steeply towards the village.
Ellen’s bungalow had a light in her bedroom window. Her parents would have gone into her room, turned the immaculate bed covers down, laid a flower on her pillow, and turned on her nightlight. Just as they had done every evening since her death, Ava caught herself remembering. Or maybe not. Perhaps they had finally moved on, and all traces of Ellen had been removed. They might even have a lodger in her old bed. Tomorrow, Ava thought grimly, she would have to go and see them. Everything had changed, and she wasn’t back by choice. But since she was here, she needed to make her peace with Ellen and her family. She told herself it was respectful and courteous, but the pain that burned on the inside was conjured from both fear and shame. Trying to make amends, she had always fallen back on cheap promises. If I can just get this grade, solve this case, take out this drug dealer… The list went on and on, and she had only ever done it for two people – her best friend and her son.
She crested the hill, panting slightly from the climb, and then spun around as the noise of someone else stamping through the wood penetrated her thoughts. It was a man, his face in shadow, shoulders hunched under his own bulky jacket. He was moving fast, along the same winding path she had just climbed. As she strained to see, the last of the light disappeared and the raw chill of darkness fell across the woodland.
Common sense told her to call out a greeting, to be adult and begin as she meant to go on. But she was still drifting, jolted out of her usual efficiency, lost in the past – her past and Ellen’s. In her mind, back in the valleys, she was no longer a successful detective working the streets of Los Angeles, but a teenage screw-up returning to the scene of the crime. Returning fifteen years too late. The man was coming swiftly now, his breath twisting smoky clouds into the darkness. As he came close enough for her to make out his face, he looked up, deliberately searching out her gaze. He was smiling.
Ava squared her shoulders, fists clenched and chin up. Still in fighting stance, she walked towards him, determined to gain the upper hand. Two long strides before her boot caught in a tussock of grass. She was down, sprawled like a helpless child, while he laughed. Time spun back, and embarrassment trailed burning tendrils along her spine, flushing her face. Their lives had been hopelessly entwined throughout her childhood. Every new experience, every memory, was filled with his laughter, his energy. Until that last night, when she’d fled towards the bridge, passport and cash stuffed in her jeans pocket, crouched low over the motorbike, praying to every angel in Wales that she would make it to the other side. He belonged to the drug-drenched memories of adolescence, not the gritty reality of her carefully constructed, and very grown-up, world.
‘Hallo, Ava. Remember me?’ Leo Evans was still laughing, still charming. Even in the shadows, he was all carved cheekbones and piercing blue eyes. He ran a gloved hand through his messy crop of dark hair as she climbed slowly to her feet.
‘Don’t be stupid, Leo. I’m not in the mood for games.’ She was not fourteen years old again, and it pissed her off that he was still a good-looking bastard. A successful bastard too, from what she had heard. Embarrassed at her primitive reaction to his appearance, she was snappy and defensive. Her legs were shaky and her stupid heart was pounding far too fast. She licked her dry lips and rubbed a bruised elbow.
‘Well, that’s a welcome. Shame. You used to love them.’ The blue eyes glinted with mischief and two dimples appeared in the stubbly cheeks. The darkness wiped away any signs of ageing, and his face was that of the manipulative, charming boy who shared his sandwiches with her on her first day at school.
‘It really doesn’t bother you, does it?’ Ava indicated the wood below them with a vague wave of her hand. The hand was shaking, a fact which he couldn’t fail to miss, even in the semi-darkness.
He didn’t pretend to misunderstand, ‘Should it? We were stupid kids. It’s over and done with, Ava. I think we’ve all moved on. Who would have thought you’d turn out to be a copper? LAPD no less. I gather you’re Detective Ava Cole, now. And you specialise in narcotics investigations? Narcotics! That is an absolute classic, darling, don’t you think? I also heard you were involved in the John Wayland case last year as well. Triple homicide, wasn’t it? Clever old you.’
So he kept tabs on her. She wasn’t sure how to feel about that, except to take it that he had never outgrown that urge to control everyone, to have power over his friends and enemies alike. Anger bubbled in her chest, but she shrugged with forced nonchalance, ‘Quite. I’m only back because of Stephen, and then I’ll be going home. We don’t have to run into one another, Leo. Paul said you turned your nana’s old place into a holiday home…’
‘Holiday home sounds like a grotty caravan – no offence, darling. I only come back for business, but luckily your visit has coincided with one of my stays in the village.’ He smiled at her, a swift upward look from under his lashes, all charm and sincerity. It was an adult version of his teenage smoulder, and without doubt an important part of his rise to fame.
‘Lucky me.’ God, she really had to stop reverting to pissed-off teenager. She was an adult now. Ava took a deep, steadying breath, and studied her ex-boyfriend as he continued. The strong Welsh accent of his boyhood was now a mere lilt dancing across some of his words, and she knew hers was long gone.
‘I know Paul hasn’t got long, and I know that he might have been a bit brusque when he asked you to come home, but he needs you, Ava. Penny went crazy when they found out he only had a few months to live. I’ve never seen her lose it, but she was crying like he was already gone. She needs you too. I’m sorry you had to come back for this,’ he added gently. To anyone else, he would have been an old friend offering condolences. But to Ava, struggling to knit past and present, the mischief was still there, despite the apparent sincerity of his words.
Ava shrugged. ‘I’m sorry too. But he’s your friend before he’s my ex-husband anyway. Shit happens. I wouldn’t wish that on anyone, but the fact that it’s Paul dying of cancer doesn’t make it any worse or any better.’
‘You’ve changed. Not just your accent, and your hair, but something else… you’re a hard woman now, Ava Cole.’
‘I’m impressed you could deduce that after a few minutes, and no, I’m not – I’ve just grown up. I found a way out a long time ago, and now I’m just here to tie up loose ends.’ She could smell his sweat, disturbingly familiar, nudging other memories to the forefront of her mind. Ava deliberately turned her head away and took a gulp of the night air.
He scuffed a boot on the wet grass, staring down as though it was the most interesting thing in the world. ‘Actually, we probably will run into each other. As you say, Paul is still a friend, and I’m filming the new series of my show this month.’ Leo looked up now, a glimmer of a smile tugging at his lips. ‘I’m sure you must know about my show. Unless the weather’s really bad we film up near Cochran Hill. Or at Big Water.’
‘Yeah, I heard about it. Clever old you.’ Big Water was an eerie place – a huge sheet of shining water that concealed a drowned village. The reservoir had flooded the bones of a rural civilisation and in the summer months, it was a magnet for the bored teenagers of Aberdyth and nearby Cadrington.
‘Touché.’ Leo sighed, and took out a packet of cigarettes, seemingly in no hurry to move on.
He didn’t offer one to Ava, and she ignored the tantalising aroma of smoke as it curled into the darkness. She had quit smoking four years ago, and she wasn’t about to start again.
‘Tough Love has the highest ratings of any reality show in the last five years. It is the ultimate blend of sex and survival.’ Leo sounded as if he was reciting a press release or a well-rehearsed publicity line. ‘You really should watch it, Ava. It was inspired by our childhood.’
‘I’m not some investor, or your producer. You don’t have to pitch it to me,’ she snapped. Of course, she had seen Leo’s handsome face on magazine covers, caught him being interviewed on television, and she had even watched an episode of Tough Love, because her friends loved it. But she was damned if she was going to admit that it was a bloody clever concept, and one that had clearly had huge financial rewards for those involved,