by Graham West
Josie never took up with the shady club owner but started singing at The Keys on Friday nights. Her Tina Turner set had everyone up on their feet, and two local musicians—a bass player called Billy Rat (because of his pointy face and ears, presumably) and a guitarist called Dodgy Den (I didn’t ask!) agreed to join her. She went live, ditching the backing tracks, and the following April, on Jenny’s birthday, she put on a party at the pub. It was nothing more than an excuse to put on a show—a celebration of our new life together and it was a night neither of us would ever forget.
Josie sang, playing the room the way she had all those years ago, while Lou had laid on a spread that would have fed a small country. And the cake—the cake, in the shape of a classical guitar—was carried in by two young men dressed as Spanish waiters while Lou led us all in an out of tune rendition of ‘Happy Birthday’.
The following day, Blakely arrived on our doorstep with Jenny’s birthday gift—two plane tickets to Spain. He had a hillside villa, high up in the town of Mijas, overlooking the coastline of the Costa del Sol.
“It’s yours for two weeks,” he told us. With that, he pushed an envelope into my hands. “That should keep you in food.” Inside was eight hundred euros.
I never asked how Blakely knew it was Jenny’s birthday, and I didn’t really care. The nightmares had stopped, and Amelia was at rest, but we were still rebuilding our lives. By the time the holiday came around, early that summer, we were ready for a break.
***
Blakely’s villa, nestled in the mountainside beneath the walls of Mijas, was everything we had anticipated, but the view was beyond anything we could have imagined. We wandered around the village during the day, taking rides around the cobbled streets in the carriages and walking the perimeter paths overlooking the miles of coastline with its hotels, bars and shopping malls. On the final evening, we ate out at a restaurant as the sun set on the horizon and watched as the Costa del Sol burst into a carpet of lights beneath us.
We ate well and shared a bottle of wine. The money Blakely had given us would cover more than the cost of a taxi home, and we raised a glass to our benefactor.
Jenny laughed. “If I was a few years older…” she said.
I smiled. One day my daughter would meet someone, and I would watch her drift away. The very thought filled me with dread—that moment when your child moves on. Not so much a fresh chapter but a whole new book. I watched her as she ate. My girl had grown into a beautiful young woman, who looked up and caught my gaze.
She smiled and reached for my hand. “I had another dream last night,” she said.
I felt as if my heart had missed a beat.
“I saw Amelia. She was in the woods. I saw her face, looking up at me.” Jenny smiled. “She looked so peaceful, Dad. So beautiful.”
It felt so good to be holding my daughter’s hand—to feel the warmth of her flesh, to see her face, to look into her eyes and see the love. Maybe there had been a purpose—a reason for everything that had happened over the past twelve months.
Someone once asked me if I believed in fate. At the time, I wasn’t sure if our lives were planned or merely shaped by a series of random events.
The truth is, we have to live with the consequences of our actions, and although my demons still lurk in the shadows, reminding me of that Sunday afternoon, I’ve learned not to dwell on the past or concern myself with the future. Heartache and loss are a part of life, yet there will always be things for which we can be thankful. If you have your health, enjoy it. If you have faith, embrace it with all your heart. Treasure your family, love your friends, and may God, whomever or whatever you perceive Him or it to be, always keep you safe.
THE END
About A Rising Evil
It is two years since they buried the remains of Amelia Root on the edge of Mosswood in the small affluent town of Tabwell, and for Jenny Adams, life has moved on. She has created an idyllic new home with her fiancé, Jake, the son of a wealthy businessman, while Jenny’s father, Robert, has settled down with Josie Duxbury who runs The Keys, a popular suburban pub.
But Sebastian Tint, a retired professor with a gift, is becoming increasingly uneasy, sensing that someone close to him is in danger. Then he finds a chilling message on the grave of Elizabeth and Hanna Adams, and Jenny’s dreams begin again…
Prologue
Jenny Adams stepped under the shower and closed her eyes as the warm spray hit her body. It really had been one of those days—a day when it had been almost impossible to concentrate. The tutor had raced through the lecture on the history of modern art, and although her friend, Kelly Dawson, had helped her fill the blanks over coffee in the college café, the caffeine had done nothing to lift her mood.
Jenny was so hungry she was tempted to call in at a fast food joint on the way home, but Jake was cooking tonight; arriving home with a burger and fries was not an option. She stepped out onto the bath mat, wrapping a towel around her and wiping the steam from the bathroom mirror. Something caught her eye and she blinked, staring hard at the reflection. The blood in her veins turned to ice.
She stifled a scream with her hand. Behind her stood a young woman—a girl in her early teens. A girl who had given birth over a century ago only to have the child snatched from her arms.
Jenny felt a crushing tightness in her chest as she spun round only to find that the room was empty. She closed her eyes for a moment and looked back into the mirror. She was tired—over tired. That was it. It was all in her mind. But the girl was still there, smiling gently.
Jenny closed her eyes again and took several deep breaths, trying desperately to steady herself before opening them. The girl had gone, and her own reflection was shrouded by condensation, but the message written in it was clear.
My precious child.
Jenny stared at the writing as her heart began to thump. She threw on a bathrobe and quickly wrapped a towel around her head. It wasn’t worth dressing for dinner—not now. She didn’t much feel like eating.
It had been two years since the last dream—two years since they buried that girl. Her spirit had been at rest, having found the peace she had sought for so long. But now, for a reason that eluded Jenny, Amelia Root was back.
Chapter One
The young man surveyed the room wondering if freedom was all it was cracked up to be. Sure, he had waited for this day. They had taught him to believe—to look to the future and put the past behind him—but he wondered why they had sent him here, to live with this old loser. At least everything back there—back in that place—well, it was tidy. They were taught to be tidy. Clean, too. Food was served on shiny plates from a kitchen that smelled of dishwasher tablets.
This place reeked, there was no doubt about it; stale bacon fat and cigarette smoke. The wallpaper looked as if it had been put up before he was born, and it was difficult to tell what colour the paintwork was supposed to be.
“You wanna brew, lad?” his uncle called from the kitchen.
“Nah. I’m okay.”
“You want a soft drink, then?”
“Nah. I’m good, thanks.”
Harry Pascoe walked back into the room where his nephew sat peering out of the window. “I’m sorry about the house, lad. It’s not The Ritz, but it’s better than that place, eh?”
The jury was definitely still out on that one. The bedroom—his bedroom—was okay. It at least looked clean, so with any luck, he wouldn’t be fighting fleas and blood-sucking bedbugs, and his stomach would eventually learn to deal with the food that came out of that grease pit of a kitchen.
Darren Pascoe just smiled politely. “It’s okay,” he lied.
“Look,” Harry said, taking a swig from a grubby mug with the words ‘Lazy Twat’ emblazoned across the front. “This isn’t ideal, I get that.” He glanced around the room. “But at least you’re out. You’re free. So you’ll just have to make the best of it. Don’t do anything stupid, right? No stealing stuff, no drugs, no getting pissed.”
Ju
dging by the state of this shithole, Darren thought his uncle had probably spent his entire life doing all of those things. For God’s sake, how could two brothers be so different? His father had been a well-respected psychiatrist. The house had been posh. Even his schoolmates had been kind of jealous. He’d had a fit mum, too—that’s what they told him, anyway. Pascoe’s mother was a MILF. It was pretty much the word around school.
Harry Pascoe wasn’t done with his pep talk, though. “I’m just a garage mechanic, stuck in the same job for twenty years. The money is pretty crap, as you’ve probably guessed by now, but it does me. I never had your father’s brains, lad. I got some bird pregnant when I was a kid myself and I needed money. No time for college, just wanted a place for the baby. Shame, really, cos the girl met someone else two years later and walked out. I was gutted at first, but she didn’t want me around and I wasn’t going to be arsed fighting for access, so I just dusted myself down and got on with it.”
“You never wanted to see your kid?” Darren asked.
Harry shrugged. “She was a bad bitch, lad. I didn’t want to take her on. Okay, maybe I should’ve—but I thought I’d be better off trying to start again. The thing is, I never did manage to get out of that garage. It was an easy life. Enough to pay the rent, enough for a couple of good nights out and some left over for the odd holiday with a few mates. I met a few girls, of course—got my fair share of action—but nothing lasted.” Harry took another swig. “Never got on with your father, to be honest. Guess who bought me this mug? That’s what he thought of me—a total loser—and he was right. I mean, look at this place.”
Darren had listened to the professionals, all telling him how to turn his life around—all telling him that he had a choice. Then they had decided to send him here? With his uncle? Okay, it all looked good on paper, and he guessed Harry wasn’t actually a bad guy, but did they really expect him to start rebuilding his life from here, with a man he barely knew?
“You can do a few days with me at the garage,” Harry said as if that was supposed to be good news. “You can make the tea, we’ll show you some stuff—oil changes, tyres. It’ll keep you out of mischief.”
Darren nodded. His uncle had looked smart at his parents’ funerals, with his rented suit and gelled-back hair. They’d made small talk under the watchful eye of his guardian, but it was clear that Harry was uncomfortable in anything clean and seemed to have an aversion to dressing up. Darren saw himself, ten years down the line, sitting in a flat over a shop, swilling tea from a stained mug with a few mangy quid in his pocket and a string of kids he never saw dotted around town.
Maybe they had been smarter than he’d thought, sending him here. Maybe that was all part of the plan, because there was no way he was going to turn into his uncle. He was going to make something of his life. He’d stay here for as long as he needed and yep, maybe he’d do some time at the garage just to show willing. But life had dealt him a shit hand. It had been an accident but a woman and her child had died, and that had torn him up inside. And then, on top of that, he had ended up losing both of his parents. How was that fair? They had paid for his stupidity. He needed to put things right, so before he moved on, Darren Pascoe decided that there were people he needed to speak to, face-to-face.
Chapter Two
Jennifer Adams hadn’t been looking for a man. At nineteen, she was more than happy with her life, studying art and design at the local college. She was a pretty good classical guitarist too, although maybe that wasn’t so cool. Not one of her friends knew any of the musicians she found herself watching on YouTube, so she didn’t say too much about it. Not that she ever aspired to concert standard, of course; that took total dedication and a shedload of nerve. But her inner desire to master the instrument, wherever that led, drove her on. She was, in her own words, busy with life when Jake arrived on the scene.
The college employed local shopfitters Huxley and Sons to upgrade the students’ rest area. Jake was the son—the only son. Jenny and a couple of friends had decided to take a look at the renovations. They shouldn’t really have been nosing around but the guys on site weren’t going to complain about a little female company. That was when Jenny and Jake first set eyes on each other.
It wasn’t love at first sight, and Jake was the one who decided Jenny was worth pursuing. For a start, there was a compatibility issue. Jake liked heavy rock and Jenny didn’t, although she could put up with it in small doses if necessary. He also oozed the kind of self-confidence that bordered on cockiness, and that bothered her. Jake would strip to the waist whenever the temperature rose above freezing simply because he had a body to show off.
“How much time do you actually spend at the gym?” It was probably one of the first questions Jenny asked Jake when she finally agreed to go for a drink with him one afternoon after classes. Jake took it as a compliment, which suggested to Jenny that he might possess a lot more below the neck than he did above it.
“Three nights,” he replied, although Jenny discovered later he hadn’t included the weekends. By the time she found out, it was no longer an issue. Jake was one of the good guys—a young man with a respect for others—and Jenny found his manners endearing. He cared deeply for his ageing grandparents, and despite her earlier misgivings, Jake Huxley had a good head on his shoulders.
Their first kiss had happened when he called to pick Jenny up and he spotted her guitar in the corner. “You play?” he asked, already looking impressed.
Jenny wasn’t sure she was ready to come clean about the whole classical thing. “Yep, but it’s not your scene,” she said breezily, hoping he’d let it drop.
Jake looked offended. “Not my scene?”
“You’re a rock guy. I just play crusty boring stuff.”
Jake picked up the guitar and handed it to Jenny. “Go on, play something for me.”
Reluctantly, she took the guitar and perched herself on the arm of the easy chair. It was pointless asking him which piece he wanted to hear, so she just started picking at something he might have heard on a TV advert. She played, nervously watching her fingers travelling the neck of the guitar. God! Why am I doing this? She half expected to look up and find him gone.
There was complete silence. No words, no patronising applause. Jake stared at her with admiration in his eyes.
“That was the most beautiful thing I’ve ever heard,” he whispered. “Why didn’t you tell me? Girl, you’re friggin’ awesome!”
Instinctively, she let the guitar slip from her lap and stood. He drew her into his arms, and Jenny knew, in that moment, that Jake Huxley was the man she wanted to be with for the rest of her life. He proposed six months later, and Gordon Huxley, who treated Jenny like a daughter, made it clear that he was going to foot the bill for his son’s wedding. The family business was doing well, and he could afford to put on a bit of a do.
Gordon moved his son and future daughter-in-law into a cottage he’d bought as an investment three years earlier. Jenny loved it. With over an acre of land at the back, they decided to buy a couple of Labradors to keep them company and even talked about starting a family after the wedding was out of the way.
Jenny would have been happy with a low key affair but Gordon had a host of people he wanted to impress, so he merely threw plastic at the bills as they mounted. But even a man with his money needed time to organise such a big event, so Jenny and Jake had a good six months under the same roof before the day finally arrived. Time for things to go wrong.
That worried Jenny. Life was a little too good, and it sometimes kept her awake at night. It had been two years since the mental health team had given her the all clear—two years since she found out that the man who had brought her up—who had been there at her birth—was not actually her biological father. They had worked through it but the scars remained. Now this. A man she loved, a beautiful cottage surrounded by several miles of farmland, and a future father-in-law with enough money to ensure she didn’t have to stack supermarket shelves at night to fund he
r studies—a man who had presented her with a car on her birthday.
***
Jennifer Adams sailed through her driving test—theory and practical—with flying colours. It was something of a blessing, as she didn’t want to throw a whole lot of Gordon’s cash at the one-man driving school she’d employed nine months earlier. Tony Mee was a well-respected instructor but was, according to Jenny, a major creep. He was in his late-forties and obviously lived on his own because no woman would allow her man to climb into a car with white stains around the crotch of his trousers, a box of paper tissues on the dashboard and a Pass with Mee sign on the roof.
Jake was glad to see the back of Tony as well. He’d only met the guy briefly—just a few words exchanged on the doorstep— but Tony had commented what a lovely young woman Jenny was. Jake had made a light-hearted remark suggesting Tony should keep his hands to himself or he’d be wearing the steering wheel. The atmosphere in the car was decidedly frosty after that, but it suited Jenny just fine, as Tony seemed anxious to get her through the test and out of his car while he still had his own teeth.
Jake enjoyed playing the Alpha male, and even Jenny’s father thought he could be a little too protective. But Rob Adams’s concerns were dispelled when his future son-in-law had gone to the rescue of a young woman on a night out several months before.
It had just been a pub meal at The Keys, but an argument had broken out on the next table. The guy insisted he’d asked for skinny fries and not the thick cut chips the waitress had served. It should have been nothing, but the bloke was making a big scene. Rob could see that Jake was becoming agitated as his face reddened—always a warning sign. The woman told her bloke to let it go—a perfectly reasonable request—but the prick had lost it and slapped the woman hard across the face.
