Will hurried from the back of the church, having finally found the right door, and slipped out the vestry.
He ignored the woman leaving the churchyard with her black Labrador in tow, a shocked expression crossing her face as he picked up his pace and tore past her, the white and black robes of the parish rector billowing from his shoulders.
He charged across the car park and round the back of the building, the stolen robes flapping behind him, his footsteps spraying gravel across the paintwork of the stationary car in front of the porch.
Will cleared the stile in one swift movement, and ran, expecting a shout closely followed by two men with guns at any time.
As he rounded the corner, the footpath began its steady drop towards the village pub, and he slid to a stop.
Tearing the vicar’s robes from his shoulders, he bundled them together, bent down and pushed the material into the back of the blackberry bushes.
Extracting his arms carefully from the brambles, he leaned forward and put his hands on his knees, panting.
He grabbed the front of his jacket, suddenly paranoid that he’d dropped his mother’s bible, and nearly cried with relief when he felt its familiar surface.
He gulped in more air, and then began to hurry across the meadow towards the safety of the pub and his car.
How the hell had they found him? And so quickly?
He chewed his bottom lip as he panted his way down the last part of the footpath.
Either Amy had left more information on the first hard drive than he’d thought, or –
He frowned. Or Rossiter’s niece had told them where to find him.
Anger flushed through him, swiftly replaced by guilt. Had she volunteered the information, or had something happened to her since he’d left the motel that morning?
He hadn’t heard from her since they’d had breakfast.
Was she okay?
His pace quickened, and he jogged the last few steps. He climbed the wooden stile that led to the asphalt-topped car park and noted that the pub had filled considerably in the time he’d been at the church. He checked his watch and realised it was fast approaching lunchtime.
He glanced over his shoulder, expecting to see two shadowy figures on the footpath farther up the field, but it was deserted. He pulled the car keys from his pocket and hurried towards the vehicle, and had hit the remote locking switch when he heard it.
A car engine, still some distance away, roaring through the lanes, and coming closer.
He cursed, paranoia sweeping over him. He slid into the driver’s seat and slammed the door, gunned the engine – and stalled it.
Swearing, he wiped the sweat running down his forehead, reset the gears to neutral, and re-started the car. This time, he forced himself to ease off the clutch, slid the car into first gear, and then turned towards the exit.
He wound down the windows, leaned forward and switched off the radio.
Sure enough, the now-familiar growl of the silver sedan was drawing closer, changing gears as it powered down the hill towards the pub.
Will realised it would be seconds before it turned the corner and caught up with him, and quickly swung the car to the left.
The vehicle bucked as he forced it into third gear, Russell’s warning remembered too late. Will kept his foot on the throttle and powered back to second, the engine revving in protest.
He sped round a right-handed turn, saw the national speed limit sign at the exit of the village boundary, and jumped the car straight into fourth.
He checked the rear-view mirror.
No silver car.
He breathed out. His ruse had worked. Hopefully, whoever was looking for him would waste precious minutes checking the pub for any trace of him.
He wiped a trickle of sweat from his brow as his thoughts returned to Rossiter’s niece.
He’d have to return to the motel to collect his clothes, but after that, what?
What if she was innocent? What if she was telling the truth about Rossiter?
What if she was lying?
***
It took Will three attempts at swiping his motel card before the door to his room unlocked with a smooth click.
Cursing his shaking hands, he shrugged off his jacket and pulled out the laptop and hard drive from his backpack.
He wondered, without hope, whether Amy had left a clue as to the importance of the bible in her notes. He couldn’t recall seeing anything the first time he’d read through them, but as he came to learn more about her investigation into Rossiter’s activities, he began to notice things he’d previously missed.
Yet he still didn’t have enough, in his view, to justify Rossiter’s actions to date, which resembled that of a desperate man.
A desperate man is a dangerous man. Hadn’t he once heard his father quote that line?
He wracked his memory trying to remember where the quote came from as he waited for the computer to go through its start-up sequence.
As soon as it was ready, he pulled out a chair and sat heavily, glancing up at the failing light outside.
He frowned at the dark clouds forming, then stood and pulled the curtains closed, switching on the desk lamp on his return to his seat.
Despite taking the precaution of pulling apart his mobile phone, he couldn’t shake the feeling of being watched. He realised it was paranoia, caused in part by what he was reading in Amy’s notes, but also by the actions of the armed men in the silver sedan earlier that day, and finding out who the mysterious caller was.
He congratulated himself on his quick thinking that afternoon, and the fact that he’d outwitted them, and settled in to read through the files on the hard drive once more.
Rain began to beat against the windows, lashed onto the glass by gusts of wind, and Will absently reached across and flicked the wall heater on, before returning to the screen, lost in his reading.
A loud knock on the door made him freeze, his fingers hovering over the keyboard.