“Jase?”
He’s holding on to the drainpipe with one hand, his face upturned, staring at me, his eyes wide and vulnerable and pleading.
“I really need to see you, Scarlett,” he says breathlessly. “Pull me in, please.”
But seeing Jase doesn’t abate my panic, it pumps it up instead. I’ve broken out in a cold sweat. Because this isn’t the first time a boy has stared up at me desperately, hanging from a drop, needing me to pull him up. Last year, Dan McAndrew’s brother Callum was clinging to my wrist, his life depending on mine. The flashback is so powerful and intense that I freeze, slapped hard in the face by déjà vu.
And my wrist goes dangerously limp as all my muscles slacken, sending Jase sliding a foot farther away from me down the wall, as he scrabbles to reestablish his foothold.
“Scarlett!” Jase hisses frantically. “I’m slipping! Help me!”
nineteen
PLENTY OF DARK SECRETS
The naked fear in Jase’s eyes and voice pulls me back to the urgency of the situation in double-quick time. Callum McAndrew’s handsome face disappears, and I’m more than relieved. I’ll never see Callum again. He’s the past, and Jase is the present: here, now, in trouble, slipping down the wall, needing my help.
Which begs the question: how much help should I give him? Just enough to get secure again, so he can climb down the drainpipe?
Or should I pull him into my bedroom? Would that be trusting him too much? The Jase just below me, holding my wrist, looking up at me imploringly, isn’t the shadowy, suspicious figure I saw earlier in the woodshed. But I remember that figure. I remember hiding from him, curling up in a ball, not brave enough to stand up and let him know I was there.
“Scarlett, I can’t hold on much longer …,” he entreats.
In the end, it isn’t my head that makes the decision. It’s my heart, which tells my other hand to reach down and close around Jase’s wrist and my legs to brace themselves against the windowsill. My knees bend and take the strain as I start to haul Jase up and into my room.
I may be the biggest idiot in the world. I don’t know the truth of what happened with Jase and his dad. I don’t know if it’s my loneliness that’s telling me to let him in, or my good judgment. I don’t know if this is a decision made out of weakness or out of strength.
But as he tumbles over the windowsill and climbs to his feet, I burrow into him as if he were a warm blanket I could pull around myself, and he hugs me back just as tightly.
“I’m sorry I was such a prat before,” he says into my hair. “I’m so messed up, but I shouldn’t take it out on you.” He shudders. “It’s horrible at home. Me and Gran aren’t talking at all.”
“When’s the inquest?” I ask.
“Tomorrow.” He shudders again, worse this time. “I’m just praying to God they say it was an accident and it’ll all be over, we can lay Dad to rest and get on with our lives.”
“But, Jase—” I start to say.
There’s so much I want to ask him: the words are on the tip of my tongue.
Do you know more than you’re telling me about your dad’s death? What were you doing in the woodshed this evening?
“Don’t, Scarlett,” Jase says sadly. “Please, no questions. There’s stuff I can’t tell you right now. I just can’t. Can you not ask me anything else? Can you please have faith in me, for now?”
I know anyone would say I’m an idiot for continuing to trust him, especially given what he has just admitted—he’s keeping secrets from me. But when I look up into his golden eyes, I can’t see anything there but honesty. Reliability. Trustworthiness.
My head feels like it weighs a hundred pounds. Suddenly, I’m so exhausted I can barely move a muscle.
“I’m so tired,” I whisper, and I know that by not challenging him, by not insisting that he tell me the truth, I’ve lost my opportunity to push him for answers, tonight, at least.
I remember Jase at the temple, telling me not to worry about my own secrets, that he had some of his own.
He really must be the right one for me, I think with a flash of black humor. The only guy who probably wouldn’t blink an eye at my past is someone with plenty of skeletons in his own closet.
“Me too. I’m knackered.” He sighs. “I had to do some errands today in Wakefield. I mean, I didn’t have to—your gran’s told me to take all the time off I need—but I thought I might as well keep busy. We needed some things for the house as well, so I just thought I’d take Dad’s truck and get some things done. Every shop I went into, people were whispering behind my back.”
“Really? Whispering what?”
I stare into his face, willing it to tell me the truth, wanting to read innocence on every feature.
“All sorts of things,” he says bitterly. “‘No smoke without fire.’ ‘Why haven’t the police just said it was an accident?’ That kind of thing. You know, Dad was a right old drunk—no one would’ve thought twice about it if he fell over and cracked his head open. Which is why I just don’t understand what this inquest is about to begin with. The coppers won’t tell me why they’re not just calling it an accident and letting it go.”
It’s those marks on Mr. Barnes, I think. I bet the police would love to get a look at that piece of stained wood I found in the wood chipper.
Jase looks down at me.
“Scarlett?” He hesitates for a moment. “Look, I know I’ve been a moody bastard to you, and I’m really sorry. You’ve got nothing to do with all of this.”
“It’s okay,” I say, though I wonder if he’s right about that last part. I think I do have a lot to do with this, more than I want to accept.
“Can I sleep here tonight?” he asks. “I don’t want to go home.”
“Here?”
I glance over at my narrow single bed. We’ll never fit on that.
“I’ll sleep on the floor,” he says quickly. “Just being here, next to you, hearing you breathe—that’d be fantastic. Please?”
“We could pull the mattress off and put it on the floor,” I suggest. “Then at least we wouldn’t be dangling off the edges.”
Jase grins for the first time that night. It’s only a faint shadow of his usual glorious grin, white teeth sparkling, golden eyes bright, but seeing him smile unlocks something in me, and I find myself able to flash a smile back at him, even if it’s only as fleeting as his own.
“That’d be wonderful,” he says, his tone heartfelt.
Ten minutes later, we’re curled up next to each other on the mattress. Jase is spooning me, his warm body pressed against my back. He’s taken off his jacket and boots and pulled his belt out of his jeans so it doesn’t dig into him. I’m in the flannel pajamas I was wearing when he came through the window. And though I normally want to have my bare skin pressed against his as much as possible, tonight I’m happy with things exactly as they are—our bodies fully clothed, the duvet wrapped around us, tucked in tightly. Jase kisses the back of my neck as I close my eyes, in the dark now, but not alone.
“Jase?” I say quietly.
“Mmn?”
He already sounds half asleep. We’re both completely shattered by the drama of the last few days, and the comfort of each other’s bodies is like a drug, knocking us out.
“I never asked if your mother told you where she got the necklace,” I say, touching it with my fingertips, thinking of how overjoyed I was when he gave it to me at the café, and how long ago that seems.
“I found it in my mum’s room after she’d left,” he mumbles into the back of my neck, his lips soft on my skin. “I never saw her wear it, actually. But I knew it’d look beautiful on you.”
He squeezes me.
“When I can afford it, I’ll get you earrings to match, eh? Same color, like your eyes. Maybe for your birthday. That’s a few months away, isn’t it? Give me time to save up.”
I realize I’m crying silently, tears pouring down my face, so silently that Jase doesn’t even notice. The sweetness of
his words gave me permission to let go. I’ve needed this release since seeing him in the woodshed. I probably should ask him more questions, but instead I turn my face so it’s resting on the arm of my pajamas, and let the soft, much-washed flannel absorb my tears.
I’m drifting off to sleep, the pressure on my skull melting away. Jase’s steady, even breathing settles into a slower rhythm now, the heaviness of his arm across my waist telling me that he’s falling asleep too. The weight of Jase’s warm arm is dissolving all my doubts, draining them out of me through my silent tears. Sleep rolls over me like a breaking wave, turning and pulling me under, and I let it take me. I’m pulled under by the breaker, and I’m so exhausted that, mercifully, I don’t even dream.
The inquest on Jase’s father started at nine this morning, and I’ve been on tenterhooks ever since. Jase climbed out of my room at dawn and went home to smarten himself up, put on his only suit. Both he and his grandmother have to testify about his father’s last hours. I shiver, remembering my own experience of an inquest. Although there isn’t a scary lawyer in a horsehair wig who cross-examines you, the coroner asks you all sorts of questions, and that’s intimidating enough, especially as you’re sitting up in front of everyone in a witness box, all eyes on you. It’ll be even worse for Jase, because he knows almost all the participants. The coroner, the police, the jury: they’re all from Wakefield. They all knew his dad.
And so they’ll all be wondering why something so obviously accidental as a notorious drunk falling over and cracking open his skull merits anything as formal as an inquest, rather than a straightforward assumption of accidental death.
From my memory of the inquest on Dan, I know that before Jase gets called, there’ll at least be testimony from the doctor who did the postmortem on his father’s body, and the police officer who was first at the scene. I wish I could have gone, but they didn’t need Taylor and me to testify about finding the body, because DS Landon had already told my grandmother that we had no evidence to contribute; we didn’t see anything beyond simply stumbling across a corpse.
So I sit in class all morning, utterly unable to concentrate. The teachers might as well be talking Cantonese, for all I take in.
We’re just going down to lunch when my phone buzzes with a text from Jase.
Meet me @ mine in 10.
“Tell Miss Newman I’ve got a headache and gone home to lie down,” I say to Taylor, and dash off as fast as I can in the direction of the Barneses’ cottage.
Jase isn’t there. And I know his grandmother isn’t either, as she was at the inquest too. So I perch on the steps, and wait until I hear the roar of his motorbike approaching. He pulls up, jumps off the bike, chucks his helmet and keys onto the seat, and walks over to me.
“What happened?” I say.
I don’t know what to think or what to hope. Jase wants his father’s death to be declared an accident, that much I know. He asked me to put my faith in him, and I want to. After all, Jase might be keeping things from me, but it’s a huge leap from that to being a cold-blooded killer. I absolutely refuse to believe that Jase would do anything premeditated and sinister. In the end, all you have are your instincts, and I trust mine implicitly. I’m as sure as I can be that I’m not dating someone who killed his own dad.
“Honestly, I don’t know what happened,” he says in a tired voice, sitting down next to me on the steps.
“You don’t know?”
“They got me up on the stand and asked me all sorts of stuff,” he says. “It’s like being on trial, sort of. It really did my head in.”
I nod sympathetically, remembering my own experience: that was exactly how it felt.
“Afterward I was all wound up,” he continues. “I couldn’t sit still, so I went out and got on the bike. I meant to just ride around for a bit, sort my head out. But then I kept going and going….” He takes a long breath. “Actually, I just wanted to ride away and never come back.”
Jase has been staring straight ahead, and he doesn’t look at me even now. But he reaches out and takes my hand, weaving his fingers through mine.
“If it wasn’t for you, Scarlett, I wouldn’t have come back at all, I swear. I’d just have kept on going. There’s nothing for me here but you.”
There’s such a lump in my throat that I can’t speak. We sit there, holding hands. Holding on to each other for dear life.
I hear a car coming up the drive, but we don’t stir. It could be anyone. Even when the car slows down to make the tight turn through the stone archway, we still can’t see it from here; the whole new wing of the school building is in the way.
“That’ll be my gran,” Jase says as we hear the car looping around the kitchen wing, coming in our direction. “She got a lift there with a friend of hers from the village.”
I stiffen, not wanting to encounter Jase’s grandmother again, but before I can get up a police car swings around the side of the building and slows to a halt in front of the cottage.
Detective Sergeant Landon and another officer get out of the car. Their faces are steely masks, showing no emotion at all. DS Landon strides toward us, her mouth set, and instinctively, we both stand up, sensing something bad is coming.
“Jason Barnes, I’m arresting you for the murder of your father,” she says.
“What?” I exclaim.
I look frantically at Jase, expecting him to protest, to tell them that they’re wrong, that he could never have done the awful thing of which they’re accusing him. But Jase doesn’t say a word. He stands there with his hands shoved in his pockets, silent, frozen, as the other officer walks toward him and nods to the open door of the car, indicating that he should get in.
“You do not have to say anything, but it may harm your defense if you do not mention when questioned anything which you later rely on in court,” DS Landon continues. “Anything you do say may be given in evidence.”
“What’s happening?” I demand of her. “Why are you arresting him?”
“We have no choice. The coroner’s inquest brought in a guilty verdict against him,” DS Landon informs me.
“A guilty verdict?” I’m gaping.
Landon nods grimly.
“It’s not that common, to have a verdict against a specific person at an inquest,” she says. “We were expecting a verdict of murder against person or persons unknown. But it’s policy to respect the jury’s decision in this kind of case, arrest him and take it to trial. I can’t say it looked good, Jase’s leaving after he gave his testimony. And”—she gives me a very direct look—“evidence came out against him that you may not be aware of, Scarlett.”
My heart sinks into my stomach like a cannonball dropping with a thud. I don’t even know if I want to find out what’s behind her words.
Jase is walking toward the car. They aren’t handcuffing him, which is a huge relief; I don’t think I could bear to see Jase in handcuffs.
“He’ll need a lawyer, won’t he?” I ask in a small frightened voice, and DS Landon nods.
“I’ll go straight to my grandmother,” I call after Jase as he climbs into the backseat. “Don’t worry.”
Don’t worry. Of all the ridiculous things to say.
The police slam the door on him, then get into the car themselves and start the engine. As I watch, still unable to believe what’s happening, the police car pulls away, with my boyfriend inside it.
Under arrest for the murder of his father.
twenty
“YOU SHOULD WALK AWAY”
I tear into my grandmother’s office like a maniac. Penny, her secretary, chases me in, apologies pouring from her lips.
“She just ran right in and past me, Lady Wakefield. I couldn’t stop her.”
My grandmother, sitting behind her desk, raises a hand heavy with rings.
“It’s all right, Penny,” she says calmly. “No doubt Scarlett has a good reason for this unprecedented interruption. You may leave us.”
My grandmother is so unflustered by dramati
c situations that she could give lessons on composure to the Queen. As Penny closes the door, I meet my grandmother’s clear blue eyes. Her white eyebrows are raised, her hands folded in front of her on the leather blotter resting on her desk.
“Would you care to tell me what crisis is so pressing that you can’t even wait to let Penny inform me of your presence?” my grandmother inquires.
“It’s Jase Barnes,” I say, catching my breath, trying not to appear too out of control. There’s nothing Lady Wakefield hates more than a girl who seems out of control. “He’s just been arrested for murdering his father. They had the inquest on Mr. Barnes this morning and the jury brought in a guilty verdict against Jase.”
My grandmother’s eyebrows rise even higher.
“Dear me,” she says.
Coming from my grandmother, this is very strong language indeed. With not a word more said to me, she presses a button on her desk phone, which buzzes Penny on the intercom.
“Penny, can you call Jennings immediately?” she requests. “Tell him young Jason Barnes has been arrested and we’ll need a good criminal solicitor. I have absolutely no idea how these things work, but hopefully Jennings will.”
Jennings is the family solicitor. My heart jumps in relief. I was so hoping my grandmother would help, but I didn’t think it would be this easy. When her brief conversation with Penny is finished, she folds her hands again, looking at me, and dips her head in a short nod that indicates I should sit down.
I obey. It’s dawning on me that I may have got a lawyer for Jase, but I’m going to pay for it now. If I’m not mistaken, my grandmother is wearing that look that says a lecture is on its way.
I get ready to take my medicine.
“Scarlett,” she says eventually, lifting one hand to touch the pearl necklace she always wears. “I want to make one thing clear: I have no interest in asking you intrusive questions about your friendship with Jason Barnes.”
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