Page 14 of The Girl in the Grave
Twenty-Two
Annie opened her eyes. She was so thirsty, the inside of her mouth felt like her tongue had swollen to three times its normal size and was stuck to the roof of it. It was still dark, thank God, because there no way she was going to make it to work yet. In fact, she didn’t know if she’d make it to work tomorrow either, she feltsoill. It was all Estelle’s fault. Christ, she was never going drinking with her again. Drinking champagne as if it was pints of orange and water was not the best of ideas, and she knew that now. Moving her head slightly, the room lurched violently, and she felt her insides contract. She couldn’t be sick; she’d have to move to be sick and right now she couldn’t move because she felt as if she was dying. Annie thought back to the previous times she’d got drunk: had she ever feltthisbad? There had been plenty of hangovers, but this was something else. Thanks to her friend, and the copious amount of free champagne, she’d taken it to the next level. This was it: she was absolutely never, ever drinking again.
She relived the moments before she’d lost control and ended up knocking over the entire table of drinks in the club. Her cheeks began to burn at the shame of it. In all her life she’d never got so drunk that she’d had to be escorted out of somewhere. If Estelle asked her to go out with her again it would be a big fat no. Absolutely not, unless she stuck to non-alcoholic drinks. Bile rose up her throat: just thinking about alcohol made her want to throw her guts up. She couldn’t move, not that she wanted to or had any intention of moving. It would be nice if someone could bring her an icy cold glass of water though. She’d be ever so grateful. As soon as she could pluck up the courage she’d try and find her phone, ring someone to come to her rescue and put her out of her misery. Was this what it felt like to be lost in the desert?
It struck her how peaceful it was. The hotel was normally a twenty-four-hour bustling hive of activity. It was unusually quiet down here for a change – not that she was complaining. But the continual noise as doors slammed and the heavy footsteps of different members of staff thudding up and down the basement stairs were part of the background. It was very rare there wasn’t some noise from out in the corridor; the amount of people that lived down here, it wasn’t really surprising.
She lay there, eyes squeezed shut and head thumping. Where was everyone? Unable to move, even though she desperately needed a drink, she did the only thing she could: she closed her eyes and let the darkness take her to a place where she wasn’t going to spend the next few hours regretting the life choices she’d made last night.
Twenty-Three
Jason didn’t have that many options; he could drive somewhere and book into a cheap hotel for a couple of days. Just until he got his shit together and they’d figured out who the girl was and who had put her in the grave. He’d packed his gym bag full of everything he might need, taken the money he kept stashed in the empty tea tin. There was a couple of hundred, not enough to sustain a life on the run for an indefinite period of time that was for sure. He didn’t have any friends he could stop with. Once the police realised he was a person of interest, and a shitty one at that, they’d plaster his picture all over the television and newspapers. His hands were shaking; he’d never felt so sick in his entire life. OK, so he had sex occasionally with some of the teenage girls who hung around the cemetery if they had no money, but it wasn’t like they were completely innocent. He ran his fingers through his hair. He could have talked to Barry about it. He was all right; he’d have known what to do. But Barry would be in Manchester now. He couldn’t ring him and spoil his night away, because then he’d be pissed off with him as well. What was he going to do?
He decided to get the train, leave his car at home. At least if the coppers came for him and took it away to have it searched, there wouldn’t be any trace of anything inside it. Thank Christ he’d taken it down to the Polish car wash last weekend and had it valeted.
He would get a train to Blackpool. It was always busy there this time of year. He could walk around in a baseball cap and dark sunglasses, and he wouldn’t look out of place. If he found some cheap B&B he could lay low for a few days, keep off the Internet in case they traced his phone. He’d seen it on the television: they could do all sorts of stuff like that now. He knew he wasn’t the cleverest of people, but it seemed like a decent enough plan. One that might buy him some time before the coppers came looking for him. He was pretty sure they’d take the easy option and he was it.
As he left his house he slung his bag over his shoulder, pulled his cap down low and kept his head down. He lived a ten-minute walk to the train station; all he had to do was cut down all the backstreets. Keep off the main roads and he’d be out of this shithole in the next half an hour.
His phone began to vibrate in his pocket. Pulling it out, he looked at the display.
Private number
He had no idea who that could be. He sent it to voicemail; it rang again. Too nosy for his own good, he lifted it to his ear.
‘Yeah.’
‘Mr Thompson, this is DC John Paton. I wonder if I could have a word?’
Jason swore under his breath; he was such an idiot. Why did he answer? He thought about throwing his phone into the bushes that ran alongside the front of the hotel he was walking past and running. Was there any point?
‘Of course, what about?’
He squeezed his eyes shut momentarily, knowing he sounded like a fucking idiot. It was pretty obvious what it was about.
‘We’d like you to come to the station, just to go over a couple of things. It won’t take long. Are you busy now? Because I could come and pick you up. Save you the hassle of trying to get parked; it’s a bloody nightmare getting parked around here.’
Jason knew what he was doing: he was trying to befriend him. He did sound like a nice bloke though, maybe he should just go with him. Tell him the truth about the girl and get it over with.
‘It’s okay, I’m out walking. I’m not far from the station; I can be there in twenty minutes if that’s okay and it can wait that long.’
There was a slight pause on the other end of the phone, and he knew the copper was weighing up the odds on him actually turning up and whether or not he should call the shots.
‘That’s absolutely fine, thank you. I’ll see you soon.’
The copper hung up first, and Jason breathed out a sigh of relief. He had some serious thinking to do and only a couple of minutes to do it. He needed to decide whether to run or face the music.
He carried on heading towards the train station. He would bypass the police station on the way there unless he changed his mind at the last minute. Christ, this was the hardest decision of his life. He knew if he ran, he was messing things up even more than they already were, but the thought of being accused of murder and locked up terrified him more than anything he’d ever experienced.
Twenty-Four
Estelle stooped across the reception desk. All the guests had been checked in and there was a lull in people passing through. She had spoken to everyone she could think of, but there was no sign of Annie anywhere. She had disappeared without a trace. Her stomach felt as if there was a heavy lead ball lodged in between that and her diaphragm. There was a thudding inside her head so loud it was hard to think; a mixture of the alcohol and stress, she supposed. She was going to have to call the police: what choice did she have? Daddy would be furious; he didn’t like the police being called to the hotel, said it was bad for business, but she’d searched everywhere. She, Gary and Paula had searched all the empty guest rooms, bathrooms, linen cupboards, storerooms, every single nook and cranny. Gary had even been outside and checked the garage, outhouse, summerhouse in the grounds and every other place someone drunk might think was a good idea to go to sleep. He’d even checked inside the huge industrial bins that Estelle had wrinkled her nose at when he’d told her. He was right to check, though; God knows what seemed like a good idea when you were pissed was definitely not when you were sober. She looked at Gary, who nodded and passed her the phone.
‘You need to do it for Annie’s sake, call them. We’ve checked everywhere and spoken to everyone: no one has seen her since last night.’
‘Did you manage to get hold of David about checking the CCTV?’
‘Nope, I’ve left him a couple of voicemails and text messages. They were busy last night on reception. He’ll be fast asleep. I’m pretty sure as soon as he wakes up he’ll come into work and run the system.’
