Page 13 of Runner 13

Adrienne

‘Adrienne, you must hurry.’

I wake up to Mariam’s concerned face, her hand shaking my shoulder.

For a second I don’t remember where I am.

My back is sore, my eyes gritty, my tongue bone dry as it runs over my sandpaper lips.

I’m a husk, all moisture sucked from my body by the wind.

I sit up, open my eyes, then immediately have to shut them again against the brightness.

The tent has been resurrected, sunlight streaming in.

The desert. The race. The storm. I don’t think I’ve had more than a couple of hours sleep. I feel like death. I can’t believe anyone is fit to run twenty-five miles today.

Mariam shakes me again. ‘Come.’

My voice is croaky as I attempt to speak. ‘What happened? Is everyone OK?’

She doesn’t answer me, just gestures with her arm and then starts moving. I scramble to follow her past the sleeping forms of Hiroko and Alex. They made it back. Mariam doesn’t wake them, though. She only wants me.

Even though the sun is up, I’m thankful for my jacket.

There’s a chill in the air, or maybe it’s the state of the bivouac that’s leaving me shivering.

It’s been decimated. There are going to be a lot more DNSs than even Boones could have anticipated once everyone wakes up and realizes that their belongings have been scattered to the wind.

Mariam slides her sunglasses on and adjusts the bandana holding back the short spikes of her silver hair, such a contrast against her dark skin.

She takes me to where I can see a small crowd has gathered in front of a tent.

She stops a little way back and puts a hand on my arm to stop me too.

I realize we’re at tent number sixteen. ‘You said you needed to speak to Jason, right?’

‘Yes, urgently.’ My eyes scan her face; her expression is pained. ‘Why? Is he OK?’

She shakes her head. ‘He’s been taken away by helicopter.’

‘What?!’

‘He was covered in blood, unconscious … Struck in the head, apparently.’

A wave of nausea hits me. ‘My God,’ I say, breathlessly. ‘By who?’

I can’t help but think: Was it because of what he wanted to tell me?

Why did we have to get interrupted?

Mariam shakes her head. ‘Not by anyone . Apparently one of the tent pegs came unstuck in the storm and flew about like a weapon,’ Mariam says. ‘So unlucky. His belongings are strewn everywhere.’

Some of the tightness in my chest releases – an accident. Bad luck, not malice.

A coincidence.

I don’t believe in those.

Mariam brings me back to the present by tightening her grip on my arm. ‘You said he had a notebook? We have a few minutes before we need to start getting ready – we can search.’

I stare at her for a moment, finding it hard to compute what she’s saying. Then I realize she’s right. ‘Yes, yes. It was a red spiral-bound book.’

I pick up a packet of food, still in its plastic bag, neatly labelled with a calorie count. The letters ‘JL’ are written neatly in Sharpie ink in the top right-hand corner. So he was a fastidious labeller too. That will help. I gesture to Mariam and show her the mark. She nods.

We’re not the only people sorting through the detritus.

There are other runners out here, combing for their missing items. There doesn’t seem to be much logic to the way the wind has scattered things, and the search field is massive – as large as the desert itself.

I find myself following items out past the toilet tents, towards the tufts of bushes that have caught things in their spiked branches.

I feel like a vulture, picking through the bits and pieces of people’s racing lives, discarding anything that doesn’t have that neat ‘JL’ written somewhere.

I shed my jacket, wrapping it round my waist – the air is so hot and still that it’s impossible to think this is the same place where the storm happened.

More and more racers appear, emerging from their tents bleary-eyed and pale from lack of sleep, preparing for the start of the race.

I’m going to have to go back and do that too if I want to make the starting line on time.

But I feel desperate now. I need to find out if Jason knew anything. And that’s when I spot it. Tucked under a bush, half buried in sand. A bright splash of red cover, spiral-bound. ‘JL’ inscribed on the corner.

I reach through to get it, wincing as a thorn scratches my skin and blood beads on the surface. I flick it open, but some of the pages are torn and missing. Still, it’s enough for me to see what he was working on – the Ibiza case, not a surprise.

‘You found something?’ Mariam shouts to me.

I nod, lifting the notebook.

She jogs over. ‘Any clues?’

‘I … I’m not sure.’ It’s hard to read Jason’s tight scrawl, but I recognize the dates that he has circled – the start of the training camp and when various people left.

I chew my bottom lip. As far as I can see, he has some pieces of the puzzle but there are still glaring omissions.

Stella’s name, for example, is conspicuously absent from the list of people at the Ibiza camp.

She’s managed to keep that a secret. No wonder he was finding it so hard to put the picture together.

I turn the pages, taking in the information as quickly as I can.

Finally, I see something that stops me in my tracks.

A note, circled. BLAMES AW FOR GK ’S DEATH ??

Then the Range Rover licence plate. The same one that had been written on my invitation.

STILL WANTS REVENGE .

But there’s no name. I slam the notebook shut, my heart pounding.

Mariam jerks back. ‘What did it say? I can’t read upside down.’

‘I –’ But I quickly shut my mouth as I see a volunteer wearing a Hot & Sandy vest striding in our direction. It’s Henry, the man who checked me in.

‘I’ll stall him,’ says Mariam, going over to intercept him.

I grab my digital camera from my bag, snapping a few pictures. But I’m running out of time. I turn my body to shield my actions from view and tear out a handful of pages, stuffing them in my pocket.

‘Thank you for searching for his things,’ Henry says as he approaches.

‘No problem,’ I reply, awkwardly dropping the notebook into a plastic garbage bag that he is using to collect anything that belongs to Jason. ‘Any word on how he is?’

‘Not yet. You had better go get ready. The race is going to start in half an hour.’

‘So the race is still happening?’ Mariam asks.

‘Boones is making an announcement in about ten minutes,’ he replies.

‘Boones. Can I speak with him?’ I ask Henry.

He glances at his watch. ‘You don’t have much time. Look out for a dark green Jeep. That’s his.’

‘Got it,’ I reply with a tight smile. Henry twirls the bag handles so it shuts tight, the notebook gone forever. Then he marches off in the direction of other runners doing their own searches.

‘What did you find?’ Mariam whispers to me as we walk back towards the bivouac.

My words come out all in a rush. ‘Mariam, I don’t think I can do this. What Jason was going to tell me – it had to do with Ethan. The same day Glenn died, when I was running the Yorkshire 100, Ethan was hit by a car.’

‘ Mon dieu , Adrienne!’

‘He was OK, luckily, but I have always been sure it was connected. Maybe someone who blamed me for Glenn’s death.

Jason agreed. Look at this.’ I pull out the pages of the notebook, smoothing them so she can read it.

‘Someone out there wants revenge. What if they’re going to target Ethan again? I need to go back home. Protect him.’

‘You think they are after your son? Or after you?’

I pause. ‘Well, me,’ I say. ‘For what I did.’

‘And you are here.’ She grabs my wrist. ‘The Adrienne I used to know wouldn’t hide away. Remember your petition?’

I cringe, thinking about how brazen I used to be.

A few years before the Ibiza camp, I’d found out that a friend had been refused permission to defer her place in a race because of pregnancy.

Outraged by the injustice, I’d launched a full-blown boycott campaign until the race directors changed the rules, which – thankfully – they did.

But that was fighting for someone else. That’s always come easier to me.

But Mariam’s right – I’m here now. I’m in the running for the first time in seven years. I’ve come to face my demons. And one of those demons might just be the psychopath who targeted my son.

Maybe I should let them come. If I retreat now, I’ll always be looking over my shoulder. Always worried. I want to show whoever it is that I’m not going to run away any more. I won’t be made to feel afraid.

A feeling of inevitability settles in my stomach. I need to focus on my mission: to get my answers from Boones.

I think about that race number. That number thirteen. I can let it be a curse. Or I can let it change my life forever.

Mariam seems to see the decision in my face. She links her arm with mine, patting my bicep. ‘Come on. Let’s get back to the tent. This race is going to be full of surprises. We need to be ready.’