Dead Scared (35 page)

‘And a muntjac is …’

‘Small, stocky deer,’ he said. ‘Generally considered a bit of a pest in these parts.’

‘Do you shoot them?’

‘If they don’t run too fast. What are you going to have?’

I picked up the menu. ‘Do they do muntjac?’ I asked.

‘You should come out with me,’ he said. ‘Tomorrow afternoon, just before the light starts to fade. The duck in Chinese spices is excellent, by the way.’

A second date in as many days? This guy worked fast. Or did he have other reasons for wanting to get to know me better?

‘Duck it is,’ I said, closing the menu. ‘And don’t you want to see how the evening goes first?’

‘Oh, I’m smitten already,’ he replied. ‘How do you get on with Evi?’

‘Very well,’ I said. ‘Old friend of yours?’

‘We studied medicine here together, although she was a couple of years behind me. I tipped her off when her current job came up.’

‘She’s worried about the number of student suicides the university has seen in the last couple of years,’ I said, deciding to risk taking the conversation up a level.

He was nodding at me. ‘Yeah,’ he said. ‘She’s had a bee in her bonnet about it for a while now.’

‘Do you think she’s worrying unnecessarily?’ If he tried to make light of Evi’s fears, it could suggest he didn’t want anyone else taking them seriously.

He shook his head. ‘Sadly, no,’ he said. ‘I think she’s probably right to be concerned. Which makes it only a matter of time before the national press gets wind of what’s going on and media attention will make it a dozen times worse.’

‘She thinks there’s an unduly influential subculture of glamorizing self-destructive behaviour,’ I said, slightly smug at how easily I’d embraced psychobabble.

Our starters arrived, giant prawns in citrus butter for Nick, tomato and basil salad for me. ‘And,’ I went on, ‘that someone could be feeding it.’

He looked puzzled, so I explained the websites I’d found where suicide wasn’t just glorified but positively encouraged. Where people in despair were taunted, coaxed and cajoled into acts of self-destruction. All the time I was talking I was watching his eyes, for just a flicker that might tell me he was more involved than he should be. Nothing. Either he was genuine, or a very cool customer. I could probably push him a bit more.

‘I’m supposed to know a thing or two about psychology,’ I said. ‘But the truth is, I don’t get it. I don’t get why people want to harm others that they don’t even know.’ I stopped and shrugged. There was a tiny patch of stubble on his right cheek where he hadn’t shaved too carefully. And he had just a smattering of grey hairs an
inch
or so above each temple, so few I could probably count them.

‘Well, there are any number of textbooks on the psychology of evil,’ he said. ‘But ultimately, I guess it all comes down to power. We do it because we can.’ He broke off to pick up his bread roll. ‘When I was studying here one of the other students told us a story about a kid whose father committed suicide when he was young. He shot himself in the head. The kid’s three-year-old sister found their father’s body. Traumatized both of them for years.’

‘Well, it would,’ I said, as the waitress took our starter plates away. ‘So what happened to him?’

‘Well, as I remember, at school he got in with a crowd of bullies. They plagued the life out of a classmate. One of the younger ones. Made his life an absolute misery until one day he hanged himself in his dorm with a ripped sheet.’

‘Nasty story,’ I said. ‘And was that the end of it?’

‘If only. The ringleader got a real buzz out of it, apparently. The feeling of power was like nothing he’d ever experienced. It made him want to do it again.’

A story of fifteen years ago, being told in quite some detail. I found myself wondering if Nick had a sister.

‘And this was somebody you were studying with? Someone who came here?’

He shook his head. ‘The guy I studied with told the story,’ he said. ‘Supposedly about someone he’d once known.’

‘Supposedly?’

Nick shrugged. ‘He was an odd chap, to be honest. Thin, a bit geeky. Dropped out at the end of his third year, I think.’

‘Remember his name?’

Nick sat back in his chair. ‘Why?’ he asked, and looked at me carefully through narrowed eyes.

Shit, I was close to blowing it. Why on earth would Laura want the name of a geeky Cambridge dropout who’d once told a good story about suicide?

‘Evi told me a similar story,’ I lied, making a mental note to tip her off the next day. ‘Only she seemed convinced the guy was talking about himself. She mentioned a Scottish name, McLean or McLinnie or something.’

‘Could well have been,’ said Nick, shaking his head. ‘Sorry, it’s gone.’

By the time we finished dinner, I still had no idea whether my date for the evening was an exceptionally nice and seriously good-looking bloke, or a cold-blooded killer playing cat and mouse with me. And given my history with men, the chances seemed pretty evenly split.

We left the restaurant to find snow had covered the ground outside and Nick suggested we take a longer route home to enjoy what he described as the city with a coat of whitewash. Despite jeans that were more hole than fabric, I agreed, because I still hadn’t worked this man out. Besides, there is something about snow, isn’t there? About the way it softens harsh sound and brightens the darkness, hiding everything that’s ugly and making the world look clean. As we walked through the town, students had left their buildings, even the pubs and cafés, to come outside and play. All around us were the sounds of fun: footsteps crunching at speed, high-pitched squealing and good-natured taunting.

For a few minutes we followed the river, watching flakes fall and melt on its slow-moving surface, then we turned across a stretch of field that Nick told me was Jesus Green. There was an epic snowball fight going on.

‘That lot are Jesus, the others are Queens’,’ said Nick, as he gallantly put himself between me and the fight. ‘Keep your head down and walk fast, they might not spot us.’

‘How can you tell?’ I asked.

‘Jesus attracts an inordinate number of red-haired women,’ he told me, ‘whereas Queens’ men are known for wearing their jeans very low down on their hips.’

I looked over at the skirmish. A girl with a Peruvian hat was rugby-tackled to the ground by a man wearing nothing warmer than a sleeveless vest. She didn’t seem to mind too much. No red-haired women or low-slung jeans that I could see. I gave Nick my best quizzical look.

‘Scarves,’ he said. ‘Jesus are red and black, Queens’ are green and white.’

A stray snowball came our way and caught him on the side of the head.

‘Serves you right,’ I told him.

‘Ouch,’ he said. ‘That is very cold down the back of my neck.’

We walked on, leaving the squeals behind us, and approached the town again. As we left the Green, I thought for a moment, and then took his arm. In front of us was a long, low house of honey-coloured stone, the ledges of its tiny paned windows frosted with snow. Over our heads a snowball soared through the air and exploded against the stonework. We turned a corner and beautiful buildings, gleaming white and gold in the lamplight, rose up around us. It was like stepping into a fairy tale.

‘I never tire of it,’ Nick said, as we made our way along the pavement and snow covered our footsteps almost immediately. ‘My parents both worked at the university. Their worst arguments when I was growing up were over which college I’d attend. My idea of teenage rebellion was threatening to apply to Oxford.’

My idea of teenage rebellion had been torching cars in the Cardiff docks. It didn’t seem like the moment to mention it. ‘So where did you end up?’ I asked.

‘Trinity,’ he said. ‘Dad’s old college. He’d died by that stage and my mother thought it would be a kind of memorial to him if I went there.’

His father had died. How exactly? Natural causes or … we were in amongst the buildings now. Towers and turrets stretched up above us.

‘It’s at moments like these,’ said Nick, who was looking up towards the rooftops, ‘that I always hope I’ll see a night climber.’

There was a tiny scar on the underside of his chin. This close, he smelled good. Something warm and rich. ‘Sounds like a low-budget horror film,’ I said.

‘I think that’s night crawlers,’ he replied. ‘Don’t tell me you haven’t heard of the night climbers.’

Careful now. This might be something every real student in Cambridge was expected to know.

‘Rings a bell,’ I said. ‘I think I just assumed they were a myth.’

‘Oh no, they’re very real,’ he said. ‘Any amount of photographic evidence. Most years in December you’ll see a Father Christmas
hat
on one of the pinnacles at King’s. All of them on a good year.’

‘So who are they exactly?’

He smiled down at me. ‘No one knows, that’s the whole point. There’s no club or society you can join because it’s all strictly against the rules. Get caught climbing and you’ll be sent down. No argument.’

‘And what do they climb?’

Nick raised his hand and gestured at the sky around us. ‘Everything,’ he said. ‘Rooftops, chimneys, drainpipes, spires, turrets. It started in the old days when colleges were locked at ten o’clock. Men who stayed out late had to climb their way back in. Some of them got a taste for it.’

I looked at a nearby church spire. It looked pretty high off the ground to me.

‘Do they ever fall?’ I asked.

‘Absolutely. A few years ago a chap got impaled on some railings. Story is he was so drunk they operated without anaesthetic.’

We’d reached the main gate of St John’s. Cambridge is a small city. Nick greeted the porter on duty by name as we stepped through the small inner door into First Court. A group of third-year students were building a snowman.

‘So, did you ever night-climb?’

‘Ah, that’s the thing,’ he said. ‘We never climb and tell.’

A cat watched us from a first-floor window ledge as we approached the main entrance to the Cripps Building and I could feel the beginnings of a nervous tickle. Nick would expect to be invited up.

We’d reached the door. He turned to face me, taking hold of the lapels of my coat to pull me closer, and I actually found myself considering it. He was the best-looking man I’d met in a long time and it wasn’t uncommon for undercover officers to have sexual relationships with people they were investigating. It was all part of infiltration and establishing trust.

On the other hand, wasn’t it turquoise eyes, not russet-brown ones, that I wanted looking down at me the next time I had sex?

‘So tomorrow,’ he said. ‘Three o’clock. My house. Come out hawking with me?’

I could not have Joesbury. Not ever. He was the one man in the world I would never be able to keep at arm’s length.

‘OK,’ I agreed, tilting my head back so the angle between his mouth and mine was perfect. All he had to do was lower his head. He smiled at me.

‘See you then,’ he said. Then he let go of my jacket, turned, and walked away.

SINCE THE ACCIDENT
that had crippled her, Evi had dreamed many times that she could run. Occasionally, that she could fly. Only once had she dreamed that she could ski, and she’d woken trembling and sweating in the early hours. She had never dreamed that she could dance.

Until now.

Rock music. Springsteen’s ‘Dancing in the Dark’. A pounding, insistent rhythm, turned up loud to be heard above the wind. Her hair flying round her head, her neck cold in the November air, the heat of a man’s body pressed against her. Harry. The priest who’d played in a rock band, who’d held her upright and moved them both around the bare rock of the Lancashire Tor. The night they’d fallen in love.

Harry back again. Harry in her arms. She could feel his breath against her forehead, knew the wonderful anticipation of a first kiss. They danced closer and closer to the edge of the Tor. He tucked her right hand against his chest, freeing his to gently tilt her chin up towards him. She saw brown eyes smiling down at her. This was it.

‘Evi fall,’ he said. And threw her off the Tor.

Evi was out of bed and the pain running the length of her body was all she could think of. She made herself take deep breaths. Just a dream. She hadn’t fallen. Maybe out of bed, maybe that accounted for the sudden stabbing pain, but she was fine. She found the light.
Sniffy
looked up at her, blinking, from her place on the rug. Then she gave a lazy wag of her tail. Nothing to worry about. She’d take some more painkillers, maybe get a hot drink and go back to bed. Everything was fine.