Written In Blood

26-2

THE JOURNEY FROM BRANTON to Oakhurst took a little under an hour, and a few minutes longer to get from there to the Wright farm. Zack drove into the yard that fronted the farmhouse – there was no gate for him to get out and open, thanks to Oliver Ryder – swung the Land Rover around, and pulled up near to the front door.

“Well, here you are,” he said, glad to have the awkward journey over with. It wasn’t that he had not enjoyed Emily’s company, but he was still uncomfortable after their conversation, which had made him painfully aware of every instance in which his eyes strayed to the teen at his side – why his gaze kept doing so, he couldn’t explain, and no matter how hard he tried to stop it doing so, he couldn’t; it made no sense to him, she was attractive enough, for someone who was only sixteen, but hardly a stunning beauty.

“Great, there’s still time for me to get dinner ready,” Emily said, the relief she felt at that evident in her voice. “Thanks, you saved my life, dad would’ve gone nuts if dinner wasn’t ready on time; he only let me go to town because I said I’d be back in time to cook. I owe you big time.”

Zack turned his head to respond to that, and got as far as saying, “You don’t owe...” before he was interrupted, not by Emily speaking, but by her lips on his.

Before he had a chance to realise what he was doing, Zack found himself kissing Emily back. It was a quarter of a minute before he came to his senses and pushed her away with a feeling of regret and shame.

“No, no, we shouldn’t be doing this, it’s wrong,” he said.

“No it’s not, why should it be wrong?” Emily wanted to know. “You like me, and I like you, why shouldn’t we kiss each other if we want to?”

“Because it’s wrong,” Zack said in a tone that was part apologetic and part regretful. “Even if Sergeant Mitchell, and probably at least half the village, didn’t think me a r****t and a murderer, it wouldn’t be right – you’re only sixteen.”

“It’s the age of consent,” Emily protested. “We’re not breaking the law by kissing. We wouldn’t be breaking the law no matter what we did.”

“That may be true.” Zack could hardly deny it since he knew very well that it was true. “But it doesn’t really matter. Age of consent or not, you’re only sixteen, and I’m more than twice that. Can you imagine your father, or anyone else you know, being alright with you being involved, in any sense, with someone twice your age?”

“Who cares what anyone else thinks,” Emily said, too caught up in the moment to worry about anything.

“I do,” Zack said. “Nothing bad’s likely to happen to you if something were to happen between us, but it almost certainly would to me. I’ve only met your father a couple of times, but I’m sure he’d be furious if he thought I was trying to take advantage of you, and having been attacked once already, I don’t want it to happen again. Not only that, but if I let something happen between us and my ex-wife found out, she’d be so happy she’d probably dance in the street.”

“Why would she do that? What difference does it make to her what you do?”

Zack shrugged. “Not a lot really, at least it shouldn’t. Cathy’s interest in what I do or don’t do, extends only to how it affects her ability to keep me from seeing my daughter, and to get money from me, if she can do both at the same time, all the better as far as she’s concerned. Cathy would see something happening as a great way to stop me seeing my daughter, or at least to extort more money from me in exchange for not keeping me from seeing her.

“You’re a great person: attractive, funny, smart, and very handy around the garden, but I have to think about my daughter, do you understand?” He hoped she did; he didn’t like to think what might happen if she didn’t understand, or became resentful of what he had said.

Emily regarded Zack for a short time before finally saying, “Your daughter’s lucky to have you.” She got out of the car, and was about half way to the front door when she suddenly darted back to the Land Rover.

Before Zack knew what was going on, she had jumped up and pulled herself through the open window of the driver’s door so she could kiss him again. “Maybe next time I come round I’ll dress like Lucy, that’ll give you something to look at.”

Zack was so surprised by Emily’s actions that she was in the house, with the door closed, before he could recover, let alone react. Still dazed, he started the engine, shifted into gear, and left the yard. He spent every second of the sixty-second drive home berating himself for what he had just allowed to happen. He could not believe he had been so stupid.

Emily was over the age of consent, he knew that, but kissing her was still one of the stupidest things he had ever done – being a suspect in two r***s and murders, both of which involved teenage girls, only made his actions more stupid. Especially when he knew Sergeant Mitchell was looking for any excuse to arrest him again; he didn’t doubt that if the sergeant were to find out what had just occurred between him and Emily, he would be in handcuffs before he could utter a word in defence of his actions. His only consolation was that there had been no-one around to witness the kiss.

He was so distracted by what had happened, and by thinking about the possible consequences, that he didn’t realise there was a car parked in his drive until it was almost too late.