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Pulling myself up the steps was more of an effort than I wanted to admit, and as I rounded the halfway landing I had to hang on to the banister and hold myself up for a moment before I continued up the next flight. When I reached the top there was cold sweat running down the hollow of my spine, and it was all I could do to stop my knees from giving way. The pack on my back felt like a dead weight, and now I dug inside it, pulling out everything I didn’t need—the wash bag, the sling, the water bottle—every bit of weight except the things I would need to see this job through to the end. I let the items fall to the floor, then pulled the half-empty bag back onto my shoulders, straightened up, and began to walk again. Mercifully, the corridor was quiet, no one around, and I was able to hold on to the wall as I half walked, half jogged through the tunnel, over the six lanes of traffic below.
As I passed, I could see the lines of cars beneath, see another police car speeding north, from London, towards the service station, and a part of me almost wanted to laugh. Three cop cars. Who on earth did they think they were dealing with, Osama bin Laden?
I was halfway across now, but looking back over my shoulder I could see the blue lights clustered around the entrance to the food court, and could imagine the police fanning out inside, searching the booths, the loos, the back exits.
How long before they noticed the overpass? Another patrol car was speeding north on blue lights, siren wailing, but this one passed underneath and I knew probably heading for the next junction, intending to double back and search the southbound service area. I had to get across before they made it.
I quickened my step, feeling the perspiration prickling at the back of my neck and across my upper lip. My whole right side was throbbing now, from my breast to my pelvis, pulsing with every beat of my heart, but I pushed myself on, stumbling once, and just catching myself by grabbing hold of the windowsill of the tunnel. I groaned, not trying to hide the sound, for there was no one up here, and held myself up while the tunnel stopped lurching and swinging, then carried on, trying to breathe with short, shallow pants, as it hurt to fill my lungs completely.
I was at the stairs now, and I skittered down them, trying not to look like someone on the run from what was now quite an obvious collection of blue lights on the other side of the motorway. Another car screamed north underneath the pedestrian tunnel, heading for the flyover at the next junction. What was that, five now? Six?
As I came down the stairs into the eerily identical southbound foyer, I was half expecting to be greeted by a matching collection of uniformed police, but there was no one there apart from a second, equally bored security guard, who did not look up as I walked quickly across the beige tiles and out into the night.
Outside I looked left and right, trying to figure out where the fuck the HGV area might be. Did they have a separate terminus? I couldn’t see one—but on the far side of the parking lot was a collection of rigs, and peering through the spattering rain I could see at least two had lights on inside the cabs.
As I stood, trying to decide what to do, blue lights appeared on the slip road leading from the southbound motorway, and my heart gave an involuntary leap in my chest. The sight made up my mind, and I took a deep breath and began to walk as quickly as I could through the rainy night, towards the lighted cabs.
* * *
“DO YOU KNOW BILL WATTS?” I asked, for the fourth, or maybe fifth, time, and for the fourth, or maybe fifth, time, the driver shook his head.
“Sorry, darlin’. Is he a driver? Have you tried inside?”
He nodded back towards the service station, and I looked over my shoulder to see a second police car sliding to a halt in front of the steps. I turned back, hoping my face wasn’t too obviously ashen.
“I’ve already been—”
“Bill Watts?” A voice came from behind me, and I turned again to see a rig, not too far away, with the window cracked open and a cloud of vape smoke coming from the slit. Now the driver rolled it down further and peered out. “I know him. Chatted to him on the radio earlier. I think he’s heading north, though. Darlington or summat? Doubt he’ll be here.”
I felt a rush of relief.
“I’m actually not looking for him. I’m his—” I swallowed. I was someone who lied professionally, for God’s sake, so why was it so hard doing it now, when it mattered most? “I’m his n-niece, Ella. I’m stuck and he said maybe if I asked around, someone would give me a lift south?”
“Where are you looking to get to?” The guy had opened the door and now he slid easily to the ground. He was a lot younger than Bill, nearer my age, and powerfully built. He looked like when he wasn’t driving he probably spent every hour in the gym.
“London, ideally.”
“No bother. I’m doing a drop in Greenwich. I can’t get you much closer cos of the Low Emission Zone, but if I left you round there, would that help?”
“Are you kidding?” Greenwich was only a few miles from Cole’s flat. I could walk the rest if I had to. “That would be amazing. Is there any chance…” I glanced over my shoulder, trying not to look too obviously at the police cars idling by the main entrance, radios crackling over the still night air. “I mean, I’d be incredibly grateful either way, but I don’t suppose you’re leaving soonish, are you?”
He glanced at his watch, then nodded.
“Yeah, just about done my break time.” He tapped something into a log on his phone, then said, “Hop in, Ella.”
For a moment I had no clue who he was talking to, then I realized and a smile spread across my face. Ella Watts. For the next couple of hours, that was me.
“Thanks. And you are…?”
“Mike. Michael Rake to the DVLA. Or Micky Take to my mates.” He held open the door for me, and I climbed up into the cab.
* * *
AS WE SPED SOUTH ON the motorway, the flashing blue lights receding behind us, Mike kept up a steady stream of chat, asking me questions about myself, my work, my supposed uncle Bill… I answered at random, trying to keep up the pretense of being related to Bill while mixing in “facts” I could plausibly pull off without research. I told him I lived in London, worked in a call center, wasn’t married. Saying those last words gave me a stab of pain that was nothing to do with the wound in my side, and I couldn’t stop myself glancing down at my bruised and empty finger. I remembered Gabe’s face as he had held the ring out to me, the light in his clear brown eyes. He must have known I would say yes—but even still, he’d looked nervous, had stammered over the words, “Jack, will you m-marry me?”
I saw again the slanting light, smelled the ocean, felt the sand between my toes as I’d crouched in the dunes, saying Yes, yes, yes…
Oh God, I thought, I love him. And for once, I didn’t have to painfully correct myself over the tense, because it didn’t matter that Gabe was dead. I still loved him. I would always love him. What was I going to do when all this was over, when I had no reason to keep putting one foot in front of the other?
