Page 3 of For My Finale

L ilah Paxton had been either in Bankton or in its general vicinity for approximately twenty minutes, and was beginning to admit to herself that she might be lost. She stood next to her sleek rental car, squinting at the crumpled sheet of directions the estate agent had given her.

“Turn left at the old oak tree,” she muttered.

She looked around. The direction might be helpful if she knew what a damn oak tree looked like. Or if every stupid tree in the area didn’t look like it had been around since medieval times.

She leaned on the car and sighed. She could drive, that was a plus. She was driving herself, something that hadn’t happened for years now. But she’d forgotten that there was a convenience attached to having a driver. Namely, that getting lost wasn’t her problem, it was firmly someone else’s.

She looked down at the paper again and sucked air over her teeth. “Follow the footpath past the field,” she read on. She sniffed and turned in a slow circle. From where she was standing, she could see no fewer than five fields. All of which looked suspiciously similar.

With a frustrated groan, she shoved the paper into her coat pocket. It was as good as useless. “I am an intelligent, competent adult,” she said out loud. “I have memorized entire scripts. I have survived Hollywood. I can find a stupid cottage.”

She turned, saw a footpath, and seized the day, her designer heels sinking into the mud as she began to walk.

“Who put damn mud here?” she muttered. But she kept walking, despite the suspicion that things weren’t exactly going well.

For a start, everything smelled like, well, like animal mess.

And smoke. Where was that from? Why did the country smell like smoke?

Was it on fire? And it was all fantastically dirty.

Not that LA was the cleanest city in the world, but there was mud everywhere here.

Only God knew how people kept their carpets clean.

She tottered around the edge of the field and through a gap in what might have once been a hedge, but that now towered over her. Which was when she heard it. A rustling noise behind her.

Lilah froze. Her heart stopped beating, her breath stopped breathing, and her skin prickled with anxiety.

It was entirely too quiet around here. Unlike the buzz of city traffic or the constant shouts of a film set, Bankton seemed eerily still.

Like one of those films where the place was deserted and yet haunted at the same time.

But something was definitely moving behind her.

She swallowed, steeling herself, then glanced over her shoulder.

Nothing.

“You’re being ridiculous,” she told herself. “There’s no zombies out here. Surely there’s nothing more dangerous here than in LA. Get a grip.”

The rustles grew louder. The sound of something very, very large on the other side of the hedge. Something very, very large approaching the gap that Lilah had just walked through.

???

Blossom leaned on the kitchen counter, sipping her tea and watching the dark gray clouds gathering overhead. It’d rain before long. She smiled to herself. She loved the smell of the rain on the trees, loved her little corner of peace.

Her cottage was tiny, no more than four rooms. But the garden stretched out in front of her, the view contained not a single other building, as long as you didn’t count the horrifically renovated cottage next door, and all was right with the world.

Particularly since it was her morning off. She took another mouthful of tea.

Well, all was perfect except for Billy.

She leaned a little further forward, straining to see further out to the road. But she saw not a sign of him. Odd. He was usually a creature of habit, and he really should be here by now.

She was just wondering whether or not she should put on a raincoat and go and look for him, when her phone rang.

“Hey, Ives,” she said, picking it up.

???

Ives groaned dramatically down the phone. “Oh, you owe me big time, Bloss. I mean big time. That blind date was a disaster of historic proportions.”

Blossom laughed. “Surely not. Was it worse than the time that guy forgot his wallet two dates in a row? Or the one where that woman took you to see that film entirely in Estonian with no subtitles?”

“Worse,” Ives said. “It was worse than the one where I sat on a cigarette.”

“How did that happen again?” Blossom asked. “You don’t even smoke.”

“I’m too traumatized to discuss it,” said Ives crisply. “Besides, we’re focussing on last night’s disaster.”

“Disaster?”

“She was eighty,” Ives said.

“Surely not.”

“Close to it,” said Ives. “I swear. She was retired. She had a million cats. And she told me each one of their names in alphabetical order. Twice.”

Blossom burst out laughing. “So, back to dating men, then?”

“Obviously,” Ives said. “At least until my next disastrous date with a man, at which point, I’ll go back to only dating women again. You know the drill.”

“At some point, you’re going to have to decide,” Blossom said, looking out of the window again. Still no sign of Billy.

“Pot. Kettle. Black,” Ives said. “And at least I go on dates. Meanwhile, you’re one tragic event away from collecting cats yourself.”

“I have zero cats.”

“Currently.”

“And I’m just waiting for the right woman,” said Blossom, turning around to lean against the kitchen counter. If Ives was going to lecture her about dating again, this could be a long conversation.

???

Lilah shook her phone, but it did no good. No signal, not a single, solitary bar of reception. She looked back at the gap in the hedge. She couldn’t go back, if she did she’d have to walk past it. Whatever it was. Which meant she had to go forward.

The path began to slope upward. Hills meant reception, right? With one last glimpse behind her, she trotted off down the path, trying and not entirely succeeding not to run hysterically.

She made it into the next field over, crashing through a hole in the hedge, holding her phone up above her head until she felt the familiar sensation of it vibrating.

Oh, thank any gods that were in the local area.

“Help!” she said, answering the call.

“Why aren’t you picking up?” Margot’s voice demanded. “Where the hell are you?”

“In England,” hissed Lilah. “I’m in England, in a field, and did you not clock that I said ‘help’ when I picked up the phone?”

“Yes, I thought you were over-reacting,” Margot said. “Why are you in a field? Actually, why are you in England, for that matter?”

“I could be being mugged, I could be being held hostage,” said Lilah.

“In a field?” asked Margot. “That would seem… unorthodox.”

The hedge behind Lilah rustled ominously. She tightened her grip on the phone. Maybe it was a fox? Or a rabbit? A really large rabbit?

“Margot,” she wailed. “Something is following me.”

“Like a mugger? You’re an LA girl, you’ve got pepper spray, use it.”

“No, not a mugger. I’m in a damn field. Why would a mugger be in a field?”

“You started it,” pointed out Margot. “Who’s following you, then?”

“Not who, what .”

Margot sighed. “Oh god, is it a goose? I told you, birds are out to get you. Birds are evil. Geese are evil. Swans too, for that matter. They can break your arm, you know.”

“It’s not a goose,” Lilah said. There was another rustle. She turned slowly. A dark shape was moving behind the hedge. A very large dark shape. It was absolutely, definitely, not a rabbit.

“Then what is it?” asked Margot, starting to sound bored.

The creature lumbered around to the gap in the hedge and at last Lilah saw what it was. Her mouth dried up and her legs started to shake and there was a very, very real chance that she was about to wet herself.

“A bull, Margot,” she said, far more calmly than she would have imagined. “A very large bull.”

Margot was silent for a moment. “Are you sure?” she asked, eventually. “I mean, is it not a dog? A very big dog? That seems more likely?”

“A dog the size of a bull is more likely in a field than an actual bull?”

“Mmm. Fair point,” said Margot. “You’re probably right, it’s probably a bull.”

The bull snorted, and a long trail of saliva dripped from its mouth.

“It has horns,” Lilah squeaked .

The bull, which had indeed been casually ambling along behind her, took an oddly dainty step toward her.

And Lilah did the only reasonable thing she possibly could. She ran.

???

“The problem is,” Ives was saying. “You live in a small town. There aren’t exactly a ton of possibilities, you know. And if you won’t go on the apps, well…”

“I’m not joining a dating app,” Blossom said. “It just… doesn’t feel right. It’s not romantic.”

“Fine. But in the meantime, you’re sitting around waiting for the right woman to just show up at your door. You need to be proactive.”

Blossom groaned. She’d heard all this before.

???

The rain began as Lilah scrambled over a gate. There were no warning droplets, just an immediate deluge, until her designer coat was plastered to her body, her hair was plastered to her head, and her shoes, which were already heavy with mud, began to leak.

The bull sauntered over to the hedge next to the gate and began to lean on it, his bulk slowly starting to move the branches. Lilah felt fear tight in her stomach. She looked around desperately and saw one solitary building.

It was an odd building. It looked like it might be abandoned, it was crooked, and the roof looked like it was sliding off. The two halves of it somehow looked different, like two children had collaborated on the same picture.

But it had a door and walls and Lilah would give her entire fortune to be behind both just at the moment. The bull snorted, branches started to break, and Lilah, whimpering, began to run for the cottage.

???

“I don’t expect Ms. Right to just knock on my door,” Blossom was saying. She was getting slightly tired of this conversation. And becoming more worried about Billy now that the rain had finally come.

“Yeah, right,” said Ives.

Which was when the knocking on her front door started. No, not knocking, pounding.

“Oops, that’ll be the woman of my dreams,” said Blossom. “Talk to you later.”

She hurried to the door, flinging it open to see what all the fuss was about, only to see a sodden woman, rain dripping from her hair, face a picture of panic, paused mid-knock.

Blossom was about to say something when she saw a familiar shape at the garden gate. “Billy,” she said joyfully. “There you are. I was starting to get worried.”

The wet woman turned to her. “You know… that?”

“Him,” Blossom said helpfully. “All bulls are boys. And yes, it’s Billy, why?”

But before the woman could answer, the wheels in Blossom’s head started to turn and she started to put pieces together until…

“I know you,” she said.

And she did. That face was unmistakable. She’d had posters of that face.

“You’re Lilah Paxton.”