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‘They’re watching,’ he whispers. ‘We don’t have long.’
2
Suddenly it feels like there’s a blockage in Lucy’s throat, sealing it shut. She sinks on to a chair. Daniel sits opposite. He laces his fingers and rests his top lip on a knuckle.
‘Who—’ Lucy begins. She stops when he shakes his head.
The covering of his mouth is deliberate, she realizes. Whatever he’s about to say, he doesn’t want it overheard.
‘You need to listen,’ he tells her. ‘And you can’t interrupt before I’m done, because you need to hear all of it. What you do afterwards might just save Fin’s life.’
Her mouth falls open. She’s breathing again, huge lungfuls of air.
Lucy’s about to speak when she remembers Daniel’s warning not to interrupt. Glancing around the hall, she sees one of the prison officers watching, a couple of the other prisoners too. Turning back to the table, she parrots Daniel’s pose.
‘This is a nightmare,’ he says. ‘I thought, for a while, I’d wake up. Now I know I won’t. That doesn’t matter. What happens to me doesn’t matter. It’s all my fault, Lucy. I can’t guarantee—’
He chokes. His face turns red. Somehow, he swallows down his emotion. ‘I can’t guarantee Fin’s still alive, but there’s a chance. If he is, you’re the only one with any hope of finding him.’
The colours in the visiting hall grow so vivid they seem to glow.
I can’t guarantee Fin’s still alive, but there’s a chance.
Lucy cradles that sentence like a live grenade.
‘Friday morning Billie called me,’ Daniel says. ‘She said Fin had a dentist’s appointment – that you were tied up at the Drift Net and needed me to help. She sounded weird on the phone but I didn’t think too much of it. I collected him from school and we took the coastal road towards Redlecker. Couple of minutes later we spotted Billie in a lay-by, frantically flagging us down. I pulled over and that’s when it happened.’
A tremor passes through him. ‘Billie came up to my window. Then the door behind Fin opened and this … thisguygets in.’
Daniel lets out a breath. ‘He pulls Fin’s seatbelt taut and puts a knife against his throat. He’s wearing gloves – those blue surgical ones. And he tells me to obey him fully or he’ll cut Fin open.’
Lucy stares across the table. There’s a buzzing in her head so loud it almost obscures Daniel’s words.
‘My own seatbelt was still fastened. However quick I’d been, Lucy, however fast I’d moved …’ He looks off to the side. Then his eyes snap back to her face. ‘Billie gets in and I ask her what’s happening. I ask theguywhat’s happening. He tells me to turn around and head back towards Skentel – that if I comply, he won’t hurt Fin. All the way there I think about crashing off the road. But although he’s not wearinga seatbelt, he never takes his knife off Fin’s throat. Next thing I know we’re in the car park on Skentel’s quay.’
A prison officer walks past. Daniel pauses until he’s further away. ‘The guy produces a bottle of Talisker and tells me to drink. When I refuse, he starts wondering aloud if the blood will reach the windscreen if he opens Fin up right there, and whether we’ll all get hit by the splashback.
‘That’s when I start drinking. Once I get through a good half of it, he tells me to ready theLazy Susanfor launch. At that point, I thought it was all some bizarre robbery attempt. That it was best to do as he asked. I’m onboard the boat, pulling off sail covers, when I notice he’s forced Billie and Fin out of the car. They come along the dock and climb into the cockpit. He takes them down to the cabin and makes me take us out of the harbour. And then I realize that up on deck I’ve got nothing – no weapon or radio – and already the whisky’s kicking in. I thought about capsizing us, letting a wave hit us broadside. But nobody was wearing a life jacket, and you know what a weak swimmer Fin is. Once we reach open sea, the guy handcuffs me to a winch. Then he … he drags Fin and Billie up on deck and I see that they’re both tethered.’
Daniel’s pupils swell.
Lucy’s hands tighten over her mouth.
‘My phone was in my pocket. I hadn’t dared use it until then. While the guy was occupied I managed to speed-dial your number. He noticed and came at me hard. I got in a few punches but I was still shackled – and the whisky had slowed me up a lot. What happened next …’
Daniel moans, a sound so low it’s almost lost inside the visiting hall. ‘Billie, she … He killed Billie, Luce. I was there and he killed her and I didn’t stop it.’
A spasm of shaking hits him, then. A full minute passes before he regains control. He folds his arms, unfolds them. Starts to reach for her, snatches back his hands. ‘This next part – it’ll be difficult to hear. There’s no good way of telling you, so I’m just going to say it and then you’ll have to get out of here, try and do something about this.’
He stops again, this time to get his breath. Lucy’s grateful for the silence. The world he’s describing is so alien to the one she thought she inhabited that she needs a moment to reset.
Daniel puffs out his cheeks. ‘This guy, he’s the Devil. Satan, Lucifer, whichever name you want to use. He started talking, then. This awful reverential voice. He said he wanted tohelpyou. That he intended to change you from the hateful creature you’d become into something beautiful.
‘It didn’t make sense, any of it. But heknowsyou, this guy. At least, he knowsofyou. He said he wanted you to experience a period of self-reflection. A sharp shock and a moral change of course. If I helped him achieve it, my reward would be Fin’s life.’
Lucy unsticks her tongue, works up some saliva. ‘I don’t understand. What does he think I did?’
‘I don’t know, Luce. He brought out our dinghy, made me tell him how to assemble it. Once that was done, he got me to radio in a distress call. Then he started the engine and took us south. He said Fin’s life was in my hands, that he’d wait three days and if I followed his instructions he’d let him go. He tossed me an immersion suit and told me to get into the water.