Accidents Happen (28 page)

Then it started again.

‘Ooh, shut up,’ she muttered. Customers inside Blackwell’s were coming to the window now. Not knowing what else to do, Kate unzipped the pocket. A phone sat on top of Jago’s wallet.

A phone?

‘Marla ringing’, the screen said.

Kate paused.

Marla?

The siren noise was increasingly desperate with each ring.

What should she do?

She hovered her finger over the answer button.

Then, as quickly as it had started, the noise stopped.

‘You missed a call from Marla.’ A message popped up.

‘Right,’ Jago said, coming up behind her, his jacket over his arm. ‘Let’s go.’

‘Oh,’ Kate exclaimed, jumping up. She glanced at the open zip of his bag.

‘I’m sorry, I was just . . .’

‘Was it going off?’ Jago said, bending down. ‘Sorry. I turned the alarm ring tone full up so I could hear it from the shower. My publisher in London was supposed to ring about the launch. Was that him?’ He picked up the phone.

Kate said nothing.

Jago looked at the screen. A shadow passed over his face as he saw the caller’s name.

He looked at Kate. ‘Did you answer?’

‘No!’ she stuttered. ‘No. I wouldn’t . . . I just . . . I . . . it was just ringing and ringing and . . .’

‘No, don’t worry. I’d better just listen to this, though.’ He pressed the message, and held the mobile to his ear. When it had finished, he changed the ring tone back to the one she’d heard before, an acoustic guitar strumming, lost in thought.

‘Oh. OK then.’ He made a face. ‘Well, that’s unexpected.’ He stood up, zipping up his bag. ‘Marla, my ex-girlfriend. I’m supposed to be seeing her in August in the States, but she’s at a conference in Paris, apparently, and wants to stop off in London some time this week.’

Kate tried to keep her expression unassuming.

Jago looked a little stunned. ‘Sorry. That’s thrown me a bit. We haven’t spoken for three months.’

Kate hesitated. ‘Well, do you need to go and ring her? I mean, we can do this another . . .’ She prayed he wouldn’t accept her offer. ‘I mean, I can go.’

Jago stood up. He punched her gently on the arm. ‘Oi, you’re not getting out of this that easily, mate. No. I’ll ring her back later.’ He leaned over and unlocked his bike. ‘Come on.’

‘But if you two have stuff to . . .’

‘Kate, let’s go,’ he said, climbing on his bike. ‘If I’m not mistaken, you and me have business,’ he added, looking back with a heavy-lidded look laden with an ambiguity that sent a shiver through her.

‘OK,’ said Kate, climbing back on her bike. The plastic bag on her handlebars swung against her. ‘Though, Jago. Just a sec. I need to hand this in to that heel bar on the corner first.’ She pointed to the end of Broad Street. ‘It’s open till eight.’

Jago pointed where she now saw steel shutters across the door. ‘It’s five past. You’ve just missed it.’ He put out a hand without hesitation. ‘Give them to me – I’ll drop them in tomorrow.’

‘Oh . . .’ she said, surprised, holding onto them. ‘No, you don’t have to, I mean, I . . .’

Jago kept his hand outstretched. ‘It’s no problem. Really. It’ll take me two seconds in the morning.’

Yet Kate couldn’t let go of her grip on the bag. It was so long since anyone had done anything kind or thoughtful for her, she realized she didn’t know how to respond. A painful rush of memories flashed through her mind: of Hugo, bringing her a coffee when she was working, without her asking. Of sticking her running clothes in the washing machine when she was out, because he knew she’d need them later for the gym, and had forgotten to do them herself.

Kate looked up at Jago and saw him examining her with his blue eyes. In his expression she saw understanding, as if he had guessed what she was thinking.

‘Come on,’ he said gently, prising the bag from her fingers. ‘Let me do this for you. I’d like to help.’

Their fingers touched as he took the bag, sending a tiny thrill through her. He hung it on his handlebars and headed off Broad Street towards town, waving a hand behind him for her to follow. Kate pulled uneasily back out into Broad Street.

‘Hey. Look at you. You’re cycling on the road,’ he called back, picking up speed.

Her mouth twisted into a pleased smile.

Jago went in front, turning right at the top of Broad Street, then on up Woodstock Road. Kate followed, feeling like a new colt, skinny, unsure legs, pushing awkwardly against the pedals as two lorries thundered past her.

• Lorries are involved in nearly a third of all road accidents where people are injured or killed.

Kate shook her head to force the number away. Luckily, a minute later Jago turned left and free-wheeled past rows of mews houses in Jericho. As the traffic died away, he beckoned Kate forwards to cycle side by side.

‘So how’ve you been after Saturday? No after-effects.’

‘No. How are you? You looked a bit surprised back there.’

He shrugged. ‘Sorry I didn’t expect to hear from her again. I’m only going back to North Carolina to pick up my stuff. The last time we spoke she slammed the phone down on me shortly after calling me a “mother-fucking piece of shit”, if I remember correctly.’

Kate sat back a little more comfortably on her saddle.

‘So, why do you think she’s coming over to London?’

‘I really don’t know. Anyway, it’s not important. What is important . . .’he said, turning onto a bridge across the river, ‘is this. Right. So Step Three:
Jump-Start Kate’s Survival Instincts by Completely Terrifying her in an Oxfordshire Village and Nearly Get Brick on Head for Trouble,’
he said. And tonight . . . Step Four:
Kate Fucks with the Statistics and Shows them who’s Boss.’

‘Oh God,’ Kate muttered as Jago sped ahead of her with a grin. She picked up her speed to stay with him. At the point in the path where she had veered right towards Sylvia’s last week, Jago forked left. Quickly, the path emptied of joggers and pedestrians. It was narrower, darker, overshadowed by the hanging branches of willow trees.

They passed a fisherman packing down a small red tent as he finished up for the day. With a start, she remembered Jack’s sleepover in Gabe’s garden. Kate’s chest tightened again, and she tried to breathe it away. She could deal with that tomorrow. Now, she needed to concentrate on tonight.

The lights of the last houses started to disappear behind her. It was amazing how in Oxford, just a few hundred yards from the High Street, you could feel you were in the countryside. As the sun began to set, Kate fixed her eye on the reflective spot on Jago’s rear mudguard. They cycled for five more minutes.

Then Jago stopped.

Kate braked and put her feet down. Jago held up a hand as if listening to something. He turned, put his finger over his mouth and climbed off his bike.

‘What?’

He jerked his head towards an opening in a hedge. They pushed their bikes into it, laid them down and emerged on the other side in a meadow. Kate heard her feet squelch and looked down. This was wetland. Her nostrils filled with the potent smell of wild grasses and water mint.

‘OK?’ Jago whispered.

‘Er, no, but go on,’ she replied, glancing around nervously. He took her hand without asking. ‘Come on.’ They set off across the soggy grass, Kate feeling her fingers stiffening in his grip. He was so unselfconscious about these things. Why couldn’t she be? With Hugo, she supposed, there had been no boundaries between their bodies, but this was a new country with Jago. A new hand, a new size, a new grip. Strange and foreign.

Two minutes later they arrived at a gap further along the hedge. Jago peered through it back onto the towpath.

‘Come here.’

He put a hand around her waist and guided her forwards, so she was nestled between his arms, with her back against his chest. She tried to concentrate on what he was showing her.

A small canal boat sat alone, chained to the path. She could just make out its name –
Honeydew
– in faded yellow paint. Piles of logs sat on its deck. Plant pots were scattered across the top, some of them cracked, full of herbs and flowers. A dim light shone inside.

‘What?’

Jago lifted his finger to his lips. A figure passed the window. Kate drew back.

‘Someone’s in there.’

‘Sssssh . . .’

He was a man in his sixties, wearing a navy cowl-neck potter’s top. He had waist-length grey hair matted into dreadlocks, streaked with nicotine, and a crumpled, round, red face.

Kate watched the man walk along his boat, shutting each pair of curtains. A murmur of a radio started up from within.

‘What are we doing?’ she mouthed.

‘You are going to steal his boat,’ he said, with the same deadly serious voice he’d used when he told her to steal the dog.

Kate pulled away, shaking her head.

‘Sssssh.’ Jago laughed, pulling her tight against him. He pointed. A rowing boat with a small outboard engine sat bobbing on the river. One end was tied to the canal boat, the other to a hook on the riverbank.

‘No way,’ she whispered. ‘The dog was bad enough, Jago.’

He squeezed her tight, his breath ticking her cheek. ‘It’s just an exercise.’

She turned her mouth to his ear, feeling his bristle brush her cheek. ‘In robbery?’

‘No. About you taking control of the numbers. You let these stats bully you. If you steal this boat, you change the crime statistics for Oxford tonight. I want you to fuck with them, like they’re fucking with you. See what it feels like.’

His breath tickled her ear.

Kate tried not to be distracted. She shook her head again.

He continued. ‘Kate. Have you felt any different since the other night? You’re on the road. That has to be good, yes? Trusting your instincts to keep you safe?’

She shrugged. The small physical action pushed her body back into his chest a tiny bit. In response, he hugged her closer. It was all she could do not to turn round and lift her lips to his again.

Jago kept talking in her ear. ‘So, come on. Let’s do it. If he sees you, we’ll run back to the bikes behind the hedge. But, honestly, he looks so stoned, we could probably take his canal boat and he wouldn’t notice.’

It was a funny joke, but she didn’t feel like smiling.

‘Kate. Do it. We’re on the right track here.’

He stroked his hand down the side of her arm, easily, comfortably. She stood watching the boat through the gap.

To her surprise she found herself, just for a second, intrigued at the unpredictability of the situation. At what might happen.

‘Just do it, don’t think about it,’ Jago said.

They waited until darkness began to fall. The man was whistling. Kate could hear him, walking around inside, clattering some pans. She crouched down in the hedge. Checking that Jago was watching, she crawled out onto the path as the dim light from the canal boat, diffused through red curtains, reached her body.

The rowing boat bobbed on the current. Painstakingly, Kate moved one hand and one knee together at a time in tandem, till she reached the metal rope cleat on the bank.

This was crazy.

She fumbled her fingers, undoing the rope, trying not to think how deep the water was. The first knot came undone easily and she dropped the rope into the rowing boat. The freed end of the boat gave a buck of excitement, and glided away.

It was too late now. Kate sized up the other knot, at the canal boat end. She crawled forwards, wanting to get this over and done with as quickly as possible. But when she reached it, she saw it was a different type of knot. Tighter.

‘Halfway,’ Jago whispered.

Kate glanced up at the canal boat, to check. It was a such strange concept. That the owner had no idea she was out here. That
she
was the bad person in the shadows.

She began to unpick the second knot, using one finger and thumb on each hand. Luckily, it came away more easily than she expected and . . .

A loud bang exploded above her. A light burst onto the deck.

Kate’s heart began to pound so heavily that it felt it had dropped into her stomach.

The man with the grey dreadlocks walked onto the deck. He coughed, and the faint smell of something curried mixed with incense drifted towards her.

Kate crouched, holding the loose rope. The urge to run overwhelmed her. But if she stood up, he’d see her. He’d be able to leap off the canal boat and grab her.

She lowered herself as flat as possible into the shadows, glancing in panic to her right, convinced her heart was pounding so loudly that the man would hear it. ‘Stay there,’ Jago mouthed.

The man doesn’t know you’re here, she tried to tell herself to calm her growing panic. Just like the teenagers in the village. You are in control. If you jump up now, he’d be more scared than you.

Kate began to count to calm herself.

One thousand. Two thousand. Three thousand . . .

She listened to the man picking wood off the woodpile, praying for him to finish and go back inside. Radio Four blared from somewhere.

Then there was a movement. Kate peeked up and saw, to her dismay, that the freed end of the rowing boat was moving further away from the bank, like a toddler pulling wilfully from its mother.

She shrank back down. If the boat owner looked up and focused his eyes in the dark, he would see it. He would . . .

‘Oi!’

The man’s yell burst into the night.

‘What the fuck are you doing?’

Kate’s heart jumped inside her chest so hard it felt as if someone had defibrillated her.

‘What are you doing to my fucking boat?’

‘I . . . I . . .’ she began to stutter.

But before he could say another word, a dark figure came out of the hedge and ran straight up to the man.

‘What the . . . get off . . .’ She heard the man growl.

She saw Jago reach the side of the little fibreglass canal boat and shove it hard. It moved about a foot away from the river-bank, but enough to catch the man off balance. He staggered one way, then the other, then flew over the side with a splash.

‘Get in the rowing boat,’ Jago yelled to Kate.

‘What? No! He’s in the water!’