Page 66 of Deep Blue Lies

SIXTY-FIVE

Do you know the Trikremnos Coves?

This is the only message I wake up to the day we’re due to meet. I don’t – know it, I mean – but I look it up and see there’s a little trio of beaches between Skalio and Kastria, near to where Imogen is staying. I text back saying I’ve seen it, and a few minutes later I get a long reply:

I remember it from when I worked here. It’s very beautiful.

Three tiny perfect coves. It’s not as quiet as I remember it, because now there’s a cafe on the first beach, but if you keep going it’s quieter, and there’s a wonderful flat rock in the final beach.

It’s lovely in the sun. I think it’s a good place to talk. Can you be there at eleven?

My fingers toy with the phone for a few moments before I reply.

I guess it sounds like a good idea, but I sort of hoped that Sophia could come with me.

Except she can’t, because she has to work this morning.

And if I try to push it later, then I have to be at the Bar Sunset.

I puff out my cheeks, but tap out a reply:

OK. See you there.

Then I text Sophia, asking if she minds me borrowing her moped again. Then I have a shower, not really caring when the hot water runs out and I just stand there in the not-quite-cold of the water from the pipes.

At ten I walk down to the dive centre. I’m not able to speak properly with Sophia, she’s busy handing out wetsuits to a group of Germans.

But she tosses me the moped key and tells me good luck.

And then when I’m back outside strapping on the helmet she comes out and makes me promise to tell her everything, unless it’s too horrible and I don’t want to.

She leans in and gives me a hug, and I can smell the peach-perfume of the shampoo she uses. I don’t want to let her go.

It’s only ten minutes on the moped, which seems easier to drive this time, I guess I’m practised now.

Soon I reach a rough parking area, with steps that lead down through some scrubland.

At the bottom I can see the yellow of the sand and a sliver of water – vivid turquoise and inviting.

I take off the helmet and check my watch.

Ten fifty. I try to calm my nerves. I don’t really understand why I’m so nervous.

I’ve known this woman for years, she’s not at all scary, not really.

She’s just really odd. But maybe what she’s going to tell me will be frightening.

I hesitate about whether to leave Sophia’s helmet dangling from the handlebars or carry it with me. It’s quite isolated here, and I don’t want someone to steal it. So in the end I carry it as I set off down the steps.

They’re uneven, stones cut roughly into the earth, worn smooth by years of use. Dry grass and thyme brush against my ankles as I descend, and the scent of sun-baked herbs fills the air.

From the bottom, the cove is truly stunning – a perfect crescent of golden sand, the sea curling gently at its edge.

There’s a handful of people, a couple lying on towels, a man standing in the shallows in bright red speedos.

A little wooden cafe sits off to the side, its terrace shaded by a straw awning.

Her message said she’d wait in the third cove by the flat rock, so I keep walking.

The cliffs here extend like fingers, cutting the beach into three.

The rock is tall but narrow, almost like a curtain that conceals the next little bay beyond, but there’s plenty of beach extending beyond it to step around into the next bay.

And here there’s only two people, lying on towels under a sun umbrella and lazily kissing each other.

They stop when they see me, glaring as if they want me to turn back.

I don’t, crossing in front of them around the next finger of cliff into the final bay.

And straight away I sense something’s not right.

The first clue is the towel, floral patterned and scrunched into the sand at the bottom of this big flat rock that comes out of nowhere in the middle of the beach.

It looks like someone’s stood on the towel, twisting it, driving it deep into the sand.

There’s a bag too, but upside down, the contents spilling out.

I hesitate, then step closer, looking around, but there’s nothing else here. And then my heart stops. There’s is something else. Protruding from the other side of the rock, on the beach beyond it. It’s a foot. A bare human foot.

For a second, my mind refuses to process what I’m seeing.

Stupidly I call out her name, but obviously she doesn’t move.

I can see that the angle of the foot is all wrong.

But still, I have to force myself forward, feeling the blood pumping through my head.

Every step I take reveals more of her – pale calves, a white flowery dress, wet in places – I don’t know what with, but sand has stuck to it. Her arm is draped across her belly.

I feel my throat tighten.

No, no, no.

I drop Sophia’s helmet onto the sand with a thud and stumble forward, my knees hitting the ground beside her.

“Imogen?”

My voice wobbles as I reach out, my hands hovering over her shoulder, over her arm, not quite daring to touch her.

Her hair is tangled, dark strands plastered to her cheek, her neck.

But it’s her head that’s the most horrible of all.

A wound on the back, seeping fresh blood into her hair and onto the ground, where it sinks at once.

Like the very essence of her is disappearing into the sand around her.