by Holly Seddon
‘Nothing. Nothing!’
The man taps his foot on the floor and then sits down heavily on the bed. The photos slide towards his thick thighs.
‘Pretty girl,’ the man says, fingering one of the earliest photographs. He moves his big hand across to the sheaf of papers, then hands it over. Greg has to hold it with both hands; it’s a thick, floppy pile. As encouraged, Greg leafs through, frowning. Emails. Lots of emails, almost all from Marianne. Some from a former pupil.
‘What does your wife know?’ the man asks again in a flatter tone.
‘Nothing! I’ve not told anyone, I promise.’
‘You must realise how naive you sound, Greg. You can’t just surgically remove yourself from our business without any consequences.’ His voice is deep and paternal. He almost sounds reasonable.
‘But I’ve not told anyone, I’ve not said—’
‘You can’t expect me to believe that you’ve not told your wife where you go every month and what you do.’ The man laughs. ‘You’re trying to tell me that you don’t engage in pillow talk with this pretty girl?’ He stares at the picture a beat too long.
Greg sags, leaning on the wall. ‘We’re not … we’re not getting on so well at the moment. We’re barely speaking. About anything. I promise.’
The man laughs, gesturing to the pile of emails. ‘I’m not surprised after reading all that. Go on, have a look.’
‘I don’t want to.’
‘Fucking look,’ the man growls. The words swim as Greg tries to take it all in.
‘How did you get these? Did you hack my, her, Jesus …’ Greg trails off, picks up a recent email. His wife complaining about his anger, his blank expression, his lack of intimacy. Not to her friends, no, to her teenage suitor.
So many emails to him over the years. About feelings and thoughts and dreams. Bile surges up in his throat and Greg runs into the bathroom to throw up.
‘Why are you covering for her?’ the man calls after him. ‘She’s not loyal to you.’
Greg hangs over the toilet, exhausted and empty. Acid gurgles in his throat. He hears the heavy footsteps behind him but doesn’t move.
‘We can’t have any leaks, you understand?’
‘I understand,’ Greg coughs.
‘If you’ve told her, if you’ve told anyone, we’ll kill you and we’ll kill them. It’s that simple.’
*
Greg walks back to the station, refusing the lift. He shouldn’t have come here today, but if he hadn’t … He thinks of the man’s threats. At least now he knows what he’s up against. A fucking rock and a hard place, that’s what.
On the train, he runs through his options. There are none. Anywhere he runs, he takes danger with him. These people know everything about him, every address he would ever go to. There’s no escape, no way around this. He just has to keep moving forward, covering all the bases and hoping for the best.
At home, Marianne and Greg eat in silence. She stares at him, expectantly, but doesn’t try to start a conversation. They eat scalding lasagne that he made on autopilot. The thick red sauce turns his stomach. She goes to bed first, taking her laptop with her and mumbling a goodnight.
Will she email her old pupil?
My husband doesn’t understand me, not like you do. How could she? He’s barely old enough to have his own email address! Some jumped-up little shit who struggled at school. Now he’s her confidante?! Thank fuck Greg didn’t open up about all this, she’d have got them both killed with her big mouth. Her cheating heart.
‘We can’t have any leaks, you understand?’ the man had said.
‘I haven’t told a soul,’ Greg had whispered. ‘Surely you can see that from these emails?’
But does that mean he’s safe so long as he stays quiet? How easily that man had talked of killing. How easily they’d got rid of Lina. And god knows who else. That first doctor, what was he called?
Henry. Henry something. There’s no way to find him now, he doesn’t know his full name and can barely picture his face. Did he meet an end when he tried to escape?
Greg waits until he’s sure Marianne isn’t coming back out. Then he opens his laptop and contacts the one person he knows would never break his confidence. The one person whose job it is to keep secrets, no matter what. Jenna.
Samantha
Thursday, 10 September 2020
This will be the first job for which I’m paid and I’m surprised by how ready for it I am. Hungry, almost. It’s been weeks since I used my mind, months of working out at home to stay strong and testing myself with bogus little tasks. Following people to keep my hand in, relearning the tube map, the road network, the overground off by heart. Preparation is everything.
For the next year, I will perform the tasks, earn my money and keep myself hidden. And I will be here, ready, whenever Joe is ready to talk. And at the end of twelve months, if I do things right, I will have the money and means to rebuild my life and hope upon hope that it can include my son.
For now, and for the next twenty-four hours, I’m to follow the target. I’m to note everybody he speaks to – and if I’m able, I need to note what is discussed – and then I need to close the case. It must look like an accident, the details are up to me.
Right now, he’s standing on the concourse at Euston station, holding a takeaway coffee that trembles in his hands. He stares at the arrivals board, as if willing it to change.
*
I follow them through Euston Square Gardens but they don’t notice me. Why would they? I smile at a man walking a squat little dachshund, its comical legs at odds with its serious face. When they sit down on a park bench, I keep walking. I catch up to the dachshund and its owner and ask a few questions about the breed, the dog’s name, his personality. I continue to smile after him as I walk back to the adjacent bench and take in every word that Gregory Darrow is saying.
On his lap is a notepad and he’s urgently scribbling in it, copying down the names of everyone who needs to be warned.
‘But what’s this about, Greg?’ she’s saying. ‘I came all the way down here and you’re not telling me anything.’
‘I can’t tell you. You’ll be at risk if I tell you.’
‘At risk from who?’
He doesn’t answer and she falls into an angry silence, looking away from him as he writes.
‘Please,’ he says, ‘you’re the only person I can trust.’
She takes the piece of paper cautiously.
‘Names,’ he says. ‘If anything happens to me, I need you to warn these people that they’ll be next. Tell them to go into hiding or run or … I don’t know, just tell them. Please?’
‘I guess, I mean …’
‘Please, Jenna.’ He rubs his eyes, his temples. ‘The most important name on there is Marianne.’
‘Your wife? Why would your wife—’
‘I’ve put her in danger. I hope to fuck I haven’t put you in danger too …’ He looks around so I turn my face up to the late summer sun and smile a little. He doesn’t pay me any attention.
‘If the worst happens, I have to protect Marianne. I have to warn the others too, but …’ It’s an awkward pause and I wonder what the history is of these two. ‘She’s the most important thing,’ he says, finally.
Greg
Friday, 11 September 2020
He watches as Marianne applies her make-up, the same sweeps and circles she’s long used. Twenties experimentation making way for thirties efficiency.
Next she scoops her hair into a bun, cursing the straggling curls. Those deft hands, whisking through all that hair and taking care of it. She glares into the bathroom mirror, plucking a hair from her temple, frowning. ‘Another grey,’ she mutters.
‘Are you waiting to use the loo?’ she asks, looking at Greg in the mirror.
He shakes his head. ‘Just watching you,’ he says softly and she smiles, then frowns as she finds another grey hair.
He wants to tell her she’s the only person he ever wanted
to grow old with. He wants to see her with her hair full of grey, to be old bones together. At the same time he wants to shake her until she screams. How could she open herself like that, to a young lad no less? Had they met in person? Kissed? Touched?
Perhaps they should sell up and move far away from all this. From her former pupil, now kicking his heels at the university she helped him get into. And away from the Bluebell. The girls. Lina.
They really could go to Italy. Why wait until they’re old? He’ll give his notice in today; Eloise will probably be relieved. She’s started to refer to him as a loose cannon, has pulled him in for extra one-to-ones every week, staring at him through red-rimmed eyes as if she’s not sure who he is anymore.
And it’s true, he’s not been himself. At work or at home. No wonder Marianne sought validation elsewhere. This is all on him. And only he can fix it. And if he can’t, at least he can trust Jenna to warn the others. But that’s just panic talking.
Yes, he’ll definitely give in his notice today and tell Marianne tonight. Tell her everything. No. Tell her nothing. She’s safer that way.
Marianne leaves before him, calling goodbye as the door snaps shut.
‘I love you!’ he calls, but he hears the street door slam.
*
He makes a mug of tea and tidies away last night’s dishes – reheated lasagne that stuck in his throat. He’s barely slept in so long that every movement is sluggish and painful. He opens his laptop and gets on with it. Deleting his secret email account and every message ever sent about this. The girls have more reason than him to stay quiet – it’s not like they’ll breeze into a police station and talk. And the clients are just as culpable, knowingly taking black market organs. No, they’ll want to keep this part of their lives as wrapped as their scars. Focus on the new life they’ve been given.
That’s what he should do too. The life he should have treasured more all along.
He has a quick look at the usual sites, combing them for what, he’s not sure. Anything that could link him to the Bluebell. Anything that could pull him back in now he’s prepared to do whatever it takes to get out.
A new post catches his eye on that shitty forum that led him into this whole mess.
ASSASSIN SUPERMARKET HACKED, it says. He reads on to the main body of the post.
Usual hoax caveats but apparently someone’s hacked the database of the Assassin Supermarket and you can search for anyone with a price on their head.
Worth checking to see if any of the trafficking bosses are on the list, or anyone else that you’re looking into. Unlikely that any of us will have gained that kind of attention but advise you check anyway.
Here’s the link.
He’s not heard of the site but it could be an offshoot of the Hacker Supermarket – the same people who are threatening his life. He shudders. It would make sense – assassinations are big business. Greg thinks of how easily, how coolly that big blond man had threatened to kill Greg and anyone he told. No wonder he could make that threat if he had the staff readily available.
Either way, it’s too similar to ignore. If they’ve been hacked too, his original messages, his request to find missing girls would be traceable. Fuck.
Greg clicks through but there’s no mention of the Hacker stuff. In fact, it’s so low rent that it looks like a hoax. Not worth the risk of putting in his name. He wonders how many people have fallen for this and have now handed over their data to these devious hands.
Shit. He’s running late. He’ll have to finish deleting everything else tonight. He slips on their shared hoodie, one that used to be his but has been wrapped around his wife more often. The inside of it smells distantly of shower gel and her body. Not sweat as such, more … her warmth. He smells the traces of her perfume on the cuffs.
He walks down the stairs, grabbing his bike on the way, something like gratitude starting to simmer under the fear. Because if he still has her, Greg has everything he needs. As the door closes on their little flat, a burst of September sun warms his face. He feels, for the first time in months, like a lucky man.
PART THREE:
Now
Marianne
Tuesday, 14 September 2021
In the Bluebell’s kitchen, the woman stares back at Marianne through the crack in the cold-room door. Her well-lined eyes search Marianne’s face and her mouth twitches. Less a smile than a rip in her face.
‘Hello, there,’ the woman says. She slides the knife into her back pocket, out of harm’s way, but she doesn’t move away. She’s tall, very tall, with broad shoulders. The dim kitchen light behind her blends into her grey silhouette so she fills the space entirely.
Fight, flight or freeze. It’s a split-second reaction. Not even a decision, it’s more lizard-brained than that. Marianne’s body has curled into a primitive ball before her brain has had a chance to catch up. The useless corkscrew clatters to the ground and Marianne’s heartbeat roars in her ears. A great monstrous sound, swallowing her up from the inside.
So this is how it ends.
Sam
She’s tiny, this cowering woman. Of course she reminds me of Cristina. Every small girl with a tough expression does. It ebbs and flows; sometimes days go by, sometimes weeks. I wonder if I’ll ever fully stop thinking of her. Of how she covered her mouth when she smiled, awkward about her overlapping teeth. Of how she always offered me her food, always held my hand when I cried. The two of us, huddled under the covers, trying to decipher the noises coming from the rest of the house.
I’ve seen Marianne Heywood many times but never this close up. I’m near enough to smell her. She has a musky, almost masculine smell – sandalwood and oranges. But creeping underneath it is the unique salty ammonia I know so well. Something like the sea at night. The smell of fear.
This close up, Marianne Heywood is insect-like in her skinny black trousers and grey V-neck T-shirt. Her navy unzipped hoodie dwarfs her, fanning over her like the shiny blue-black of a beetle’s wings.
The sleeves are rolled over several times, more security blanket than garment.
Behind her, David Ross stands to attention. A museum exhibit, a grim waxwork. His expression has fallen since I left him here, or maybe I just imagined him wearing that oafish smirk right to the end. He talked about his kids, his sons, how they needed him. ‘When did you last see your children?’ I’d asked, cocking my head to the side. His faltering reply told me everything.
I do feel for Marianne; it must have been a shock seeing him like this. This is probably one of the better bodies to find. Preserved in the cold with no decomposing sludge, no sour stink. A mannequin made flesh. But it’s still going to take a toll. People have become accustomed to separation from the dead. In their final moments, bodies are cared for by a select few, wrapped and cleaned, then presented, ready for a neat disposal. Flowers. Songs. Embalming. Real death no longer touches us. No wonder people feel immortal. Until they don’t.
It wasn’t that way for me. I had seen death as a raw, gaping wound, a black hole swallowing everything around it. My mother and then one of the men who killed her. Not long after that, it was Cristina. And that was before I started this work and became its architect.
‘Hello, there,’ I say, and I open the door a few more inches. She looks up at me and then scrunches her eyes tightly shut, as if I’m a monster. She is surrounded by monstrosity, it’s true, but then aren’t we all?
I don’t like seeing my previous work. My chest aches with something akin to claustrophobia. On the cold floor in front of me, Marianne coils tighter, her body letting out a whimper that she’s too slow to catch.
I look at her and then back at David Ross. I wonder if Marianne even had time to notice his eye; how the scar looks so shiny, magnified by the crystals of ice decorating his skin.
Not so long ago, I wouldn’t have considered myself capable of staring down a dead man like this. But then I wouldn’t have considered myself capable of so many things. A female trait, I almost laugh. But I don�
�t think this is what women’s magazines mean when they talk of empowerment and leaning in.
‘It’s OK,’ I say to Marianne. Her head is tucked into her knees like a child. From her hands, a corkscrew tumbles to the floor. The noise is deadened by the cold room so it seems as useless as a film prop.
I pull the door open a little wider. There’s no risk of her running, I doubt she could even walk on those trembling legs. She just curls up tighter, her spine bending almost to a snap. A desire to comfort her stirs in me and I crush it. I have other business with Marianne.
I feel it before I hear it. A tiny flutter in my pocket. Then that ringtone I know so well, once so familiar: ‘The Final Countdown’. It’s just a little joke, just for me and Joe. Joe. I snatch the phone out of my pocket so fast I nearly drop it. One bar of reception. Over a year of ignoring me. And now he calls.
I have to answer.
Marianne
Marianne’s spine shakes so violently she imagines its individual knots shaking loose and scattering across the floor like marbles. Anything is better than this gaping mouth of anticipation, the fear so choking she can barely breathe through it.
Just do it.
Just kill me.
Just put me out of my misery.
Is this how Greg felt, as he saw those tyres coming towards him? Time has slowed to a deadly crawl … was it the same for him? The loneliness of this moment swallows her whole and she cries out before she can stop herself. The fear is so acute that she’s ready to die just to escape it. But still she waits, curling, burning with anticipation. And then, just outside of the silence of this cold coffin, Marianne hears a song, a ringtone, tinny and muffled in the woman’s pocket.
It’s familiar and nostalgic, something they played at their wedding, she’s sure, but Marianne is too churned up to name it, much less make sense of it. By the time she dares look up, the woman has gone.
