Page 1 of Too Close To Home

Prologue

The Long Way Home

Emily Fisher tugged her jacket tighter around herself and checked her phone again.

23:18.

The numbers glowed too bright in the dark, harsh and accusing, as if the screen itself mirrored her dad’s disappointment.

She shouldn’t have left without a lift. She knew that. Claire’s mum had turned up early though, when she’d been mid-conversation with Deacon. He’d leant on the bar, close enough for her to smell his beer breath, mint chewing gum and whatever aftershave it was that boys in bands used to make them instantly more irresistible.

How could she walk out when the lead singer of Static Youth paid her attention?

He’d definitely flirted.

Even if the flirting had mostly involved him sliding his empty glass across the bar with that half-smirk suggesting he knew exactly what he was doing. Trouble was, she couldn’t pour him another one, being only seventeen and her role being glass collection. Meaning he’d wandered off eventually.

Still.

It counted.

And so what if Deacon had a reputation? She wasn’t naïve. She knew exactly what people said about him. But there were worse people to lose her virginity to than a thirty-year-old frontman who knew exactly what he was doing. Then, when she eventually got herself to Manchester and met Leo properly, she wouldn’t have to admit she’d never done it.

Unfortunately, hanging around for Deacon had meant missing the last bus.

So she’d stood in the back corridor of the King’s Arms, zipping her coat over her black bar polo, staring at the staff rota pinned to the corkboard, and made a choice.

She wasn’t calling her dad.

Not on her first week of shifts.

Not after standing in the kitchen doorway earlier, arms folded, telling him she didn’t need ferrying back and forth as if she were twelve. Not after the blazing row about curfews and tracking apps and her screaming how he needed to “chill the hell out.” Not after he’d said, tight-voiced, “You don’t know this town the way I do.”

She wanted some bloody freedom.

She was seventeen.

Nearly eighteen. An adult.

She now understood why her mum had packed up and left when Dad was this suffocating.

The pub door shut behind her with a dull, final thud. Deacon hadn’t followed her out. She hadn’t actually expected him to. That would’ve been ridiculous. Still, some small, stupid part of her had imagined him jogging after her, offering her a lift home in the band’s battered van. The drummer usually drove it—the one with dark curly hair down to his shoulders. Jake. She didn’t really know him beyond his name, the fact he’d apparently been in trouble years ago, and that he was gay, which at least meant she’d never had to embarrass herself wondering if he might fancy her.

But no Deacon appeared, and the warmth and laughter of the pub were sealed away behind the door, replaced by cold air biting her cheeks.

Emily shoved her hands into her pockets and waved through the steamed-up glass at her boss, Pete, as he locked up. He caught her eye and mouthed, Text me when you’re home. She nodded, forcing a smile.

God, why was everyone so concerned?

The high street lay mostly dark, shutters down, winter merging hopelessly into spring, which looked more or less the same as autumn. One takeaway still glowed at the corner, neon sign flickering OPEN as if unsure if it was or not. A car idled outside the Co-op, exhaust curling silver into the air before it pulled away.

Then nothing.

Until a dog barked.

Then it stopped too abruptly.

Emily hitched her bag higher on her shoulder and headed towards the lane cutting between the chapel and the old mill cottages. The shortcut. Everyone used it as it shaved off ten minutes. She’d be home before midnight.