Give Yourself Away

by Barbara Elsborg

  “Okay.”

  March helped Kev load the boat on the trailer so that it could be towed back to the lifeboat station.

  “You’re in trouble,” Kev said.

  “Looks like it.” March fastened the straps on his side.

  “What were you thinking?” Kev asked.

  “That I couldn’t let someone drown if there was a chance to save them.”

  While Kev chatted to the tractor driver, March walked up the beach. He frowned when he saw a guy wrapped in a foil blanket, who had to be the one they’d just rescued, getting into a taxi. There was no sign of the ambulance and a police car was pulling out of the car park. Why hadn’t they taken him to the hospital? He was on the verge of hypothermia, if not already there. He needed monitoring. But then what the hell did it have to do with him? Maybe the guy had lied and hadn’t fallen. Maybe he’d jumped and when he’d survived changed his mind. Maybe the secrets weren’t ones March needed to know.

  March hoped Brian would have calmed down by the time he walked into the office, but when he saw the guy’s scowl, he braced himself.

  “What the fuck were you thinking?” Brian barked.

  March leaned against the door. “About a guy dying.” Just didn’t happen to be that particular one, at least not when he’d thrown himself into the water.

  “You’ve been trained. You know the procedure. What you did was reckless. It endangered all of us.”

  “Sorry.”

  “Could you at least make the effort to sound sincere? Just because we had a good result doesn’t mean it was the right thing to do. I have to write it up, March.”

  March shrugged.

  “We work as a team. You’re not a team player. We don’t even go on a call without authority. We do everything by the book.”

  “You wanted me to agree with you to try to get into the cave.”

  “True, but I didn’t want you to chuck yourself in the water until we’d at least discussed it. You didn’t even fasten yourself on. Have you got a fucking death wish? This isn’t the first time you’ve risked your life.”

  “We all risk our lives every time we go out.”

  “You know what I’m talking about.”

  Yeah, I do.

  Brian sighed. “Until I’ve talked to Richard, you’re suspended.”

  March almost laughed. Two suspensions in one day. Maybe he should try to get banned from the pub and make it three. He put his pager on the table.

  “Go home and think about why you volunteered for the RNLI,” Brian said.

  “I don’t need to think about it. I did it to save lives.” March walked out.

  I am such a fucking liar. A byproduct of volunteering to be a member of the lifeboat crew was that he might stop people dying, but it was his own life March was trying to save, or maybe end in the process. This is not living.

  March strode to his car. He’d give the pub a miss, just in case.

  Chapter Seven

  “I’m sorry,” Tye whispered, trying not to cry.

  Baxter wiped the blood off Tye’s face with a few sheets of wet toilet tissue. “Don’t be. You did your best.”

  Tye wanted to believe that, wanted Baxter to believe that, but he kept thinking if he’d run the other way, gone down the drive, seen that log before it tripped him… “There weren’t any other houses. This place is all on its own. I saw a wood, that’s all. I ran into it but…that’s where he caught me. I got the license plate of his van. TY4 76RP.”

  They both flinched at a loud bang. The scrap of light from the window disappeared.

  Tye took a deep breath. “I’ll stay with him, and you can go.”

  Baxter pulled Tye under the blanket and lay close to him on the mattress. “He isn’t going to let either of us go.”

  “But he said he would.”

  “He won’t because we’d go to the police. He’d warn us not to, threaten to hurt the one he still had, but our parents would make us tell the police everything. We can identify him. He isn’t going to risk that.”

  Tye gulped. “What’s he going to do then?”

  “I think he’ll kill the one he takes away from here.”

  Tye clung to him, buried his head against Baxter’s chest as he shook, and Baxter wrapped his arms around him. Tye loved him so much. He couldn’t bear the idea of Baxter being dead.

  “The only way out is through the door,” Baxter said. “We can’t set up a trap to trip him or overpower him because he can see exactly what we’re doing. So we have to trick him. We have to persuade him to let us both out of the room and while he’s…busy with me, you have to escape. Look for a window to get through. He’ll have locked the doors. Maybe take his phone if you can, but don’t waste time looking for it.”

  “No. You should run this time.”

  Baxter shook his head. “I know what he wants. I’ll let him do it.”

  Tye knew what Liam wanted too. Tye had had his chance. This one was Baxter’s.

  * * *

  Caleb was relieved the paramedics hadn’t insisted he go to the hospital. Well, they had insisted, but he’d been adamant. He didn’t want any more questions, the cops putting two and two together and concluding he had tried to kill Mike and then tried to kill himself. When Caleb took his phone from his pocket, it showed no glimmer of life. One of the policemen called him a taxi.

  The money in his wallet was as wet as he was, and he gave the driver a hefty tip for the short journey back to his car. It was the only one left in the car park. When the taxi had gone, he stripped and put on another set of clothes, including socks, and threw his last dry pair of shoes into the passenger footwell. His wet things went into a plastic bag, which he stowed in the boot after taking out the sleeping bag and pillow. He’d lost his lenses at some point. Maybe there were a few friends he could have gone to, but Caleb wanted to be on his own.

  The police had accepted his story of stumbling into a crevasse and pointed out he should have taken more care. You think? But Caleb was polite and contrite because he didn’t want this going any further. He’d been desperate to get away before a reporter turned up. It was a newsworthy rescue and Caleb would have been happy to give the man who’d rescued him public credit for what he did, but not at the expense of possibly losing his security. He didn’t think either the police or the RNLI would reveal who he was without his permission. He’d asked them not to.

  He squirmed into the sleeping bag, pulling it up to his neck, and lay on his side, legs curled, his hands tucked under his arms. He was cold but getting warmer. Part of him regretted not having let them take him to the hospital. After a shower he might have had a comfortable bed to sleep in, but there would have been more questions. He wasn’t sure he could cope with anything else today.

  Caleb lay with his eyes open, thinking about the guy who’d saved him. He’d hardly been able to believe it when he popped up in the cave. He’d had a light around his head like an angel with a halo. Caleb didn’t believe in angels, but tonight he’d almost changed his mind. While he wasn’t in the habit of trusting people, particularly ones he’d only just met, something about March’s calm, measured voice had reassured him, reminded him of a long time ago when another voice had kept him centered. He’d still been fucking terrified when March pulled him under the water.

  He wanted to thank him, thank all the lifeboat crew. That was the first thing on his mental to-do list. He also needed to buy a new phone, find somewhere to live and look for another job. He had enough in his current account to last for a while, enough in his savings account to last more than a while, but that wasn’t something he wanted to touch unless he had to.

  Leaving Dorset was a consideration, yet this area was the only place he’d ever been truly happy. That happiness seemed a distant dream now. Would he feel safer elsewhere or would his past continue to haunt him?

  Until the attack on M
ike, Caleb had believed he was a victim of his own paranoia. Not surprising with his history. One dead boyfriend might be seen as bad luck. Two dead boyfriends, something else entirely. But Mike wasn’t dead. Perpetual worry that someone might be watching him had convinced Caleb it was true when he knew it wasn’t. Except now he didn’t know what to think. Was someone looking out for him in a good way? Not that stabbing Mike was good, but it sounded as though whoever did it was on Caleb’s side. Unless it was a random burglar who hadn’t known Caleb was in the bathroom. Except those words… “Are you sorry you hit him?”

  Who was he trying to fool? It wasn’t random.

  Caleb woke with the rising sun shining in his face. As he sat up, he groaned. His entire body ached, particularly his neck. His throat was parched and his dry, salt-encrusted skin felt tight and uncomfortable. He rubbed his neck and dragged his fingers through his hair—ugh, sticky. He wriggled out of his sleeping bag and searched under the seats until he’d unearthed half a bottle of water.

  Once he’d soothed his parched throat, he climbed out of the car and stretched, shivering in the chilly morning air. Maybe finding a B and B in Lymton was the first thing he should do. He needed a shower, something to eat, and then he’d sort out his phone.

  He put in a set of lenses, slipped on his shoes then drove to the next town. He went past the lifeboat station that had come to his rescue last night and drove along the seafront, checking out the line of hotels and B and Bs, most of which had vacancy signs at the window. It was well after the end of the holiday season, the kids were back at school and the coastal resorts would be settling into their quiet period, wincing at the loss of income but heaving a sigh of relief at the lack of traffic.

  Caleb picked a B and B away from the seafront, with on-street parking, pulled his fingers through his hair again and rang the bell.

  A middle-aged woman opened the door and smiled. “Can I help you?”

  “I know it’s early but I’m looking for a room for one night,” Caleb said. “Maybe a couple of nights.”

  “Forty pounds for bed and breakfast.”

  That sounded a bit steep for a place not facing the water but Caleb pulled out his wallet and removed three damp twenty-pound notes. “Sorry for the state of these. My wallet’s been in the sea. If you could let me have a room now, and throw in breakfast today, you can keep the sixty.”

  “Did you go in the sea as well?”

  “Yes.”

  She narrowed her eyes. “Drunk?”

  “No. I fell in accidentally. Slipped. Is there a launderette nearby where I could dry my clothes?” Caleb didn’t have to work hard at looking pathetic; he felt it.

  “Bring them in and I’ll wash them for you.”

  Ten minutes later, he stood under a hot shower, his head tipped back, eyes closed, quiet groans of pleasure slipping from his lips. He cleaned his teeth, shaved and stared at his thin face in the mirror. He looked a bit battered, though whether that was courtesy of Mike or the fall he didn’t know. There were dark circles under his eyes, a couple of bruises on his face and that wary expression seemed to have returned, the look he’d started to lose when he thought Mike might be the one.

  Caleb dressed in worn jeans, his last pair of pants that weren’t work gear, pulled on his best white shirt and went down for breakfast. Only one table had been laid and he deduced he was the sole guest.

  The last thing he’d eaten was cheese sandwiches at work almost two days ago. Caleb wolfed down the full English, together with four rounds of toast and marmalade, and drank three cups of coffee.

  Back in his room, he left his wallet drying on a radiator and pushed his debit and credit cards into the pocket of his jacket. The room was okay, basic and clean, though a bit old-fashioned, with striped curtains, matching bedspread and too many cushions.

  As Caleb stood remembering how long he’d spent moving from one B and B to another, covering his tracks, he felt melancholy creeping over him. His life was like a trampoline. One minute he was high and happy, and the next he was down and not. Not that he’d ever been on a trampoline. He worried about bouncing off.

  He walked into town with his damaged mobile and was first through the door of the phone shop when it opened. He’d taken out insurance and it didn’t take long to get another phone with all his data restored from the cloud.

  There were no new messages, no emails. He’d been hoping for one from Ricardo about a job, even if it was forty miles away. Caleb texted him and asked. Work for carpenters was thin on the ground, especially ones like Caleb who didn’t have years of experience and a vanload of fancy equipment.

  The fancy equipment could have been his if he’d been prepared to touch the money in his savings account. But the more stuff he had, the less mobile he was, and Caleb took comfort in knowing everything he owned could fit in his car. As he thought about the money, he had a brainwave.

  The bank clerk didn’t hide her surprise when Caleb told her he wanted to make an anonymous donation of ten thousand pounds to the town’s lifeboat station.

  It had to be his imagination, but he felt lighter and much happier after he’d done it. There was a spring in his step he hadn’t noticed before. He drew out a hundred in cash from his current account, bought a large box of biscuits from Marks and Spencer and headed for the lifeboat station at the far end of town.

  The building was open to the public and Caleb made his way to a glass-windowed office where two men were talking. He rapped on the door.

  “Come in.”

  Caleb stepped inside, recognized the red-haired man behind the desk, and held out the biscuits. “Thank you for saving my life last night.”

  “This the one you picked up?” The guy who’d opened the door turned to the other.

  “Yep.”

  Caleb walked forward, put the biscuits on the desk and offered his hand. “Brian, right? Thank you.”

  “You’re welcome. How are you feeling?”

  “Alive, thanks to you and your crew.”

  “Do you remember what happened? How you came to be in the cave?” asked the one who’d opened the door.

  “I strayed off the clifftop path. I was running, not paying attention to where I was going, and the next thing I knew I was in the water. I couldn’t believe it when March surfaced in the cave. I thought I was hallucinating. Is he around? I’d like to thank him.”

  “He’s not here. I’ll pass on your thanks.”

  “If I come back later, might I see him?”

  “Unlikely in the near future.”

  Something in Brian’s manner told Caleb there was a problem. “Is he in trouble for helping me?”

  “I can’t discuss that. Thanks for the biscuits.”

  Caleb took the hint and left.

  So March was in trouble for helping him. Shit. And he’d just given them ten thousand pounds.

  He sat on the seawall and used his phone to check online to see if there was anything about his rescue or about March. Nothing yet, but local reporters lived for this sort of story. Caleb had read them often enough in the papers and seen them on TV.

  He went on to the site for the lifeboat station and found photos of the volunteers dressed in dark-blue RNLI sweaters. When he scrolled down and found March, Caleb swallowed. I wasn’t wrong. He is gorgeous. He looked a few years older than Caleb and had messy, dark hair, dark eyes and thick lashes, a slightly stubbly jaw and sexy, kissable lips. Way out of my league. And most likely straight. There was something in the set of his jaw as he stared into the camera that looked familiar. Probably because Caleb always fancied the same type, but had never managed more than a one-night stand—maybe fifteen-minute stand—with any of them, apart from Simon and Mike.

  March Durant. Armed with a surname, Caleb headed for the library.

  It didn’t take long to uncover March’s address from the electoral roll. Bank Cottage, Pender Road.
He looked it up on a map. It was out of town but not too far to walk, so he bought another box of biscuits and set off on foot.

  A silver Peugeot was parked outside the cottage, but when Caleb knocked on the door, no one answered. He tried again and was sure he heard a noise inside.

  He put his mouth to the letterbox. “I’m not selling anything or trying to convert you. I’m the guy you rescued last night. I just wanted to say thanks. I went to the lifeboat station and got the feeling you were in some sort of trouble because of me. I’m sorry. If there’s anything I can do to help…”

  There was no answer.

  “Can I at least buy you a drink?”

  If March was listening, he’d have no idea how hard that had been to ask. Caleb was not brave and forward as far as guys were concerned. He’d never asked anyone to go out with him or even to have a drink with him before. All the picking up had been done by the other guys. The only reason he’d plucked up enough courage now was because a door stood between him and March, and, quite possibly, there was no one there at all.

  “I’ll be at the Red Lion from seven to eight if you fancy a pint.” Or me. Shit. Well, that wasn’t going to come out of his mouth. For all he knew, March was in the garden with his wife and kids.

  He left the biscuits on the doorstep, stuck his hands into his pockets and walked away.

  When he heard the crunch of gravel as Caleb headed down the drive, March let out a shuddery breath. Why the fuck hadn’t he opened the door?

  Because if he’d have invited the guy in, the temptation to push him up against the wall and do something stupid might have been too strong to resist. Although that assumed March knew what to do, and he didn’t. He’d spent so long fighting his sexuality he was going to look like an idiot when he finally went for what he wanted—if he ever did—if he really wanted it. Fuck, fuck, fuck.

  For the first time March wondered if he should see someone—a psychiatrist or a psychologist—or just go for something simpler and pay for sex with a guy. Maybe that would fill the gaping chasm in his chest. He couldn’t get his head around why he was so mixed up about this, though he suspected guilt had something to do with it.