Those We Left Behind (2015) by Stuart Neville

Author:Stuart Neville [Neville, Stuart]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Mystery, Thriller, Adult, Suspense
ISBN: 9781616956370
Google: wZ_0BQAAQBAJ
Goodreads: 25279684
Publisher: Soho Press
Published: 2015-09-21T12:00:00+00:00

30

DANIEL ROLSTON HAD been drinking since the morning. He had jumped onto the first bus that stopped and found himself in the city centre. Not long after eleven, he wandered into a bar on Chichester Street and ordered a pint of lager. It was gone in minutes, and he asked for another. The barman looked at the cut beneath his eye and asked if he was all right. Daniel did not answer the question, repeated his request for another drink. The barman obliged.

As lunchtime clientele began to fill the bar, Daniel neared the end of his fourth pint. Lifted the glass to get the barman’s attention, relishing the buzz in his head.

‘Maybe you should have something to eat,’ the barman said. ‘A glass of water, too.’

‘No,’ Daniel said. ‘Just give me another.’

‘I’ll get you a sandwich. On the house.’

‘No. Another pint. Please.’

‘All right,’ the barman said. ‘One more, but after that, I want you out the door.’

Daniel nodded and handed over his money.

As he left the bar, the noise of the city rushed in on him, the cars, the people, the undying clamour of it all. He marched past the front of the City Hall, hating the kids who gathered there, mouthy little bastards all of them. He bumped shoulders with some tracksuit-wearing knuckle-dragger who shouted after him to watch where he was going. Daniel spun to the angry voice, saw the confidence drain from the boy’s face at the sight of him. He kept walking, headed south, around the City Hall, past the upmarket restaurants and fashionable bars, out of the city centre, towards Shaftesbury Square and beyond, until he made his way to the northern end of Botanic Avenue. If he kept walking, he’d come to Botanic Gardens, the trees and the grass there, the flowers. As the sun warmed him, that seemed a wonderful place to be.

Daniel stopped at an off-licence and bought a bottle of cheap vodka, paid the extra few pence for a plastic bag to conceal it. The purchase left him with less than ten pounds on his person. He had less than a hundred in his current account. Not that he cared much.

A few minutes’ walk took Daniel to the park, its open lawns, tree-shaded paths, the Palm House as its centrepiece. He found a bench with a view of a green where a gathering of people threw balls and sticks while their dogs chased and gambolled.

Happy people, he thought, every reason to enjoy a Saturday afternoon in the park. He would never be one of them, Daniel knew that: a normal contented life was lost to him long ago.

He twisted the bottle cap, breaking the seal, and took a deep swallow of vodka. His stomach threatened to expel the liquid, and he doubled over, coughing and spitting, but kept the vodka inside. The second mouthful went down a little more easily. The third easier still. He did not remember the fourth.

A hard hand shook Daniel from a dream of mangled flesh and bone, of horrors upon horrors, death walking among the living, cutting them down as it went.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.