Page 53 of The Rising Tide

‘Nasty-looking grey building beside the river?’

‘That’s the one.’

‘If the Taw bursts its banks, you’ll be the first lot carried away.’

They pull out of the car park and head up to the roundabout, rain tattooing the roof. None of the streetlights are working. The North Road is a graveyard of fallen trees. Emma switches on her full beams. ‘I know you don’t want to talk about the case.’

‘Correct.’

‘But purely from a human perspective …’ She winces, shakes her head. ‘Ugh, that was shit. Listen to yourself, Emma. Have some self-respect.’

‘You swear a lot.’

She flicks her head towards him. It’s too dark to see her eyes. ‘I fucking try.’

Abraham frowns, says nothing.

Emma steers around a wheelie bin beached in the centre of the road. ‘You think you’ll find those kids?’

‘I’vegotto find them.’

‘You think you’ll find them alive?’

‘I pray that I will.’

The emotion in his voice must be noticeable because he hears Emma draw breath. For a while they drive in silence, the storm raging around them.

‘If they’re not …’ She hesitates, and he knows she’s choosing her words. ‘If they’re not, and youdon’tfind them, will you be able to get a murder conviction?’ Another long pause, during which the rain drums down. ‘I’ve seen the CCTV footage. In case you were wondering.’

It takes all his self-control not to react.

‘Well?’ she asks.

‘You know I can’t talk about it.’

‘Proving something like that, without bodies. It’s hard, isn’t it? Even with the CCTV. Because that footage doesn’t showintent.’

Abraham glances out of the passenger window. They’re passing through the centre of Barnstaple. A huge oak has crashed down, blocking a side road. A fire engine, blue lights strobing, is parked nearby. Three firemen are working on the tree with chainsaws.

Eyes on the road, Emma asks, ‘Did the Lockes have personal accident insurance covering them for this sort of thing?’

Eve, he thinks. And immediately castigates himself. She’s doing her job, same as him. Likely she’s just fishing, but that felt like more than a random question.

The car rolls to a stop. ‘Here you go, Samson.’

3

He picks up his car and leaves without visiting the incident room. Some of his contemporaries will view it as negligent, no doubt, but Abraham follows a higher authority.

Ever since he glimpsed that black wall moving in from the Atlantic, he’s sensed the approach of something transformative. It’s not just the storm. Not just the slow-motion destruction of Lucy Locke. Nor the look of wolfish cunning in Daniel Locke’s eyes.

At the school, Abraham had sensed a tangible evil stalking the halls. At the hospital, too, he’d felt the same thing. His own reckoning, he knows, is gathering speed. Perhaps he’s being given one last opportunity for redemption before it arrives.

It takes him half an hour to travel the eighteen miles home. The house stands inside the boundaries of Exmoor National Park, nestled in a dell out of sight of the nearest road. No streetlights, no neighbours. Tonight, not even any stars. Inside, he’s greeted by the smell of mothballs and dust, the steady tock of a grandfather clock. Abraham pulls off his wet shoes and climbs the stairs.

For years, there were two of them in this house. These days it’s just him. In the master bedroom, he sits on his mother’s bed and smooths the eiderdown. Her side table, once cluttered with framed photographs, is empty save a film of dust.

Abraham looks around: at her hatbox crowning the wardrobe; at the faded Caravaggio print on the far wall. Fishing out his mobile, he dials a stored number. On the fourteenth ring, a sleepy voice answers.

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