The Girl With Nine Lives, The Girl Who Bit Back, The Girl With Ten Claws 3 Book Boxset (The Adventures of Benedict and Blackwell Series)

by E. Earle

  Now.

  I never asked what Brynn could bring to the table. I would have liked to have heard his suggestions, but I was planning on talking to him at some point. My skin prickled, knowing that he was still watching me. Forcing my body to stop moving uncomfortably, I pasted a fake confident smile on my face.

  The surveyor came the next day and walked around with me and Donny, talking to us about what needed to be done. It was pretty much the same that the last guy had quoted us, and afterwards I was feeling thoroughly depressed. But I liked being proactive and wrote up a news story for the local paper, a Christian aid request for the church paper, which Donny’s girlfriend could tweak, and I managed to get a load of flyers made with Jessica, asking for donations and supplies.

  Jack’s dad was a painter and decorator so there were tubs of half used paint for projects that they didn’t need anymore.

  I raised my eyebrows at the assortment of colours as the team sat in the front bar. We had shut early that day- the only customers being two couples from Spain who had come for a surfing holiday. I hadn’t seen Brynn at all. I don’t know what he had been doing, and I was yet to see his contribution towards the place.

  He was constantly outside on the beach.

  “Is there something you reckon you can do with this?” I asked Jessica dubiously.

  She was smiling, flushed with excitement and nervousness. “Oh yes- I can pretty much make any colour out of this lot.”

  “What you gonna do?” I asked her curiously, brushing the sand from my knees.

  Her smile dropped. “What do you want done?”

  I shrugged. “Anything,” I said. I looked around at the sea shells stuck onto the wall and the old mural of people surfing. “It looks a bit like a hippie shack at the moment,” I mused. “Let’s not do anything by half-baked measures, yeah? Let’s go all out.”

  “What? Really?”

  “Yep,” I said, standing up. Ben had found a spot of sunshine on the floor and had stretched himself out with a feline grin on his face. “If you want to paint a mermaid on the wall with dreadlocks and a tambourine- you go for it.”

  I realised then that this wasn’t just my home. I shook the thought away angrily as quickly as it had come. It wasn’t my home, I corrected myself. But it was for these people. They lived and worked here. I had to put the effort in and at least try to make this work.

  I left her to it before she could say anything else. I had to sit down with Charlotte. Charlotte had suggested doing a Twitter and Facebook page for Craggys. We agreed that promotion was important to get more business. I left her with instructions to set us up the social sites as well as a normal website and walked outside to catch a breath.

  Donny was down at the church pinning up the rest of the flyers we had made about donations with his girlfriend, who I hadn’t met yet but had spoken on the phone with. She had sounded very enthusiastic about getting a story sorted. I’m not sure whether she was happy that I had already prepared something for the church news, but I assured her she could take from it and even rewrite it if she wished.

  The next morning, I missed Brynn again. He was out with the Spanish couples for the morning surf with Jack.

  Craggys had four floors and a basement. There were four bedrooms on each of the top two floors, and I was surprised to learn that Jack was living in a caravan down the road from the surfer shack. Jessica and Charlotte shared the biggest room in the attic, which left a room for me and a room for Brynn. Donny lived in a small outbuilding on the property and showed me around.

  There were three small outbuildings at the side of Craggys, which stored junk basically. Old tables and chairs, broken surfboards, other surfing equipment, smelly wetsuits and two old fridges. I sighed as Donny locked the doors. There was potential, so much potential. But money was needed.

  Donny’s small outbuilding was surprisingly cosy. A small electric heater was in the corner of the room and in the other corner was a small makeshift gas stove. It didn’t look particularly safe, but that was for another discussion. There was also an outside toilet, which Donny informed me suited him just fine. I thanked him for the excess of information and admired his photograph covered walls.

  “These are amazing,” I breathed, skimming my hands over the black and white pictures of people surfing.

  “They sure are,” he said, puffing his pipe behind me. “Them’s all Brynn’s work.”

  I turned around in surprise. “Brynn’s a photographer?”

  Donny grinned at my surprise. “Yeah,” he said, pulling his pipe from his mouth so his smile could widen, exposing two gold teeth. “He’s always done it.” He turned back to the pictures sadly. “Great stuff as well. Real talented. Don’t listen to me though,” he huffed, shoving the pipe back into its home, the wood clacking between his teeth. “This stuff should be in a gallery.”

  “Yeah…” I breathed, putting my hands into my pockets. It was cold today. I had wondered about asking Jack to take me for a surfing session- I had only been once (when I was very drunk with friends) and although I had clung onto the board whilst I caught a wave, I didn’t figure it counted.

  I sighed. No, there was no time. There was too much to do and I couldn’t go about wasting hours getting wet and slippery on a board.

  The next week, I dedicated in doing as much as I could do make Craggys look presentable. A plasterer had seen our story in the church news and donated some of his time to do up the worst of the rooms with two of his sons.

  I was so grateful and was running around making bacon batches and tea for them, helping when I could, washing what they wanted and thanking them to the point of becoming annoying.

  “Look,” John (the plasterer) said, turning from his ladder, “I’m surprised this place didn’t ask for help sooner. The guys who owned it weren’t local and I don’t think they took too kindly to Brynn’s phone calls about improvements. I’m just glad you want the place to live again.”

  I stared at him stunned at his monologue then frowned. “How do you know that Brynn phoned?”

  He laughed and stepped off the ladder. “He’s my nephew,” he said, wiping sweat from his face. I noticed then that he had the same colouring, tanned skin, dark hair (although slightly peppered with age) and dark eyes. “He comes over on a Sunday for dinner sometimes. Helps out on the odd job now and again if he’s got time.” He picked up a bucket and swished the mixture around with a stick. “Good bloke as well. He’ll look after you love.” He threw a wink at me then that made me blush. I mumbled some excuse and decided to go upstairs.

  What rooms didn’t need plastering, we painted. Whatever wood that was scratched, we repainted and varnished. The beds we had in were old but still serviceable. The linen- was not. I ordered new bedcovers for all of the bedrooms, new duvets and new curtains, all neutral tones. We would jazz up the rooms later with coloured throws.

  Ben was loving the holiday. He constantly sunbathed and gorged himself on bacon, to the point where I forbade the staff to feed him anymore. He was getting chunky, and we couldn’t be having that. He refused to talk to me for the rest of the day when he heard about his bacon ban, but a trip to the local shops to get him a new catnip toy and he was all mine again.

  Chapter Three

  It was a Sunday when I finally got to speak to Brynn, and it wasn’t under the best circumstances.

  It was windy outside, the sky grey and the air warm. This was my favourite kind of weather- the time where I could smell the thunder approaching.

  “Mind if I go for a swim?” I asked Ben.

  “Meh.” He twitched his tail, content in favourite spot by the window. We had turned Craggys around over the past week or so. There was still some way to go, but the website had taken in a few more bookings that week, and I could finally look forward to paying off the bills. Locals were coming in at night, enjoying the views and the new later hours- and I think they came to see Ben as well.

  Ben was the charmer of the pub, available for anyone to stroke and fuss over.
There had been a sign chalked up, however of, “Do not feed the cat- he is on a diet.”

  I was glad that Ben couldn’t read.

  “Do you want to come?” I asked.

  He yawned and flipped himself over to stretch, exposing his belly. “It’s going to rain,” he meowed.

  I grinned. “Stay here if you like,” I checked my watch. 11am. I could go for a swim and be back to cook lunch. Jack and Jessica were behind the bar. It was Charlotte’s day off and Donny was off on a date. Brynn was nowhere to be seen, as usual- but then I remembered about what his uncle said about sometimes eating at theirs on a Sunday.

  Ben meowed his “ok,” and I was grabbing my towel before he had found a new position to lounge in.

  I needed to swim off some aggression today. I hesitated as I saw a board leaning against the side of one of the outbuildings. I recognised it as Jack’s and jumped back into the bar.

  “Hey, Jack?” I shouted.

  “Yeah?” He was flirting with Jessica and it made me smile. She snapped up to attention as soon as she saw me and started to pretend to tidy up.

  “Is that your board outside?”

  “Yeah?” He wasn’t even looking at me, but ogling at her low cut top. He winked at her and she giggled.

  “Can I use it?”

  “Yeah, yeah, yeah,” he said, waving off my question, consumed in the barmaid next to him. I wondered if they were dating or if he was just trying to get lucky. “You surfed before?”

  I hesitated, trying to remember the drunken experience years ago. “…Um…” I said slowly.

  “Go for it.”

  I raised my eyebrows as my response went completely over his head and shrugged. The board was mine.

  Just then the phone rang, snapping the romance short between the two.

  “Hello, Craggys here, how may I help you?” I watched the expression change from flirty, to professional to worry on Jack’s face. “It’s a man wanting to speak to you,” he said, frowning.

  I huffed. “Can’t you just say I’m out?” I hissed.

  Jack relayed the message and then shook his head. “It sounds urgent,” he said, offering me the phone.

  I rolled my eyes and took it. “Hello?”

  “Ellie- listen.” Calloway’s voice was severe on the other side of the phone making my heart skip a beat. I hadn’t heard from him since Nuneaton. “Now, I want you to sit down and be calm.”

  “What? What are you on about?”

  “Are you sitting down?”

  “Calloway, this isn’t funny,” I said, my voice changing even to my ears. “What’s going on?”

  A pause.

  “Don’t put on the news, Ellie, just listen-”

  “Put the news on,” I snapped at Jessica. “Quickly.”

  “Rino’s prison van was apprehended by two masked men earlier on,” Calloway explained. “Rino escaped. We’re looking for him now-”

  He carried on talking but I wasn’t listening. I snatched the remote from Jessica’s fumbling fingers and started going through the news channels.

  Then I found it.

  A woman reporter was sitting at a desk, her red suit bright and glaring against the bright lights.

  “…At nine fifteen this morning…”

  My heart stopped. Suddenly I couldn’t see anymore. Everything was blurred, and I was back in Warwickshire, in that barn in Stratford, staring at the lighter in Rino’s hand as he threatened to set alight my friend.

  “Two masked men, unknown to the area held the prison van at gunpoint in Warwickshire…”

  His smile burnt in my mind, blood blinking from his lip from where I had hit him.

  “Thought to have been sentenced for murder, kidnap, attempted murder, fraud and drug trafficking and a long list of other offences dating back from 1999….”

  I had thrown myself at him, screaming in the face of evil.

  “…Do not approach this man…”

  The sound of a gun going off threatening to drown my senses as we wrestled on the ground, his hands around my throat. I couldn’t breathe. Calloway running in and Emily opening her eyes at me. “You’ve got red all on you…” she had said.

  I ran out of the building, the news reporter’s quiet words screaming behind me. “…Thought to be highly dangerous.”

  Panic froze my limbs into a forever moving running machine. I felt as though I was flying over rocks, and for moment I was. My legs stung when I picked myself back up but I carried on running. My lungs opened and closed, desperate for air, the fire burning within them doing nothing to stop my haste to escape.

  Too much, too much.

  I ran along the cliff’s edge, getting nowhere fast. I looked down at the thrashing black waters below me. I wanted to be enveloped, encased and hidden from sight. I took a breath and didn’t even have to think about it.

  Fuck it.

  I jumped.

  The air tore through my hair but it didn’t last long. The burning sensation in my lungs was frozen as soon as ice hit my skin. Sight was stolen, light was sucked away, and I was dragged down.

  My body twisted in the water, the current bending my limbs where it wanted me to go. Warmth was stolen from my blood as I was dragged further down and I kicked out. Terror came in the form of Rino’s face and all I wanted to do was bury myself in the sand.

  He had escaped.

  It didn’t matter that I was underwater; I don’t think I could have breathed even if I wanted to. This wasn’t supposed to happen. I couldn’t deal with this. Not this. The gunshot wound in my side started to burn and I kicked out again.

  Too much had happened. Things weren’t supposed to go this way. Rino was supposed to be safely behind bars. He was the bad guy.

  My will cracked and I bent over double, terrified suddenly of living and dying at the same time.

  My ears were filled with the roaring of the waves above me and suddenly my head broke the surface. Light blinded me from the day and the clouds growled at me in anger. It wasn’t to last long as another wave broke down on top of me, shoving me down into the dark waters again.

  I spluttered and kicked out, my fingertips just touching the foam of the next wave.

  I was reminded suddenly of the time I nearly drowned when I was a child. A wave had crashed down on me and I couldn’t get up. Sand was clenched in my fingers as an impossible weight bore down on my back. I tried and tried to get up, but I couldn’t. I had accepted death as a child there and then, the decision simple, sad and fruitless.

  But then I had stood, and the relief worked its magic on my body like the oxygen did in my lungs.

  But this sensation I was feeling now wasn’t the calm acceptance. It was full of anger and hurt. I couldn’t stand up this time.

  I thought of my mother.

  And Ben.

  I didn’t fight when another wave came down. I didn’t fight when water forced its way into my throat. I didn’t fight when warmth encased my weight and suddenly dragged me up.

  Lights flew this way and that as soft noises drowned out the roar of the ocean around me. I couldn’t feel my limbs anymore and for some reason, it was nice.

  “Ellie!”

  It was my favourite dream. I was curled up at the bottom of the sea, sleeping. Strange to sleep in dreams, right? Not like this. I was safe, protected in darkness. Was this how mermaids slept?

  I had always wanted to be a mermaid when I was younger. I used to have discussion with my family about becoming one, researching as much as I could. I ordered books about mermaids constantly. Sometimes I remembered what it felt like to believe in something so much, and I yearned for that feeling again. We would walk around the seaside shops and I would go into every book shop, searching for what I could. I had been distracted momentarily by the Jinny horse book series, and a brand new obsession took place.

  My lungs were filling with warmth and I took a breath. Strange to breath under water.

  Kayleigh and I had gone with another girl with her parents to a beach. The gir
l had promised me that there was a key buried beneath the sand that would make me a mermaid. I dug all over the place as they paddled in the sea, desperate to find it. I never did.

  “Ellie!”

  I used to put salt into my baths like the mermaid out of Splash, crossing my legs into a tail shape. My mother for my birthday had made me a mermaid costume. I had never felt more beautiful.

  The warmth was spreading, and with it came the pain. I curled up tighter in my dream, feeling myself lose control of it.

  “Ellie! Can you hear me? Wake up, damn it!”

  Reality came flooding back in one painful jolt when I opened my eyes.

  Brynn was staring at me, worried face pale and dripping water down on me. My lips felt warm.

  “Ellie!”

  I took a breath, choked and started coughing up water. Brynn rolled me over quickly to puke out the rest of the seven seas, rubbing my back.

  He made soothing noises, hushing my sudden tears and wrapping his warm arms around my shoulders. Paws patted at my face suddenly and my tears doubled. Ben meowed at me, breathing hot cat breath onto my skin.

  “Oh God…” I sobbed. “Oh God!”

  Brynn hushed me, and suddenly he was standing and I was in his arms, curled up like a child, silently crying.

  “Come on, cat,” he said to Ben. “Let’s get her out of here.”

  Brynn put me in a truck when we got to the top of the hill. I was shaking violently, from shock or cold, I didn’t know. Ben was sitting on my lap, his fur getting soaked. He didn’t care, and I loved him even more from it.

  “Where are we going?” I mumbled through chattering teeth. “Craggys?”

  Brynn shook his head and belted me in, turning on the hot air in the car. I shivered as the cold hit me, praying it would get warm soon.

  “We can’t go back there,” he said grimly. “Not when you’re like this. What the hell do you think you were doing? You could have killed yourself!”

  I buried my face in my hands, knowing he was right. I couldn’t go back there in this state. I couldn’t let them know why I was upset. Oh God, had I really jumped off that cliff? It hadn’t looked that high when I first jumped…