Shadows to Ashes

by Tori de Clare

  She was through to Solomon’s phone. It rang. And rang.

  She was certain after the sixth ring or so there’d be no answer, but the thought of Vincent’s phone vibrating against some part of him while he drew it and studied her name, held her still. She cradled the image in her mind while cars flashed by full of people whose lives were brimming with purpose.

  When she’d ended the call, she busied herself by texting him instead, though there was a sharp feeling of futility now. Inside, she felt quite crumbly. Nothing of substance seemed to be filling her legs. She tapped out, ‘Home in Manchester. Why have you changed the locks on my flat and ejected my stuff? I’m stuck in the city with no money now. My mum isn’t answering her phone!!! Can you collect me or something? Please.’

  She deleted ‘please’ and sent the text. Either Vincent would respond or he wouldn’t. Pleading with him would make no difference.

  Ten minutes passed. The temperature was dropping, the sky was black. Her phone was stubbornly silent. The pit of her stomach had begun to churn, convincing her that her stomach lining was being eroded by acid. Her chest was tight, her muscles clenched against the chilled air. Blood rushed past her ears in violent thuds and the flooded ventricles of her heart pulsated blood around the rest of her. It didn’t seem to be filtering to her remotest parts – to her hands and feet. They were numb and, like Vincent, cold and out of reach. Her insides were responding to a crisis she didn’t want to acknowledge.

  She began to look about her for inspiration because she didn’t know what to do. Her brain was frantically filing through a list of names of people she might call. She remembered she could use the phonebook in her mobile to help her. Relieved to look busy again, she stamped her feet to encourage circulation and scrolled down names in alphabetical order. Camilla, Dan, Henry, Mum, Nathan, Naomi, No. No. No. Definitely not. No. And on through the whole list. Through Solomon and his crew, through people who worked at his club, and through a few names of people she hadn’t thought of in years. It was a shock to realise that there wasn’t a single person she could call, even in this emergency she was in.

  There’s nothing for you in England, Lorie.

  She had no siblings and only one cousin who lived in Brighton. Not long ago, she’d have rung Henry and he’d happily have swung by and taken her to her old room at the front of the house in Alderley Edge. The room which looked out over the enormous front garden, which was tended as attentively as any park. The room with a double bed and a private bathroom and a hot shower. She could never call that room hers again.

  It was in this moment, as a group of noisy girls passed by in towering heels and nothing on their arms, that she realised she had no one really. Strange, but the thought had never struck her before. Her life had shrunk to this street, these cases, this moment. And suddenly the world seemed huge and hostile and she seemed small within it. A tiny dot on its surface in a city that could find no room for her at all.

  She tried her mum again. It was a desperate call. Her voice was tight, the tone too high, giving it a childlike flimsiness as she gabbled a message:

  ‘Mum, it’s me. Where are you? I’m home in Manchester and I’m in a bit of a mess.’ She cleared her throat and an open crisp packet scuttled past her on the pavement. ‘The machine’s just swallowed my debit card and I have no English money. Please, please call me as soon as you get this. I’ve no way of even getting to your house.’

  She stood for what seemed like an age on that street, looking at her phone from time to time, willing someone to appear on the end of it. A thin red line indicated that it needed charging. It was only when a police car slid by, lights flashing, no noise, the inside of the car illuminated while the officer on the passenger side studied a sheet of paper in her hand, that Lorie’s attention was diverted. She watched the car as if it was passing her in slow motion, and got a clear impression of the officer who glanced out of the window in Lorie’s direction, then studied the paper in front of her. The vision had gone, but it was emblazoned on Lorie’s mind.

  She knew that officer. She’d been examined by her all over, on another cold night like this one, beside a cemetery gate. Her brain, as shocked and baffled as it was by her new circumstances in England, dealt out a name with ease. A name that Vincent Solomon had given her as a parting gift. A name freshly stored and easily accessible.

  Kerry Marshall.

  ***

  Solomon lay awake in his bed, one arm jammed under his pillow, eyes open, glaring at the ceiling of his room studying shadow patterns in sepia shades, his mind still busy and alert. Only sleeping pills closed it down, and even then, not for long. He wasn’t hoping for a loss of consciousness tonight though. He’d slept on the journey home and was feeling reasonably fresh. So he was using these still moments to finalise plans in his head, best done in the dark where there was little to stimulate him visually and where he could escape the cold air.

  So, Lorie was back as predicted. Silly girl. He thought she may have lasted a while longer in the sun, but she’d cracked and followed him home impulsively, tailing the vapour trail of his British Airways flight, puzzling over his last words. She’d piece them together and work them out in time. A two-fold plan that would keep her occupied and would inevitably lead her to the realisation that her work with him had finished. That whatever relationship they’d sustained over the years would no longer be serviceable to either of them. She would understand that he was not and never would be, a friend.

  He could expect the odd tantrum, an outburst or two. But, in the absence of a job and an immediate source of money, she was likely to take her frustrations out on the Hamiltons and pick a fight with them. This was fine by Solomon, as long as Naomi didn’t get hurt. The Hamiltons were an easier target. Lorie knew, had always known she was no match for Solomon. It would be interesting to see how things played out, once she’d engaged her brain for a spell.

  Solomon tested a leg out of his bed and quickly buried it again. The temperature in England was a shock after life in Sydney. But the real compensation was a delicious creeping feeling that slithered somewhere beneath his skin’s surface whenever the thought re-entered his mind that Naomi Hamilton was only a few miles away, and that she was hungry to see him.

  He’d waited patiently for this time – when Dan Stone would dissolve from the outside world to be reborn into a world known as the ‘inside’. A world that was a mystery to anyone outside its walls. A world where structure reigned and uniforms were worn and constraints were issued hour by hour. Where good behaviour earned virtual stars on an invisible chart and where survival and bad food was a daily reality. Like being at school again only without home time.

  Oh he’d waited, and like any waiting that was almost over, the last lap would be the toughest.

  How many years had he worked for this? To have Henry Hamilton’s daughters where he wanted them, whilst gripping Henry by the balls? And all he needed to do now was to be still. Henry would feel the squeeze and would be compliant and silent. And Naomi would come to him, right here, to his door. When she did, he’d offer her something she couldn’t resist. And then the game would begin. And Naomi would play. Head to head. With him.

  9

  A loud voice and the clattering of pots and pans woke Lorie. Her face stung on one side, the side that was scraping a carpet as she sat up, trying to work out why she was hurting all over.

  She was in a windowless room, a very dark room with the shape of two towers in front of her. As she reached out and simultaneously groped for memories, her fingers met with her suitcases. These tipped all the memories into a pile, which then she began sorting, in order. She groaned.

  The shouting continued somewhere. She must be near the kitchen. She’d wandered in here last night, a hotel, deciding that no one would question her dragging her cases. Not here. She couldn’t remember the name of it now.

  After going into the toilets and changing into warmer clothes and her best coat, then washing her face and applying fresh makeup and a squ
irt of perfume, she’d gone to the reception desk.

  A man wearing oiled-back hair and a deep red waistcoat over a white shirt said, ‘Good evening, Madam. Are you waiting to check in?’

  He wasn’t English.

  ‘I’m meeting someone actually, but he’s going to be late.’

  ‘I see. May I have the name please?’

  She leant forward. ‘It’s . . . delicate. His name is David Leeson, but I’ll be surprised if he’s used his real name. He doesn’t even tell me his booking-in name.’

  ‘I see,’ he said again, refusing eye-contact now. His eyebrows had lowered a little. He busied himself at the computer screen, toying with the mouse. ‘There doesn’t seem to be a Mr Leeson booked in for this evening.’

  ‘Typical. Well, we’re meeting in the bar, so I’ll head over there now. Do you have a room or somewhere that I can leave my cases in the meantime?’

  ‘Yes, of course.’ He signalled to a nearby guy who was helping an old woman into the lift with her bags. ‘He’ll be with you shortly.’

  ‘Thank you. Excuse me.’

  Lorie stepped back and pretended she needed to answer her phone. The red-waistcoated guy turned his back on her and attended to other things, but he was close.

  ‘Hi, darling,’ Lorie said, with a giggle into her phone. She paused. Her phone was mute.

  ‘Oh really? Oh no! How long then, do you think?’ Another ridiculous wait. ‘Can’t be helped. It’ll be worth it.’ A pause to chuckle again. Lorie had never felt less like laughing. ‘Yes, the bar. I’ll order a few drinks to occupy myself before you get here.’ She smiled into her phone. The silence deafened her in return. ‘Me too. See you soon.’

  When the porter-guy returned from the lift, he assessed the need and then dragged her cases around two corridors on the ground floor, until they arrived at a numberless room. He opened the door with a key card and flicked on the light. It had no windows and no chairs. Just an empty room with a dark patterned carpet and shelves across one wall, under which was a long rail for hanging coats.

  Lorie’s plan had been to deposit her cases and actually head to the bar to see who she could exploit for drinks and then a room, fingers crossed. She expected the porter to hang around, but he wedged the door open with a doorstop, and told her to close the door behind her when she left. Then he vanished.

  Lorie didn’t have to think for long. She didn’t need a lonely bloke in a bar or his room, because she had a room now. And suddenly, she was exhausted. She walked carefully to the door, kicked it free of the doorstop, looked out onto the corridor, which was vacant, and closed the door.

  What a relief to be shut inside a warm room. Beat the terror of facing a night outdoors with no shelter.

  That was her last thought before she pulled a couple of woollies out of her case and laid them on the floor in one corner. Then she turned off the light, padded across the room, hid herself behind her two cases, covered herself with a coat, and began to drift towards the ecstasy of sleep. In that moment, her troubles melted. She’d deal with the issues tomorrow.

  So when the kitchen staff woke Lorie next morning (she presumed it was morning), she felt confused. A line of yellow light shone along the base of the door. Otherwise it was very dark. She remembered where she was and reached for her phone, which was lifeless. This room must have a power point and she was keen to see if her mum had responded to her messages.

  She dug inside her handbag for her phone charger and then began to grope her way along the walls until she found a plug socket, too disorientated to remember that a flick of a switch on the wall beside the door would flood the room with light. When her phone sprang to life, there were no messages. No missed calls either. Nada.

  It was 5:17 a.m. She’d slept for many hours even though it was only early. She flicked the light on by the door, then tried to open the door, but found she couldn’t. The door handle wouldn’t shift at all. It took her under a minute to concoct a story and then she started banging on the door and yelling out. She wondered how thick the door was and if the sound was weak on the other side. But a short time later, she heard footsteps trotting urgently along the corridor outside, and prepared the tears.

  As the oiled-headed manager from the night before registered horror at the sight of her, she broke down and a series of lies flowed out of her. How the porter hadn’t been patient enough to wait for her to sort her cases. How he’d left the door jammed open and how it had promptly slammed shut. How she’d yelled for help but received none. How David Leeson had left a message to say he couldn’t make it and how she’d curled herself into a corner and fallen asleep and woken up, aching and cold.

  The manager was mortified. Couldn’t have been sorrier, he said. Had never heard anything like it, he told her. And next thing, Lorie is hearing great news which is loading into her ears like music, drying her mock tears.

  A room – would she like one, a double? Well, yes. Complimentary drinks and food for the day? (Brought to your room, Madam, of course.) Sounded OK. Apologies, will she accept them, please, offered profusely? She could be persuaded to.

  The hotel reputation is everything. Everything, see!

  She understood.

  So Lorie was shown to a fantastic room to conclude her sleep and continue her stay as a ‘special’ guest, and he was still sorry as he headed for the door, bowing.

  ‘Really, don’t worry about it.’

  ‘Most generous, Madam. I’ll leave you to rest in peace now.’

  Rest in peace? She laughed out loud when he’d gone and was still amused after she’d brushed her teeth and used the toilet. Lorie scrambled into bed. It was only when she realised she had no one to share her story with, that her elation began to recede. And then the chilling draught of isolation breezed over her again.

  ***

  ‘It’s cold enough to snow.’

  ‘I agree,’ Henry said to Camilla. He was sitting at the island in the kitchen with a cup of black coffee, leafing through a newspaper and struggling to concentrate. Dan was in the paper, just a small article, an update of the trial. Henry flicked past it quickly and said nothing to Camilla. Mentioning Dan’s name pressed her many and varied buttons. Henry couldn’t think that he’d ever met Dan. He’d had a view of him that night, when he’d raised Naomi from the dead and dropped her by the door in the small hours. Dan had held up a palm from the car before disappearing into the night.

  Was he a killer?

  ‘Just when I was looking forward to spring, the Arctic Circle reminds us it has a clear view of us and can take a shot whenever it likes.’

  Her words buzzed around him like little flies, too quick to catch, the talk too small to interest him. ‘Mmm.’

  To think that Naomi had almost married Dan in secret. Not a word to anyone except Annabel. A desperate act. And now Dan was a whisker away from being banged up for murder. What was Solomon up to? Where was he? Henry stiffened against the compulsion to shiver.

  The agony of not being able to discuss anything with anyone was excruciating sometimes. Too much to bear. Had Naomi heard from Solomon? Was she living in silent fear? When would Annabel realise that the father of her child was a dangerous liar, the son of a criminal? The brother of two lunatics! For the first time in Henry’s life, the idea of murder had stolen into his mind and rummaged through his head. No violent thoughts as such, just a lingering and intense longing for Vincent Solomon and his family to cease to exist. For their lives to evaporate for ever.

  Was Dan guilty? Who knew? What Henry did know was that he could sympathise with the notion of wanting to be rid of someone, even though it was wrong. Legally, morally, it couldn’t be justified, and yet . . .

  ‘I get tired of living in the UK, Henry, don’t you?’ Little flies were buzzing again – irritating, but he tried to pay attention. ‘The summers of my childhood memories are filled with sunshine. Bad winters, yes. But lovely summers, always.’

  How could she harp on about the weather at a time like this? The woman was clue
less. He watched her darting around the kitchen, packing her time with hollow things.

  ‘Hmm.’

  ‘What does “hmm” mean?’ Before any words could line up in Henry’s head and file out through his mouth, she added, ‘You’re in cave-mode again. Might as well be chatting to the ironing board.’

  ‘Actually, Camilla, we need to talk.’

  She stopped now, looked at him. Her expression faltered. All the determination drained out of her face. ‘About what?’

  ‘Important things. “Hmm” means that I have things on my mind that I’m trying to suppress and to process. I’m not in cave-mode, as you put it. I’d prefer to talk.’

  ‘Oh.’

  Henry could read her impulse to run, to brush him off and avoid whatever words were now crowding into his throat.

  She didn’t move. She looked almost frozen with apprehension. ‘Go on.’

  He drew a laboured breath. Whatever words were queuing for release, he’d be limited in what he could share. ‘Naomi’s preparing to testify at Dan’s trial.’

  Her face clouded. ‘When?’

  ‘Soon now.’

  ‘Why is this the first I know about it?’

  ‘Because Naomi can’t talk to you about it, Camilla. You don’t want to know, so you’ve forbidden the topic.’

  ‘I thought it was done with.’

  ‘How can it be? The lad’s on trial for murder. And Naomi loves him. You think she can just forget about him because you want her to?’

  Camilla had begun huffing her breath out.

  Henry added, ‘She’s a woman, not a child. Threatening her isn’t going to make her feel differently about Dan. A different approach might help.’

  She was too angry to respond, but she was firing a look at him. That I’ll-never-forgive-you-for-raising-this-and-making-me-feel-this-way look.