A week tomorrow and Burn is published. Feels like this one has a been a long time coming which I suppose is true in a way. I’m really proud of this book and hope others like it as much as I do. Links to come as soon as I have them. In the meantime, here’s a sneak peek of what to expect.
BURN
CHAPTER ONE
Approaching his boss’s office, Steve Crossley halted and wiped his damp palms on his trousers. Striding through the open-plan office down on the first floor and barely aware of anything a few of his colleagues might have said as he passed, he’d taken the stairs instead of the lift as a distraction against the metallic fear in his mouth. Up on the fourth floor, seconds from Fred’s door with the low murmur of voices and the occasional ringing phone emanating from nearby, that fear could not be ignored.
And all because of how Fred had sounded when Steve answered the phone. To be in this state of what he might try to pretend was apprehension at being called up to his manager’s office was ridiculous and he knew it. Apprehension did not work here. Nor did a simple case of the nerves. This was fear and the only thing he had as a root cause was the hesitancy and the low murmur of Fred’s voice on the phone.
“…Steve…it’s Fred. Can you…can you come up…for a minute?”
It was like a rope around his neck: a tightness slowly constricting the blood-flow. Steve cleared his throat. A welcome rationality interceded. He didn’t have anything to fear here. He knew the Council offices inside out; he knew his boss was more of a mate than a manager, and this was just another day at work while the weekend approached and the days of doing his job and going home to his family ticked by in their sweet regularity.
At the other end of the long corridor, doors parted and good-natured conversation was audible. Steve wiped his hands on his trousers again and knocked on Fred’s door. Out of habit, he entered before his boss could tell him to do so. Fred’s voice, not quite covered by the whisper of the opening door or the soft rush of blood in Steve’s ears, made him sound like a man recovering from the flu.
Fred sat at his desk, fiercely bright sunlight falling on him, bleaching his skin. Opposite, a man perhaps in his late-forties and a woman ten years younger. Although they wore no uniform, carried no handcuffs or batons, Steve knew they were police. It was in their eyes, in the smell clinging to his nostrils and the back of his throat. Police in his boss’s office. Police who wanted to talk to him.
Steve shuffled forward and found his voice.
“Afternoon.”
“Steve.” Fred kept a hand on his desk as he rounded it. He walked like a guy who’d taken a smack to the groin, Steve thought. The man who could only be a police officer rose and offered a hand. Operating on autopilot, Steve took it. The officer’s fingers were long and cool.
“I’ll be right outside,” Fred muttered.
“Fred?” Steve pushed the name out of his mouth, again.
“Right outside,” Fred whispered. He held Steve’s shoulder for a moment, grip weak. He shivered as if Steve was made of ice.
The door closed and Fred was gone.
“Mr Crossley. I am DCI Ali Hannan. This is DS Laura Atkinson. We need to talk.”
Fred’s name had made it as far as his mouth; other names were buried deep in his chest. He knew those names, loved the taste of them. He couldn’t break them free from his heart.
Atkinson guided him to a spare chair with a gentle hand. “Have a seat.”
He thought he might start screaming soon. Thought it in a faint way he would remember a dream from weeks before. Where his spine met his neck, deep in the muscles and the nerves, sleeping until now, an animalistic alert rang out bright and sharp like the peal of church bell.
“Please, Mr Crossley.” Hannan indicated the chair.
Steve sat.
“Mr Crossley. Earlier this afternoon, we were called to an incident a few miles away.” Hannan remained standing and his shadow fell over Fred’s desk. It being late October didn’t matter; the room was a cramped sauna. Dribbling sweat trickled from Steve’s armpits and down his back. He was fairly sure he’d never been as hot before in his life.
“The details are still vague. There’s a lot more to uncover there. We found several people in a public area along with credit cards, phones, and personal possessions.” Hannan took a tiny breath. “I am so sorry to tell you. We found bodies.”
“No.” Steve had nothing more than that because he knew the truth of what was coming in the next few seconds. That understanding was born from Hannan’s words and his tone. And his eyes. And the flames racing through Fred’s office, come to scorch the flesh from Steve’s bones and drop his ashes straight into hell.
“No. Please.”
“I am so, so sorry, Mr Crossley. The bodies we found. They appear to be your wife and children.”
Chapter Two
“You’re wrong.”
Steve wanted to bellow it; he wanted to rage his argument with enough force to smash the window and blast the furniture into the wall. He could only draw enough breath to stay conscious, not shout at the police.
“Mr Crossley,” Hannan said. “I’m afraid we aren’t.”
You’re wrong. You made a mistake. You’re talking to the wrong man. You. Are. Wrong.
Steve tipped to the side and Hannan was there, faster than it seemed possible, catching his arm and keeping him upright.
“Here we go.” Hannan eased Steve to an upright position while Atkinson poured ice-cold water from Fred’s dispenser. She offered Steve the cup who stared at it.
“It will help,” she said.
“Help?” The word meant something. He didn’t know what.
Hannan took the water and placed it on the little table beside Steve. “Mr Crossley, we know this is horrendous. We really do, but we’d like you to come with us. Mr Peterson has agreed to come, as well. Can you stand?”
“Her dad,” Steve muttered.
Hannan leaned closer. “What was that?”
All at once, the names Steve kept under his heart broke free. It was as if they’d been jettisoned by an explosion.
Jenny. Tim. Rob. Debs.
More than names. More than his family. His soul.
“Jenny. My wife. She’s with the kids. At her dad’s.”
His fingers stretched like glue as he reached for the water. The trembling worked its way into his wrist, up to his elbow and into his shoulder. Water spilled and Atkinson steadied his grip. He managed to sip a little. The rest ran down his chin to his shirt.
“Jenny is with the kids. Her dad.” He coughed hard and sipped more water. “He’s in a care home. With dementia. They’re staying in his house for a few days before school starts again. They’re due back tomorrow.”
Atkinson had been right. The water did help. There was a white noise of unreality humming at the edges of his hearing, but he could think.
“I spoke to her this morning.”
“What time, Mr Crossley?” Hannan asked.
“Just after I got here. About eight thirty, I think.”
Steve fumbled with his trouser pocket, only then realising that his hands, neck, and back were damp with sweat. His shirt clung to him as if it was part of his body.
His fingers too moist for the fingerprint to work. He miskeyed on the phone, swore and tried again. Another miskey.
Steve clenched his jaw at the last second to keep his frustrated shout inside and thumbed the code in. Zero seven one seven. Debs’s birthday. A change from the previous code being the twins’ birthday. The boys seventeen now and how could that be possible when they were ten about a week ago? How could any of this be?
He scrolled, then showed the screen to the two officers. “Twenty to nine. We spoke for a minute. They’re fifty odd miles away. Jack, her dad, his place is in a piddly little village outside Winchester. The care home is in the city. She goes to see him there at least once a month and look after the house. They are fine.”
“Mr Crossley,” Hannan said.
“Listen to me, will you?” Steve closed his eyes for a count of five. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to shout. I am telling you whatever the hell is going on here, my family are fine. You’ve got the wrong man.”
He heard his last few words and cackled wild, jagged laughter. He was in every bad cop thriller ever made.
“I’ll call her right now.”
“Please. Take a moment. We’re with you. Mr Peterson is with you. We just need you to come with us.”
“I’ll call Jenny.” Steve tapped his wife’s name. “She answers and I’ll put her on speaker. Then we end this, right?”
“Please don’t do that.”
In his ear, the line rang.
“Give me a minute.”
The line continued to ring.
“It takes her a few seconds. Always does. With the kids.”
Ring.
“Please,” Hannan said. Atkinson reached for Steve’s hand, and he knocked it away.
“Just hold on,” Steve said.
“Mr Crossley. We have your wife’s mobile,” Hannan said.
Jenny’s voicemail answered Steve.
He dropped his phone.
Luke Walker - Writer 