Wreckers Island (romantic suspense) (23 page)

Dan pulled out onto the scenic road to St Perro. The tourist
season was all but over and few people were about. The landscape seemed cloaked
in a disquieting tranquillity in contrast to the turmoil inside his head. Yet
he found his mind emptying as he drove on the 20-minute journey as if the time
for agonising and hand-wringing was over. Dan just wanted to see Emma and hold
her in his arms, and kiss her.

It was surprisingly easy to park at that
time in the evening and Dan left his car in a road off the main high street adjacent
to the dreaded police station. As he walked towards it, his legs felt like they
would give way.

Get a grip!, he told himself. He had to be
strong for Emma’s sake – she would be fragile, distraught, inconsolable, and
frightened. Yes, above all, frightened. She was not a strong, confident
character like Louise with plenty of brass neck to get her through life. Emma
was a sensitive soul capable of great courage but without the self assurance to
underpin it.

He rounded the corner onto the high street
and stared with foreboding at the looming police building on the other side. To
his surprise, standing outside under the orange glow of a street lamp was a
slim, light-haired figure similar to Emma.

It
was
Emma! His heart leapt. They
must have released her on bail! That was something to be grateful for. At least
they were not keeping her caged like an animal. They would be able to go somewhere
and talk. Dan crossed the street and walked slowly towards her, resisting the
temptation to run. It might scare her, he had to appear calm, even if he didn’t
feel it.

She had seen him. A weak smile crossed her
face. She did not approach, but waited patiently until he reached her. Neither
said anything as they were reunited. Words somehow, were not necessary. Dan flung
his arms around her and hugged her tight. He reached his hand and stroked her
hair and looked into her eyes, those lovely, watery blue eyes.

‘Come on, let me get you away from here. We
can go can’t we – have they released you on bail? Oh Emma you must have been so
frightened,’ he said, eventually.

She broke away from him and gazed at the
police station frowning down on them.

‘Look at it,’ she said softly. ‘Look at that
great ugly, menacing place. Think how horrible it is to end up inside there, locked
in the cells, plonked down in interview rooms, monitored, tape recorded, filmed,
fingerprinted, forced to empty one’s pockets; one’s hopes and dreams in life
draining away.’

Emma clasped his arm as she spoke. It was trembling.
‘I know how frightened you are, I can feel the fear inside you. Let us share
that emotion. Let us stand and behold that terrible building and be frightened
together.’

Dan did as she asked and gazed steadily
upwards. It was like a monster of bricks and mortar, ready to pounce on them.

‘
Now let’s walk
away,’ instructed Emma. ‘Come on, let’s go.’

Dan’s eyes were
still locked as if in a trance. Suddenly the main doors opened and a police
officer walked out. Dan clutched Emma in fright.

The officer wasn’t
interested in them, although he noticed with amusement them staring up at his
workplace.

‘Tourists?’ he
said with a grin. ‘You can always tell a tourist cos they’re the ones standing
around looking upwards. It’s a dead giveaway – watch you don’t get mugged. Mind
you, it’s a grand old place isn’t it, wonderful gothic architecture, like an
old-fashioned asylum. They knew how to build ’em in Victorian times. Beats the
modern copshops any day. Enjoy your stay,’ he added, with a wink, and walked
off.

Emma turned to Dan
and giggled. ‘Come on, before we get mugged.’

They walked arm in
arm along the high street. Emma was relaxed and at ease, as if a great weight
had been lifted from her. She stopped in front of a five-star hotel, the
Metropole – St Perro’s finest.

‘From fear to
hope,’ she said. ‘Come on.’

Dan walked with
her through the sturdy oak doors with their reassuringly solid brass door
knobs. Emma headed for the hotel bar, an elegant, old-fashioned room of dark
leather upholstery, mahogany tables and brass fittings. It reeked of history
and the comings and goings of important people.

‘I thought this
might be a good place for us to talk and have a drink together,’ said Emma, as
she chose them a table near the window.

‘It’s a lovely
place,’ said Dan, sitting down. ‘Emma, can I say, I’m so glad the police have
let you out on bail and that you’re being so upbeat. It’s good to come
somewhere as fine and opulent as this. Let’s thumb our noses at doom and gloom,
whatever tomorrow will bring.’

‘Tomorrow will
probably bring a hangover, Dan,’ she said as the waitress came over, carrying a
bottle of expensive champagne in an ice bucket and two champagne flutes. Dan
watched disbelievingly as she undid the wire cage around the cork and wiggled
it out with a loud pop. She poured them both a glass and placed them on dainty cloth
doilies.

‘Join me in a
toast,’ instructed Emma softly, as she raised her glass. ‘This is in honour of you
and what a wonderful person you are and what a bright future lies ahead. You
do
have a bright future, you know. There is something I have to tell you. I’m not
proud to have made this decision but I spent a long time this afternoon after
you’d gone thinking things through carefully.

‘After you left me
earlier outside the police station, I went to the main doors. I saw you glance
then turn away and I watched you keep walking, and not looking back again. I
appreciated that because you were true to your word, you put me under no
pressure.

‘So I found myself
with my nose pressed against the glass of the doors and I saw my reflection,
looking sad and anxious. I found myself asking why I was doing this and for
whom. I was doing it entirely for myself, to make myself feel better; the
cathartic experience of unburdening myself, purging myself clean by telling the
truth and facing the consequences.

‘I started to open
the door but as I did so another door slid shut in my mind and a voice said
“wait, think about this first, it’s not just about you”. So I walked away, and
I walked for miles, Dan, round and round, you should see the blisters on my
feet.

‘I know St Perro
like a native now. I’ve been to the river and back to the park and sat beneath
that same lovely horse chestnut. I went for a coffee and tried to straighten
everything out in my head. Several times I returned to the police station,
right to the doors, looking through the glass. But I never once went inside. I
haven’t told the police a thing. I don’t plan to.’

Dan stared deeply
into his champagne flute, watching the countless bubbles rise to the surface,
still unable to take in what Emma was saying.

‘Somehow I couldn’t
square the circle. I couldn’t separate out what I was willing to do to myself
from what I would thereby inevitably do to you. If I deserved to face the music
Dan, I didn’t see why you should,’ continued Emma.

‘Your wrongdoing
was done for my benefit. You didn’t act out of self preservation, or for
financial gain. You did what you did for me, because you loved me and wanted to
protect me. Should your reward for that be to lose everything? Your top
university course, your job prospects, your reputation, your share of the
reward from treasure which would never have been found without your scholarship
and perseverance?

‘In the end, I
simply couldn’t take you down with me. What swung it, and what made me appreciate
how special you are, was that never once did you seek to dissuade me from handing
myself in. Louise did, several times. John did to an extent and he admitted that
part of his motive for disposing of Zak was concern for our fortune. But you only
wanted what was best for me.’

Dan could only nod
his head. He was too choked to speak.

‘What’s done is
done,’ said Emma. ‘While one can be sympathetic for Zak’s family, he did bring
it upon himself. Destroying our lives, and John’s and Louise’s won’t bring him
back.

‘However, we must
learn from this, Dan, and how wrongdoing so nearly cost us dear. I hope you
understand why I didn’t tell you straightaway when I called earlier and why I
made you share the fear with me outside the police station. I wanted you to
suffer with me and to learn a lesson that we will never forget.’

‘I understand,
Emma. I can’t tell you how grateful I am,’ mumbled Dan, finally finding his
voice. He felt overcome with it all, and unsure what to say.

‘Hey, this stuff
will go flat if we don’t drink it,’ scolded Emma with a grin. ‘Come on, let’s
draw a line under everything and enjoy this vintage champagne.’

Dan smiled and
took a big, long sip. He did not normally quaff champagne but this was as cold and
refreshing as a mountain stream, like liquid diamonds.

‘That tastes
good,’ he said. ‘I suddenly feel like I’ve walked out of a nightmare and into a
dream.’

‘You have,’ said
Emma. ‘Our dream, our dream together. Oh Dan, just think – we are students on a
top degree course at England’s finest university and thanks to the wealth we
are coming into, our money worries are over. No more badly-paid, exhausting
part-time jobs for us, this will set us up for life, and above all, we have
each other.’

Dan gazed at the
champagne bottle with its Grand Cru label and wished he could take that moment
with Emma, push it inside the bottle and cork it forever. Every sight, every
sound, every smell in that genteel, civilised place was bliss to him. He hoped
he would never forget it.

The rattle of
cutlery and china; the murmur of conversation from other tables; the old boy in
a blazer with the walrus moustache by the wall, pouring water from a small jug
into his double scotch. How he would have loved a cigar to accompany his whisky
in the days before the smoking ban, mused Dan. The fragrant waft of a sleek
panatella would have made the atmosphere complete.

From the window, Dan
saw passers-by going about their business and a handful of leaves – the colour
of Felipe’s gold ingots – flitting their way up and down in the light breeze, a
sure sign that the colder months were on their way.

In the distance he
could see the police station in which he and John might now have been detained,
seated on straight-backed, thinly-upholstered metal chairs with two police
officers and a whirring tape recorder.

John and Louise!
They must be told straightaway. He had promised to contact them as soon as he
could. ‘We must phone the others,’ said Dan, grasping into his pockets for his
mobile phone. ‘I feel awful I’ve forgotten them.’

‘Don’t,’ said
Emma, calmly. ‘They needed to feel the fear too – as much as we did. Come on, let’s
take our champagne to our room and ring them from there.’

‘Our room?’ said
Dan.

‘Yes, young man,
our room,’ said Emma, smiling. ‘Here’s the key if you don’t believe me,’ and
she took it from her pocket. ‘We have a lovely room with a wonderful en suite
and jacuzzi and we’re going up there now for a luxurious bath while we guzzle
the rest of the bubbly.

‘When we’re done,
we’ll put on some smart new clothes that I’ve bought for us this afternoon and
come down looking as shiny as new pins and go into the luxury restaurant for a
delicious meal. I’ve bought you a razor and some shaving foam so you’ll even have
smooth cheeks.

‘When we have
eaten and drunk as much as we can hold, we slip away to our room and jump into
our king-size bed. It’s all right, I’ve put it on the Visa card – now that I
know I’ll be able to afford the bill!

‘I don’t know what
to say,’ said Dan. ‘If this is a dream, I don’t ever want to wake up.’

‘Ok,’ said Emma,
‘I’ll try and avoid the temptation to pinch you. Let’s go.’

They ignored the
lift and instead took the magnificent wide staircase with intricately carved
banisters to their generous-sized room on the second floor.

Dan’s eyes widened
when they stepped inside. ‘A four-poster bed! I’ve never slept in one before. It’s
so grand and atmospheric here. I wonder if this hotel is haunted, I bet it is,’
he said.

‘Maybe by the
ghost of a long-lost Spanish sea captain,’ teased Emma.

Dan’s face fell
slightly. He had forgotten amid everything else, what lay at the heart of their
incredible adventure – Captain Felipe and the elegant, spidery writing of his
diary.

‘We owe so much to
him,’ said Dan. ‘We should never forget whose fortune it once belonged to and
the circumstances in which it was lost.’

Emma saw pain and
sadness cross his face. ‘I’m sorry, Dan, I didn’t mean to be flippant. But you
know something,’ she said, as she walked over to the large bay windows and looked
wistfully out, ‘I think he would have been content if he’d known the way things
had turned out, 230 years on. He’d be pleased that his historic possessions
would go to a museum for people to marvel at and for folk like you, me, John
and Louise to benefit, giving us such a good start in life. That must be a
better fate than for it to languish beneath the sea – or worse – fall into the
grasping hands of oafs like Zak and Jake.’

‘I felt an
attachment to Captain Felipe you know,’ said Dan. ‘That’s why, when I realised
I had left his precious diary by itself on the rock shelf in the cave, I
couldn’t bear it and had to go back for it. That’s what brought the trouble
upon us, of course.’