SOMEWHERE BETWEEN MANCHESTER and a service station on the M40, where the coach stopped to change drivers, Ben came to a decision. When Alice took advantage of the rest break to visit the ladies’, he pulled his phone out of his pocket and called Norina’s friend with the hotel, and asked him if he had another room.
He was in this now, whatever ‘this’ was.
He felt guilty about not being back in Invergarrig when he said he would, but he was already going to be a day late, thanks to the snow, and when he’d called Norina, she’d said Willow had hardly batted an eyelid. Of course she’d be fine if he stayed a bit longer. Which was just as well because, until he was absolutely sure there was no hope, he wasn’t letting Alice out of his sight.
Inside the service station, he and Alice opted for the coffee shop, grabbing a couple of sandwiches and hot drinks, then sat down to eat them while listening to the music being piped from speakers hidden amongst the exposed heating vents in the ceiling. An eighties mix, he guessed, as he made short work of his ham and cheese toastie.
When he finished it, he leant back in his chair, stretching his legs out and crossing one foot over the other, and his eyelids drifted closed. It was tempting to let himself nod, seeing as he’d only snatched a few hours’ sleep the night before. ‘Every Breath You Take’ by The Police was playing, and he was mulling over the haunting, slightly claustrophobic mood of the song when a chair leg scraped against the floor. He opened his eyes, but it took him a second or two to realise that while Alice’s coat was hung over the back of her chair, Alice herself was nowhere to be seen.
A cold spike of fear shot through him. So much for not taking his eyes off her! Where was she? He stood up to see above the heads of the other diners and spotted her jogging towards the entrance. When the automatic doors slid open, she kept running out into the night. Ben didn’t stop to think. He took off after her.
‘Alice?’ he called out as he neared the exit, and spotted her standing on the kerb overlooking the car park, arms wrapped around herself. She didn’t turn, didn’t answer. He picked up speed.
When he reached her and touched her arm lightly, she jumped as if she was surprised he was there, maybe even as if she was surprised thatshewas there, instead of listening to the music in the warm café. While it wasn’t snowing this far south, the temperature was still icy.
‘Are you okay? What’s going on?’
Alice inhaled a jagged breath. ‘I don’t know. I think I need to … to …’ She looked up at him helplessly. ‘I don’t know. I just … It was that song …’ Her eyes widened, as if the words she’d just said were a revelation to her just as much as they were to him. ‘I really hate that song!’
‘You hate The Police?’
Alice pressed her lips together and shook her head. ‘No. I don’t … I don’t hate the band, not at all. It’s the song. That particular one. And now I feel a bit … strange. Like my head is buzzing. Racing. I think I might— Oh!’
Ben stepped closer.
‘I just saw …’ She looked at him with terror in her eyes. ‘I just had another one of those flashes … an image of something. But this time it was longer. Clearer. And I could hear that song playing in the background.Every move you…’ She trailed off and hugged herself tighter.
‘What did you see?’ Ben asked quietly.
She swallowed. ‘It was the same thing, almost, as the last time … the bridal shop, the mirror. I was wearing a … Oh, God! I was wearing the wedding dress. It was me!’ Her fingers moved to her neck, touched the skin there. ‘The collar was scratchy and tight … But I wasn’t really looking at the dress. I was looking at my reflection. It was as if I was looking at another person …’ She swallowed. ‘I think she was trying to send me a message.’ Her lips trembled. ‘I think she was telling me to get out of there. To run.’
Ben reached out and pulled Alice into his arms, where she stood, shivering. It wasn’t like earlier, he reasoned. This was about safety, about making a friend feel better when they were having a wobble. ‘It’s freezing out here,’ he said. ‘And the coach is going to leave shortly. Let’s just grab our coffees and get back on board.’ He was much less likely to lose her again there, especially as she preferred sitting next to the window.
When they got on board, Alice slid into her seat. He sat beside her in silence, knowing that she needed time to process what she’d remembered,giving her space, even though he was desperate to ask questions.
After about ten minutes, she picked her handbag up from beside her feet, unzipped the side pocket and carefully pulled out the crumpled invitation. ‘The wedding …’ she said, her voice trembling. ‘The one I’m trying to get to … I have a horrible feeling it might be mine.’
Chapter Forty-Five
Now.
ALICE STARED AT the invitation in her hands. She studied every word, taking in the play of light on the gold foil on the bride and groom’s names, following each scrolling letter with her eyes until the words became nothing but shapes and lines without meaning.
Was that her name? Her full name?
She felt no connection to it at all.
No. It couldn’t be true.
The coach rumbled on towards London, joining the M25 near Heathrow Airport, then coming off again to head into the urban sprawl, through the city towards Victoria Coach Station, just a stone’s throw from Buckingham Palace.
It had to be a memory that she’d experienced standing outside the service station. Something real. Otherwise, why would the same image keep slapping her around the head, getting stronger each time, getting clearer? It was as if her brain was trying to say,Wake up! Listen!
She ran her fingertips across the embossed lettering of the invitation, then slid it carefully into the side pocket of her handbag before staring at the back of the seat in front of her.She wanted to put her hands over her ears and go ‘la, la, la’. She wanted to take Ben by the hand when the coach stopped and just get the first one back to Scotland.
Was she right? Was she really about to get married?
A wedding should be the happiest day of someone’s life, full of joy and excitement, so why did the images in her head trouble her so much? Of course, this uneasy feeling could just be a hallucination, her brain misfiring. There might be a groom, searching frantically for her, worried sick. If there were, she’d probably put him through the worst week of his life. But, somehow, even if she managed to squash this sense of foreboding, she couldn’t bring herself to care about him. He was a stranger.
