The Lie by C. L. Taylor

Author:C. L. Taylor [Taylor, C. L.]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Thriller, Mystery
ISBN: 9780007544264
Publisher: Avon UK
Published: 2015-04-23T07:00:00+00:00

Chapter 26

Five Years Earlier

“Isaac?”

He’s sitting a metre away, his arms wrapped around his legs, his forehead pressed to his knees. In one hand is a rock, slick with blood. I reach for my shorts, still down around my knees, and pull them up. The action is automatic – I am half-naked and I should cover myself up – but I barely register what I am doing.

“Isaac?”

Frank’s body is on the ground behind him, his head turned away from us. The hair is matted, a pool of blood circling it like a red halo.

“Isaac?” I wince as I crawl towards him. There’s something wrong with my right arm. I can’t move it. “Are you okay?” He flinches as I touch him. “What happened?”

He raises his head and looks at me. His face is pale, his pupils dark. There is a graze on his left cheek, his lip is split open and his left eye is bloodshot.

“Is he …”

We both watch as Frank’s chest rises and falls.

“He …” The shaking starts in my hand then continues up my arm, across my chest and into my jaw. My teeth chatter against each other. “He was …”

“I know.” Isaac shifts himself towards me and wraps an arm around my shoulders. “I know.”

I press my head into his T-shirt. It smells of sweat, jasmine, musk and warmth. Neither of us says a word then he gently peels himself away from me and cups his hands to his mouth. A piercing whistle fills the air, cutting through the cicadas’ chirping and slicing through the river’s roar. The sound of laughter from the waterfall stops abruptly, and then there’s a new sound – the slap, slap of feet on mud – and then they appear: Isis, Cera, Daisy and Leanne. They stop short, a good ten metres away from us. Daisy’s eyes grow big and scared as she stares at Frank’s prostrate, bleeding body.

“What happened?” Isis asks, but she’s interrupted by the crashing arrival of Kane, Jacob and Kieran.

“Frank’s hurt. I need you guys to take him to the basement” – Isaac nods towards Frank – “then go and get Sally to check him over and patch him up.”

“He looks like he should go to hospital,” Daisy says, but Isaac shakes his head.

“It’s not as bad as it looks, and Sally’s a trained nurse.”

The men rush into action, dipping down to haul Frank up from the ground, his torso supported by two of the men, the third holding his feet. They rotate him around so his head’s pointing towards the house, then set off, carrying him away.

“Emma?” Daisy takes a step towards me, her face contorted with indecision and, just for a second, I see her – old Daisy, university Daisy, the Daisy who’d sit on my bed and stroke my hair and make me imagine the sun on my face and the sea at my feet.

Please, Daisy.

She looks back towards the house. Frank and his human ambulance are tiny figures in the distance now, stick men, wind-up toys.

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