Page 92 of Deep Blue Lies
“Actually, I think I’m going to walk,” I say to the driver through his open window. “Can you still pick me up though, in an hour?”
He shrugs, but looks happy enough – which helps me not second-guess my idea. It doesn’t even occur to him to be concerned about a female walking alone at night. I step back to let him turnthe car around, then watch the rear lights disappear back down Maria’s little lane.
There are street lights – not the harsh type we have in England, but soft and pretty – that illuminate the route from Sophia’s house to my apartment. And quite a few of them are softened further by the blooms of bougainvillea and other flowers that have been planted in this part of the town. And even though the walk is only short it does me good, and I start to think how I’m going to pack my things. It’s not even that big a job. But when I step around the final corner – so that the front door of my apartment is over the road, opposite – something stops me. There’s a car, parked just in front of me, and I can clearly see there’s a man in it. He has his back to me – he’s sitting in the driver’s seat, as if he’s watching the front door.Of my apartment block.I don’t move for a moment, and at first I’m just confused. Is he waiting for someone? But then I realise I’m being stupid. There’s loads of people he could be waiting for, any of the other residents of the building. Maybe they’re going out and he’s just picking them up.
But then I have another thought – I guess it’s triggered by my wondering earlier whether it’s safe to walk here at night. Someone attacked Imogen – in broad daylight – and I don’t know who they are. And they didn’t get caught.
Either way, there’s no way I can get to my apartment without walking past this car. So I take a deep breath, and drop my head and just power past. But then the moment I draw level with the driver’s window, I sense more than see – because I’m keeping my eyes forward – the man duck down into his seat. Like he’s trying to hide.
I keep going, pretending I didn’t see, but I can’t not notice. And then another thought fires in my mind. Before the man dropped down, I recognised him. I stop, my thigh level with the front of the car, and I turn around. And then very slowly – carefully – the man pulls himself back up, like he’s expecting I’ve gone past now and I won’t see him. But I do. I look right into his face. And I don’t understand at all.
“Gregory Duncan?”
SEVENTY-NINE
I’m close enough to see his hand snatching for the key in the ignition, but something stops him from turning it. I can see what. The way he’s parked he’s backed the car right up close to the one behind him, so the only way out is forwards. And where I’m standing, I’m already one step in front of the car. He’d have to run me over to get away. For a wild second I think he might do it anyway, start the car and surge forward before I could even get out the way. But he doesn’t, and I do something else. I step more in front of him so that he can’t leave. We stay there a few moments, staring at each other through the windscreen. Then I see him swallow, and buzz down the window.
“What are you doing?” I ask.
He doesn’t answer. He doesn’t seem to have any idea what to say.
“You’re Gregory Duncan. I remember you. Why are you outside my apartment?” As I speak I remember my break-in, how my laptop was stolen and the weird way it was returned to me, smashed up.
“Are you gonna say anything?” I demand. I take a half step back, so I could get out of the way if he did decide to start the car. Ican’t see his hand now from where I am. It might still be on the ignition.
“Do you know?” he asks.
I wait, expecting something more, but it doesn’t come.
“Do I know what?”
“About Imogen?”
I stare at him, not understanding. “Do I know she’s dead? Yes, how do you…” Then I remember the portrait he had on his wall, the pencil sketch of Imogen when she was younger. He was in love with her, that’s what Kostas told me.
“No, not that she’s dead. Do you know the other thing?”
I feel my forehead pinching into a frown. “What other thing? What are you doing here? Are you spying on me? On my apartment?” I want to ask if it was him who broke in, did he smash my laptop?
“I’m not spying, I’m…observing.” He’s silent. So am I, for a few seconds.
“Observing what?”
Gregory doesn’t answer. But then he surprises me by suddenly pushing open the door. He unfolds himself from the seat. I’d forgotten how tall he is. When he stands straight he looks down on me, and I see his Adam’s apple roll up and down as he swallows.
“Do youknow?” he says again. There’s a desperation to his tone, like he can’t bear not knowing my answer. But I still don’t understand the question.
There’s no need to stand in front of his car anymore, but there might be a need to run. So I take a step back, away from him.
“Do I knowwhat?” I say again, trying to sound tougher than I feel right now. He just observes me.
“You don’t know,” he says now. He shakes his head a little, like this development is almost too much for him to bear. “You actually don’t know.”
“Are you going to tell me? What it is I don’t know?”
He doesn’t. Instead he moves suddenly and I think he’s about to grab me, but instead he simply rests his lanky frame against thecar and drops his head onto the roof. He even hits his head against it a couple of times, like he wants to hurt himself. I don’t know what to do. I don’t know what the hell is going on. But then I hear a familiar sound – the buzzy whine from the motor on Sophia’s scooter. A few seconds later I see the headlight, and then she pulls up over the road from us. She takes off the helmet, pulls the bike onto its stand and moves for the door, but then senses us. She turns around.
“Ava? Hey…” Her eyes move from me to Duncan, and her eyebrows go an inch up her forehead. “Mr Duncan?”
