The Fear Within Page 10

  “I know,” he said. “Well, why don’t you go on and speak to the ex-fiancé? I’ll wander around here and see if there’s anyone worth a chat. We can swap notes in the morning. I’ll talk to the section petty officer and then to the trots, or whatever the skimmers call their sentries. I’ll also get Josie to sit at the office and check through some of the CCTV to see if we can spot her leaving. Then we can see what tomorrow brings.”

  “Okay, let’s do that,” said Dan.

  12

  Natasha Moore—Late September (three months before disappearance)

  “I feel really odd.”

  Natasha looked over her shoulder again, scanning the streets behind them.

  “Tash, relax,” said Sam, giggling and waving to a large group of lads who were walking parallel to them across the other side of the road. “Hellooo, boys,” she shouted, waving and then bowing to their applause and whistles.

  Natasha looked away.

  “Doesn’t that bother you?” she asked.

  “No,” scoffed Sam, looking to Bev for support. “I just spent hours making myself look this good. Least I can do is get a little appreciation.”

  Natasha shook her head and looked to Bev, who just turned away from her, as she always did when the other option was to challenge Sam.

  “Wait until we get to Joanna’s,” said Sam, still grinning at one of the boys across the road.

  “You ever been to the Royal Naval School of Dance before?” asked Bev, speaking for what seemed like the first time in ages.

  Natasha shook her head; she’d never been, but she’d heard of it.

  “Carpets that make your feet stick to the floors?” Natasha asked. “A half-hour slot for ska and dance music so that all the blokes grab each other and jump up and down until fights start?”

  “Sounds like you’ve been properly briefed, if nothing else,” said Sam. “If never fully debriefed.”

  Sam and Bev looked at each other and then burst out laughing. They’d drunk a fair bit more than Natasha had; she wasn’t much of a drinker at all, really. They’d stayed behind when the ship’s company crowd had moved on from the last bar, chatting to some young guys they’d met near the Guildhall walk. They’d decided the guys weren’t right for them, before downing their drinks in one go and leaving to try and catch up with Defiance’s ship’s company. They were getting louder by the minute as they led Natasha to the next pub on the crawl.

  Sam had toppled over once already, her skirt riding up and three young lads shouting, “Aye, aye!” as soon as it had.

  Natasha had offered to walk behind her until they got to the next pub, but Sam didn’t seem to care and flipped the boys the finger before carrying on her way.

  “Joanna’s is…” Sam paused, sucking her teeth as she looked at Natasha. “Not a bad place to get yourself laid, you know.”

  Sam and Bev fell about laughing again, and Natasha walked on, ignoring them.

  “I’m just saying,” continued Sam, “if you wanted to try some hot sausage and never see the guy again, then you could do a lot worse than there. Just make sure you bag up.”

  “Twice,” added Bev, immediately looking at Sam and then laughing again.

  Natasha walked on. “I’m fine, honestly. Thank you.”

  She was walking slightly behind the other two now and was relieved when they turned a corner and caught sight of some familiar faces gathered on the pavement outside another pub. Mark Coker was among them, and he smiled as soon as he saw her.

  “Back in a mo,” said Natasha, not waiting for an answer and heading straight for him. “Hey, you okay?”

  He smiled.

  “Yeah. You don’t half scrub up well,” he said as he approached.

  His hair looked wet from the shower and he had a red graze across his cheek.

  She waited till he was close enough and punched him on the chest.

  “Don’t be sassing me, Coker, or I’ll give you another bruise to match that one,” she said, brandishing a fist at him.

  He laughed and held up his hands in surrender.

  “Surprised you’d have the energy for a fight. You were struggling to keep up on the run at lunchtime.”

  Natasha turned to Sam and Bev, who’d caught up with her, her mouth dropping open as she made eye contact. “He. Is. Lying,” she said. “I whooped him like a naughty puppy and his excuse was”—she pulled a face and made her voice go high-pitched like a whining child’s—“‘I have to take it easy, because I have rugby training tonight.’ Honestly, it was embarrassing.”

  “I did have rugby training. And you never whooped me, although, if there’s a whooping to be had…” He moved closer and put his hands on Natasha’s waist.

  “Get. Off,” she said, jerking away from him, but still smiling.

  “Looks like Tasha might have found a new squeeze after all, Bev,” said Sam, a group starting to form around her.

  “Hardly,” said Natasha.

  Natasha watched as Sam and Mark Coker eyeballed each other. She looked at Bev, who rolled her eyes and looked away.

  “Come on, Bev, let’s go,” said Sam, and she stalked off into the crowd without looking back.

  Bev trailed off behind her, only briefly glancing back to smile at Natasha.

  Natasha looked at Mark Coker, eyebrows raised, waiting.

  “Bit too long a story for tonight. I could fill you in on our next run, if you like, but it’s way duller than I bet you’re thinking.”

  Natasha shook her head. “I don’t want to know,” she said, then craned her neck to look in the direction that Sam and Bev had taken.

  She turned back to look at Mark just as something flashed past her eye.

  His face changed in an instant and it took her a second to understand what was happening. He seemed to be smiling at her one moment and then she lost focus.

  It was getting dark and the artificial light wasn’t great out here on the street, but Mark’s cheek was obscured for just a second before it exploded into a fountain of red. Before she knew it, Mark’s whole chin and chest where seeping with the same glistening color.

  He looked dazed, wobbled a bit as he blinked, then staggered back a few paces.

  A swell of people surrounded her.

  Natasha heard shouting—“Someone’s glassed Cokes!”—and then there was fighting all around her and she was knocked to the ground. She was narrowly missed by a glass herself as it smashed on the pavement next to her, and she crawled away from the legs all around her like a child lost in a thick forest of adults.

  She looked at her hand, it was bleeding, a small splinter of glass jutting out of it, picked up from crawling on the pavement. Her vision wavered and then she heard someone talking to her.

  “Come on, get up.”

  She looked up and saw a face she recognized.

  “Come on, Nat. Get up.”

  Hands grabbed her under her armpits and she was picked up like a toddler and carried out of the melee before being placed on her feet.

  There was still fighting outside the pub. The number of people seemed to have tripled and the noise was deafening as sailors, locals, and door staff clashed and shouted.

  She was being dragged away now, a firm grip on her wrist guiding her away from the noise.

  “You okay?”

  She looked up at Gary Black and nodded.

  He moved around behind her, putting his huge body between her and the trouble, and walked her farther away.

  “It’s just a little cut, I think,” said Natasha, looking back over her shoulder, hoping she might see Mark Coker and know he was being helped.

  Black looked down at Natasha’s hand. His eyes went wide.

  “You’re hurt,” he said, squinting down at the glass. “You’re not supposed to be hurt.”

  He scanned behind them and then turned back to Natasha.

  “I think I’ll be okay,” she said.

  “You’ll need stitches in that.”

  He was holding her hand out, twisting it slight
ly, and Natasha winced.

  “You’re hurting my arm,” she said.

  His eyes met hers as he twisted it just a fraction more, seeming to take a moment to understand what she’d said before he let her go.

  “I didn’t mean to,” he said. “I’ll get us a taxi and we can go to the sick bay and get this stitched up.”

  “Honestly, I just want to go home, but thank you.”

  Gary Black was shaking his head and fumbling in his pocket as he looked around.

  “What are you looking for?” said Natasha, blurting the words out, annoyed at the way he was acting.

  “Nothing.”

  “I need to find Mark before I go anywhere,” said Natasha, still peeved. “He looked like he was in a bad way. He didn’t get glassed—well, he did, but someone threw the glass. I saw it.”

  “You saw who threw it?” asked Black, watching her closely.

  “No. I saw it hit him in the face. It looked really bad.”

  Black was dialing a number on his mobile phone now.

  Natasha listened as Black told the operator where they were and where they were going.

  He was taking her back to the sick bay at HMS Nelson, probably to get a few stitches.

  The cold was starting to catch up with her and her hand was throbbing. The pain felt as though it had always been there, but she was only just noticing it, and as she did, it grew in intensity.

  She shivered, clutching her arms around herself and turning quickly. She had a feeling, a tingle down her spine as though someone was watching her. She looked all around.

  There were still a lot of people behind her. Sailors milling about, some police cars that had turned up, and bouncers standing on the pavement ready for more action. Some of them looked as though they might start some if nothing exciting was forthcoming soon.

  Aside from Gary Black, no one seemed to be paying any attention to Natasha at all.

  She scanned the scene again, glancing back to a pub doorway where she could have sworn she saw someone step back out of sight.

  “Anyway,” said Black, as he dropped his phone back into his pocket, “there’s a lot of people who would think Mark Coker deserves anything he gets.”

  13

  Monday, February 2

  “Can I help you?” Dan asked to the man’s back.

  He turned slowly, calm, unbothered at being questioned.

  “Oh, hi. No, I’m okay, thanks. Well, actually, yes, you probably could help me. I’m looking for Mountbatten Close? There’s a house for sale. I’m thinking about viewing it, and I thought it was here, but, as you can see, it’s not.”

  Dan looked at him.

  He had current, or former, military written all over him. The way he stood, the way his hair was cut and his neck was shaved. The way he looked, confident and sure, and the way he spoke; friendly, but clipped and businesslike. There was no doubt in Dan’s mind that civilians often possessed these traits, too, but there was something in the way that they combined in someone with military experience and training that just stood out if you knew what to look for.

  “You’re one street too early,” said Dan, returning his smile. “Mountbatten’s identical to this, but one street over.”

  She pointed over the top of her own house.

  He looked behind himself, at Dan’s house, as though he might be able to see through the terrace to where she was directing him.

  “Oh, great, thanks,” he said, moving up the small hill toward the road.

  “The signs for all these small closes get lost in the bushes,” said Dan, pointing to the thick greenery where the street name for her close should be. “But it literally backs onto these houses, so it’ll be easy to find.”

  “Well, excellent,” he said, stepping toward Dan and extending his hand. “Maybe we’ll be garden neighbors?”

  “Maybe we will,” said Dan, shaking his hand.

  She watched him leave and couldn’t help but vividly imagine what Felicity’s expression would be now.

  Her friend would almost certainly have raised eyebrows, wide eyes, a gleam in her eye, and a broad smile on her face. She’d very likely be mouthing “Handsome” as the man walked away.

  Dan headed straight to her front door. She shut it quickly behind her and went to the kitchen window to check that he was gone. She pulled her phone from her pocket and searched houses for sale in her area. Sure enough, she found an end of terrace in Mountbatten Close for sale, just as the man had said.

  She watched the small parking lot outside for a while, knowing she was just spooked but feeling that to dismiss her instincts so easily would be a mistake.

  The last time she’d been here, looking out the window for something that wasn’t there, she’d ended up on the phone to Josie, asking her for a favor, asking her to check where Aaron Coles was.

  He was at sea, redeployed onto HMS Torbay and gone for several more months; still she’d watched and waited for an hour or so, the lights off, peering out from the darkness of her kitchen to the darkness of the world, until fatigue had forced her to bed.

  There was nothing there, no one watching, and the man was simply on the wrong street.

  She felt herself relax and flicked the kettle on before she wandered upstairs to her room.

  The lady on reception at the hotel where Jason, Natasha Moore’s former fiancé, worked had been helpful, but she hadn’t known where Jason was.

  Dan had left her card and asked for him to call her, talked the woman into giving her his home address, and left another card there when the small flat had been empty. She’d hoped for a callback soon but suspected it’d be morning now before she heard.

  Her phone rang and she snatched at it, wondering if she might be able to speak to Natasha’s former fiancé tonight after all, but it was her dad again.

  “Be honest with me,” she said, without any other greeting. “And I mean super honest. Do you set an alarm to remind you to call me?”

  There was silence for a moment.

  “Well, yes, but not to remind me to call—to remind me not to call too often.”

  Dan chuckled.

  “Then you set it wrong, because I’m in-date for Dad calls from yesterday.”

  “I just wanted to remind you to call your sister back,” he said, ignoring her teasing. “Don’t tell her I rang, and she’s out for dinner tonight now, but call her tomorrow, okay?”

  “Is something wrong?”

  “No, not at all. I think she just gets bored being the one who always has to deal with me.”

  “Hey,” protested Dan. “When the time comes, I’ll pay my share of your old folks home.”

  “Bet you don’t do your share of the visiting,” he said.

  “I will,” said Dan. “I’ll come and sit and listen to your stories, but I’ll secretly nap, and you’ll be too old to notice.”

  He laughed at that, and the sound made Dan smile; he had an infectious laugh, loud and honest. He’d have slapped her shoulder if he could’ve reached it.

  “You used to try that when you were little,” he said. “You’d hear me coming upstairs and switch off your flashlight and hide your book, then pretend to be asleep when I came in to check on you.”

  “You didn’t know,” said Dan. “You’re just guessing.”

  He laughed again.

  “Believe it or not, Danny-bear, I’ve known you and your sister all your lives. I remember when all you wanted to be when you grew up was a boy. And I can tell without fail when you’re lying to me, when you’re pretending to be asleep, when you and Charlie are rolling your eyes behind my back…”

  Now Dan laughed.

  “We don’t do that, Dad. We wouldn’t, not to you!”

  “Yeah, right,” he said.

  “I have to go, Dad,” said Dan, glad of the distraction he’d brought.

  “You always do,” he said gently.

  “I’ll call Charlie tomorrow, and I’ll call you next time, okay?”

  “Okay,” he said.

&n
bsp; They said their good-byes and Dan sat down on her bed and then stood up again, hearing the kettle boil and switch itself off downstairs. She remained in her room.

  Her sister would soon be facing several months alone while her husband, Liam, deployed with the marines. Dan thought about how cheerful Charlie was at the moment, even as the time for his leaving approached. Dan wondered if she’d be able to be that positive if her partner was leaving for so long; though she also wondered if she’d ever be able to have someone in her life who meant as much to her as Charlie and Liam did to each other. She moved to the window and looked across her garden at the back of Mountbatten Close, then went back to her bed and kicked off her shoes. She let herself slump onto the floor and instinctively pulled the lockbox from beneath her bed. She hesitated, not sure why she wanted to look at it tonight, then set the combination and opened the lid.

  She looked at the picture on top for the first time in a long time. She’d become used to palming it out and flipping it facedown as soon as she opened the lid, hiding it from view so she wouldn’t have to deal with the guilt that it spawned, then putting it back on top so that she’d never forget what had happened, as if that was possible. Now she let her eyes scan over the image and down the words before she set it aside, faceup; she was proud that she was able to look at it today.

  Tucked to the side was the letter her father had given her a few months before, still unopened, though she had no idea why.

  There’d been something in the way it’d been delivered, passed to her by Roger, by hand, that meant that Dan knew it was important and would know when to open it. Now so much time had passed that she didn’t open it for fear it was something so important that it shouldn’t have been ignored, or maybe too mundane, something that should have been dealt with long ago but had now changed and become more complicated.

  She’d spoken to her dad many times since she’d received the letter and he’d never once mentioned it.

  The envelope felt cool in her hand; it was plain, boring, and functional, everything her father wasn’t.