Thwunk. The sound of a book landing on her welcome mat. Ten or more came through Lucy’s door every day. Uncorrected proofs, they’re called, or ARCs. Advance Reader Copies, sent by editors hoping for a juicy cover quote. Ellis, her assistant, usually dealt with them, but she was on holiday in a rainy corner of Cornwall. Lucy wished she were with her: hiking to shore-huddled pubs; peeling chips from salt-licked paper; watching waves rise and die. Instead, she was at home, finishing her latest novel. Supposed to be finishing it, anyway. Only ninety-two words had been eked out that morning. She had, however, eaten fifteen Hobnobs, spent two hours researching methods of hanging and another trying to find the exact word for the smell of death. Words never came for her. She had to lasso them, drag them to the page.
Enough. She stood and stretched, arms locked above her head, mirroring the hands of the clock. Lucy leant back until her spine ticked. Words could wait till after lunch.
* * *
There was nothing unusual about the package. Her name and address were printed dead centre on the brown envelope. Proofs were sometimes accompanied by bribes—bars of chocolate or tiny bottles of gin—but this one came alone. Not even a begging letter from an editor. Just a plain white proof in a Jiffy bag shroud.
Lucy carried the book through to the library and was about to add it to the hundreds of other ARCs when she remembered—Ellis had a system. All ARCs were recorded in a blue notebook: date received, title, author, publisher, editor, date of forthcoming publication. Ellis would love it if Lucy actually followed her method. Before Ellis (B.E., as Lucy called it), she had piled books in teetering columns that swayed like the trees from which their pages were made. The rest of the house had been no better. Her clothes had been kept in one mourning-black mound on her bedroom floor and she could barely step into her study for all the paperwork. Ellis had changed all that. Ellis had changed everything. She sorted books, cooked, placed paperwork in one of the filing cabinets and laid out clothes on Lucy’s bed every morning and night. Maybe Ellis would be so pleased that Lucy had followed her system, that she’d let Lucy call her by her first name. Love stories began like this. It had the weight of fate behind it.
Sat in her favourite armchair, Lucy opened up the notebook and followed the curve of Ellis’ cursive with her ring finger. Underneath, letters straying into the line above, she wrote down the details of the new ARC: 13th April; ‘In Advance of Death’; Anna E. Masters; Corpus; editor not mentioned; 13th April.
Who sent out proofs the same day as publication? Magazines and journals needed six months, minimum. The artwork would be sorted by now so there was no chance of a cover quote. A PR intern at Corpus, whoever they were, probably forgot to send out copies. In Advance of Death would sink like a mobster wearing concrete Dr. Martens.
Lucy laughed, even though there was no one there to hear her. She’d use that line in her book. Who said she’d gone off the boil with the second DCI Imogen Shaw, the follow-up to her debut? She was doing better than Anna E. Masters, that was for sure. Where did she know that name from? She met hundreds of writers at awards ceremonies, signings, panels, while sprawled on the lawn at Harrogate… It was hard to remember specifics after being plied with Prosecco by publishers on the poach. She may even have promised Masters that she’d take a look at her book. After all, a bestselling writer had raved about Lucy’s debut. It was how Lucy had made it as an author, give or take a technicality or two.
Lucy turned to the first page and settled back to read. Her armchair gave a leather-breathed sigh.
Lucy Horsley sits back in her chair, red leather creaking beneath her. She cradles the book in her lap as if it’s a paper cat. All that knowledge in the library around her yet Lucy doesn’t know one important fact: in seven hours, she’ll be dead.
Lucy gripped the book tighter. Her name. Right there. First line. Coincidence, that’s all. Couldn’t be anything else. If Ellis were here, she’d laugh and say that was typical—putting herself at the centre of everyone’s story, taking space on someone else’s page. She read on.
Lucy had always wanted a library, ever since she was a girl. Her childhood home in Pocklington had possessed two tomes: The Karma Sutra and a Delia Smith cookery book. Both came from charity shops and both were lost on her parents: they favoured fighting over fucking; divorce over duck à l’orange.
Lucy froze. She was from Pocklington. Not that you could tell from her accent. Her flat vowels had risen like a Yorkshire pudding when she moved to London. She’d left parents, friends and a lover behind, getting away with what fitted in her backpack.
When her first novel, The End of Julia McCleod, was made into a film, she’d sold her flat and bought an elderly house in the arse end of Medway. Half of her next advance went on filling the dark-beamed dining room with shelves and books, the rest of it on elocution lessons. She sits in her library now, reading these words. Knowing that she is a liar. A murderer. A plagiarist.
“What the fuck?” Lucy jolted up to standing. The book fell to the floorboards. She fumbled in her pocket for her phone and pressed on the last used number.
“I’m afraid I can’t answer the phone at the moment,” Ellis’ recorded voice said. It had a lightness to it that Lucy hadn’t heard before. The holiday was obviously agreeing with her. A thread of jealousy sewed Lucy’s heart shut.
She phoned Simone, her editor. Same thing. Straight to answerphone. A message came through shortly after: In a meeting. Will call ASAP! S. x She was probably in acquisitions, wrapping Sales and Marketing round her tweeting finger.
Lucy then did what writers knew best, other than procrastination wanking and judging the perfect number of coffees in a day: she Googled. Lucy’s fingers spat the words into the search bar: Anna E. Masters. A guide leader in Orpington; a chef in Auckland; and one writer, with one of those greyedout Twitter silhouettes with the profile name, Writer_in_ Law. No mention of her books. No tweets. As for Corpus, her publisher, not even a smell or whisper of them existed.
The phone rang. Let it be Ellis.
“Lucy! Can’t be long, I’ve slipped out for a vape,” Simone shouted. Her voice and, no doubt, her signature vanilla vape fumes competed with the Embankment traffic. Cars had no chance against her.
“Something weird’s happened,” Lucy said.
“Good weird or bad weird?” Simone asked.
Lucy curled back into the chair. “Have you heard of a book called, In Advance of Death?”
“Don’t think so. Not a bad title, though. Why, thinking of it for your next one?”
“Someone got there first. I got an ARC of it today. By someone called Anna E. Masters.”
“If I’ve never heard of it, or the author, no one else will have,” Simone said. “You could use the same title, no problem.”
“That’s not the problem.”
“What is, then?”
Lucy tried out the words in her head. It was no good. How could she tell her editor that a book was stalking her? Or that it was accusing her of plagiarism? Or that its claims were true? “Nothing,” she said at last. “I’m being silly.”
“You don’t sound like you’re being silly,” Simone said. “You sound…” She paused for a moment. “Scared.”
Lucy tried to smooth the shakes in her voice. “Don’t mind me. Ellis is away and I’m spending too much time in my own head.”
“You know my advice in these situations?”
“Gin?”
“Gin. And if that doesn’t work, go for a walk. To a bar that sells gin.”
“Thanks, Simone.”
“Any time. Now bugger off and write me some words.”
Lucy pulled a throw over her goose-bumped body. She couldn’t stop shivering. She tried Ellis again. No answer. Who else could she call? No one.
* * *
Dark pressed its face to the windows. So many windows. So many eyes that could lie behind. Someone had been watching her. Maybe they’d been watching her a long time, maybe they were watching her now. Lucy pulled all the curtains, checked all the locks, switched on the chandelier that hung in the centre of the library. Its crystals threw light onto books like confetti at a wedding.
What would DCI Shaw do now? There was only one piece of information to hand. Only one thing Shaw could go on. The proof. She picked up the book and paced as she read.
Lucy stuffs the pages into her bag along with the teddy bear that Marta gave her for Christmas. ‘I’ll keep it close,’ she says. ‘It’s like taking you with me.’
‘I’ll come with you,’ Marta says, reaching for Lucy’s shoulders.
Lucy steps away. ‘I’ll call for you, when I’m safe and set up somewhere. I promise.’
‘Wait, your shoelace is undone.’ Marta bends down. Ties up Lucy’s shoelaces for the last time.
Lucy then kisses Marta with winter lips that feel like paper and walks down the stairs.
Lucy comes out of the front door and hurries towards her car. She then drives away with the only copy of Marta’s manuscript.
* * *
Lucy choked on the words that lay her as bare as the victims in her books. Her mind chased itself, going through permutations. The only people who knew all this were deceased. And the dead spilled nothing but decomposition chemicals. Marta herself had died fifteen years ago, the year that Lucy’s debut came out. She was found, hanging from a noose, in her dining room, a copy of Lucy’s book on the floor. Lucy had spoken about it in interviews; how she was glad she’d been there for a fan in need.
Anna E. Masters. The name kept whispering to her. DCI Shaw was always able to join the dots. That was her USP—a preternatural ability to turn seemingly impossible things around in her mind until they could be explained. Lucy did not have this facility. The dots floated before her eyes, unjoined.
Poor little Lucy. She still doesn’t know what’s going on. Still unable to tie things up by herself.
“Leave me alone!” Lucy shouted. The library said nothing, only held the echo in its pages.
She should stop reading. The book couldn’t affect her, couldn’t hurt her, if she stayed well away. One of the tips she gave wannabe-writers was to never read their reviews.
But Lucy never follows advice, even if it’s her own. She picks up the book, In Advance of Death, and flicks through. Her stomach twists like a thriller at every line. Every reminder of what she’s done. And still she hasn’t worked it out. It would be as easy as a slip knot to undo if she only had the brain. All she knows is that this centres on the manuscript. Marta’s manuscript.
Of course. Lucy ran into her study. Post-Ellis, it was already returning to its default setting: crumbs and mugs multiplying; Post-its vying for wall space. Feeling under her desk, she found the mound of Blu-Tack and peeled it off. She crawled back out and sat cross-legged on her rug.
Buried deep in the Blu-Tack was something she hadn’t looked at for fifteen years. She picked the stiffened blue stickiness away, revealing a small silver key. The key to her other filing cabinet, the locked one. Not even Ellis had been allowed access.
The drawer shunted open. There it was. The handwritten manuscript of The End of Anna Masters. And, on top of it, a note in Ellis’ handwriting. She was all I had. I’ve left what you should wear on your bed.
* * *
It took two hours for Lucy to gather the courage, another one to gather the rope that Ellis had left on the bed into a noose. She then walked slowly downstairs and into the library.
Lucy dragged her armchair under the chandelier. Her heart beat quickly, as if trying to use up its allocation before it was too late. She climbed onto the chair’s back. It wobbled, as she knew it would. Everything does. And she’s no different. She got away with nothing, after all.
She placed the book on the arm of the chair then threw the rope over the beam. She knew how to tie the knot. Of course, she did. She knew the beam would hold, that she didn’t weigh enough to trouble it. The only variable, the only possible plot twist, was whether her indecision would have her feet reaching for the chair. She gave herself over to the story and stepped into the air.
The weight of fate pulled at her feet. Her throat was closed by the rope’s choke. Her arms flailed a hundred times in the chandelier’s crystals. Her leg kicked the proof onto the floor. It fell open.
She knows what comes next, even as her brain sparks its last. She has done her research. Her tongue will swell. Her eyes will dot with red petechiae: unjoined. And now, at last, she can smell it. It is waiting for her, has been waiting all this time. The word. The smell of death. A yellow smell. Tallow lit and extinguished. The word welcomes her as no one else will again, it sweeps over her like love. Her tongue swells with it. It is all that is left. The smell of death.