else did the man talk to you about?'

'I don't know.'

I just looked at him, letting him know that he wasn't getting off the hook that easily. It was in his face that he could remember something. Even if he couldn't, he was going to have to try.

The tension in the silence steadily increased, but I was implacable. In the end, I forced him to break it.

'All I know is, we talked about Jodie.'

'That's not all you know. I appreciate it's hard, Scott.'

He started to cry. 'I don't know.'

My instinct was to back off, but that was no good. I kept looking at him - the same implacable expression as before - and settled back in the chair, trying to dilute my expression with some compassion, some understanding.

'I know what you're thinking,' I said. 'I know what you're afraid of.'

He shook his head and looked away.

'You're scared that you left her to die,' I said, 'and you don't think you'll be able to forgive yourself for that, or else you think people will judge you for it. I understand more than you think. But Scott, look at the window. It's not dawn yet.'

I leaned forwards.

'She's still alive. Whatever you think you've done, it's not too late to take it back. I envy you that.'

He sniffed, shook his head again. 'You don't understand.'

'What did you talk about?'

Nothing. He was trembling.

I sighed to myself. I had no idea whether what I was going to say next would make the slightest bit of difference, but it was all I had left.

Empathy.

'Listen for a minute.' I checked my watch. 'It won't take long, and I think we've still got some time. I want to tell you something.'

We were on holiday, camping. This beach campsite. We went swimming. Just messing about, really, but we drifted out of our depth, and didn't realise the current was so strong. We called for help, but there wasn't anybody on the beach. So we just had to swim for it. And basically, I made it to shore and she didn't. There was nothing anyone could have done.

That was what I'd told the rest of the team earlier on in the canteen. But in its own way, this was my version of the photograph of Jodie that Scott kept in his wallet. It was a snapshot of an event in my life. One I kept close at hand; one I was prepared to share with people. And like that passport photo, it was only a small part of the whole story. The real truth is always between the lines. It's hidden inside what you don't say.

We were on holiday, camping. This beach campsite.

My memories of the evening were disjointed, as though what happened later had reached back and smashed a hammer onto the time leading up to it, leaving me only fragments to sort through. The tension of tent poles: I remember feeding them awkwardly through the tight canvas loops, curving them into position, the tent stretching itself into shape. Lise wafting away mosquitoes as we hammered pegs into the packed, sandy ground. Her bikini bottom was tangled slightly at the back.

We went swimming. Just messing about, really, but we drifted out of our depth, and didn't realise the current was so strong.

It was me that noticed first. I wasn't a confident swimmer and the sea was slightly rougher than I was comfortable with, so I felt the need to put my toes down on the seafloor every so often. And at one point I tried and went under. When I came back up, I was shocked, coughing.

Panicking.

'It's all right,' Lise said. 'Just swim back to shore.'

But I was floundering, and I accidentally kicked her in the stomach; I still remember the soft-hard impact. She told me, 'Calm down,' but I wasn't listening, just clawing for the shore, instinct taking over and telling me I needed to get myself safe above and beyond anything else.

Swim, I thought. Swim as hard as you can.

I noticed how rough the water was this far from shore: choppy on the surface, full of motion underneath around my chest and legs. I swam hard, for what felt a long time, and when I stopped for a moment I saw that I was further from the beach than when I'd started.

Lise had been swimming, too; we were still very close to each other at that point. I looked at her and saw my own panic reflected back at me. That was what did it. I'd never seen her look scared before; she was normally so calm, so together.

'Scream,' she told me seriously.

We called for help, but there wasn't anybody on the beach.

I'd never shouted for help in my life and it sounded ridiculous and wrong, but I screamed. I screamed as loud as I could, over and over. Above the noise of the waves I could hear her doing the same.

I was half shouting, half swimming when a wave punched me on the back, knocking me under. My lungs filled with water, and I was coughing and choking as I came up, my eyes stinging. The world around me was just a blur, a smear. Lise was further away, a misty smudge of colour. In my head, curtains of dark water were pulling themselves round her. Taking her from me.

So we just had to swim for it.

I started out again, thrashing as hard as I could, blind except for flashes of the sky. But I was panicking too much to control myself, and the sea kept pushing me under. I understood very clearly that I was going to die, and I'd never felt frightened on such a primal level before. Fighting against the waves, I was tensing my arms so hard that the muscles started to spasm. Mentally, I was absent: just an animal with death in sight, struggling desperately to escape. I wasn't thinking about Lise. At that moment, all that mattered was myself.

And basically, I made it to shore and she didn't.

It was a minute, if that, before I staggered up the beach. I was only wearing shorts, but I might as well have been swimming fully clothed. My arms and legs felt waterlogged: heavy and tired. Immediately, I collapsed to my knees on the sand and then forward onto my elbows, coughing out water, then heaving in air. When I could breathe, I forced myself to my feet and turned to scan the sea. Calling out for her.

There was nothing anyone could have done.

The funeral. Friends, colleagues; my parents and hers. The sea never surrendered Lise's body, so all these people were standing round a patch of land that could never genuinely be called a grave. Her mother's scarf was blowing softly to one side in the breeze. She told me:

'There was nothing you could have done, Mark.'

I'd started crying when she said that, but I'd accepted it anyway, and that single sentence lay at the heart of the picture I kept to show people. Just as someone seeing the photograph of Jodie would smile and say something complimentary, so the people listening to me would nod and be sympathetic. There wasn't anything anyone could have done, so it was sad, but everything was right with the world. They wouldn't look for the truth below the surface.

But I couldn't hand Scott that picture. If I wanted to know his secrets, I had to be prepared to show mine.

'I was standing on the beach,' I said. 'And I was looking for her, trying to see her. Screaming her name. And suddenly, there she was.'

I'd spotted her out in the water, about fifty metres from shore. By sheer blind luck, I'd escaped the current, while Lise had made hardly any progress at all.

'She was shouting something, but I couldn't hear it. I don't know if she could even see me. Maybe she was just screaming.'

I could see her, though. I could see the terror and panic and pain on her face.

Scott had turned back to look at me. He'd stopped crying as well, although the part of his face that was visible was red and swollen, gleaming in the light. I wasn't naive enough to think that telling him this story was going to flick a switch and make everything okay, but at least he was looking at me. Listening to me. At least I'd got him back for as long as I could keep him.

'I went back into the water,' I said, 'but only up to my knees. I was waving to her, shouting that she'd be okay, that she just needed to keep swimming. But the sea was so choppy. One minute she was there and then the next she just wasn't.'

I remembered the last I'd seen of her: a black Y bobbing in the waves. After that, it was only the waves, and I was screaming, 'You'll be okay' to nothing.

'You didn't go back in?' Scott said.

'I wanted to,' I said. 'I started to. But I didn't dare. I was too scared to go back into the water. And so my fiancee drowned.'

Scott stared at me, shocked. I could hear him breathing.

I smiled as best I could.

'I know deep down there was nothing I could have done. I could have gone back in, and then I'd probably have drowned too. She was a stronger swimmer than I was. But I still blame myself for what I didn't do. I could have tried to save her, but I didn't because I was too afraid of dying myself. Do you understand?'

He nodded slowly.

'And in a way, that's the game,' I said. 'That's all the killer is, that's all he does. He stacks it so that there's too much to cope with, too much to deal with, until your only option is to walk away. Anybody would do the same. But I can't imagine what she was thinking when she died. I can't bear to.'

When I said that, Scott looked so desperate, so helpless, that I wanted to take it all back. But we were in the thick of it now; it would be harder to retreat than to push through to the other side.

He said, 'I abandoned her.'

I nodded.

'You probably did. But right now you're in the same position I was in when I was standing on that beach. Your girlfriend is still alive, Scott.'

One of the ground rules for the interview. This time, I actually believed it.

'So you've got one up on me. In your own way, you can still go back in there and save her. If you don't, you'll live with it, and everybody will understand. But please, don't make the same mistake that I did. You won't be able to live with yourself. Do you understand what I'm saying?'

His voice was sad as he whispered again: 'I abandoned her.'

I leaned forwards, clasping my hands together. If this was going to happen, it would happen now.

'What do you remember?'

The question hung in the air for a moment, and the only sound was the soft beeping of Scott's pulse on the machine by the bed. It was calm now.

'He showed me something. A piece of paper.'

'In the woods? You were in an old stone building, and he was talking to you for a long time. Is that when he showed you this piece of paper?'

'I think so.'

'Did you read it?'

'I didn't want to. He made me.'

'What was it?'

'It was an email.' He took a deep breath. 'She was having an affair with Kevin Simpson. Her ex-business partner. It was something about that.'

'Okay.'

He shook his head. 'You knew that, didn't you?'

'No. We knew she'd spent some time at Simpson's house. I didn't want to tell you before. The man who abducted you did the same thing to Kevin Simpson. He was murdered yesterday morning.'

'Good.'

I didn't reply.

Scott didn't say anything, either. His face had grown curiously blank, but it seemed hard to maintain and was threatening to collapse into something else. Anger? Grief? Self-pity? I couldn't tell.

Keep it moving.

'So he showed you this email,' I said. 'What happened next?'

'I told him I gave up,' he said. 'Just like that. "I give up." I kept saying it over and over again so that he'd understand and stop hurting me.'

I nodded. 'And then?'

'He ... let me go.' Scott sniffed. 'Oh, God, he let me go. As easy as that. I left her.'

I was willing him on, but I forced myself to keep calm.

'He untied you? How did you know which way to go?'

'No.' Scott frowned. 'He walked with me for a while. Just a few minutes, I think. We crossed a river, crossed a path. All the time he was talking to me, telling me he'd take care of everything, that I'd made the right decision. He even told me I could come back if I changed my mind. Then we stopped and he pointed into the trees. He told me what direction to head in.'

We crossed a river, crossed a path.

I wanted to run downstairs as fast as I could. The search teams had been looking in the wrong area. The river was north of the top bar of the 'n' and the camp was just a few minutes from there.

He looked at me with something close to desperation: 'And ... so I ran.'

I gave him a gentle smile, then walked over, sat on the edge of the bed and put my hand on his shoulder.

'Thank you,' I said. 'You've done everything you can. The next time I come up here will be to tell you we've found Jodie and we've got the man who did this to you.'

He started crying again. But he nodded.

I gave his shoulder a careful squeeze, then stood up and walked across to the door. As I opened it, I turned to look back. Light from the hall rested on the floor and the corner of the bed, but it didn't quite reach him.

'Officer.'

He looked suddenly quite peaceful, despite his tears.

'Whatever happens, thank you.'

'I'll be back soon, Scott.'

I went out into the corridor, closing the door softly behind me. Then and only then, I started to run.

4 DECEMBER

1 HOUR, 50 MINUTES UNTIL DAWN

5.30 A.M.