The Girl on Shattered Rock: A gripping suspense thriller

by Matt Hilton

  ‘Yeah, we’ve got that covered.’ He indicated a sealed pocket on his vest. ‘Satellite phone. Ordinary mobiles don’t work out here.’

  Leah nodded in thought. Should she ask to borrow the sat-phone for a quick call to McBride? If she did, it would only mean giving in to irrational fear. After all, nothing bad had happened, nothing that would require an emergency evacuation from Shattered Rock. She was allowing her imagination to populate the island with a menace that wasn’t really there. Then she recalled the falling rock and how a shape had ducked out of sight. ‘Do you know if any other people visit the island like this?’

  ‘I’ve never seen anyone,’ Cooper said. ‘But I’m rarely here, so couldn’t really say. Why?’

  Leah shook her head, brushing away his question. ‘No reason,’ she lied. ‘I just wondered if I should demand my money back from McBride.’ She tempered her next remark with laughter. ‘I came here on the promise of privacy, there doesn’t seem to be much of it going around.’

  Cooper’s smile flickered again, unsure if she was joking or not. ‘Like I said, I promise we won’t disturb you, and I’ll make sure the gang behave themselves.’ He gave a thumb’s up to the guy he’d introduced as Dom, who winked in response. Dom’s gaze drifted to Leah, and he winked again, but this time slower and more calculated. His smile turned up one corner of his mouth, and Leah shivered slightly at the way she felt under his scrutiny. But in the next second Dom had turned away, calling out to the others to get unpacked.

  Leah looked over the youngsters in the group again, saw the relief on their faces, and understood allowing them to rest was the right thing. She moved towards the steps.

  ‘Hey, uh, Leah?’

  She turned and Cooper pushed his hair back from his eyes. He looked slightly flustered. ‘I, uh, just wanted to say thanks. I appreciate you allowing us to stay.’ He fumbled over his next words. ‘If you change your mind well, ehm, the invitation still stands to join us for lunch.’

  Leah didn’t reply. Her arms were crossed over her chest again, but this time she wasn’t as defensive. She nodded gently, but more to herself than Cooper, then headed up the steps. She suspected Cooper was watching her, and couldn’t help glancing back. Their gazes met and held for the briefest of moments. It was enough to tell he liked what he was looking at. Leah suddenly felt warmer than she had since coming out of the woods onto the cliff top.

  14

  Leah hit the back key on her computer, frowning as the cursor danced in retreat, obliterating the words she’d typed since sitting at the table in the kitchen. She’d written an introduction featuring the romantic lead in her next novel. He was a tall guy with shaggy brown hair, chocolate eyes and a slightly off-center nose, called Cooper Roberts. Now he was relegated to the obscurity of a blank screen again. She’d no right creating a fictional version of the man she’d just met, based on a few minutes’ awkward conversation. She knew nothing about Rob other than that he was a reckless team leader who’d brought out a group of teenagers unprepared for the changing sea conditions. Mind you, he was a good-looking guy, and his shy affectation and polite manners appealed to her in a way Pete’s self-centeredness didn’t. In the novels she read, the romantic leads were often attracted to each other through a chance meeting where a spark of interest was ignited, before it smouldered and then flared into hot passion. She had to admit that in those fleeting final glances as she’d walked away from him, something had jumped between her and Cooper. Was it a spark of mutual interest? Obviously it had been on her part, otherwise she wouldn’t have immediately returned to the cabin and written out a description of the man she’d just met. She told herself it was her writer’s interest that had been kick-started by the encounter. She’d just got rid of one man; she certainly wasn’t in the market for another. Not yet. Though she had to admit — if she were looking — then the handsome hunk was someone who’d definitely catch her eye.

  She tapped at the keys, her fingers moving fluidly, and letters formed a broken string on the screen. This time Cooper Roberts was emerging from the choppy tide, and he wasn’t clad in his weatherproof suit and life vest, he wore only trunks and the sun glistened on the moisture trickling down his sculpted chest. Leah nipped her bottom lip between her teeth, reading back the words, feeling warm and fuzzy. She coughed, and again hit the back key. Then sat looking at the blank screen.

  ‘Give over, Leah,’ she finally growled in admonishment, ‘instead of acting like a love-sick schoolgirl.’

  She stood, looked around the cabin, unsure what for and then went to fetch her coat from where she’d dumped it in her room. As she passed the cupboard housing the radio, she caught something unusual out of the corner of her eye that didn’t immediately register. Two more steps and she paused. She looked back to where the cable protruded from the side of the cupboard. The plug and a foot of flex were lying loose on the floor, though the switch was still in the “on” position. Didn’t she plug the damn thing in earlier? Yes. She remembered clearly, when discovering that the radio charger wasn’t working. She’d plugged the flex into the wall socket and checked that the LED light was glowing.

  ‘What’s going on around here?’ she asked aloud.

  She picked up the plug on its flex, checked it and then reinserted it in the socket. She jiggled the plug and though not exactly a snug fit, it didn’t seem in danger of falling out by itself. She gave the plug an extra nudge, then flicked the switch off and on. She opened the cupboard, and the dull red light glowed satisfactorily on the charging unit. She closed the cupboard, checking that the act of opening and closing the doors hadn’t pulled loose the plug. It was fine. Earlier she’d joked that the cabin had a resident poltergeist, now she wondered if she shouldn’t laugh. No, there had to be a logical explanation for the plug coming loose. Maybe there were rodents in the cabin, and one of them had nibbled at the flex, pulling it free from the socket. Yeah, and maybe a rat was responsible for moving and then making off with the bracelet. And if she believed that then she was even stupider than she already felt at entertaining the notion.

  Not for the first time, she considered that someone could have sneaked inside the cabin, and had deliberately unplugged the charging unit. But who was it, and more importantly, for what purpose? Until Rob Cooper and his friends turned up the island was supposedly deserted, but of that she now couldn’t be sure. McBride had assured her she would be the island’s sole inhabitant, but how could he be positive? He wasn’t aware that Cooper and his group had put ashore. Had somebody else landed on Shattered Rock without his knowledge, and been the one responsible for the odd occurrences she’d experienced? Now she thought about it, it maybe wasn’t a swooping bird whose shadow had flitted past when she was showering. Someone could have been spying on her through the window. Suddenly the thought of being the target of a stranger’s lecherous gaze made her feel dirty. She’d be damned if she was going to shower again until she could be certain she wasn’t observed.

  She finally grabbed her coat from her room and pulled into it, went outside and walked around the cabin. The bathroom window was small, and because the ground outside was lower than the cabin floor, was high up. But if Leah stood on tiptoes she could crane and see inside the bathroom, with a direct view of the shower cubicle. Anyone taller than her would have had an easier time of spying on her. But had there been someone there, or was she just letting her imagination run havoc? She checked around, and thought that she could spot depressions in the soil near the cabin wall, but wasn’t confident they were footprints. In the grass that grew nearby there were other impressions where somebody had walked, some of the grass crushed underfoot, but for all she knew they were her prints from when she’d come and gone on her trek into the woods. Whatever, she’d ensure she kept the roller shutter down in the bathroom from now on, and the bolt thrown on the cabin door. Apparently locking the door with only the key wasn’t enough, because someone had to have been inside, otherwise who had moved the bracelet and unplugged the battery charger if it weren�
�t her? Maybe her memory was full of holes, but it wasn’t an idea she could be flippant about. Her grandmother, and her mum, had both suffered early on-set dementia, so she shouldn’t make light of memory loss: but both had been in their early sixties before dementia struck them, and Leah still had a trio of decades’ grace. She hoped.

  When first heading to her room to grab her coat, it was with the intention of taking a walk, and she couldn’t quite say why she’d come to that decision, until she recalled what had prompted her to get up from her desk in the first place. She’d been thinking about her fictional character Cooper Roberts, and maybe just a little of the real man who’d inspired him. She told herself that she’d only wanted to check if the group had put back to sea again, leaving her in peace, but she was lying. Despite admonishing her schoolgirl crush antics, she hoped she might have another brief chat with Rob before he left and was out of her life forever. She forgot about boot prints in the grass, and possible Peeping Tom’s spying through her bathroom window, and headed round the cabin to lock the door. She double-checked to ensure the mechanism had engaged and the door stood firm.

  ‘Right,’ she said, making a conscious note of her actions. ‘No mistake this time.’

  She dropped the key on its fob in her coat pocket and strode for the trailhead.

  Barely ten yards out from the cabin, she jolted to a halt. Her pulse jumped in her throat and she bent fractionally at the waist as she stared at the dappled shadows among the trees. A figure, silhouetted against the fractured shade peered back at her, but for only a moment. The shape melted into the deeper darkness alongside the trail and was gone. Leah exhaled sharply, and took another step forward, before her feet dug into the grass. She was tempted to flee back to the safety of the cabin, but annoyance overruled any fear. She stomped across the glade towards the point where the figure had ducked back into the woods.

  ‘Hey! I saw you,’ she snapped, as if scolding a naughty child. ‘I know you’re out there, so you may as well show yourself.’

  Her only reply was a swirl of wind through the canopy, and the accompanying rustle of leaves and creak of branches.

  ‘Whoever you are, you’re not bloody clever! And if you think you’re frightening me, you’re mistaken.’ Leah glared at the unresponsive forest. ‘Huh! You’re just bloody pathetic.’

  Sadly, her final exclamation could have been aimed at herself. She shook her head as much in self-disgust as at anybody who could be hiding in the woods. She knew that people naturally searched for recognisable shapes in random patterns. It was like seeing the face of a man in the moon, or in the billowing clouds; once again she trusted that she’d simply formed the figure of a man out of the subtly shifting dapples as the trees swayed in the breeze. She was seeking a lurking figure and that’s exactly what her brain had shown her.

  ‘Idiot!’ She kicked at the grass alongside the trailhead.

  Her head snapped round.

  A figure stood on the trail, watching her.

  15

  This time it was no insubstantial shadow form Leah faced; she could see the man’s face where the light broke between the canopy, and his mouth was twisted up at one side, as he eyed her antics with sour humour. His eyes glared with predatory hunger, and now his grin grew wider. Leah’s hand went to her throat, and she took an involuntary step backwards. The man followed, matching her’s with a step of his own, and Leah felt that if she were to run, he would chase.

  Taking an instant liking to someone during a brief encounter – as she had with Rob Cooper – wasn’t as surprising as how much of a disliking she’d taken to another man in even less time. The instant that Dom had winked at her, sizing her up, mentally undressing her with that twisted sneer on his face, had told her he wasn’t a person she could easily take to. Leah placed a lot of faith in first opinions, and when Dom stepped forward waving jauntily, she didn’t run, but neither did she change her mind about him. He reminded her of those cocksure boys she’d known in school, full of themselves and fully expectant that girls would fall for their arrogant charms. Well, Leah had just about had enough of arrogance and self-centeredness from Pete to last her a lifetime, and Dom’s swaggering gait did nothing to sway her.

  She stuffed her hands in her coat pockets, one hand curling around the door key. Unlike when she’d held her car keys as an impromptu knuckleduster, this time she only wanted the key ready for a quick retreat.

  ‘What are you still doing here?’

  ‘Hey, good to see you again too,’ Dom countered in a northern English accent, and continued towards her undeterred. He’d pulled a coat and lightweight hiking trousers over his wet suit. His copperwire hair was pulled back in a ponytail, and looked thick and matted with sea salt.

  ‘Weren’t you lot supposed to put back to sea once the wind settled down?’

  Dom shrugged again, then nodded up at the swaying canopy. ‘Does it look as if it’s settled?’

  ‘It’s not as strong as it was,’ she argued.

  ‘Mebbe not here under shelter, but things have grown wild out there.’ He thumbed over his shoulder, in the general direction of the bay where the group had settled in. ‘Personally a bit of wind doesn’t bother me: I once rode The Bitches in a storm. But some of those younger ones would struggle.’

  ‘Really?’ The Bitches? Leah had no idea what he was talking about, only that his proclamation sounded more than suggestive. But she could agree that battling the headwind could prove dangerous to the team’s young charges. She sighed.

  ‘Huh! Sorry if we’re troublin’ you,’ Dom said, sounding insincere.

  Leah sighed again, but this time because she knew her objections were pointless, and more for her disliking of Dom as an individual than the group in its entirety. A small part of her was actually relieved they hadn’t left yet. Not only because it wasn’t too late to see Cooper again.

  ‘What are you doing here?’ she said.

  ‘I like a girl who’s straight to the point,’ Dom said, and gave her that sour turn of his lips again. ‘Who’s to say I didn’t come up here to apologise for the group disturbin’ your solitude?’

  Leah raised her eyebrows, unimpressed by his question. She knew that wasn’t it.

  Dom took a mobile phone from a trouser pocket. ‘Truth is, I was wonderin’ if you had a workin’ phone. None of us can get a signal and I wanted to let someone back home know we won’t be returnin’ this evenin’.’

  ‘You’re planning on staying that long?’

  Dom lifted his gaze to the rolling canopy. ‘Looks as if we’re gonna have to bed down for the night.’

  Leah shook her head slowly.

  ‘You don’t have a phone?’ Dom asked.

  She hadn’t shook her head at his question but at the inconvenience the group might cause if they hung around. She knew that her inquisitive nature meant she’d spend more time wondering what they were up to than knuckling down to work.

  ‘I’ve got a phone,’ she said, ‘but no signal. The island’s dead to coverage, I believe. What about the satellite-phone Rob has with him? Can’t you use that?’

  ‘Yeah, I suppose. But it’s bloody expensive. And supposedly “only for emergencies”.’ He shrugged again, a regular feature of his character. ‘It’s not as if campin’ overnight on an island is cause for an emergency call.’

  ‘Don’t you have to log a course with the coast guard or something? When you don’t show up again, won’t it raise an alarm?’

  ‘We’re not sailin’ a cruise liner,’ Dom said snarkily. ‘We’re in kayaks. We come and go as we please and don’t have to log our movements with anyone.’

  ‘Sounds risky to me,’ Leah said.

  ‘Not really. We’ve friends and families ashore, if there was any cause for concern they’d call the emergency services. That’s kind of why I wanted to ring home, to let them know there’s nothin’ to worry about.’

  Leah sniffed. ‘Sorry I can’t help you. You’re just going to have to use the sat-phone, too expensive or not.’
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  Dom peered past her towards the cabin. ‘I heard this was an old research station or somethin’. I’m surprised they didn’t have some sort of landline installed. How’d the scientists communicate with the mainland?’

  Leah chose not to mention the radio: why should she share private information with him? ‘That was years ago. Maybe back then they did have a working phone, but there isn’t one now. Like I said: I can’t help you.’

  ‘Have you been up on the crags?’

  Leah didn’t answer; too busy wondering why he wanted to know.

  ‘The high ground at the far end of the island,’ Dom said, pointing beyond the cabin to where she’d trekked earlier in the day. ‘Mebbe you can get a signal up on the tops.’

  ‘I didn’t try my phone up there,’ she admitted. In hindsight maybe she should have, but it simply hadn’t occurred. At the time she was too absorbed in the beautiful view.

  ‘Mind if I try?’ Dom asked.

  She fully expected that he would do whatever he wanted with or without her permission. ‘Try if you like, but I’m sure you’ll be wasting your time.’

  He thought about it, eyes squinting, lips pursed. Finally he came to a conclusion. ‘I don’t think I’ll bother. Like you said, Rob can always use the sat-phone. He’s the one who pays the bill.’

  Leah eyed him spuriously. There’d never been an issue about his lack of a mobile phone signal: so what was his genuine reason for hiking to her cabin like this? She wondered…

  ‘When did you get here?’

  Dom quirked his head, nose crinkling up. ‘Whaddaya mean? You where there when we arrived…’

  ‘I don’t mean on the island. I mean here.’ She opened her hands, indicating the spot they were standing. ‘When did you get here?’

  He eyed her as if she was mad. He then looked around at the nearby trees as if they’d make things clearer for him.

  Leah clucked her tongue. ‘Were you here before I spotted you just now?’