He wouldn’t admit it, but Nathan always felt challenged by men who’d done something with their lives. It was amazing the kinds of people who turned up at FitnessFanatix. Individuals who’d known serious self-discipline in their time, who’d done physically demanding jobs, or had regularly courted danger – ex-soldiers, ex-cops and the like – and yet for some reason had let it all slip away, their sculpted physiques now dwindled into unimpressive shadows of what they’d once been, their reactions turned sluggish, their outlook on life morose, tired.
Deep down, Nathan scorned such losers. But that wasn’t why he avoided working with these one-time alpha males. Mostly it was because, for all his contempt of them, he still felt challenged.
That Monday evening, like all evenings, he walked the gym floor on the balls of his feet, in his regulation red tracksuit trousers, white tennis shoes and slashed crimson vest, the one that hid nothing from the world of his muscular, sunbed-bronzed physique with its multiple menacing tattoos. The vest was non-regulation, of course; as one of the permanent staff here, Nathan was supposed to wear a non-threatening white T-shirt, but no one really cared. First of all, because he was a good personal training instructor; he didn’t just talk the talk, he walked it too (or swaggered it). But also because he looked the part. A tad brutish maybe, with his shaven head and his constant menacing frown – it was all nonsensically macho, but wasn’t that what this place was all about? Most of the blokes who came here did it because they yearned for big muscles and flat bellies, because they dreamed of being tough guys who would turn all the ladies’ heads when they lumbered past on the beach, or while walking their pet pit-bulls in the park. Whether that sort of thing really worked for the sophisticated twenty-first-century woman was a moot point, of course, but this was still the way most men thought. So, in that regard, Nathan was a great advert for the place.
Even if, deep down, he was increasingly frustrated that this was all he’d ever be.
He was twenty-four now, and personal trainer was the only job he’d ever held. It was great on one hand, because it was something he was good at, and he wasn’t too badly paid. Plus, it allowed him to run one or two other lines of private business, which were also pretty lucrative. But when he was putting some wimp through his paces on the rowing machine or the grappler, or watching him sweat and cringe as he pumped out the miles on the static bike, and then suddenly learned that the wimp had once worked in a field hospital in Afghanistan, or had flown fighter jets, or had climbed Everest or been to the South Pole, he was the one who felt inferior, he was the one who was intimidated – and that wasn’t great for Nathan.
How could he prowl the gym as he was now, gruffly correcting poor technique, or telling people to put their phones away, or ordering them off the weights if they were going at it solo, when, inside, he didn’t feel like a real man? How could he smarm his way around the girls when the lies he told them about his undercover operations in Russia and Iraq, or his days as a submariner or paratrooper, were paper-thin, based on nothing more than his own imagination?
Of course, at the end of the day, that didn’t stop Nathan looking for girls. When you were as red-blooded as he was, it was impossible to do anything else in a place like FitnessFanatix. They came in by the bucket-load. After the old ladies in the morning and the stressed-out mothers in mid-to-late afternoon, came the late teens and twenty-somethings in the evening, the lookers, the gorgeous babes who fitted their Lycra to perfection, whose skin soon glowed with perspiration. Those were the ones Nathan was really interested in, and the reason he always requested the late shift if he was allowed to choose. Of course, you had to be careful these days, in the age of the #MeToo movement.
Frankly, that rankled with Nathan.
You had to be especially careful in the workplace, where simply hitting on a girl could be seen as exploiting your position and might well be deemed a sacking offence. Looking was still free, of course – that was something, at least. Not that Nathan was content with that. He was bursting to get up close and personal with several of the regular girls here. But even so, for his own protection, he knew that he must win their confidence gradually, over a protracted period. Until then he’d have to restrict himself to feasting his hungry eyes. And right now, there were plenty such meals to choose from. From the blonde on the treadmill to the brunette on the power rack to the raven-haired darling on the dip bars. Above all, though, as always, his predatory gaze was drawn most to the redhead on the cross-trainer.
Mainly that was because, tonight, unusually, she was here alone, but also because she was an absolute knockout. He’d been watching her for at least a couple of months now. She was a frequent attendee at the gym, and she worked hard when she was here, often pushing herself close to the limit, and fuck, did it show.
She was about nineteen, he reckoned, and though, up close, there was something vaguely wintry about her, she was still an absolute beaut, with a porcelain-pale complexion, a pink, cherubic mouth and piercing blue eyes. Her hair wasn’t red as such but fair with reddish tints; it was also short, spiky and shaved at the back and sides, a near-punk look, which, along with her trim but terrific physique, and her little shorts and sweat-damp vest, only added to the ‘action girl’ lustre.
Truth be told, Nathan was no keener on being challenged by athletic women than he was by rugged men, but in their case, it was a different kind of challenge – it was a taunt, a tease, it virtually invited him to meet it, and Nathan would never turn down any invitation with such a honeyed promise at the end.
‘See you’re on your own today,’ he said, idling past.
She threw him a quick, incurious glance. ‘Very …’ She was breathing hard, almost too hard to speak. ‘Very … observant of you.’
He nodded and smiled, and then realised that he’d already been dismissed. Mildly vexed, he turned away.
‘Sorry,’ she added. ‘Don’t … don’t mean to be rude. It’s just that –’ she forced a breathless laugh ‘– I’m totally … wiped out.’
He turned back. ‘I’m not surprised.’ The digital reading on the cross-trainer’s VDU was ample evidence of just how hard she’d been at it. ‘Four hundred calories! And this isn’t the only machine you’ve been on tonight, is it? You’re really putting yourself through it.’
She focused on the VDU herself. ‘I like to keep … fit.’
‘Well, you’re …’ He paused. He’d been about to say that she was in great shape as a result, but that could have been construed as overstepping the mark. ‘You’re … certainly doing that.’ He edged away, not wanting to press his opening too much. ‘If you need anything, you know where I am.’
‘Oh!’ she suddenly said sharply. And then, more loudly, ‘Oh! … oh! … OH!’
She came stumbling down off the machine on her right leg, all but carrying the left.
Nathan jerked towards her with a look of concern.
Her face etched itself with panicky pain as she hopped around in a half-circle. ‘Think it’s my hamstring … think it’s just gone.’
‘Okay, erm …’ He glanced around. ‘Here, quick!’ He dragged a bench over, so that she could sit on it and extend her injured limb to full length. He dropped to his knees but didn’t get any closer than was permissible. ‘Unusual for a hamstring to go when you’ve been working out all night. Normally happens when you’ve not warmed up properly.’
The girl felt warily down the back of her left thigh, as she panted for breath. ‘I don’t think it’s actually gone. It just … well, it suddenly really tightened.’
Nathan watched her carefully. She cringed again, in genuine pain, and he understood why. He’d torn a hamstring, himself, once, and he knew how horrible it could be. In his case, he’d literally felt and even heard it snap. Not that the naked, sensually muscled leg in front of him seemed in any way imperfect. He offered a spread hand.
‘I can … erm … have a feel for you, if you don’t mind? Or I can get one of the girls?’
‘No, it’s okay … you go for it,’ she said quickly. ‘See what you think, please.’
Very tenderly, determined to enjoy it as much as possible, he ran his hand up the back of her thigh. The muscle was smooth and firm, the soft skin still damp. Good Christ, it was just as he’d always imagined. More importantly from the girl’s POV, though, there was no obvious damage there – no bump or ridge.
‘Does that hurt?’ he asked. ‘I’m not pressing hard, but …’
‘It’s a bit uncomfortable,’ she said. ‘But not too bad, I suppose.’
‘I can’t feel any swelling or tear. It might just be a strain.’ He moved his hand away and knelt back. ‘Probably best not to continue, though. Not tonight.’
She nodded in full agreement. ‘I may have overdone it.’ She glanced at the clock on the wall. ‘It’s nearly knocking-off time, anyway. Do you think a sauna would help? Or a swim?’
‘Well … a swim’s always good for recovery. But we close in about five minutes.’
‘Yeah, it’s just that …’ She extended an arm towards him, and he realised that she wanted him to help her stand up. He hurriedly obliged. Upright, she tried to balance again, pressing down gingerly with her left foot, and grimacing. ‘It’s just that … Hell, I don’t think I’m going to be able to drive home.’
Nathan shrugged. ‘If you want to call a taxi, your car’ll be okay here overnight.’
He didn’t actually know if that was true. FitnessFanatix was part of the Forton Country Club complex, located on the southwest fringe of Crowley, quite close to the M62 motorway, in a largely rural area, and thus encircled by woodlands and pasture. The only other building within half a mile was the small country church of St Barnabas, which stood a hundred or so yards to the south. There wasn’t much daily villainy in this district, but though the Country Club had a hotel section, there’d only be a sleepy night-manager on Reception later on, and he couldn’t be expected to keep his attention fixed on every corner of the car park. It wasn’t impossible that a bunch of thieves could make an opportunist drive-by to see if there was anything worth pinching. But why scare her with that? The idea was to try and give the impression that he was being helpful.
Even so, the girl didn’t seem keen on the idea. He wasn’t quite sure why. Because she didn’t have enough cash in her purse? Or could she be one of these women who didn’t like the idea of travelling in a taxi alone after dark, with a male driver she’d never met before?
Either way, it was another opportunity for Nathan, one which, if he’d given himself two or three minutes longer to think about, he probably wouldn’t have taken.
‘The alternative is …’ he said, all innocent. ‘I mean, I don’t want you to get the wrong impression or anything … but I can give you a ride home. Like I say, I’m going in ten or fifteen minutes.’
She regarded him thoughtfully, with no apparent emotion – which made him nervous, though there was no disdain in that coolly pretty face. With a jolt, he realised that she was appraising him, looking him over properly, maybe for the very first time; checking out his well-defined pecs, his moody features, his mean but stylish tats.
‘Whereabouts are you going?’ she asked.
Nothing she’d seen had put her off, he realised with a thrill.
‘Just into central Crowley. If you’re not too far from there, I’m happy to drop you off at home.’
She pondered it again, and as before, he saw no evident distaste.
‘Okay,’ she said. ‘That might be a plan. Save me waiting out there on the car park for half an hour for a taxi, won’t it?’
‘Yeah, I suppose.’ He noted that she hadn’t yet told him where she lived. He wasn’t sure what that meant. Either she didn’t trust him to know her actual address, or she lived way, way across the borough and didn’t want to dissuade him from his act of generosity before they’d even started. Either way, it worked for Nathan. The whole point of it was to get her into his car with him.
‘I’ll go and get showered,’ she said, hobbling stiffly away. ‘I’ll see you at the bar in … shall we say fifteen minutes?’
Nathan glanced at the clock. It was 21.57. The gym officially closed at ten, which was why, when he looked around, there was almost no one left on the exercise floor. The cleaners would be in first thing tomorrow, so it would simply be a matter of switching everything off, hitting the lights and locking up.
‘Yeah, that’s great,’ he said. ‘Sure.’
She smiled and nodded, before limping away. Even moving clumsily, she looked amazingly sexy, the shorts and vest only enhancing her supple, shapely form. It was all Nathan could do not to lick his lips.
He spent the next few minutes in a flurry of activity, closing everything down, saying goodnight to his fellow instructors, none of whom appeared to have noticed his brief flirtation with the redhead, and then dashed to the staff locker room to get his stuff. He wasn’t supposed to leave the premises in ‘uniform’, and so changed into a spare pair of joggers and a hoodie top and trainers, grabbed his bag and hurried through into the bar.
Though the gym was now closed, this part of the building was also for the use of hotel guests, and so it usually stayed open until midnight at least. It was fairly basic: low-key lighting, stripped-down décor, a tiled floor, but it was clean and tidy, and one or two patrons were in there.
Rather to Nathan’s surprise, because girls always seemed to take an age to get ready, the object of his interest was already here, seated on a bar-stool in a beige tracksuit and blue anorak, a glass of what looked like sparkling water on the counter in front of her, and a bulging sports bag on the floor. She was chatting on her phone when he came in, but now cut the call and shoved the device into her pocket.
‘Sorry,’ she said. ‘Hope you don’t mind, but I’ve just rung home and they’re coming to pick me up. I told them I had a lift, but they weren’t happy. I’m grateful for the offer though, so I bought you this.’ She pushed a half-pint glass of what looked like cola with ice along the counter towards him. ‘The barman said you usually have Diet.’
‘Uh … yeah, thanks,’ Nathan said, struggling to conceal how disappointed he felt. In truth, it was more than disappointment. It was outright anger. He’d been stood up, slighted. When he took the glass of coke, he grabbed it forcefully as though he was about to throw it across the room. Thankfully, the girl didn’t notice. She reached down, pulled her bag onto her knee and tried to work the zip up. Pissed off though he was, Nathan reminded himself, it was vital not to lose his temper. Not if he wanted to get another chance at a later date.
‘Boyfriend coming for you, then, is it?’ he said.
She glanced up at him and pulled a face. ‘Boyfriend?’
She chuckled, and for an ugly moment Nathan wondered if she might be a lesbo. Usually, when she was training here, she had another girl with her. That was a more than unpleasant possibility; it had the potential to ruin all his plans. Despite common sense telling him to rein it in a little, to avoid being cheeky or forward, he needed to know more, so he had to probe further. It probably wouldn’t seem too out of order now that they were in a social situation.
‘I’m amazed by that,’ he said, deliberately sounding unamazed, as if it was only of mild interest. ‘I’d have thought they’d be lining up …’
‘I get approached a lot, I suppose,’ she said. ‘I haven’t met one that suits me yet, that’s all.’
‘Ah.’ He nodded his understanding, feeling more relaxed. Nathan didn’t have an issue with people’s sexual preferences. As far as he was concerned, it was live and let live, a free world. If some lass got her rocks off with other lasses, that was fine. So long as it didn’t get in the way of his ambitions.
The girl checked her phone, having heard a text arrive. She straightened on her stool. ‘My ride’s here.’
Nathan glanced from the window, puzzled. They had a good view of the main car park entrance, and no headlights had speared their way in in the last few minutes.
‘Don’t see anyone,’ he said.
‘No … the little idiot’s parked at the church.’ The girl shook her head. ‘Don’t know why, but it’s not untypical.’
She clambered from the stool, again wincing with pain, carrying her left leg as if it was a dead weight. Nathan took a big swallow of coke, slung his own bag over his shoulder and made as if to collect hers. ‘Want me to carry this for you?’
‘Uh-uh.’ She was quite decided about that, at least, though she smiled apologetically. ‘Sorry again. Not being rude, but … well, don’t want to give anyone the wrong idea, do we?’
‘Erm, no … suppose not.’ Nathan could have kicked himself for acting like an over-eager puppy. He leaned on the bar again, while she slipped her phone into her anorak pocket. ‘Nice meeting you, anyway.’ He offered a hand. ‘I mean, I meet you every day, obviously … but … I’m Nathan.’
‘Janice.’ She shook hands with him, very demurely and platonically, before turning and limping away, struggling a little with her bag. ‘And thanks for your help,’ she called from the doorway, before disappearing outside.
Nathan nodded, sipping his coke again as he watched her go. She clearly could have used a hand with the bag but would have found that embarrassing. Or was it him that she’d have found embarrassing? He scowled to himself as he finished the drink. He shouldn’t have fawned over her, that was for sure. But then again, she’d told him that she didn’t have a boyfriend when there’d actually been no need to. Maybe that had simply been to assert her independence, to reinforce that she was always the one in the driving seat – or then again, perhaps it had been to let him know that he was in with a chance.
Cheered by that thought, Nathan finished his drink and headed outside, his own bag hanging down his brawny back.
Somewhat coincidentally, he himself was feeling untypically stiff tonight, mainly in his neck and shoulders. It was odd. He’d done his usual forty-minute workout before coming on duty, but he hadn’t pushed himself harder than he normally did, and anyway, that had been hours and hours ago. The September night wasn’t especially cold, but it was chillier than it had been, and it struck him harder than he’d expected. He loitered at the top of the steps, fleetingly feeling groggy, wondering if he might be coming down with something.
But Nathan didn’t exactly feel ill. Even if he did, he would fight it. He wasn’t the sort who called in sick easily. That was for layabouts and wusses.
He trotted down the steps and adjusted the bag at his shoulder as he set off across the car park towards his beaten-up second-hand Micra. As he did, he passed the entrance to the footway that led through to the car park at St Barnabas’s – and a pair of flashing headlights caught his attention.
He glanced sideways, and found himself looking directly along the narrow, paved path that connected with the church car park. The shadowy shape of a vehicle was parked at the other side of it. Even as Nathan stared, it flashed its beams again.
He stopped and watched, and very briefly felt light-headed, even dizzy. It occurred to him that this might have been caused by the half-hour he usually spent in the swimming pool at the end of each workout. He’d once been told that water in the ears could cause sensory imbalance.
The car flashed its beams again.
Were they signalling to him?
It didn’t seem likely, but then Nathan wondered if it might be the girl.
He couldn’t understand why she’d be trying to attract his attention, unless … perhaps her leg was giving her real problems. There was supposed to be someone else with her, but if they’d had no physio training, they’d likely be no use. And hadn’t the girl called whoever it was an idiot, anyway?
Picturing some gormless younger brother sitting behind the steering wheel, or maybe a doddery old parent, he started along the path. As before, his vision tilted slightly, and he felt dizzy. Definitely fluid in the ears, he decided. He’d been doing lots of underwater lengths recently. But then why was he feeling sluggish too, and even sleepy?
Someone on his left gave what sounded like a choked scream.
Nathan turned sharply, and almost toppled over.
More than water in the ears, maybe. Now, he was really feeling tired, unnaturally so, his eyelids drooping … but first things first. Was someone in trouble?
He was maybe thirty yards along the path. The wall behind him had a dense rank of rhododendrons on the other side, but beyond the wall in front stood the church, a vast, gothic silhouette on the starlit fields. Just to the left of it, cluttered together somewhat, many of them old and leaning, stood the cruciform outlines of gravestones. Nathan tried to focus on these, because suddenly he thought he’d spied movement over there, as if someone had just flitted out of sight around the back of the main building.
As though in a dream, the edges of his vision blurring, he spied the lychgate in front of him, pushed it open and stepped through into the churchyard.
‘Everything all right over there?’ he shouted, trying to get his vision straight, wondering why his voice sounded hoarse and weak.
Not water … flu. It could only be flu.
He dropped his bag before blundering forward, following the gravel path along the side of the church, the jumbled headstones drifting foggily past. When he reached the far corner, he wasn’t sure what he expected to see. The girl from the gym maybe, whatever her name was – Janice? – being dragged through the long, straggling grass by some masked assailant. That he could have handled, rough and exhausted though he now felt.
But all he saw was a few more graves, a dry-stone wall and, behind that, open fields.
Nathan was bewildered. He knew what he’d seen. He tottered forward a few steps, his feet stumbling off the gravel and into the lengthy grass.
A reverberating clunk sounded behind him.
He spun around and again almost fell over, staggering sideways, only just managing to keep his feet. When he finally looked up, he realised that someone had emerged from the nearest church door, and now was standing with back turned, in the process of locking it. It probably should have struck Nathan harder than it did that, even though this was a church, it was odd at this late hour to see what appeared to be a cowled monk.
‘Sorry … father,’ he burbled, reality swimming. ‘I just … I thought I heard …’
The monk turned around to face him, and for an amazed second, Nathan, intoxicated as he felt, was transfixed.
‘Wha’ … wha’ the fuck … fuck happened to … you?’ he stammered.
The monk didn’t reply, because at that moment, three steel points were driven forcefully into Nathan’s back. His senses were so dulled now that his reaction to the sudden, astonishing pain was sluggish. It didn’t help, of course, that the middle prong of the pitchfork pierced his upper spine, causing his head to jerk back, his torso to stiffen, his hands to claw into talons.
It made it easy for the monk, who produced a large, heavy-bladed knife, complete with a cross-guard, and swept it once across Nathan’s exposed throat, opening it clean to the back of the windpipe.
As the paralysed trainer sagged to his knees, his lifeblood boiling away in a raging crimson torrent, the monk with the mangled face lowered the knife, leaned down close and, phone in hand, commenced taking photographs.