The Survivors(88)

Pendlebury stopped suddenly and glanced at Mia, who rolled her eyes. Of course she knew.

‘But as far as anyone else is concerned –’ the officer continued, ‘Olivia was on the cliff path, hurrying to get home in the rain when she saw you in trouble in the water. She made an emergency call, the word got patched through to Julian Wallis as head of the local search and rescue operations, and he put out an alert that was picked up by Finn and Toby. They confirmed they would respond, they raced out on the Nautilus Black from the marina, rounded the point here by the caves and were hit by a freak wave. The boat sent out a distress signal of its own, but nothing could be done and they drowned.’

Kieran gave a tight nod. ‘That’s about it.’

‘Right. The thing is, the time of every one of those calls and alerts was noted. They’re right there – fair enough, they’re spread all over the place across various official records – but they’re backed up by phone data, emergency signals. The individual times are correct, they’ve never been in dispute.’ Pendlebury looked over at Kieran. ‘The problem George Barlin picked up when he sat down with all those separate documents in one place and looked at them properly with his notebook and writer’s quill or whatever, is that the story doesn’t work.’

‘In what possible way does all that not work?’ Kieran said. He felt Mia shift next to him.

‘The only way the timing fits is if Finn and Toby were already out on the water in their boat when they got the radio message that you were in trouble.’

Kieran stared at Pendlebury, but she was looking past him now, out to the Nautilus Blue.

‘It takes, what, fifteen minutes – absolute minimum – to sail out here from the marina, correct?’ she said. ‘That’s what I understand.’

‘Yeah.’ Fifteen was pushing it, actually; twenty was much more typical.

‘Right. Well, from the time Olivia’s first emergency call was made – confirmed by phone records – to the time your brother responded on the Nautilus Black radio, just under four minutes had elapsed. Less than three minutes after that, the Nautilus Black’s distress signal was activated, with the GPS positioning them out there on the water beyond the caves.’

Pendlebury looked at Kieran now.

‘From when you were swept away to when your brother and Toby arrived, not even ten minutes had gone by. They can’t have been at the marina when the emergency call came in, they were already out on their boat.’

Kieran shook his head. ‘No. That’s –’

‘See for yourself.’ Pendlebury handed him the tablet. ‘The important bits are highlighted.’

Kieran took it, and Mia leaned in to see, her face close to his. He could hear her breathing as he tapped the screen. A phone record appeared, and another, then a string of official reports and records. Kieran flicked back and forth, again and again, trying to absorb what he was seeing, while Mia read over his shoulder.

Not trusting his own eyes, he glanced at her.

‘What do you think?’ He was surprised to find himself whispering.

She pointed at the screen. There, and there. And there.

The emergency call made by Olivia, the log report filed by Julian, the response by the Nautilus Black, the activation of the boat’s distress call.

Kieran tried to concentrate. How long had he been in the water before he was thrown onto the rock and caught that first glimpse of the Nautilus Black? It had felt like hours, but – Kieran made himself focus. But he had survived, so it could only have been minutes, at most. How many? He looked down at the screen. Less than ten, according to the black and white text in front of him.

Kieran opened his mouth. ‘If these timings are right –’

‘They are.’

‘Okay, but –’ He couldn’t think of a single thing to say.

‘Why has no-one picked up on this before?’ Mia said, but from her tone Kieran could tell she had also guessed the answer almost as soon as she’d asked. Because with everything else that had happened that day, the minutiae simply hadn’t mattered. Not to the traumatised crowd who’d gathered on the clifftop to watch two men drown. Not to townspeople faced with damaged homes and destroyed businesses. Not to the family of the missing girl, last seen on the beach with her backpack and then never again. Ash’s voice rang in his head. It was a crazy day.

‘So if those timings are accurate, that would mean Finn and Toby –’ Kieran was still not quite there yet.

‘That Finn and Toby were out on their boat and headed in this general direction before they even knew you were in the water, yes,’ Pendlebury said. ‘So whatever went wrong that day, Kieran, it wasn’t your fault in the way you think it was.’

Kieran opened his mouth, but felt like he couldn’t draw breath. He felt Mia’s palm on his back, rubbing in circles. He bent forward and buried his face in his hands.

He could almost see it, and felt sick with giddiness. He’d been carrying this weight for so many years, he couldn’t imagine what it might feel like to be able to set it down. The lightness and the freedom. He could tell Verity. He could try to tell Brian. The thought of that flashed so tempting and bright it was almost painful.

But beneath the dazzle he felt something sliding and flickering. A question. Kieran tried to ignore it, but it turned over in his mind. Prodding at him, soft but insistent. He raised his head and thought from Mia’s face that she was wondering the same thing. The same question Verity would arrive at after the initial rush had ebbed away. The same one everyone in Evelyn Bay would eventually gossip about over their coffees and keyboards. Kieran knew what they would all ask, because he was already asking it himself.