After the Accident: A compelling and addictive psychological suspense novel Read online

  Chapter Two

  THE BRAVE BOY

  Emma: There was a big dinner on the first night at the hotel. It was Mum’s idea, so I couldn’t really say no. We were right in the middle of the restaurant, with all ten of us around this one table. I was last one down, so didn’t get a choice about where to sit. The twins were at one end with Julius, while I was at the other. I had Dad on one side, Daniel on the other, and Mum opposite.

  Julius: I dodged a bullet on that first night. No way was I getting stuck next to Dad and Daniel when they started knocking back the wine.

  Emma: Daniel was telling this really long and really boring story about a skiing trip where he dislocated his shoulder. It was the type of thing you think might never end. You could circumnavigate the globe in a rubber dinghy, come back to the hotel and he’d still be banging on about it.

  He was making it sound like he’d been on the beaches at Normandy, but the essence was that he’d ignored a bunch of signs, skied into a rock and fallen on his massive arse.

  Daniel: Ah, the skiing trip! Did I tell you about how I dislocated my shoulder? We’d just left my villa and it was my sixth run of the day. I was on my best form until I dislocated my shoulder. Still managed to finish, mind. It was this Swiss guy’s fault for not looking where he was going. I probably should’ve sued him, but it wasn’t worth it in the end.

  Emma: I asked Daniel if the doctor gave him a sticker for being a brave boy. He didn’t like that.

  Daniel: Emma? What would you expect from her? She always has to have the last word. I bet she didn’t have such a smart mouth in prison.

  Emma: I can’t stand the bloke. He’s one of those men that, before they’ve even opened their mouth, you know they’re one of those ‘you-can’t-say-anything-nowadays’-types. The sort that goes on about winning two World Wars, even though he wasn’t there for either. He’ll own a massive four-wheel drive, even though he never goes anywhere near the countryside. He’ll spend an hour droning on about the plague of average speed cameras on the motorway, or complaining that there’s now a vegan option at his favourite pub. He’ll talk about running over all cyclists, or saying how women’s football shouldn’t be anywhere near the TV. Not that he ever watches the lefty-liberal BBC, obviously. You think all that before he even opens his gob – then he starts talking and you realise he’s everything you thought he was but much, much worse.

  Sorry, where was I? Oh, yeah. Daniel Dorsey. Complete dickhead.

  Julius: I knew Emma was going to blow that first night. I could see it, even from the other end of the table. She and Daniel are, um… very different people.

  Emma: Daniel owns forty-nine per cent of Dad’s company, so it’s hard to avoid him. I try to stay away from him, but there wasn’t much I could do when the only free seat was at this side. I was doing my best to ignore him, but he wouldn’t shut up. I swear, that skiing story was into its second hour and he’d somehow blended it into another ‘kids today’ rant, which is another of his favourite moans. He was saying something about how young people always want everything on a plate, and I suppose I snapped.

  Julius: Don’t get Emma started about Boomers versus Millennials, or Gen X.

  Emma: He kept saying how kids today aren’t willing to work for anything, and how they waste all their money on phones, so I fired back at him. I said: ‘Didn’t you buy a bunch of council houses because the government sold them off on the cheap?’ He took a breath and I think he was going to carry on as if I hadn’t spoken, so I kept talking. I said: ‘It’s a shame young people can’t do that now, isn’t it? Shame that houses today are ten or twelve times’ their average salary while you bought yours for eight grand.’

  Julius: I don’t think Emma realised that she was shouting. Everyone else had stopped and I could hear every word from the other end of the table. There was this moment of silence and then Daniel came back at her.

  Emma: He said: ‘That’s easy to say when someone else has paid for you to be here.’

  I was going to say that I only came because Mum wanted me to. He wasn’t done, though. He was shouting in my face. I could see the red veins across his nose from where he’s such a massive pisshead.

  He goes: ‘I don’t think you’re in a position to be lecturing others on morals.’ Then he held up his wine glass and angled it towards me, like he’s making a toast. He said something like: ‘Chill out. Have a drink and enjoy yourself.’

  Julius: I thought Emma was going to smack him. I looked across to this waiter who was carrying some dirty plates across towards the kitchen. He was frozen and watching, like everyone was. There was this long pause and it felt like anything could happen. Good job Mum was there.

  Emma: The words were stuck, like I couldn’t get out a reply. He knew exactly what he was doing when he tilted that wine glass towards me. You know that saying about ‘When they go low, we go high’? Daniel is the opposite. He’ll go as low as he possibly can… though not in any physical sense, of course. It’s been a good two decades since he last saw his feet over that gut.

  Daniel: Back in your box, little girl. Back in your box.

  Emma: Dad just sat there and it was Mum who answered. She spoke really quietly – and yet it felt so powerful. Like, sometimes the quietest voice in the room is the one that talks the loudest. She goes: ‘Let’s not do this now.’

  That put an end to it because everyone listened to her, even Daniel. Daniel gulped his wine, then turned to Julius at the other end of the table and asked something about how Julius’s bank was doing. I don’t remember exactly how Julius replied, but it was something like how it had been a big three months and that the only reason they’d given him the days off for the holiday was because he’d built up so much time owing.

  I wish I’d listened properly now. I didn’t know then that it would be important.

  Julius: I don’t think anyone asked about the bank.

  Emma: That first dinner set the tone. It wasn’t just me and Daniel, although I guess we were the loudest. Liz was moaning on about how she could only get one bar of reception on her mobile. She kept saying how it was like being in a third-world country, even though she was eating an all-inclusive buffet, while chugging down the red wine like it was water. She’s the sort who’d be surprised to find out they have electricity in the north – but then she did choose to marry Daniel, so her judgement isn’t the best.

  Then there was Victor and Claire sitting in the middle, hardly saying anything to each other. Claire was barely eating, while Vic’s plate was piled high with meat, fish, and probably a bit of everything else from the buffet.

  …

  I feel sorry for Vic sometimes, considering who his parents are. Then I remember that he’s a forty-year-old man and that he’s made his own decisions. I don’t know how or why Claire married him. Julius, Vic and me are all stuck with these families – but she chose to marry in.

  …

  I suppose I’m not one to talk about making bad decisions.

  Julius: Victor and Claire hated each other. No doubt about that.

  Claire Dorsey (wife of Victor Dorsey): I didn’t want to be at that dinner and I never should have gone on that holiday. Vic wanted a free trip and he somehow talked me into going. He said we could get our marriage back on track with a week in the sun to relax. I knew that wasn’t going to happen, but I suppose I didn’t see anything wrong with spending a week by the pool. More fool me, huh?

  Emma: Sometimes I wonder whether everything would have been different had I been sitting next to Claire. We’d have found something to talk about and there wouldn’t have been all those arguments at the very beginning.

  After the row with Daniel, things calmed down for a minute or two – then Dad asked me to get him some more of the paella. I stood up to do it without thinking. Part of it was probably because I wanted to get away from Daniel – but I think there was a moment where I felt like a little girl again. When I’d been young and we’d been on the same holiday, Dad would’ve asked me to fill up his
plate from the buffet and it felt like going back through time. Before I knew it, I was scooping rice onto a plate.

  Claire: As soon as Emma headed off to the buffet, I followed. There was too much tension at that table.

  Emma: Claire was standing next to me and we were making small talk about the food. Nonsense stuff, like about how the crab looked nice and all that. If someone wrote down half the stuff people make small talk about, we’d all sound completely mad.

  I ended up apologising to Claire for the shouting at the table and she smiled at me, as if to say it was all right. I think I needed that.

  Claire: Emma fascinated me. She seemed so nice… so normal. Perhaps the only normal one there. But then, when you know what she did, it’s hard to put it all together, isn’t it? I wanted to ask her about it, but I didn’t know her well enough.

  Emma: There were two platters of paella; one with fish and the other with pork. I got the pork one because of Dad’s shellfish thing. It was an automatic thing. I barely thought about it.

  Claire: I didn’t know anything about Geoff being allergic to shellfish. This is the first I’ve heard.

  Emma: It felt like Claire wanted to say something to me, but she never did. We stood there awkwardly and then we headed back to the table. Julius was still wearing that stupid necklace, and was making the twins laugh by flicking food around on a spoon. I suppose that broke the tension, even if someone was going to have to clean it up eventually.

  I remember watching them and hearing the girls giggle. It was so pure – but that makes it worse sometimes.

  …

  I keep saying things that I know will make me sound bad.

  …

  I shouldn’t say this, but there are times when I couldn’t bear to look at the twins. I know they’re my nieces, but, sometimes, being with them makes everything that happened before that feel so real. I’ll be fine and then I’ll hear one of them laughing and I’m back on the side of the road. It’s not their fault, I know that.

  Julius: Amy and Chloe only wanted to eat ice cream. I was trying to distract them.

  Emma: I gave Dad his food and he said something about the hotel’s paella being the best in the world. I wasn’t really listening because I could still hear the twins laughing. It took me out of everything for a moment. The next thing I remember is Dad banging his ring on the side of his wine glass.

  Claire: I never realised that signet ring would play such a part in my life.

  Emma: It’s an emerald signet ring that he always wears. Dad clinked his glass loudly enough to make everyone on the table stop talking and then he stood up. I didn’t realise how much wine he’d had, but he was already slurring his words when he spoke.

  He said that we were there to celebrate his and Mum’s thirty-fifth wedding anniversary, plus Mum’s sixtieth birthday. They both wanted everyone there and they saw Daniel and Liz as family. I suppose I wondered why Mum and Dad were paying for everything if that was the case – but it was their money and I didn’t worry too much.

  I can’t remember what was next, but he rambled for a while and then finished by saying: ‘Let’s eat, drink and be merry.’ He then made a ding-ding-ding with his ring on the glass again before he toasted the table.

  Daniel: It was a good moment. Geoff always knew how to rouse the troops.

  Emma: After that, Daniel pulled out a cigar and said he was off for a smoke. Dad looked to Mum, but she raised an eyebrow, which made it clear what she thought. Dad said ‘maybe later’ and then Daniel went off on his own.

  Claire: Everything felt so much calmer after Daniel left the table.

  Emma: It was only a minute or so and then Julius came across to sit in Daniel’s chair. Mum said she was so happy to have the girls with us on the island. I actually felt a bit emotional hearing that. She probably thought it was the last time we’d all be together in such a place.

  Julius looked towards them at the other end of the table and then said that it almost didn’t happen. Simone didn’t want to swap weekends with him, and the girls were due to be with her. It felt like a very deliberate thing to say, if that makes sense. Like he wasn’t just talking about that week. He wanted Mum to know that Simone had always been the unreasonable one and it wasn’t his fault they’d broken up.

  Julius: What kind of woman would deny someone a final holiday with their grandkids? That’s what Simone was like.

  Extract of a letter received from Tite, Tite and Gaze Solicitors, on behalf of Simone McGinley: Allegations that my client tried to prevent her daughters from holidaying on Galanikos are a calculated, malicious and provable untruth.

  Emma: That whole conversation was so weird. Julius said something about everything he did being for the girls. I can’t remember the exact words, but it felt as if he’d rehearsed it. You know when somebody’s heard something in a movie and they’re trying to recite it back?

  Perhaps it was only me who thought that? Mum took his hand across the table and thanked him for being there. It felt like a moment between them, even though I wasn’t sure it was real.

  Then Dad beckoned over a waiter and ordered two more bottles of wine. Start as you mean to go on, and all that.

  Chapter Three

  THE SHOW OFF

  Emma: I’m not sure how it happened, but the men all disappeared.

  Claire: I looked around the table and suddenly realised all the men had gone.

  Emma: The twins were sitting next to Mum by this point and I didn’t know where Julius had gone. Liz was still busy complaining about a lack of signal on her phone, while Claire was taking the chance to actually eat something after Victor had disappeared. The twins were amusing themselves, so I finally took the opportunity to ask Mum why we’d specifically returned to Galanikos.

  Claire: I’d literally never heard of that island before Victor told me we were invited on a family holiday. I was really confused when I found out it wasn’t Victor’s family holiday.

  Vic said his dad’s business partner used to visit Galanikos every year. There was Geoff and Bethan – plus their two grown-up kids: Julius and Emma. Julius was separated but he had twin girls. That was six of them, so that’s a family, isn’t it? I could just about understand Geoff and Bethan thinking of Daniel and Liz as family, given they worked together so closely. What I never really understood was why Vic and I got to go along.

  Emma: Mum said we’d had loads of good times on the island before Alan died.

  Claire: We were just about to take off when Vic said that someone had died on the island nine years before and that was why everyone stopped going. If we’d been getting on better, I’d have probably asked a few more questions. You talk about red flags and they’re all there. I think I was seduced by the words ‘free holiday’ and ‘all-inclusive’. It was a bit late by then anyway.

  Emma: Mum said the island was her favourite place and that she might not get a chance to return. They’d given her about eighteen months to live at that point – although she never said that specifically. Perhaps it was the truth, but, even then, I thought that it was probably Dad who wanted to go back.

  I remember one Christmas before I went to prison. Julius was still with Simone and I suppose everyone was happier. We’d all gone to Mum and Dad’s house – and it was Dad who was talking about how great it would be to go back to Galanikos one day. I don’t think Mum said anything about it.

  Julius: I don’t know whose idea it was to visit Galanikos specifically. It wasn’t mine. Did someone say it was?

  Emma: Mum has this way of shutting down when there’s a subject she doesn’t want to talk about. If she’s into something, she’ll look you in the eye and, even if she doesn’t say anything, you can tell that she wants to know more. If she’s said or heard enough, she’ll look away and it feels like you’re a naughty child being sent out of class.

  When she looked away, I figured we were done. I was feeling a bit tired anyway, so said goodnight to everyone and headed into the hotel. It was probably about eight o’clock, but
I don’t know for sure.

  I was going to flick through the TV channels and find something to send me off to sleep, but it was only when I closed the door to my room and stared at the suitcase sitting on the bed, still packed, that I realised I didn’t want to be by myself.

  I know there’s a contradiction because I was so used to being on my own – plus I’d just walked away from a table where people would have actually talked to me. I can’t really explain it. I wanted to be around people… just nobody that I actually knew.

  Claire: I figured Emma had gone to bed.

  Emma: I ended up going to the bar in the hotel next door. I’d ordered a Coke and was sitting by myself, watching everyone do their own thing.

  I think I’ve always been a bit of a people-watcher. When I was at school, me and my best friend would sit high on these steps that looked out over the playground. We’d spend our whole breaks watching everyone else and talking about them. You could figure out a lot about people by keeping an eye on them when they didn’t realise they were being watched… That’s true in prison as well – although only if you’re smart enough to not get spotted.

  Paul Bosley (sound technician, Garibaldi Media): I was in the hotel bar half watching the football on TV. I can’t remember which game was on, but I think it was a replay from Copa America, or something like that.