Chapter 14

Despite the heat of the fire, it's a long, uncomfortable night. Tom tried to insist that I had the sleeping bag, but in the end we both lie on top of it, a good distance apart.

I doze, off and on, but we're both constantly on fire duty, getting up to add a log whenever it dies right back. Despite being physically exhausted, I can't get comfortable on the hard floor, no matter which way I turn. When daylight starts to filter around the edge of the boarded-up windows, I finally give up and sit upright. In the gloom, the kitchen with its layer of grime, shaggy cobwebs and debris is far more depressing than it was by candlelight. Tom groans and winces as he sits up. The fire has died down to embers but quickly roars back into life when he tosses one of the logs from the dwindling pile onto it.

I get up and busy myself boiling water and gathering up the clothes that are now dry.

‘What are you doing?' asks Tom, catching me stashing candles in my rucksack.

‘In case we need them again.'

‘Good thought, although I hope to fuck we get to the motorway today. Not sure I can stand another night like this.' He gestures around the room and suddenly I really want to get out of the squalid surroundings.

‘I need to get some fresh air,' I mutter, leaving him to sort out making coffee. I've fought too hard to escape this, and I don't like the memories it's bringing back.

Outside the contrast to the previous day is almost unbelievable. A brisk wind lifts and tosses my hair across my face and I lift a hand to hold it back to take in the view. The bright, glorious morning is full of sunshine and hope. It's a million miles from yesterday's dank, grey hours of unrelenting misery. I take a deep breath, relief flooding through me, although I can't contain a shudder. I would kill for a shower and to be clean.

I hear Tom's footsteps. He hands me a cup of coffee and we both lean on the wall in front of the cottage, taking in the wide sweep and rise of majestic hills, crowned with outcrops of grey crags and sliced by verdant valleys. There's not a soul in sight and the only sound is the distant call of a bird, a lonely echo across the field.

‘Cheers,' he says lifting his cup and taking an enthusiastic sip. ‘Heaven in a cup. I'll never knock instant coffee again. Thank God that you're a cheapskate and pinched a load from the hotel.'

‘I call it thrifty.'

‘Whatever. I'm extremely grateful for your forethought.'

I'm quietly satisfied by the praise but I revert to inanities because I don't know what else to say.

‘It's a gorgeous morning.'

‘Thank fuck. There was a point yesterday where if I'd seen one of those bloody orange Land Rovers, I'd have run towards it begging them to capture us.'

‘Good job we didn't then. I'm a great believer in tomorrow's another day. Things can only get better.'

He gives me a thoughtful look and nods before returning his gaze to the view.

Our silence for once is companionable.

‘Well,' he says decisively. ‘We're almost home and dry. I reckon another six or seven miles this morning – we can do that in a couple of hours. It's seven now. Once we get to the slip road, we can hitch a ride and potentially be back in civilisation by this evening if we're lucky.'

He swigs his coffee.

‘I need a wazz.'

‘Right. I'll go tidy up and get ready.' Reluctantly I leave the daylight and the clean air and go back into the kitchen, where I quickly chuck another log on the fire and put some more water onto boil.

By the time Tom returns, I've rolled up the sleeping bag, tucked it back in its waterproof sack and I'm waiting for the water to heat.

‘What are you doing?' he asks impatiently, doing up the clips on his rucksack. ‘We need to get moving.'

‘Just making some more coffee for the thermos flasks.'

‘What the fuck for?'

‘In case we need it on the journey.'

‘Jesus, Lydia,' he snaps with obvious irritation. ‘We're only walking for two hours, tops.'

‘We might be glad of it,' I insist, my fingers clenching at my side. This is a hill I'll happily die on.

‘Water's fine. Once we get a lift, hopefully whoever it is will stop at a service station. We can get a coffee then. Don't forget we've got twenty quid each.'

‘That's for emergencies.'

Tom glares at me, his eyes narrowing in a what-sort-of-idiot-are-you expression.

‘And what sort of emergency do you think we're going to have? We've managed pretty well for two nights without any cash. I think we can treat ourselves to a bit of food. I tell you, if we get anywhere near a KFC or a McDonalds, I'll be blowing some of my cash on a burger and fries.' He pauses and takes a deep sniff as if he can smell them right now.

This profligacy fills me with horror but I'm not backing down.

‘Fine, you don't have to have any but I'm not leaving until I've made coffee.'

I hear him mutter, ‘Fuck's sake' under his breath.

‘It'll take an extra ten minutes,' I snap and turn my back on him.

‘I'll wait for you outside,' he says and stomps off.

I eye the second thermos flask, tempted not to fill it but I can't bring myself not to. Just in case.

When I finally emerge from the cottage, offering Tom the second flask, he snatches it from me with a roll of his eyes and stashes it in one of his rucksack pockets and marches off at a pace he knows I can't keep up with. Ungrateful git.

The brisk wind that toyed with my hair earlier has whipped dark-edged clouds up from nowhere, and after only an hour of walking the light has closed in. It's amazing how quickly the weather has done a complete about-turn. I wouldn't have believed it possible. Scowling up at the sky, I remove my rucksack and retrieve my raincoat as well as stop for a sneaky rest. We're on quite a steep path and I'm nowhere near as fit as Tom, who strides ahead as I struggle into the coat, the wind determined to wrest it from my fingers. Before I've managed to shrug the bloody thing on, the first heavy drop plops down the back of my neck. Like a turtle I hunch into it and swing my pack onto my back. Ahead of me Tom whips out his fancy pac-a-mac, like a sodding matador cape, and puts it on with all the panache of someone on one of those Dancing with the Stars shows doing the paso doble without breaking a stride. And then he puts the GoPro on his head with the supplied strap.

Bloody marvellous, he's going to film us walking into the hideous weather conditions. He has an eye for drama – I'll give him that.

Fascinated by the sudden storm, I watch the rain sheeting across the valley, coming straight towards us, and the cloud which has dropped to surround us. I hurry after Tom, my legs struggling on the challenging incline. Shit, I really should go to the gym more often but then again I'm not normally charging about with a ten-tonne weight on my back, which is the killer. In a matter of minutes, the rain hits in earnest and I can barely see, it's so fierce in my face. I duck my head and look at my feet, battling forward. When I squint upwards there's no sign of Tom because he's rounded the bend ahead. The increasingly muddy path is getting narrower by the second and is full of trip hazards with sharp rocks protruding here and there. I hadn't realised we were quite so high up and I'm sure the view must be amazing but all I can see is the mist of the cloud that has descended around us and not Tom. The bastard has left me behind. At least there'll be no footage of my struggle up the path.

With a heavy sigh I tuck my hands into the straps of my backpack and pick up my pace. God, it's hard going. ‘Come on, you can do this,' I mutter to myself, forcing my aching leg muscles into action and ignoring the irate protests they're firing off to my brain. I round the corner straight into the oncoming wind and spot Tom a little way ahead. I sway for a minute, blinking the rain out of my eyes. To my relief the path has levelled out and … my toe catches a rock and I start to pitch forward, my feet stumbling as I desperately try to regain my balance. I just manage to sink to one knee, sending a shower of scree cascading down the hill, catching myself. Tom looks round and then my foot slips and the weight of the rucksack topples me over and I roll right over the edge of the path.

There's a flash of rocks, grass, plus a mouthful of said grass as I go bump, bump, bump down the hill, so fast there's no way I can stop myself. Everything is a blur, pain punching into my head, my arms, my legs as I tumble over and over and just when I think it's never going to end, my body slams into something. Shock and pain radiate through every part of me as I lie there looking up at the sky, much like a tortoise with my arms and legs dangling from the rucksack on my back. Dazed, I'm too stunned and shaken to do anything but look up, the rain spattering my face with cold wet slaps.

When, at last, I try to move I realise my rucksack is wedged fast between some rocks and until I wriggle out of the straps, I'm as stuck as a beetle on its back. In fact, more stuck; at least they can go round in circles. This irrelevant thought makes me wonder how hard I've hit my head, and then reflect that if I can think like that, I can't have done any serious damage, even though trying to extricate my arms from the straps is very uncomfortable.

‘Oh my God, are you all right?' Tom comes half running, half stumbling down the hill and vaults the last few feet off one of the rocks above me. It's like watching the hero of a film swinging into action and makes me feel even more stupid for my clumsiness.

I try lever myself to my feet but it's a bit too hard to draw breath in at the moment. My back took one heck of a whack when I landed and it's knocked the wind, the stuffing and everything else out of me. I try again. Lying here like a useless jellyfish, even though I think I might have turned into one, it isn't an option. I can't hold Tom back.

‘Fuck's sake, Lydia. Stay still,' Tom shouts at me and I blink up at him. What's he so angry about? Because we've lost time? I make another effort to stand up. I'm not going to be a handicap.

‘I'm fine.' Bugger, there's a bit of a give-away wobble in my voice. I try again and this time sound more in command of myself. ‘Honestly. Just give me a second.'

‘Lydia –' his voice is gentler this time ‘– you're not fine. Don't move. What hurts?'

I look up at him, the concern in his eyes, the way he reaches to touch me and then pauses as if I'm a delicate thing that might break.

I stare at him mutely, microscopically aware of the darker blue around his irises, the tiny water droplets clinging to the dark hairs of his arched eyebrows and the softening of the lines on his rain-misted face.

‘Lydia? Just take a minute. I think you might be in shock.' Then he hisses in a breath and says, ‘Shit.'

I look down to where his gaze has landed. The bottom of my trousers is shiny with blood. He's pulling off his rucksack and throwing things out until he gets to the first-aid kit. It's a bit déjà vu; we've been here before. It's like having my own personal doctor.

He rolls up my trouser leg and I watch. That's a lot of blood and now I'm looking at it, pain roars in, ripping across the surface of my skin with sharp teeth, bringing tears to my eyes. I grit my teeth.

Tom's tossing things out of the green box and then he grabs something back again. ‘Sling,' he mutters. ‘That'll do.' Unfolding it, he immediately starts mopping up the blood with it. I kind of wish he hadn't because now neither of us can unsee the jagged gash slicing down my shin, which hurts like buggery.

‘Shit, Lydia.' He grips my hand. ‘Don't look.'

‘It's okay,' I say. ‘I'm not dying.'

‘You're not dying but…' His voice trails away. ‘I need to bandage it up and we need to get some help. And don't you dare say you're fine.'

‘I'm sure I'll be able to walk on it, once it's bandaged. It's just a cut.'

He sits back on his heels. ‘And what about the rest of you?' Now I realise his face is white, those dark brows and three-day stubble accentuated by the pallor. ‘God, when you went over…' He closes his eyes. He's as shaken up as I am.

I turn my hand in his and give it a squeeze. ‘I'll live.'

‘Jesus, Lydia. You're something else.' He shakes his head and then lifts his hand to touch my face. ‘You're going to have a hell of a bruise there,' he says skimming my cheekbone. ‘How does it feel?'

I'm about to do my usual shrug and brush his words away but instead, I give him a grim smile. ‘Like I've done a dozen rounds with Anthony Joshua before going head to head with a herd of bulls.'

‘Can you move your arms?'

I bite my lip. It's almost as if his words have taken the lid off the pain. My right arm is excruciating and when I lift it, I cry out.

‘Probably just a bruise,' I say, nestling it protectively into my body.

His mouth tightens but he turns his attention back to my leg and takes out another big dressing and puts it over the wound before winding a bandage tightly round it and pulling my trouser leg back down again. The rain is bouncing on the fabric, sending blood spatters onto the surrounding rocks.

‘We need to try and find you some shelter and then I'll call for help.'

I catch sight of the GoPro. ‘Please tell me you're not still filming.'

His hand snaps up to the camera. ‘Shit. Sorry.' In a quick fluid move, he tugs it off his head and switches it off. ‘We can always delete it later.'

He stands up and surveys the area, although you can hardly see through the gloomy flat grey light.

‘First I'm going to see if there's any shelter nearby. I'll be right back.'

I nod. What else can I do?

I watch as he strides off down the hill. Despite my difficult childhood, I'm not sure I've ever felt quite so cold, wet and miserable. The pain shooting round my body like a random pinball isn't helping. It would be easy to feel sorry for myself but I grit my teeth. For all his faults I know that Tom is totally reliable. He will do everything he can to resolve this situation.

He is right back, for which I'm very grateful.

‘There's an overhang of rock just below us. It's not quite a cave but it's shelter.'

When he tries to help me to my feet, I wince as I try to straighten one leg. I shake my head. ‘Give me a sec.'

It takes me a whole minute to stand up. Every bit of me hurts. He takes my rucksack and guides me down the hill. It's slow progress, one foot in front of another, until we reach the overhang. It's very shallow and neither of us can stand in there, but once I'm sitting it's okay. It's dry. When he's arranged me in a heap, he props up my rucksack and goes into his.

‘I think, on this occasion, you're quite entitled to tell me, "I told you so."' He holds up the thermos flask.

I give him a prim look. ‘Wouldn't dream of it.'

‘Here.' He pours me a cup of coffee and produces two paracetamol. ‘I think you're going to need these.'

‘Good job we have two first-aid kits,' I say. ‘Who knew they'd come in so useful?'

The coffee is pure indulgence and I'm grateful for every single mouthful. When he retrieves my flask it's somewhat dented but functional. After drinking a small cup, he puts the first flask within my reach. ‘Where's the bat phone? I think we need to call in the cavalry.'

‘How much did you appreciate that coffee?'

The reminder immediately makes him suspicious. He just looks steadily at me. I wince and it's nothing to do with the pain settling on every bit of my body. ‘The phone…'

‘Lydia,' he prompts when I falter.

‘I-left-it-behind-on-the-coach.' The words run together because I spit them out so quickly, like I'm ripping a plaster off a wound.

His mouth purses but to give him credit, he simply nods, admittedly several times like one of those plastic dogs you see in the back of cars, as if it's a distraction technique to stop him yelling.

‘Sorry. It must have dropped out of my rucksack and I didn't notice 'til much later.' I'd sort of been hoping we'd never need it. ‘But I'm fine,' I insist. ‘I just need to rest. We can't give up now. We're not that far from the motorway, surely. As soon as we reach the slip road, like you said, we can hitch a lift and we'll be in London in no time. We stand a good chance of winning that prize money. You want to win it don't you?'

He scowls. ‘Yes.'

‘Well, so do I.' There's no way I'm letting my parents' desecration stand; I will reclaim and restore Gran's house.

A series of expressions cross his face, one after another. Irritation, exasperation and finally resignation. I smile because I like getting to Tom. The real Tom. The mask is off and I'm starting to know him again. The person that I connected with so briefly.

‘I don't like leaving you but I'll be as quick as I can. Are you going to be okay on your own?' He catches his lip between his teeth and looks torn.

‘I'm a big girl. I'll be?—'

He frowns and real anger blazes in his eyes. ‘For God's sake, Lydia, don't you dare say "fine".'

‘I'll be all right,' I say, a little cowed by his forceful snap.

His voice gentles and it almost finishes me off when he touches my face, lifting my chin to the light and studying what I'm sure is swollen flesh. ‘Sure?' His eyes crinkle with concern and I hear the hitch in his breath.

‘Yes. Go,' I say, desperate for him to leave. ‘The sooner you go, the sooner you can come back. And I'm toasty and dry here with coffee.' I lift the cup in an almost cheeky salute but it's a challenge.

As soon as he's gone, I close my eyes and let my head rest against the rock, tears leaking out of my tightly shut eyelids – the traitorous bastards. Fuck, I hurt all over. I've bitten the inside of my mouth and my tongue can't stop playing with the ragged flesh of my cheek. Usually it's easy to be by myself and cope on my own but now I'm praying that Tom won't be long. It's just the cold and wet, I tell myself, but I know it's a little bit more than that. He's kind. To me. And I'm worried I could get used to it.