For Rye Gavin Gardiner (best book club books for discussion TXT) 📖

The snoring returned. She felt like she should hate herself for this moment of longing, the undeniable hope that the eternal flame of her father had finally extinguished, but she didn’t.

The details of Hector’s investigation swam before her. Both her mother’s murder and the explosion were connected, of this the detective – yes, still a detective – was sure. As for Quentin, why were words from his novel left at the crime scene? Midnight, midnight; it’s your turn. Clock strikes twelve; burn, burn, burn.

Was someone trying to set him up, or were they just inspired by his book?

She shouldn’t care about any of it, least of all her long-lost family. They weren’t her problem, just as she eventually hadn’t been theirs. The teenaged Renata, following the accident, had swapped this hellhole of a home for a hospital, one that became more of a home than this house ever could have been. How reluctant she’d been to leave those white corridors. Fifteen years in care and not once had her family visited. Her mother likely had no say in this, so she didn’t hold it against her. Besides, despite Renata’s amnesia robbing so much from her, she did remember her relief at the lack of visitation. But it was true. She’d never stopped loving Sylvia Wakefield, the woman who’d endured so much to keep her family together.

Promise you’ll be there for him if anything happens to me.

Yes, she’d stick around long enough to ensure her mother’s husband was cared for before checking out, that one-way ticket all knotted and tied and ready to go. Help the monster responsible for Mother’s bruises and black eyes, then snap goes the noose. Simple.

The twisted logic of her intentions knocked around her head until she could take no more. She pressed her hands over closed eyes, but the darkness behind her eyelids couldn’t erase the image of what lay behind that door at the end of the hall, beyond those cheery cartoon animals still spelling his name.

NOAH

The implications of a child’s bedroom kept so clinically intact all these years hadn’t escaped her, and the possibility of her brother not even being an option was too much to bear. She couldn’t afford to put Thomas in a home. End herself now and rely on state care? That’s not what she’d promised her mother. Besides, Sylvia Wakefield’s killer was still out there. Part of her felt compelled to hang around long enough to look the sweet old woman’s murderer in the eyes.

She needed peace to think. She leapt from the child-sized bed.

Her father’s snoring continued as she stuffed candlesticks, matches, and a packet of wet wipes into her satchel. She gave her hands a quick rinse under the kitchen tap, made a note to replace the thinning soap bar, and slipped into her duffle coat. A pile of hair clips sat on the sideboard. She fastened these in her hair for good measure, tied a woollen scarf around her neck, and eased open the front door.

The bitter night air embraced her. Then she heard the weeping. A sobbing figure sat on the curb by the blackened crater, head in hands. Quentin looked up.

‘Ren,’ he said, wiping the sleeve of his blazer over reddened eyes. ‘I thought you’d be asleep.’

‘I was,’ she replied, curling her toes in her shoes until they hurt. ‘I just woke up and realised I hadn’t locked the house.’

He looked at her boots, coat, and satchel. ‘Which house, and what mountain’s it up?’

They were interrupted by the clock tower, its midnight tolls filling the vacuum of the night. They looked in its direction.

‘You’re going there, aren’t you?’ he asked, his Maine cadence still alien to Renata. ‘The tower. I saw the way you looked at it during the service.’

‘I…’ She fished for the words. ‘Sorry, yes. I am. I used to go there as a child. There was a room at the top I liked.’ She paused. ‘I need to get my head together.’

‘That’s twice you’ve seen me cry like a baby,’ said Quentin, picking his glasses up from the curb. ‘I’d be embarrassed but I’m too torn up about those guys. Third-degree burns. Had to have their seatbelts surgically removed.’ The tears renewed behind his lenses. ‘They have kids, Ren. They could have died and they have kids.’ The bell ceased, leaving only the man’s sobbing to fill the night.

‘I’m not…the person to speak to about this, Quentin,’ Renata stammered. ‘Sorry, I’m just not good with people.’ She hesitated, words yet to be said balancing on her tongue. Was she really going to do this? ‘The clock tower…I mean, it’s kind of falling apart, but if that doesn’t bother you, well…’

The horn-rimmed glasses looked up at her. His gaze was intense, but unusually calming; still no knives. Scalding water on flesh, that’s what the gaze of another usually felt like. But not these eyes.

‘Come with me,’ she heard herself say. ‘The view’s impressive, if nothing else. Not that you’ll see much in this fog.’

Quentin removed his glasses again and rubbed his eyes. He cleared his throat. ‘Gotta be better than this. That’s real kind of you, Ren. I mean, after everything I’ve done…you sure?’

‘These people are criminalising you over a book, your production company’s being sabotaged, and people are getting hurt. It’s taking its toll on you. No shame in that.’ She held out a hand. ‘To me, you’re the victim.’

He took her hand and squeezed—

always at the right times

—then got to his feet.

‘Thank you, Ren.’

Stones crunched underfoot as they made their way along the gravel track. The path ran beside the road to the church, eventually straying through a knee-high stone wall that looked as ready to collapse as the church. A jumbled army of gravestones populated the cemetery grounds, marking generations of Millbury Peak’s deceased.