The house seemed empty as Jayne woke. The sun was bright against the curtains, but there were no sounds. She reached across the bed, her eyes closed, but she knew it was vacant. It was missing Chris’s weight, his warmth, and instead her hand found some paper.
She lifted her head. It was a note. She yawned before she felt able to focus.
Early shift. Help yourself to breakfast. Thank you for a wonderful night. We must do it again. Call me. X
Again? She smiled to herself. Again and again was her memory.
She reached over to the curtain and pulled it back, letting the light stream in. She squinted at first. The sky seemed brighter than it ever had in Highford. That was something she’d noticed as she’d got closer to Brampton, that the sky seemed bluer, was fresher in some way that she couldn’t quite pin down. It was the same that morning.
She lay back and reflected on the night before.
There’d been too many times in her recent past where a sexual encounter had been about satisfying a need, the bad end to a drunken night, Jayne pretending to be asleep as whoever she’d brought home slinked off into the night. Even on those rare moments when she felt sexually fulfilled, there was an emptiness to it, that the person underneath or on top was nothing more than flesh.
It had been different with Chris. There was a connection there, that she had wanted his pleasure as much as her own, and for the first time in a long time she’d fallen asleep draped across him rather than turned away and buried under the sheets.
She grinned as she thought of her hands on his back, her passion digging deep into his skin, lost in the moment, Chris too. Both of them slow, careful of her bruises, but in sync. She giggled as she thought how he’d better not take his shirt off in front of others for a few days.
She swung her legs off the bed and carried her good mood all the way downstairs, her hair tangled, her clothes rescued from the floor. She needed to get back to the hotel to change, but she didn’t want to leave just yet.
Chris’s kitchen was at the back of the house, and she went in there to boil the kettle. A coffee and some moments of reflection would be a good start to the day.
As she waited, she walked through the house and to the window at the front, moving the blinds to peer along the road.
It had that seaside look of the world at a cliff edge, where the buildings carried on and then came to an obvious stop, just the sea on the other side. The constant cry of gulls filled the air, but she thought she could get used to it here. There was something about the pace of it she liked, lacking the rush-hour snarl, but what was there to rush to? There were no office complexes, no large warehouses. Just a few streets of shopfronts, livings scraped on novelties and postcards, and the rest of the town was houses and small bed and breakfast hotels.
She liked the people too. Not many had any glamour to them, most with a hard-worn look, skin made old by the freezing and salty sea air, but she found that appealing, as if there was no need to compete.
The kettle clicked off, so she wandered back to the kitchen. Ruby’s picture took away some of the smile, reminded her why she was there, but she remembered what Chris had said, that he wanted to be reminded about the happy times, not just think about her death.
Once in the kitchen, she entertained herself with the thought of staying in Brampton, of this being her new home. It wasn’t really about Chris, because she knew from experience that one night didn’t tell her much about a man, but about the new start. Highford felt like a different life, Manchester too. Maybe she could start over.
She poured the water over the coffee granules and, as she stirred it, her gaze drifted along the worktop.
There were some papers, torn in half and waiting to be put into the recycling bin. One was the remains of a bank statement. She didn’t mean to look, but something caught her attention. Just one word, but it made her go cold, and then angry.
She reached for it, hoping she’d read it wrong, but as she looked closer, her eyes swam with tears.
She slammed the scrap of paper onto the worktop and ran upstairs, looking for her shoes, throwing the duvet around as she looked on the floor to make sure she didn’t forget anything. She wouldn’t be coming back.
She rushed down the stairs and slammed the door, wiping her eyes as she rushed towards the hotel. She needed a shower, wanted to get back to her room, to wash him away.
But the memory of what she’d seen on that small piece of torn-up bank statement made her feel sick.
Just for a moment, she thought she’d connected with someone. No, it was more than that. She’d allowed herself to connect. That’s why it had been different. That shield she put up so wilfully had dropped, and for one night it had been wonderful. But she should have known it was too good to be true.
It had been just a line on the bank statement. Millbrook Service Station. £65. A petrol station, his car filled up for his long journey. But it was the other word that had wiped out the morning glow, because the bank statement revealed the whereabouts of the petrol station, and she knew it well. Highford.
Chris had been to Highford a month earlier, a town he’d claimed he didn’t know.
He’d lied. There was something else going on, a hidden agenda behind the night before.
As the hotel got closer, her anger was replaced by something else: disappointment. At herself. At Chris. One more lie told by one more man, and once again she’d believed it.
She wanted to go home. Just get the hell out of Brampton. She’d had enough of the cold and the gulls and the taste of salt on her lips.
She paused as she got closer to the hotel. It wasn’t about her. She could shut out her feelings, she’d had enough practice, but why had he lied? There had to be a reason, and it had to be connected to the case.
A chill ran through her. Chris. He’d been to Highford and he’d lied.
She had to get back to Highford for a different reason. She needed to speak to Dan. He had to know all this.
And as she thought of Dan, she surprised herself. She missed him.