Give Yourself Away

by Barbara Elsborg

  The lack of control over his flight both thrilled and alarmed him. If he’d been kitesurfing, he’d have fallen back onto the waves by now, maybe doing a flip or risking a loop. Without water to cushion his landing, tricks were out. Staying airborne for as long as possible was the aim.

  Caught by a sudden gust, March spiraled up until he must have been at least a hundred feet off the ground. Too high. He maneuvered to lose height, then leaned to change direction. Still not quite the direction he’d hoped for. He wanted to avoid built-up areas, and he was still heading for the town. His heart leapt as a bird zoomed across his flight path. Distracted momentarily, he was caught in another updraft and had to turn again to bring himself lower. Now he was going the right way but there was a finite amount of land ahead before the sea stretched in front of him.

  Concentrate or crash.

  And look for somewhere to set down before the land runs out.

  There might have been no pylons or houses, but there were plenty of isolated farm buildings, trees and cows. March hissed with a mixture of delight and terror as he pulled up his feet and barely skimmed the tops of several trees. He tugged at the bar to turn until open fields lay ahead, though the sea still glittered beyond. Maybe he would be landing in water. But between him and it was a steep drop over a cliff where an unexpected updraft could drag him back to disaster.

  One last maneuver brought him into the wind and as the stretch of remaining land shrank and a herd of cows scattered, March tucked his legs up, waited until the last second to unclip himself from the kite to stop it dragging him, then let go of the bar and rolled as he hit the ground. The kite came to earth several yards away. He was lucky the wind hadn’t taken it over the water.

  The landing knocked the breath out of him but not the life. Was that feeling in his chest disappointment or relief? Relief. When he turned onto his back to give his lungs a chance to inflate, he found himself looking up at an inquisitive Friesian. March laughed.

  “What the fuck do you think you’re doing?” a guy yelled.

  March looked from the cow into a farmer’s florid face.

  “You’re trespassing and you’ve freaked out my animals.”

  It was probably the most exciting thing to happen to the cows since their first moo escaped.

  “Sorry.” March pushed to his feet. “Slight miscalculation in wind direction.”

  “Get off my land.”

  March walked down the field to collect the kite, stuffing it into the backpack as he went. He’d fold it properly later.

  “That way.” The farmer pointed his stick toward a gate. March nodded his thanks and set off.

  It didn’t take him long to get to where he’d left his car. March tossed his backpack in the boot. He might as well shop while he was here. Since he hadn’t died or ended up in the hospital, there was still a requirement to have food in his fridge.

  He was doing okay until he saw a harassed-looking guy struggling to keep his toddler sitting in the cart. Crisps had been spilled and a half-peeled banana lay mashed against a bottle of washing liquid. The man grew more and more frustrated, promises turning to pleas and then threats. The kid held out a biscuit to March as he passed, the chocolate licked off. As March stopped, the man snatched it from the boy’s hand and flashed March an apologetic smile.

  The good work of the flight completely undone, March felt himself choked in depression. That guy with the kid could have been him, but he’d had his chance at a life with kids with Annabel and fucked it up. It was his own fault he was only shopping for himself.

  Chapter Five

  Tye wriggled through the window and crawled out of the undergrowth into a dirt backyard. When he heard the bikes falling and Baxter groaning with pain, he squirmed back. “You okay?” he whispered.

  “Yes. Get away from here!”

  Baxter had told him to have a quick look around first, to get a feel for where he was, which direction he needed to go before he ran. Tye couldn’t see much from where he was crouched, apart from Liam’s van. He kept below the level of the windows and sidled around the house.

  No neighbors. The house was in the middle of the countryside. Tye didn’t recognize anything. Open fields lay on one side and a wood on the other. The drive would lead to a road but he’d be visible from the house if he went that way. Tye made for the wood. He sprinted through an overgrown lawn and clambered over a wall. As he raced into the trees he heard Liam yell, “Get back here.”

  Tye kept running. Baxter had told him that no matter what Liam said, what threats he made, what he said he’d do to Baxter or to him, Tye continuing to run was their only chance. But he could hear Liam coming up behind him, sounds of him crashing through the undergrowth. As fast as Tye was, he knew an adult could run faster, but maybe not for as long. Adrenaline kept him going until a fallen log brought him down.

  As Tye lay winded he could hear Liam calling him, telling him what he’d do to Baxter if Tye didn’t stop—cut off his cock, stuff it in his mouth, make him eat it.

  Liam was too close for Tye to risk running now, so he curled up behind a tree and closed his eyes, willing Liam to pass by, wishing they’d done this when it was darker. When he thought he could hear something at his back he began to shake. A breath of wind, but it was a windless day. A finger traced a path down the line of his neck onto his shoulder, and Tye froze.

  * * *

  After Mike had been whisked away by the paramedics, Caleb was escorted to the kitchen and subjected to a barrage of questions—how did he get the bruises on his face? What had they been arguing about? Why had he stabbed Mike? Ironic that what had happened in Caleb’s past allowed him to compartmentalize his situation now. He had his secrets locked away. Worse had happened to him. He could cope. He’d learned to cope.

  While crime scene officers suited in white overalls, paper shoes and latex gloves swarmed over the house, Caleb had gone over everything so many times with the police that night had turned to day. He was exhausted, hungry too, but wasn’t sure it was a good idea to mention that when he had no idea whether Mike was alive or dead.

  Caleb understood he was the prime suspect. The police had told him they’d found no sign of a break-in. When they’d walked him around, Caleb had confirmed there was nothing missing. He remembered pushing the front door closed, but had the catch snapped into place? He knew his prints would be on the knife. There was one missing from the block on the counter behind him, and Caleb did most of the cooking, dried the dishes, put everything away.

  When they asked for his clothes, Caleb’s mind strayed to thoughts of blood-spatter patterns. Too much TV. Photographs had already been taken of him, fiber samples snipped into evidence bags and scrapings removed from under his nails, but they still wanted his clothing, wanted to photograph him without clothes. There was no way he was stripping for a photo unless a lawyer told him he had to, but he didn’t want to ask for a lawyer because that made him look guilty.

  He agreed to give them his clothes, requested privacy to take them off, and it was denied. His heart raced during the standoff and the compromise was that the door to the downstairs cloakroom would be left open.

  He undressed out of sight behind it. They gave him sweatpants and a T-shirt, Mike’s, but Caleb didn’t tell them. He washed the blood off his hands and chest and kept washing long after the water was no longer tinged with red.

  Caleb sat in the kitchen for what seemed like the entire morning with a police constable standing by the door, staring at him as if he expected him to make a dash for it. Caleb wasn’t guilty, but it was weird how much he wanted to run. He had nothing to hide about what happened last night, but he did about what had happened in his past.

  He hadn’t told them that a former boyfriend had been killed, because he knew how it would look. Caleb wasn’t going to tell them anything farther back than when he’d first met Mike. His stomach churned with anxiety. He wished he knew
how Mike was. The policeman made him a cup of tea, added two sugars, and even though Caleb didn’t like sugar in his tea, he drank it.

  Tanner, the detective who’d done most of the questioning, returned and put Caleb’s phone on the table. “Like to call someone?”

  Did he want him to say a lawyer? Caleb shook his head and then nodded. “A friend.”

  Caleb almost broke down when he heard Victor’s voice.

  “You know I don’t stir until after noon, my darling.”

  “Mike’s been stabbed. He’s been taken to the hospital.” He glanced at Detective Tanner.

  “The Royal,” Tanner said.

  “He’s at The Royal,” Caleb repeated.

  Victor gasped. “What happened? Did you fight?”

  “No. Yes, but I didn’t stab him. I’m with the police. Will you go to Mike?”

  “God yes.”

  Victor ended the call and Caleb registered that how he was hadn’t mattered to Victor. But that was okay as long as he’d be there for Mike, at least temporarily.

  Tanner picked up Caleb’s statement. The guy had already read it and questioned him about what was in it.

  “He hit you?” The same question Caleb had already answered.

  “Yes.”

  “Didn’t break your glasses?”

  “No.”

  Caleb had volunteered to write out exactly what happened from the time he arrived at the party, and he’d included the part about him thinking he was being followed, but not that he’d had a panic attack. He saw the detective didn’t believe him. He could give no description of the man or the car. No reason for a stalker. Just a feeling. Caleb could almost see the wheels turning in Tanner’s head, the idea that Caleb was inventing a mysterious guy because he was the one who’d stabbed Mike.

  “Had Mike ever hit you before?”

  “No.” Why was he going over it again?

  “You hit him back?” Tanner asked.

  “No.”

  “Why not?”

  “He didn’t know what he was doing. He was drunk and maybe high on something.”

  “Were you in the habit of taking drugs?”

  “Neither of us did. Mike isn’t an addict but sometimes he takes Ecstasy.” Caleb’s heart pounded so hard he could hear it in his head. Sorry, Mike.

  “So you hit him.”

  “No. I only tried to defend myself.”

  Tanner was trying to trip him up, but if Caleb stuck to the truth, that couldn’t happen.

  “He locked you in the bathroom. How did he manage that?”

  “He slid the door shut before I realized what he was going to do, then he must have wedged it.”

  “So you weren’t strong enough to open it, but he managed it even though he’d been stabbed?”

  “Yes.”

  “Look, I’ll be honest with you.” Tanner sat opposite. “It seems pretty clear what happened. You two had a falling-out at this party. Must have hurt seeing him with another guy. You go off to a friend’s. Mike comes to get you, tells you he’s sorry, but you have another row there. We’ve spoken to Jamie. You drive Mike back here. By the time you arrive, you’re still angry. You want to leave. Mike doesn’t want you to and you struggle. Hence your bruises. The fingermarks on your neck are quite clear. You were only defending yourself. That’s understandable. Did you take the knife upstairs? Or did he?”

  Oh God. “I was trapped in the bathroom. I assumed Mike wanted to sleep off what he’d taken so he could talk to me the next day. But I heard odd sounds…a scuffle…gasps. The door slid open and Mike stood there bleeding. I thought he’d done it to himself at first but… You should be out searching for whoever did this. It wasn’t me.”

  Tanner looked disappointed. “Why would some random burglar go to the trouble of stabbing Mike and not take anything?”

  “I don’t know. Maybe Mike woke and saw him and whoever it was just lashed out.”

  Caleb’s inability to provide them with the names of anyone who might want to hurt Mike also disappointed the detective. Mike was genuinely popular. When they’d asked about Caleb’s former boyfriends he’d lied and said his ex was living happily somewhere in London and, no, he didn’t have the address. Since it was three and half years since Simon died, Caleb didn’t see how it could be relevant. Even so, he wondered how long it would take before the police found out about his more distant past. In theory that couldn’t happen, but Caleb had learned you never knew what life would throw at you.

  If the truth did come out, would he be deemed more likely to have stabbed Mike? If the press found out and printed Caleb’s picture, his freedom was gone. All the work he’d done to help him cope, wasted. He hoped with everything he had that his past stayed in his past.

  It was two more hours before the detective came back into the kitchen. “Your friend’s out of theatre and conscious. He says you had nothing to do with it.”

  Caleb groaned with relief. Did it make him a bad person to be as relieved he’d been cleared as he was that Mike would be okay?

  He pushed to his feet. “So I can go?”

  “This is a crime scene,” Tanner said. “You can’t take anything from the house for the time being.”

  Almost everything he owned was in his car and they hadn’t asked to see that. “I just want my phone and keys.”

  Tanner pushed them across the table and Caleb picked them up. They’d taken photos of his phone before it had been wiped clean.

  “Don’t leave the area,” Tanner said. “We might have more questions.”

  Caleb walked out of the house barefoot.

  When he’d driven a couple of streets away, he flipped open the boot and pulled a sweater and trainers from his case. He dressed at the side of the road, put in a new set of lenses and went straight to the hospital.

  Victor sat next to the bed, holding Mike’s hand.

  “Where’ve you been?” Victor asked.

  “The police thought I did it until Mike told them otherwise.”

  “Oh shit,” Mike croaked.

  Caleb pushed his hands into his pockets. Something about seeing Victor holding Mike’s hand made him uncomfortable. Probably because he should be doing it and he didn’t want to. “How are you feeling?”

  “Like I’ve been stabbed.”

  “The doctor said you saved his life,” Victor said. “They’ve had to remove his spleen. Pressing the towel on his wound stopped him bleeding out.”

  “Well, he was making a mess on the carpet and you know how pissed off he gets about that.”

  Victor rolled his eyes. “He can detect a speck of dirt on his preciousss before he gets in the house.”

  “I am here,” Mike said. “And don’t make me laugh. Why are you wearing my sweatpants?”

  “The police took my clothes because they were covered with your blood.”

  “Christ,” Victor mumbled.

  “Do you know who did it?” Caleb asked.

  “No. I woke when I felt this pain. I thought you’d managed to get out of the bathroom and had thumped me, but when I opened my eyes, even though it was dark, I saw the guy was too big. A bit taller than you, a lot broader. He wore a balaclava. That was all I noticed. I didn’t realize what he’d done until he switched the light on as he left and I tried to get up.” He grunted in pain.

  Victor patted his hand. “Mike’s going to stay with me for the time being. The police don’t think it’s a good idea for him to go back to the house.”

  “Who’d want to kill me, for fuck’s sake?” Mike muttered.

  “Every guy with a cock smaller than yours, sweetheart,” Victor said.

  Mike laughed again, then groaned.

  “The police asked me that,” Caleb said.

  “About my cock?” Mike managed a grin.

  “Everyone loves you,” Victor said.r />
  “Except Caleb.” Mike looked up at him. “Sorry I hit you.”

  But not that you cheated?

  Mike swallowed. “The guy asked me if I was sorry I’d hit you.”

  “What guy?” Caleb asked.

  “The one who attacked me, that’s what he whispered. ‘Are you sorry you hit him?’ I’m guessing you know who he is.”

  “Former boyfriend?” Victor asked.

  Not unless he’d come back from the dead. Caleb shook his head. “No.”

  “Caleb doesn’t talk about former anything,” Mike said. “His life pre-me is out of bounds. Guess I just found out why.”

  Caleb clenched his fists. “I have no idea who did this. Definitely not the guy I went out with before you.” Everyone since had only been a hookup and not a boyfriend. “How did he know you’d hit me? He must have been watching the house. You ought to tell the police.”

  “I won’t be doing that,” Mike said. “You think I want him to come back and finish me off?”

  Caleb gasped.

  “What shit are you mixed up in?” Victor asked him.

  “I don’t know.”

  “Well, whatever it is, it’s your problem, not mine,” Mike said. “We’re over.”

  Caleb let that go. If it made Mike feel better to think it was his decision, then that was fine.

  Caleb walked back to his car, alert for anyone watching. He hadn’t lied. He had no clue who stabbed Mike. It didn’t have to be a man either of them knew. Maybe it was some random guy who fancied Caleb. But Caleb wasn’t good with the idea of random. He drove away from the town without a destination in mind. If he didn’t plan, then unless someone was trailing him, they wouldn’t be able to work out his whereabouts.

  When he found himself close to the car park at Dorney Head, Caleb pulled in and parked in a spot where he could see if he’d been followed. In the ten minutes he watched, no other cars entered and since there was nowhere to park on that narrow stretch of the coastal road, unless you used a car park, he felt he was safe. He crawled into the back seat and fell into an exhausted sleep.