The Visitor: A psychological thriller with a breathtaking twist

by K. L. Slater

  Now Josh was telling her that her modest £13K basic salary could be inflated to massive proportions. If she did the job right.

  When Josh returned to his office and the customers had left, Holly walked over to Emily Beech.

  The shop was quieter now, possibly as it was almost lunchtime, and Emily was standing near the expansive front window, checking her phone.

  As Holly made her nervous approach, she registered Emily’s well-cut navy trouser suit and crisp white blouse. She couldn’t help wondering how this elegant woman managed to stand all day in the towering black patent stilettos that encased her feet.

  A sleek butter-blonde bob hovered, razor sharp, over Emily’s shoulders, framing a perfectly made-up but curiously expressionless face.

  Holly suddenly became painfully aware of her own dull complexion. The lank hair that she’d tucked impatiently behind her ears to keep it off her face until she could muster the enthusiasm to wash and style it; her bitten, unvarnished nails.

  Now, she wished she’d made more of an effort before leaving the house that morning, not that she’d have looked much different. There was only so much you could do with dry, overdyed hair and dowdy, ill-fitting clothes.

  It was difficult to be motivated when there was so much that needed attention. But Holly reminded herself that if she could earn a salary remotely near Emily’s, then she too would be able to invest in a new wardrobe and a good haircut.

  She felt like a penguin waddling across the shop in her scuffed flat shoes, but she forced herself to go through with it. Josh had mentioned that all the sales assistants were on the same level; Emily had no seniority over Holly.

  She wasn’t going to change her life by running away from an opportunity to get on the right side of someone who could teach her a lot, even if that meant sucking up to her a bit. It simply had to be done.

  She stretched her mouth into something she hoped resembled a friendly smile.

  ‘Hi, I’m Holly! Pleased to meet you.’ She extended a hand. ‘I’m really looking forward to getting stuck into the job. Josh was telling me you’re a great saleswoman.’

  ‘The best saleswoman, I think you’ll find,’ Emily said coolly, without looking up from her phone. Slowly, indifferent eyes drifted over Holly, but her proffered hand was ignored. ‘Let’s hope you’re a bit tougher than the last one we had here. She ran off crying after a couple of weeks. Pathetic.’

  ‘Oh!’ Holly swallowed, taken aback. ‘I didn’t know that. Anyway, maybe we can have a chat over coffee or something. I’d welcome any tips you could give me.’

  ‘I don’t socialise at work if I can help it,’ Emily said airily. ‘I’m here to make money, not friends.’

  ‘I just wondered if you’d have time to talk a bit about how you close your sales. I’ve heard that’s the tricky bit, and—’

  ‘Sorry. I take it you’ve heard the phrase time is money?’ Emily cut her off, striding away on her spiked heels. ‘See you around,’ she called over her shoulder.

  For the rest of the day, Holly purposely stayed in the background, well away from Emily’s barbed comments. She floated around the periphery of the large showroom, making notes on the furnishings and exchanging pleasantries with customers.

  However, behind her useful naïve facade, she was learning fast.

  She might appear a little shy and uncertain, wandering here and there without any real purpose. In fact she was a woman on a mission, discreetly shadowing her colleague.

  Emily might refuse to have a conversation with her, but she couldn’t stop Holly watching and learning.

  As far as Holly was concerned, securing this job had been a gift that ultimately could help her find Evan quicker.

  She’d already decided that she wouldn’t be dissuaded by someone like Emily Beech.

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Holly

  By her third day on the job, Holly had stopped her aimless drifting and dared to venture a little closer to Emily as she interacted with customers.

  She noticed that her colleague saved her energies for a certain type of shopper. One might say the more discerning customer. She usually made three or four sales each day – furniture and accessories of varying costs. But there was nothing remotely pricey enough to explain the sky-high commission that Josh had claimed she was earning.

  The majority of customers who shopped here held a certain fascination for Holly. They weren’t exactly the sort born with a silver spoon in their mouths – many seemed to be self-made business people – but some of them weren’t far off.

  They complained loudly about getting stuck in traffic on the way to their exclusive health club, or bemoaned the fact that they’d have to rush to make their restaurant reservation at lunchtime.

  Holly got the distinct impression that none of them had known a particularly hard life, although, to be fair, you could never be sure. Still, she’d have bet good money that not one of them had left home in search of a better life, escaping the misery of being poor and a virtual outcast.

  But Holly herself had a lot to be thankful for, and she vowed to keep reminding herself of that. If she was ever in any doubt, all she had to do was conjure up the dread and fear she’d felt that first night in the Manchester hellhole.

  That always served to put things into perspective.

  * * *

  The emaciated man who had appeared in the living room doorway at the dilapidated house had looked as if he’d just woken up.

  ‘Who are you?’ he’d croaked.

  ‘We were told to come here,’ Markus had replied nervously. ‘Just for a couple of nights. We—’

  ‘Got any stuff for me?’

  ‘What? No! No, sorry.’ Markus had patted his pockets and held up his empty hands to show he had no drugs.

  The man’s bony features had hardened when he saw there would be no benefit to him. He’d turned to leave.

  ‘Where shall we crash, man?’ Markus had called after him.

  ‘Anywhere you can,’ he’d muttered, and shuffled back into the front room.

  Markus had moved to the doorway and Holly had stayed behind him, peering over his shoulder.

  The room had been gloomy, the heavy curtains almost closed. There had been a sour, rotten smell pervading the place and Holly had clamped her hand over her nose and mouth.

  Groans emanated from the darkest corners and she saw vague writhing, tortured shapes.

  ‘We can’t stay here,’ she had hissed, stumbling back into the hall and pulling in a big breath of the slightly less polluted air.

  ‘We’ve no choice, Holly,’ Markus had told her firmly. ‘Wait here and I’ll have a scout around.’

  Holly had huddled close to the front door, next to their luggage.

  She’d felt a welcome trickle of cool fresh air through the broken glass behind her. Her stomach had felt raw with nerves and she’d thought she might need the loo soon, shuddering at the thought of the bathroom arrangements in a place like this.

  The house had been shrouded in a curious silence, punctured only by moaning from the doomed figures she’d spotted in the room next door. She dreaded to imagine the pain those people were experiencing to be making such harrowing noises. They certainly weren’t sounds that arose from pleasure of any sort.

  Goodness knows what danger she and Markus might be in here, and the risk of picking up some nasty disease had to be pretty high.

  Why had Markus given her the distinct impression that his boss would be taking care of them when this was the true reality of what awaited?

  At that moment, Markus had returned from upstairs, his face grim.

  ‘There are people everywhere, and every room is like that one.’ He’d shuddered, nodding to the room next to them. ‘There’s a free corner in one of the bedrooms. We should grab that now, I think. We can sleep in shifts to keep our belongings safe.’

  ‘Never mind keeping the luggage safe; we need to keep ourselves safe,’ Holly had countered. ‘I’d rather sleep in a local park than her
e.’

  She’d felt close to tears and he’d slid his arm around her shoulders.

  ‘Come on, we can do this, Holly. It’s raining and freezing out there. I’ll make sure it’s just the one night, OK? At sunrise tomorrow we’ll leave.’

  A wave of tiredness and hopelessness had rolled over her. What was the point in fighting? They were here now, so it was a case of just getting through to the morning.

  ‘We will look back soon and laugh at this, I promise.’ Markus had winked at her. ‘Tomorrow we will move on to our new life.’

  ‘Where’s your boss?’ she’d pleaded. ‘I thought he had everything in hand.’

  ‘Tomorrow, you’ll see.’ Markus had shrugged.

  That night had been ten years ago now, and despite Markus’s assurances, she still wasn’t looking back and laughing.

  A clear, cultured voice flooded the showroom via the store tannoy system. Cath, the receptionist, was trying to chase down Mr Kellington.

  Grateful for the interruption to her disturbing memories, Holly set about neatening the elaborately carved chairs nestled around the bespoke Italian dining room set.

  She ought to be counting her blessings. Finding a place to live with Mrs Barrett and securing a decent job that had the financial potential to kick-start her recovery plans was something to celebrate.

  But as usual, whenever she ought to be enjoying a rare moment of contentment, the troubling memories always found a way of elbowing their way in and ruining everything all over again.

  She resolved to put a stop to it. She would give everything to this job and be a success.

  That was by far the best way for her to begin the healing process, and to ensure that she and Evan would be together again. She felt it in every fibre of her being.

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  Cora

  When Cora got home from town, she went straight upstairs.

  She took a cursory look in Holly’s bedroom. Everything seemed to be in order in there. The girl was quite neat and tidy, which was a relief.

  Cora had read in the newspaper recently that young people from Holly’s generation had been largely spoiled by over-generous parents and consequently were barely self-sufficient. It was probably an unfair generalisation.

  Holly hadn’t said much about her early family life, but she had made one or two vague comments that had led Cora to believe she hadn’t been particularly cosseted, nor indeed nurtured appropriately, as one might expect.

  Cora walked over to the window, and that was when she saw the flashing green light on the floor. A laptop.

  She’d popped her head round the door yesterday evening to bid Holly goodnight and the girl had been sitting up in bed tapping away on it. Nothing unusual about that, but she’d had the most dreadful scowl on her face and Cora could have sworn her eyes looked moist.

  She’d slammed the lid shut and smiled over-brightly, bidding Cora goodnight as if nothing was wrong. Which, of course, usually indicated that something was.

  Last year, Cora had attended a free ten-week computing course at the local library. It had covered basic IT skills and had been billed as suiting ‘silver surfers’, which she had found a silly and irritating term.

  Surprisingly, she’d taken to it like a duck to water. Their tutor, Anna, had shown them how to compose a letter, write and send emails, and negotiate the internet.

  It had been a revelation to Cora: whole department stores and supermarkets to browse at the click of a button!

  She had fully intended buying a computer to use at home after the course, and Anna had offered to help her select and purchase a suitable model. But then the tutor had moved away to care for a sick relative, and Cora’s new-found computing enthusiasm had seemed to disappear with her.

  She stared at the laptop. She could open it right now and, provided it hadn’t got one of those password locks on it, have a little practise before her skills became too rusty. She’d been thinking of getting a lightweight coat for the spring, and it would be useful to look around online to save her walking all round town in search of one.

  She felt sure Holly wouldn’t mind.

  Cora glanced at her watch then and realised the time had quite run away from her. It would have to wait for another day after all.

  She walked out of the room and across the small landing. Picking up her bulging handbag, she went into her own bedroom and closed the door behind her, setting to work immediately.

  Huffing and puffing, she eventually managed to get everything sorted, and only had the bed to make and the curtains to open when she heard a tap on the bedroom door.

  ‘Hang on,’ she managed, perching on the edge of the bed to get her breath back and calm her heart rate down.

  Was this how it felt, she wondered, when a heart attack struck? At her age, you often got to wondering how you’d go, how exactly it would happen.

  Cora’s preference was for quick and painless… but that was everyone’s wish. Last year, an old man had been vocal in the greengrocer’s and that had set her thinking.

  ‘Not to drag on for months but to give me long enough to put my affairs in order,’ he’d declared, obviously having given it a lot of thought.

  He had a point, Cora admitted. It occurred to her that should she pop her clogs right now, this minute, nothing at all would be sorted.

  She knew it was something that needed addressing without delay, and she fully intended to take action. She just needed a little more time to finalise her thoughts and speak to David.

  Holly called out her name.

  Cora hadn’t heard the back kitchen door open and close, or footsteps on the stairs. It was frightening really; she should lock up in future before getting sorted up here.

  ‘Cora? Are you all right in there?’ Holly called again, this time in a concerned voice.

  ‘I’m fine, dear,’ she said. ‘I’m just getting my breath back. Come in.’

  The door opened and Holly peered round it cautiously. Her eyes darted this way and that as she squinted a little in the gloom.

  ‘You’ve got the curtains closed,’ she said, stating the obvious.

  ‘Yes, I’ve just had a little lie-down.’ Cora shifted uncomfortably under Holly’s stare. It was glaringly obvious, what with being a little out of breath and ruddy-cheeked, that she hadn’t been resting.

  Whatever, Cora told herself. She didn’t have to provide an explanation to Holly. This was her house, her bedroom and her business.

  Nobody else needed to be involved. Yet.

  Holly, God bless her, seemed to sense Cora’s reluctance to chat and went back downstairs to make them a drink.

  Cora finished her tasks in the bedroom and went downstairs herself.

  ‘David came around this afternoon,’ she told Holly after thanking her for the tea. ‘He says he’s seen you at work.’

  ‘Kellington’s?’

  ‘The very same.’ Cora looked pleased. ‘Didn’t I tell you? He works there as a parking attendant.’

  ‘No, you didn’t say.’ Holly frowned. ‘I haven’t seen him there.’

  ‘Well, he’s stationed outside mostly, I think.’ Cora chuckled to herself. ‘To hear him talk, he’s got more responsibilities than Mr Kellington himself.’

  ‘He seems very fond of you, though, David,’ Holly said. ‘I’m glad you’ve got someone close by to look after you a bit… after your husband passed, I mean.’

  ‘Oh yes, David has been coming round here since he could walk.’ Cora smiled and gazed into the middle distance. ‘Harold had been ill for some time. The day I went upstairs and found him cold and still, David was the one who calmed me down, phoned the ambulance. He stayed with me until the next day, slept right there on the sofa.’

  ‘That was kind of him,’ Holly said softly.

  ‘Yes.’ Cora smiled at her. ‘The mark of a true friend.’

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  Holly

  At lunchtime, Holly took her salad and a tatty paperback up to the top floor. There was
a pleasant roof terrace area there where customers and staff could get coffee.

  She found a table next to the large windows that overlooked the cityscape, then opened the plastic container and poked unexcitedly with her fork at the spinach leaves and flaked tuna she’d cobbled together that morning. Not the most appetising meal, but it was still a while until her first payday, and watching the pennies was mandatory.

  She opened her book at the folded-over corner, resolving to buy a bookmark when she saw a nice one. Anyone who valued books knew that bending page corners wasn’t the done thing.

  It seemed that everything she touched held a memory just waiting to spring free. Take this book, for instance, A Kestrel for a Knave by Barry Hines. It was the only book she owned, the only one she’d kept from her school days.

  She remembered sitting night after night in the furthest corner from the door in the library with this book. For a short time she’d been able to lose herself in its pages, forget how shitty her life had become.

  Ironic, she thought now, that what she’d considered a bad life back then had actually turned out to be the better times.

  Regardless, the book still had the power to hold her entranced and, munching on a few tasteless spinach leaves, she began to read. Within moments the story pulled her in and she was there with Billy Casper in the school assembly, holding his breath when the boy coughed and invoked the wrath of the headteacher, Mr Gryce…

  ‘Hello, Holly.’

  Surprised, she looked up at the sound of the hesitant voice.

  ‘Oh, hello, David!’ She placed the book face down on the table and laid down her fork. ‘Cora only just told me you worked here. Apparently you spotted me the other day?’

  ‘I didn’t know it was you. I wasn’t following you around or anything, I just had to tell Mr Kellington something important and Cath, the receptionist, said I might catch him as he was about to interview someone for the new job, and then I realised…’