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‘Mabel, Flora, go and stand either side of your sister.’
He felt a little sorry for the girls, who both looked as if they were about to burst into tears. They were looking at each other and still holding hands.
‘Now, please. If you continue to fuss about it the longer it will take – what on earth is wrong with you both?’
Mabel looked the oldest out of the three of them; she implored Flora with her eyes. He folded his arms across his chest and watched them. Mabel stepped forward pulling the younger girl, who let out a sob.
‘Please don’t make me touch her; she’s cold and she smells. I’m scared – I don’t want to stand next to her. Why do we have to do this?’
Her mother looked up from her crumpled handkerchief, surprised by her daughter’s outburst of insolence. She didn’t need to speak because the girl’s grandmother walked across and slapped Flora across the face.
‘Stop that at once, child – that is your sister, not some stranger from the street. It is the very last chance your parents have to get a photograph of you all together. Now you will stand next to your sister and smile for the camera before she is taken away and buried.’
The girl stopped speaking but her hand came up and began to rub at the red finger marks that had appeared on her pale, perfect skin. She let Mabel take hold of her shoulders and position her next to the dead girl, then Mabel took her position on the other side. Neither of them looked at their sister. He put his head underneath the cover to take the picture but it was no good. Those red marks on her cheek would stand out on the still when it was developed and it wasn’t as if he could arrange to come back and do this all over again; he only had this one chance to get it right. He lifted his head up and walked across the room, taking hold of Flora’s shoulders.
‘I’m sorry but the mark on your face is too prominent, I need you to turn and face your sister. I promise I’ll be quick and you won’t have to stay there for very long.’
He didn’t think he’d ever forget the look the young girl gave him then; obviously this was a huge ordeal for her. This must be her first brush with death and an experience that would no doubt stay with her for the rest of her life – but her parents had made it quite clear when they asked him to call around yesterday. They could only afford to pay for two stills so he couldn’t make any mistakes; these two pictures needed to be perfect. He gently turned her to face the dead girl and could feel her entire body shaking; he then went to Mabel and turned her in a similar position so they were both staring at their sister with what he hoped would be assumed was loving attention and not abject horror. He then went back to his camera and buried his bead back underneath the cloth. Holding up the flash he snapped first one, then another still.
‘That’s it. Thank you for your patience, girls. You can leave now.’
Flora scurried away from the girl that she had no doubt shared a bedroom with for the last twelve years; they had possibly even shared the same bed. How sad that two such close sisters should now be so torn apart by death. Still it wasn’t his place to say anything; his job was done here. He would pack his equipment away and go back to his house so he could develop the films. He would of course keep a copy for his own records; he was getting quite a collection in his brown leather book. People were dying of all sorts of diseases, and more and more families wanted their loved ones photographed before they were buried. When he’d taken up photography as a hobby he’d never envisaged that memento mori photography would prove to be such a lucrative business move. He packed up his stuff and carried it out to the waiting horse and carriage; he lived too far away to carry his equipment around town. The grandmother walked him out to the front door, leaving her sobbing daughter alone with her dead granddaughter. The other two girls had run from the room as fast as they could once they had been dismissed; it was indeed sad to watch such grief day in day out, but it was also providing his family with a way of life they could only ever have dreamed of.
‘How long will it be before you can bring the pictures?’
‘As soon as they are ready I will personally hand deliver them; it should only take two days but it depends how busy I am tomorrow.’
‘Thank you for your time, Mr Tyson. It is very much appreciated.’
He nodded his head then turned and ran down the last few steps and climbed into the waiting carriage. As it pulled away from the side he looked up to see the two girls watching him from the upstairs window. Flora’s face was damp, no doubt with the tears she had finally been able to shed, but Mabel looked as if she was weighing him up. Embarrassed they had been caught staring, Mabel stepped back, pulling her sister with her, and he looked straight ahead, pretending he hadn’t noticed either of them.
1995
‘Beautiful, really beautiful – that’s it, hold that position.’ The camera flashed several times. ‘Gorgeous, you look stunning. So demure yet so damn sexy. I love it.’ Heath Tyson walked towards her and pushed her head to the left, just a touch. ‘That’s it, don’t move, we’re almost done. You’re going to love these pictures; I swear you’ve never looked so good.’ He snapped a few more shots then let his camera drop around his neck and clapped his hands.
‘Bravo, bravo. You have been the best model I’ve ever had. Thank you so much for your patience.’
He walked away towards his dark room, eager to develop his films and add these very special photographs to his secret album. Left lying on the chaise longue, she didn’t move to get up and change out of the long, cool, linen nightgown he’d dressed her in. She would stay there until he came and lifted her onto the makeshift trolley he used to push her to and from the freezer in his garage. When he was happy with his photographs he would undress her and put her back inside the cold blackness of the large freezer he’d bought when the village butcher had been closing down. Slamming the metal door, he would lock her in until he had no further use for her or until her body started to decompose too much, whichever came first. Probably the decomposition because he didn’t think he would ever get tired of staring at her. There was something so beautiful about death that was never present in the living. Her hands had already begun to turn black despite the freezing temperatures. He wondered why it was they did that – in his collection of Victorian mourning photographs you could always tell the deceased family member by the discoloration of their hands.
It had fascinated him the first time he’d seen a photograph of three sisters, all no older than fifteen – he had been eight years old when he found that photograph album. Heath had been sent to bed but he could hear his father whispering on the phone; he knew he shouldn’t be listening in because he shouldn’t be out of bed, but he couldn’t sleep. He loved his granddad but today’s visit had been playing heavily on his mind; his normally fun-filled granddad had been lying in a bed in the front room of his terraced house in the busy town centre street. The smell had been pretty bad; he didn’t know what it was but as soon as he’d walked in he’d had to screw his nose up and try not to breathe through it. His mother, who refused to come into the house because she was ‘not going to be there when he croaked’, was back at home and for once he wished his father had left him at home with her. His older brother didn’t care; he had gone straight into the converted front room which was now a bedroom and stood by the frail old man who was asleep. Heath watched the shallow rise and fall of his chest underneath the covers; the rattling sound of the breaths he was struggling to take would stay with him for ever. They could hear their father in the kitchen banging around; he turned away for a split second and when he turned back his brother, who had just celebrated his eleventh birthday, was stroking the old man’s hair. Heath shuddered; this wasn’t the happy, funny man he remembered and he wanted it all to stop. Their dad came in, his tear-stained face a mask of grief.
‘Right you two, go in the kitchen and get yourselves something to eat. I need to sort your granddad out.’
His brother leant down and kissed the man’s forehead and Heath tried to force himself to move towards him to do the same but he couldn’t. His legs wouldn’t move. As his brother walked past he whispered in his ear ‘Scaredy cat’. His dad came over and placed his hands on his shoulders, then pushed Heath out of the room and shut the door behind him. Finally finding his feet, he went into the kitchen where his brother was sitting eating a packet of crisps.
‘He’s going to pop his clogs any minute.’
‘How do you know that?’
‘I just do. You wait and see.’
Sometimes he hated how his brother was such a know-it-all. It made him feel stupid and like a big baby. He got himself a packet of crisps out of the cupboard and they both sat on the high stools near the breakfast bar waiting for their dad to come back in. After what seemed like forever he finally did; his eyes were red and he’d been crying. Heath had never seen his dad cry. He walked over and hugged them close to him.
‘Your granddad’s gone to heaven now; you can both go in and say goodbye.’
This time it was Heath who wanted to go in first – he desperately wanted to see what you looked like when you were dead – and it was his brother who lingered behind. He jumped off his stool and went to the room where the door was ajar. The first thing he noticed was how peaceful it was now that horrible sound his granddad had been making had stopped. He stepped inside. The sheets were no longer moving and he walked closer to look at the man on the bed. The second thing he noticed was how different he looked; his skin looked yellow but it was no longer scrunched up and wrinkled in pain. It was smooth, his mouth was open and his false teeth had slipped down. He’d expected his eyes to be closed but they were open slightly, staring straight ahead. Heath marvelled at how wonderful his granddad looked now he was dead – how much younger. It was amazing. Did everyone who died look like this? His foot kicked something soft and he looked down to see one of the pillows from the bed there. It puzzled him how it had got there; it wasn’t there before when they’d been in the room and his granddad hadn’t moved at all. His dad must have taken it from under the old man’s head but he didn’t understand why. He picked it up and felt a warm patch in the middle; placing it on the chair next to the bed he thought nothing of it. It wasn’t until some years later when he replayed that last scene in his head that he realised that the pillow was warm in the middle because that was where his granddad’s last breaths had gone. He had known all along that the grief his dad had shown had been filled with guilt – but he hadn’t known why until his dad’s own dying confession had confirmed the sneaking suspicion he’d always held. His dad had been the one to end his granddad’s life that morning all those years ago; he could have gone to prison but he’d decided it was worth the risk. The only regret that Heath had was that he’d had no means to photograph how wonderful his granddad looked, more wonderful than he ever did when he was alive. It was as if his true inner beauty had been revealed and it was something Heath never forgot; in fact he thought about it an awful lot. When most kids his age had been playing with action men or cap guns, he had spent all his time locked in his bedroom wondering how he could see more dead people.
There was a certain beauty in death which could not be achieved at any cost in life, even with the amount of plastic surgeons and cosmetic surgery available. When he was ten years old he knew that he wanted to be a photographer but he did have a backup plan. He would probably one day become a funeral director if his photography didn’t take off but his one passion in life was photography. What he really wanted to do was photograph the dead. He didn’t really want to have to deal with the grieving families; he just wanted to photograph their loved ones like his great, great grandfather had back in the Victorian days. It had been quite normal back then, but if you told anyone now that you liked photographing the dead they’d lock you up and throw away the key. There were some things you didn’t admit to and getting your rocks off over corpses was almost certainly one. He spent hours locked in his room studying the photos in the album they’d found when clearing their granddad’s house out. Luckily for him, he’d been on his own in the bedroom when he found the dusty album at the back of the wardrobe, wrapped in faded yellow newspapers. His brother had gone to the tip with his dad and a car boot full of their granddad’s belongings. At first he hadn’t realised just what it was he was looking at but he knew there was something strange about the pictures in the album. It had Memento Mori in gold letters engraved into the soft brown leather cover. He’d had no idea what that meant, but would try and find out. There was no one in the pictures that he knew and they looked as if they were very old. Not wanting his dad to throw it out on his next visit to the local tip, Heath ran downstairs and stuffed it into his backpack. It was his secret, and he wouldn’t tell anyone about it – not even his brother. Well, not unless he was going to help him somehow find dead people to take pictures of. That photograph album had started this obsession with death, be it in male or female form – although he much preferred females; they were so much more elegant and prettier than men. His warped obsession with death had now resulted in the dead girl in front of him.
She was his first and quite possibly his last; it was too risky. He’d briefly considered the implications before it all happened but he hadn’t realised just how seriously a missing teenager would be taken. He thought they’d assume she’d run away and that would be that – the reality had been far different. The police had been crawling all over the village, surrounding fields and woods looking for the missing girl who had been on her way to visit her friend who lived at the opposite side of the village. It had scared him, seeing the crowds of villagers that had gathered with their dogs and the many police officers who’d been drafted in to search for her. He’d known her since he had moved back to the village he’d lived in as a child and set up his business, taking her first photographs when she had been seven. Then every year since until she was seventeen. Sharon Sale had come to him alone this time, asking him to take some photos she could send off to a modelling agency, only he wasn’t to tell her parents because they would freak. She had told him she would pay him but he had shook his head, telling her that he would do it for her if she would do a big favour for him and she’d agreed. Perhaps if she’d known what it was he’d wanted she would have run away as fast as she could and never come back. He knew her by her name, just like he knew all the local children that the parents brought to him for their portraits to be taken.
It had been two weeks now and he deemed it safe enough to take her to the woods behind the cottage and bury her. He had already dug a deep grave in the early hours this morning; it had taken him hours but it had been worth it because the woods had been searched three times now, by police, the villagers (including himself) and then searched again with sniffer dogs. Yesterday they had publicly declared that they thought the girl had left the area. He wished he could keep her for ever but if they did come looking, how would he explain to them that he had a dead girl in the freezer in his garage? It was far too risky; he was a patient man and was happy enough to wait until the fuss died down, even if took a couple of years, before he tried it again. At least now he had started his own collection of photographs of the dead, and it was a work in progress – the best works of art weren’t achieved in a day. He would wait until the opportunity arose and it was the right time to do it all over again. He had no doubt that soon enough another girl with big ambitions of becoming a model would turn up at his doorstep and when they did he would be ready.
Chapter 1 (#ub55812e8-d377-564f-b748-c6da8b3ce765)
Annie Ashworth let out a sigh and turned on her side. The heat from the late afternoon sun was warming her skin and even though she’d tried her best to keep out of the direct sunlight she still had a warm, golden glow. Her husband, Will, had a deep, bronze tan, his normally clean-shaven chin was covered in dark stubble and his dark blond hair had lightened considerably with the sun. He looked the picture of complete health and happiness but she knew different. He was lying on his side with his back to her and her eyes fell on the angry, red scar which ran across his right kidney. It would take a long time for it to fade into oblivion and when it did she hoped the memories would go with it. She was so lucky he was still alive, that they both were.
She shivered at the thought of that man, Henry Smith, and his accomplice, Megan. What she would have given to have watched their bodies being brought up from the cellar of Beckett House in black body bags and wheeled out to the waiting private ambulances. But she’d had to go with Will; he had been so badly injured and she had needed to be by his side. Jake, her best friend and colleague, had stayed along with Cathy and Kav, their inspector and sergeant when they were both stationed back in Barrow, to watch on their behalf. They had brought Megan up first because her body had been the most straightforward to bag up. She’d fallen down the cellar steps from top to bottom at Beckett House and instantly broken her neck. Henry, though, had got what he deserved. That strange man/monster thing had sliced his throat open with its long sharp claws but not before Annie had watched the terror on Henry’s face as he had stuck his knife into its strange, grey body. Jake had told her when he came to see her in the hospital that even Matt the pathologist had been horrified to see the mess of blood and limbs. No one had ever seen anything like the strange creature that lived in the drains below Beckett House, and it had been badly injured by Henry because there had been a trail of blood which led to the huge drain in the corner of the cellar – but then it had disappeared. Search teams had been brought in with special infra red and thermal imaging cameras and apart from a trail of blood that stopped suddenly in the sewers there had been no trace of it. Annie suspected that it had gone deep underground to another lair and either died or gone into hibernation. She hoped for Martha Beckett’s sake that it had curled up and died. The last time she had spoken with the elderly woman she had arranged to have the drain filled in with concrete and the cellar door permanently sealed shut. She had told Annie about the long letter she had written detailing the history of the house and everything that had happened there. She had given it to her solicitor with strict instructions that when the day came that someone was eager enough to buy Beckett House they would be given a copy of the letter so they were fully aware of the circumstances. It had made Martha feel much better but Annie knew that the house would be snapped up by some property developer who wouldn’t be remotely interested in the letter or the history of Beckett House. They would turn it into luxury apartments and move on to the next project. Annie just hoped that history wouldn’t repeat itself and no one with small children moved in there. All of this had been kept hush, hush and out of the media for the sake of Martha who had kept the terrible secret of the thing hidden for years. One day they could make a film about what happened at Beckett House; it was that horrific no one would ever believe it was all true.
She picked up her Kindle. It was amazing how Will could lie there for hours and not get bored. Turning to face her he smiled as his hand reached out for hers and she held it tight. His fingers trailed across the baby bump and he let them rest there.
‘I thought you were asleep again.’
‘What do you mean, again?’ He opened one eye and winked at her, ‘I’m just making the most of the last day before we have to go back to reality. I’ve been thinking about it, and you know I’ll have to go back to work soon, don’t you?’
She nodded, wishing they could stay here – cocooned on this island for ever, away from the madness that seemed to take over their lives on a regular basis.
‘I know you do, but are you ready to go back? I mean they couldn’t exactly say no if you had a bit longer off, could they? You almost…’
She couldn’t say the words because it set her heart racing every time she thought about what had happened at the Lake House where she’d almost lost him.
‘I think I’m ready, Annie. As much as I love spending time with you I’m getting a bit fidgety, restless. I need to be doing something a bit more challenging with my life than pottering around pretending everything is okay.’
She knew how he felt – she was on restricted duties because she was six months pregnant and she was bored, bored, bored. Although she was glad to be away from the prying eyes of the public and every weirdo that seemed to be attracted to her, she still liked to do her job.
‘If you’re ready that’s fine; I’m just being completely selfish but I love having you around. Although I suppose you’re bound to start getting on my nerves sooner or later.’
She winked at him and he shoved her arm. Jumping up he bent down and kissed her lips then he moved further down and kissed her swollen stomach.
‘I thought I was already getting on your nerves; you were a right grump before we came on holiday.’
‘Well, maybe just a little; you know I like my own space and I was getting fed up of doing nothing myself. But I’ve forgiven you because you brought me here.’
‘So it was a good choice coming here?’
‘Yes, probably the best idea you’ve ever had apart from marrying me. I’d never even thought about Hawaii until you showed it to me on the internet. It’s so perfect, just how I imagined paradise to be. Could you imagine living here? It must be so wonderful.’
He smiled and she knew that he loved to please her and she also knew she was very lucky that both of them were still alive to be here enjoying this perfect holiday.
‘Come on, how about we take a dip then go and get ready for tea?’
She held her hand out for him to pull her up, tucking her Kindle under her towel.
‘I’m starving.’
Will laughed, ‘Funnily enough I thought you might say that; after all it’s been, what, two hours since you last ate?’
‘You know I’m feeding for two; it’s the only time I’ll ever have an excuse to eat what I want without worrying.’
‘You could eat for three for all I care; as long as you’re happy then so am I.’
They walked hand in hand towards the crystal blue ocean which was gently lapping at the sand. She didn’t hear her phone which was at the bottom of her beach bag ringing; she’d switched it to silent – in fact she hadn’t bothered to look at it for days. She wasn’t bothered about telling the whole world on Facebook what she was doing every single second of the day, unlike most of her friends. They walked into the water, which made her yelp at the coldness. Will began to splash around and she sank into the water and began swimming, relishing the sudden change in temperature which cooled her warm skin. Further down she could see the beach was full of people but their hotel had its own private beach which was never busy. Even their ground-floor room had sliding patio doors which looked out onto a lush green lawn, with palm trees towering above to provide shade from the constant heat. It also had the shortest walk to the Pacific Ocean she could imagine. When Will had booked this holiday he had thought about everything, knowing that if it was hot she wouldn’t feel like walking far. Her phone kept on ringing in the bottom of her bag but oblivious to it she began to swim towards the floating sundeck not far from the shore, to work up an appetite before they went back to get ready to go out and make the most of their last evening together in paradise.
Chapter 2 (#ulink_8558cb3e-5576-58ed-be08-b9be9f92901a)
Matilda Graham had finally plucked up the courage after dithering for days and told her mum, Lisa, she was going with a friend for a job interview at a hotel in Bowness. She had known she’d object to it because she always did.
‘How ridiculous – you can’t drive, Tilly. How on earth do you expect to get up to Bowness day in day out and home again? It’s at least a thirty-minute drive there and back on a good day, without traffic or bad weather.’
‘It’s not ridiculous, Mum. They might let me live in – and if not I’m pretty sure Aunty Annie would let me stay with her. She has plenty of room in that big house and I wouldn’t get in her way. She wouldn’t mind at all.’
‘No, she might not mind but I certainly would; you never know who’s going to turn up knocking on her door. It wouldn’t surprise me if the Yorkshire bloody Ripper decided to pay her a visit.’
And so it had continued for the next ten minutes until Tilly had stormed out of the kitchen and up to her bedroom, slamming the door for good measure. They hadn’t spoken for the rest of the afternoon and when Ben arrived home Lisa was drinking her second glass of wine. He walked in, looked at the half-empty bottle of Chardonnay on the table and nodded.
‘Rough day?’
‘You could say that. Your daughter has got it into her head she can go for a job interview at some hotel in Bowness and live and work up there – for Christ’s sake, she can’t even keep her bedroom tidy.’
‘It’s not the worst idea I’ve ever heard, Lisa. At least she’s looking for a job.’
‘Are you having a laugh, Ben. She said if the hotel won’t let her live in then she’ll go and stop with your Annie. Which is never a good idea. I love your sister to bits but she has more nutters and serial killers chasing her than the bloody detectives on the television. No, it’s not a good idea at all – and you should go upstairs and tell her that.’
‘Yes, you’re right about Annie but she’s pregnant now and that man who was stalking her is dead. For all we know it’s not as if Tilly will even get the job; the least you can do is let her go there and have an interview. It will be good experience for her and if she does get it then we’ll discuss what’s going to happen then. How does that sound?’
‘Fucking ridiculous, Ben. The day you actually stand by me and my opinions I’ll probably drop dead with shock. Do what you want, but I’m not being a part of it. You can tell her and if anything bad happens then on your head be it.’
She rolled her eyes towards the ceiling. Ben walked across and kissed his wife’s forehead, then he sighed. All he seemed to do lately was try to keep the peace between them but it was getting more difficult each day. Then he went upstairs to talk to his daughter, who had music blasting from her room so loud the floor was vibrating underneath his feet. No doubt it had been to drown out the noise of him and Lisa arguing. Tilly hated it when they argued, which seemed to be an awful lot lately. What she didn’t realise was that she was the cause of most of the arguments. He’d never imagined teenage girls could be such hard work.
He knocked on her door and waited for her to open it. She did and he followed her inside and sat on the end of her bed.
‘God, she told you to say no, didn’t she?’
Ben nodded. ‘Tilly I can understand where your mum is coming from. She’s only worried about you.’
‘No, she isn’t. She doesn’t want me to have a life – she wants me to be stuck in this crap town for ever and pregnant before I’m twenty-one. For God’s sake it’s only an interview, I probably won’t even get the job.’
‘When is it?’
‘Tomorrow.’
‘How are you going to get there? Me and your mum are both at work, you know that.’
‘I’m not an idiot, Dad. I can get the bus or a train – and besides, Gemma is coming with me and her mum who isn’t a total psycho might be taking us yet.’
Ben started to laugh. ‘All right, you can go, but if you get stranded make sure you phone one of us, okay.’
‘Thank you, Dad, I promise I will. You do both realise I’m almost eighteen, don’t you?’
‘Yes, but you have to realise that whether you’re eighteen or fifty-eight you’re still our little girl and we’ll always worry about you.’
She rolled her eyes and lifted two fingers to her head, pretending to shoot herself.
‘Very funny. Now make sure you look smart and don’t be cheeky when they ask you straightforward questions. Look them in the eye and do your best to answer them.’
‘Argh, Dad, get out. Now you’re just being insulting.’
He stood up and grinned.
‘Just checking. Oh, and I wouldn’t mention that you’re allergic to the hoover or washing machine either.’
He walked out and as she shut the door behind him, she felt her stomach churn. She didn’t care about lying to her mum but she hated lying to her dad. But hopefully he’d never find out. She only had to meet the photographer, have her photoshoot and then come home again. Tilly had found his details through Facebook. Some of her friends had liked his page so she’d clicked on it and had been impressed with some of the photographs. There were lots of prom photographs and a few before and after makeovers; one of the women had looked like an old dog before so he must be good to have taken the after photo where she looked quite nice. There was a voucher on there for a free photoshoot, no obligation to buy the photos if you didn’t like them. He sounded perfect and he didn’t look like some sort of major pervert. He wasn’t based in Barrow, he was in Hawkshead – which was a bit far away and trickier to get to – but she could do it. There was a bus route and if she got stuck she could go and see Annie for a lift home. She would tell them she didn’t like the manager at the hotel and didn’t want to work there anyway, so that would put an end to this argument. Then hopefully she would be able to send off her portfolio to the modelling agencies in Manchester and London. Her mum would have a complete shit fit when she found out that she wanted to move away to a city, but she wouldn’t be able to stop her once she was eighteen. She would be able to do whatever she wanted and get out of this dead-end town. The last three years she had done nothing but dream about becoming a model and living a far more glamorous life than the one she did now. If she didn’t try she’d never know, and would spend the rest of her life regretting it.
Chapter 3 (#ulink_4ae503d6-c9d1-510d-be93-7313b3945aff)
Joanne Tyson opened her eyes and wondered why she was lying on a damp, hard, concrete floor. For a moment she didn’t have a clue as she blinked and her vision semi-cleared, then she remembered exactly where she was. One eye was swollen shut and she opened her good eye; he had gone, she couldn’t hear him stomping around. Which was good. She tried to sit up but felt queasy and lightheaded; he’d managed to really do some damage this time. Joanne wondered what it was she’d said to make him fly off the handle; she thought back but couldn’t think of anything that had warranted him giving her a black eye and knocking her unconscious. He was getting much worse – for a while everything had seemed okay and he seemed to have forgotten about using her as a punching bag, but lately… She shuddered. Well, lately it was getting more painful to be around him. The floor was freezing and she remembered where she was – she had come into the garage to ask him if he wanted some dinner, and he’d flipped. Now here she was. She heard his heavy footsteps as he came back through the door and walked towards her. She sat up, tucking her knees under her chin and wrapping her arms around them. She felt the air cool as his dark shadow loomed over her and she flinched once more; he bent down and stroked her head.
‘I’m so sorry, Jo, I didn’t mean it. You caught me off guard – you know I don’t like you coming in here when I’m working. It puts me off my stride; if you put me off I lose my momentum, then I can’t get it back – and the bills won’t pay themselves, will they?’
She whispered, ‘I’m sorry, I forgot. I just wanted to see you. I get so bored on my own all day.’
He reached down and stroked her hair like she was some kind of pet dog. ‘I’m nearly done for now. How about you go and clean yourself up and I’ll come inside, make us both a sandwich?’
He reached down, putting his hands under her arms, then pulled her to her feet. He brushed her down and she had to stop herself from flinching at his touch. Keeping her one good eye on the ground, she didn’t look across at the bank of steel fridges that were now lined against the back wall. She remembered now that she had stared at them when she’d come in and that had been why he’d hit her. She’d never seen them before and wondered why he wanted those monstrosities, which looked like something out of a television morgue. He must have seen the shock on her face and that was when he’d hit her. She pushed the thought to the back of her mind. They weren’t morgue fridges. What would her husband want with second-hand fridges that had been used to store dead bodies in? It wasn’t right and he had no use for them – he was a photographer, not a pathologist. Maybe they were for keeping his equipment in, or something to do with developing his films. She pushed all thoughts of them to the back of her mind and stored them in the little black box where she kept the flashbacks of the kicks and punches he had hurt her with previously. She would lock them away and forget about them. She had no right prying into his business. If she kept out of here and did as she was told then he would be happy with her. She cursed herself under her breath. What on earth had she been thinking, coming in here?
She walked out of the garage, through his workshop and out through the studio, keeping her head down. He had been so busy lately and she had been so restless it had seemed like a good idea to come and see him. He hadn’t hit her for at least six weeks; what a fool she was, thinking that once again he had realised how cruel he was being to her and was a changed man – the same old stupid dream which had kept her going year after year. It was never going to come true. Now they were back at square one; she wouldn’t be able to go out of the house until the swelling had gone down and it was the height of summer, the weather was glorious. She supposed she could potter around the garden and there was nothing stopping her walking through the woods at the back of the house, although she didn’t really like them. On the rare occasions she’d gone walking out there she had always felt as if someone was hiding in the trees watching her and it freaked her out even though she knew it was just her imagination running wild. She didn’t need to go into the village really; it was easy to do an online shop now that every supermarket did home delivery, and the swelling would go down before she knew it. She went straight to the downstairs cloakroom to look at her reflection in the mirror. Her swollen eye was already turning blue; she’d never learn. Running the cold water tap she put the flannel underneath it, wrung it out, then sat down on the toilet and pressed it against her eyelid. ‘Ouch.’ She stayed that way until she heard the loud footsteps coming down the hallway towards the toilet. They paused outside the door and she felt a cold shiver run down the entire length of her spine, making her drop the flannel into the sink. She picked up a towel and patted the water from her cheek.
‘I’m coming, sorry, I won’t be a minute.’
Then she flushed the toilet, blew her nose and opened the door. There wasn’t anybody outside; she could have sworn she’d heard him walking towards the bathroom door. She looked around, not daring to call his name in case it made him angry again. Maybe she’d knocked her head when she hit the floor and was hearing things. Turning to wring out the flannel and fold it up, she put it back so it didn’t look untidy. She glanced into the mirror one last time, and screamed. There was a much younger woman watching her from inside the glass. Her face was pale, with huge dark circles under her eyes. Her long dark hair hung around her face and the left side of her head was covered in thick, almost black, dried blood. Part of her skull was showing where the flesh had been eaten away. Jo gasped and stepped away from the mirror; terrified the woman was behind her, she turned to look… but there was no one there. She looked back at the mirror, hoping she had gone – but the woman was still watching her. The fear which filled Jo’s heart was different to anything she’d ever felt. It was a cold, creeping feeling, like her entire body was freezing itself from the inside out. The woman in the mirror watched Jo for a little while longer then lifted her hands, which were bruised purple and black, and slammed them against the glass of the cabinet. The glass bent with the force of the blow and Jo turned and ran, expecting it to shatter everywhere. Slamming the door behind her she ran into the kitchen to see him coming through the door which led from his studio.
‘What’s the matter with you? You’ve gone white.’
Instead of telling him like she wanted to, like she should have been able to, she shook her head and tried her very best to make her voice not shake.
‘Nothing, sorry, I just gave myself a bit of a fright.’
He looked her up and down.
