The Survivors(59)

Kieran’s immediate reaction had been utter astonishment that Brian had engaged with any kind of therapy at all. He wondered if Verity had bullied him into it or, more likely, Kieran suspected, Brian’s grief had manifested itself physically. It had happened to Kieran too for a while, with persistent headaches and stomach problems that seemed to have no real cause or cure. Brian Elliott would never have sought help to get his head straight, Kieran knew, but he might have if his body was letting him down.

The worksheet had been marked ‘Confidential’ across the top, so Kieran had of course read it in its entirety. He wasn’t sure what the task had been, but Brian had filed his thoughts into two columns.

Kieran was only eighteen, Brian had written. Kieran was old enough to have known better. Kieran made an honest mistake. Kieran put his brother in danger.

The argument continued all the way down the page.

Finn could make his own choices. Kieran should never have put him in that position. Finn would have done everything he could to save Kieran. Kieran needed his help.

At the very bottom of the page, a conclusion: Kieran is

Brian hadn’t finished. Kieran had spent the rest of that week ransacking the house trying to find a second page, or another worksheet, but if Brian had ever completed his thought, it had not been on paper.

Kieran is … what?

He’d returned to that question a lot over the years.

Kieran had turned back to the task at hand and was about to shove another folder of documents into a shoebox when he’d heard movement in the doorway.

‘Thanks for doing this.’ Verity was running her eyes over the near-empty shelves. ‘You’ve made good progress.’

‘No worries. Can I do anything to help with Dad?’

Verity gave a bleak smile. ‘I think that’s a bit beyond both of us, unfortunately.’

She picked up one of the stacks of papers and leafed through them. A corner of a photo stuck out and she pulled it free.

‘That was a nice day,’ she said, turning the image so Kieran could see. ‘I remember that being taken.’

Finn, Toby and the Nautilus Black. It wasn’t exactly the same photo as the one that had been pinned up on the Surf and Turf noticeboard for a year after their deaths, but it was a close variation. The composition was essentially the same – the two men, their arms around each other, the champagne, the new paint shining on the boat in the background – but it had been taken a few seconds earlier or later and the overall effect was weaker. The men’s smiles were a little less natural, and Finn’s eyes were hooded on the cusp of a blink. It didn’t have the buoyancy of the original but somehow seemed a little more real. Verity ran her thumb across Finn’s face.

‘We’ve got the better version in an album somewhere,’ she said, almost to herself.

‘Hey,’ Kieran hesitated. ‘What was Dad talking about earlier? About Finn and a baby?’

He could tell that Verity was considering bluffing, but either the inclination or the energy fell away and she shook her head.

‘I honestly don’t know. Finn was always closer to your dad than he was to me.’

She broke off as there was a clatter from Brian’s study. She closed her eyes and took several deep breaths. When she opened them, her face was tight.

‘Do you think you could call Sean?’ she said. ‘Ask if we can go diving tomorrow after all?’

‘Sure. If you want to.’

Verity, ignoring another ominous thump, put the photo of Finn back on the pile, facedown. ‘Yes,’ she said. ‘I think I do.’

Kieran drifted up to his neck in the sea now, still thinking about Verity and Brian and Finn as he watched the twilight creep in. He had gone out deep and swum a few more laps back and forth between his parents’ house and Fisherman’s Cottage, and was now treading water somewhere in the middle.

He had seen only two dog walkers – both male – on the beach the whole time he’d been out, but as he bobbed in the growing gloom now, he caught a sudden flash of movement of someone cutting down one of the side paths. Kieran stilled in the water as he watched. Not coming after blokes and babies, he told himself. He believed it, but he was still a little relieved when the figure came into view. Olivia’s mum, Trish Birch.

She was wearing the same dress as earlier in the day when she’d confronted Sergeant Renn at the police station, but now she was holding something grey and bulky under one arm.

The beach was deserted as she checked both ways along the sand, her gaze skimming right over Kieran, submerged to his chin in the waves under the darkening sky.

He watched as Trish crossed the beach and picked her way over the flat rocks that cut out into the sea. The same rocks where Gabby was last seen by Brian Elliott, twelve years earlier as the storm clouds grew. The rocks were slippery then, and would be slippery now, Kieran thought as he watched the woman edge her way out, still clutching the bulky object. He frowned. What was she doing?

Trish reached the tip of the rocks and Kieran was about to call out – a warning or something, he wasn’t sure – when to his astonishment, she took the bulk in both hands and, with some effort, swung her arms through a graceful arc and hurled it straight into the sea.

Kieran’s mouth opened, letting in salt water. Locals never threw things into their ocean. He couldn’t remember the last time he had ever seen someone toss something in. Even the floral tributes to Bronte had been placed well above the tideline so the plastic wrapping wouldn’t float away. Trish watched the grey shape bob once or twice and then, with Kieran still wondering if it had somehow been an accident, she stepped away from the brink, picked her way back over the rocks, and walked straight across the beach to disappear the way she’d come. The whole thing had taken less than a minute from start to finish and the beach was deserted once again. It was like she had never been there.