Scattering Like Light (18 page)

“She knows
something
. I know that Olivia took the memory from her by mistake, but Catherine told me that she had written it down. I didn’t care at the time because I thought I knew how to save you, but of course it turns out that I don’t. Maybe she knows something different.”

“I don’t know,” said Callum dubiously. “You’re hardly best mates, are you? What makes you think that she would help?”

“Well, nothing really. I’m sure she’ll be as obstructive as ever. But don’t you think it’s worth going to ask? She’s had a bit of time on her own now. Maybe her outlook has changed.”

“I think you’re mad,” he said, ruffling my hair, “and clutching at straws.”

“Maybe, but if it’s a straw that might bring you over to me I
have to grab it, don’t I?”

“I suppose. But do you even have any idea where she is?”

“No, not really,” I admitted. “But she can’t have disappeared off the face of the earth. She doesn’t have a passport so my guess would be that she’s still down in Cornwall where Rob said she was going.”

“If he was telling the truth, of course.”

“I know. But didn’t you see her on the train to Exeter or Truro or somewhere?”

“I guess. It was the West Country line. That was weeks ago.”

“Why would she move on? She’s as likely to be there as anywhere else.”

He paused for a second, considering my response. “OK, what if you’re right? What are you going to do then? Cornwall’s a big place.”

“I’ll start stalking her again on Facebook. Maybe there’s a clue that she has given away. Maybe she’s talked to one of my friends – I can ask them all and see.”

Callum shrugged. “If you think it’ll do any good. Then what’ll you do?”

“Go down there and talk to her; get the information I need.”

This time he actually snorted with derision. “Alex! Get real! She hates you
and
me. There’s no way she’s going to be helpful. The only thing she’d like more than leaving us to wallow in misery is to watch us all die horribly.”

“It doesn’t mean I can’t at least try,” I retorted.

“I know, I know.” He was instantly contrite. “It’s just that, well, having lived with her for so long, I know what she’s like. But you do have some winning ways, so you never know. It’s worth a shot.” I felt the gentle stroking of his hand down the length of my
hair and relaxed back towards his touch. In the mirror I could see his mesmerising blue eyes, the gold flecks flashing briefly in the sunlight as his glance flicked towards Olivia for a moment. Olivia was oblivious to us, deeply engrossed in her game with Beesley. “I don’t want to leave you either,” he whispered, his soft lips finding my neck in the tiny reflection. I could feel the faintest of touches as he worked his way up to my jaw line, and slowly, slowly along to my mouth. Kissing Callum was always bittersweet: his gentle touch filled me with longing for more; more that we couldn’t possibly have. But I didn’t stop. I didn’t know how many kisses I had left.

After a couple of hours Olivia and Callum had to go and find some memories. Luckily the local cinema was showing summer-holiday films: lots of romantic comedies, which meant both of them could scoop up dozens of happy thoughts in double-quick time.

Once they were gone and the dog was securely tied up in the garden I fetched my laptop and started my search. Facebook was the obvious place to start. Catherine had set up a profile some weeks earlier when she had first started tormenting me, and had used it to become friends with a lot of my friends. I started with the so-called friends who didn’t actually like me much, and Ashley was the top of that list. I scoured her page for any interaction with Catherine. There was an awful lot to trawl through. Ashley was clearly taking the summer holidays as an opportunity to really spread a load of gossip. She talked a lot of drivel, I realised, as I worked through page after page. Eventually I gave up and found Catherine’s own page. I needed to see the detail and I wasn’t down as one of her friends, but I knew who was. She had attempted to get friendly with Grace a few weeks before, and I knew Grace’s password. I logged on quickly and was momentarily distracted by
the familiar photos. An unexpected wave of loneliness suddenly swept through me; I really missed Grace and was glad that her holiday was nearly over too. It was always so much easier to deal with problems if I could discuss them with her first. She’d know the best thing to do.

I realised I was staring into space and mentally shook myself: I had to rummage through all the information on Catherine’s page. Angling the screen to get the best view I started reading.

After an initial flurry of activity, Catherine had gone pretty quiet. There was no location given either.

“Come on!” I muttered to myself. “There has to be some way of finding her!” I couldn’t believe I was drawing a blank quite so quickly. Some detective I was.

“What’s up, titch?” Josh’s voice made me jump.

“Oh, Josh! I didn’t hear you coming.”

“Just creeping around so that mutt doesn’t see me.” He nodded out towards the garden where Beesley was, for the moment, lying in the shade of a tree, pink tongue lolling out of the side of his mouth.

I decided that Josh might be able to help me. “Actually, it’s good you’re here, techno-geek that you are. I’m trying to find someone and I’m not having a lot of luck.”

Josh pretended to be offended for five seconds, but his curiosity was piqued. “Anyone I know?” he said.

“Well, now, don’t jump down my throat, but it’s Catherine River.”

Josh looked at me sharply. “Are you having a laugh? Why on earth do you want to find that nasty piece of work? Have you forgotten she attacked you and left you for dead!”

I pulled a face. “No, I hadn’t forgotten. I just really, really
need to find her. Are you still connected to her on Facebook, on that other account where she pretended to be Cliona?”

“Who knows? I don’t think I unfriended her, but she might have done it to me.”

“Would you have a look? I really need to find where she is. I think it’s somewhere in the West Country but I don’t have very much more information than that.”

He looked hard at me, and I did my best to look like I knew what I was doing. “I don’t think this is a good idea, you know,” he muttered as he reached for my computer.

Within a few minutes he had found what he was looking for. “Here we are, still a friend. That woman’s a psycho, remember. Don’t do anything stupid.” He turned the laptop round to face me.

“Thanks, Josh, you’re my favourite big brother in the whole wide world.”

“Ha ha,” he said. “See you later.”

I turned my attention back to the screen, anticipation making my heart beat faster. Catherine had pretended to be an old penfriend of mine, Cliona, when she befriended my brother. It was an ideal alias for her to hide behind. I started to flick through the pages and read all the conversations. This account was even less active than the other one. She had obviously done what she wanted to do in manipulating Josh but wasn’t into making conversation. I continued to scan the entries, but the further I went, the less likely it would be that I would find something that she had given away, some inadvertent clue revealing her location.

After an hour I pushed the laptop away in frustration. I was absolutely no further forward. Glancing out into the garden I could see the late afternoon sun casting purple shadows into the corners. Beesley continued to sleep contentedly, which was surprising given
that it must have been his teatime. I really ought to take him back home, I thought, watching his tail swish as he dreamed some doggy dream. I was just about to get up when the tingle appeared in my wrist. I knew immediately that it wasn’t Callum.

“Hello?” I said carefully.

“It’s me, Olivia. I’m sorry, Alex, but I wanted to talk to you without Callum around.” Olivia’s soft voice was even quieter than usual.

“Oh, hello, Olivia, I wasn’t expecting either of you back so soon.”

“I gave Callum the slip. He thinks I’m gathering in screen four, where they’re showing that new film about the honeymoon. He says he can’t stand watching it again this week.”

“You won’t have long before he notices then, I guess.” I waited, but she said nothing. “Come on, Olivia. If you want to talk to me you’re going to have to tell me what’s on your mind.”

“There’s a rumour going around. Matthew was trying to keep it quiet, but people are talking. Is it true? Are you going to kill everyone? Can you even do that? No one will tell me what’s going on!”

I sighed. “Who’s been telling you all this?”

“Apparently there was a newspaper report about Lucas being dead. We know that he’s gone, and the rumour is that it was something to do with you. Is it true?”

It was going to be pointless denying it. “Well, yes,” I admitted. “When I was trying to stop Lucas from hurting Rob I did something that killed him. I didn’t mean to, I didn’t know exactly what was going to happen, but I did. He’s dead.”

There was a sharp intake of breath and then a silence, which continued until she could stand it no longer. “It’s not fair! They
never tell me anything. They think I’m too young to understand but I’ve been here for years and years and years. I just don’t get any bigger. Why won’t they treat me like a grown-up? I’ve as much right to know what’s going on as anyone else, haven’t I?”

“Shh, Olivia, don’t shout in my head. I’ve not discussed this with anyone but Callum so far, not even Matthew. No one is keeping anything from you. What do you want to know?”

“Are you going to do it?”

“I need to do what’s best for everyone, and I don’t know what that is yet.”

“So you might? You might kill us all?”

I bit back a sigh. It was always difficult getting into arguments with Olivia. To her, everything was absolutely black or white, with no shades of grey at all. “I need to talk to Callum, and to Matthew, and I’ve not had the chance to do that yet, but—”

I stopped dead as I heard the front door open. I didn’t have my mobile phone anywhere in sight. “Crap. I’ve got to go. Someone might hear me talking to you! I’ll speak to Callum, OK?”

“If you say so,” she said grumpily, “but I want to know what you decide to do. I’m not too young, whatever Callum thinks, and he needs to understand that.”

“OK, I’ll talk to him,” I hissed through gritted teeth as I turned around. It was Josh, and he wasn’t alone. Max was walking into my kitchen.

It took a couple of moments to regain my composure. “Max! I didn’t know you were coming round.”

He gave me one of his most devastating smiles. “I was in Richmond so Josh and I decided to make an evening of it. We’ve come back to dump the car and grab a sandwich, then we’ll be heading out.” He paused for a second. “Fancy joining us?” he added, a bit too casually.

“Umm, thanks, but I can’t go out tonight. I’ve got to wait and look after the dog until our neighbour comes back.” I gestured out into the garden, where Beesley was still sound asleep.

“He doesn’t look like he’s too much trouble,” laughed Max.

“You have no idea. Earlier today he escaped by chewing through a solid wooden gate.”

“Impressive.” Max smiled and turned away from the window back towards me. I was suddenly conscious that Josh was nowhere to be seen. “It’s good to see you, Alex. Really good.”

I didn’t know what to say so I just smiled and quickly looked away. Where had Josh got to? “Do you want a coffee to go with your sandwich?” I winced at how inane I sounded but at least it gave me something to do. Moving across to the far side of the kitchen, I picked up the kettle and filled it with water. Deliberately not turning to look at Max I stood the kettle back on its stand but as I reached for the switch long, tanned fingers encircled mine. He
was right behind me.

I stood completely still, my skin prickling where he was touching me. Then I felt his lips brush the top of my head. “Give me another chance, Alex, please?” he murmured. “I really enjoyed the time we had together in Spain, and I think you did too.”

I started to object, but as I drew breath to speak he continued. “Look, I know about the other guy, the one who’s abroad, and I understand. But he’s not here, is he? Why not at least come out with me a couple of times? It can’t hurt and you’ve nothing to lose.”

I could feel the strength in his fingers as they continued to hold mine. He was standing close enough behind me that I was conscious of the heat from his body. He took my silence as a good sign and carried on.

“I thought that maybe we could just go and get a drink – nothing more, just a drink. We are friends after all, and then take it from there. The thing is…” He paused and turned me round so I was facing him, his hands resting on my shoulders. “The thing is, I can’t stop thinking about you, Alex, and I just needed you to know that. I reckoned it was time for me to come and fight for something I really, really want.”

I tried to keep my eyes firmly fixed on a button on his shirt, but there was no doubting the sincerity in his tone. I couldn’t stop myself from looking up at him.

“You’re really sweet, Max, but I just can’t. I’m sorry.” I dragged my eyes away from his face; looking at those soft lips made me remember that kiss on the beach, remember how he tasted.