The Hit List Read online

  They want me to dispose of a body.

  *

  I flew down the motorway to get here, false plates rattling, engine screaming. When I got to the hotel, the parcel was waiting outside on the ground. Someone had wrapped it in old potato sacks and tarpaulin. I have to trust that they’ve done a good job – I don’t have the time to check.

  I’m not welcomed by anyone. A tall muscular man, who I saw when I first pulled up, turned away almost immediately and I watched his back as he strode fast around the corner of the building and disappeared.

  I’ve already wasted forty-five minutes of my allotted hour for lunch. I think I can wring it out to ninety minutes without Karen saying anything. But it’ll still be tight.

  My rear seats are down and coated with plastic that I luckily had in my boot from previous errands. On top lies the cargo. I try not to think about what’s inside and instead focus on getting rid of it. I spotted somewhere ideal on the way here and pick my way back along country lanes and quiet wood tracks, eventually opening the gate and tucking my car inside away from the road. It takes longer than I’d hope to unload and unwrap the outer layers, and by the time I’ve shoved it as far into the pile of manure as I can get it, I’m coated in shit. My hair, eyelashes and fingernails are thick with it. The acrid taste so strong in my mouth I think I must have swallowed some.

  I stand back to check my work and pay my respects, wiping thick black ooze onto my forehead as I move my hair out of the way. This should work, the smell disguised, the rot hastened. I have left two potato sacks in place, one on the top and one on the bottom. I know from the size that this was an adult. I hope it was a bad person. I can’t think of the alternatives. I can’t let myself think that this was what would have happened to Cristina. That perhaps this is what happened to my mother.

  Stop. Come back to the present.

  It’s as good as it can be but time has bled away from me. I’ve been gone over an hour and I’m covered in literal shit, which only just covers the ammonia sweats from all the adrenaline. I can’t go to the store like this.

  I drag some of the plastic wrapping onto my seat and then drive around until I get some reception.

  Karen answers crisply.

  ‘It’s me, Samantha.’

  ‘Hello.’ I picture her crossing her arms, probably wondering how Steve puts up with such a flaky woman.

  ‘I’m really sorry,’ I say, in a smaller voice. ‘But I’m not going to be able to come back to work today.’

  ‘May I ask why not?’

  ‘I want to tell you but,’ I pause. ‘It’s just … I don’t want Steve to know.’

  ‘Oh?’ she sounds intrigued, which is better than angry. ‘I mean, you can trust me.’

  ‘You’re so nice,’ I say, letting my voice waver just a little. Almost imperceptible, a touch that only another woman would notice. ‘I went to the doctor a few weeks back,’ I say. ‘About my bladder trouble.’ I take a deep breath, let out a sigh. ‘They booked me for further tests. Just a precaution.’ I laugh thinly. ‘That’s what they said.’

  ‘Oh.’

  ‘Well, I just had the appointment on my lunchbreak and …’ I can picture her straining with expectation. ‘Well, they found something. I mean, they think. I’ve had some other, well, symptoms they called them. I thought it was just my age, just women’s stuff, you know?’

  ‘I know, I know.’

  ‘I need more tests. Another scan. They’re sending me to a different ward. I just came out to call you, but, Karen, I just really don’t want to worry Steve. I mean, it might be nothing but the growth looked pretty big on the screen they showed me.’

  ‘I’m sure it’ll be OK,’ she coos, a softness to her voice that is usually reserved for elderly customers. ‘But you take as long as you need. OK?’

  *

  I gun it back up the lane to the hotel, the brambles clawing at my wing mirrors. There is only one other car here now – an expensive sports car with mud splattered as high as the tinted windows.

  I park as tightly as possible to the back entrance. Outside, I hide behind the fire escape stairs to peel most of my clothes off, shoving the filth-encrusted layers into a carrier bag and throwing the lot into the wheelie bin near the kitchen door. I spot my old shoes on the floor, abandoned here on Jonathan’s birthday, and I scoop those into the bin as well. A gust of foul rot escapes as I close the lid. I gag.

  I slide out of my boots and rinse them under the outside tap sticking out of the wall. I leave them tucked around the corner, ready to slip back on.

  It’s sticky with heat but I’m shivering, stepping near-naked up the iron steps. I have fresh clothes in another carrier bag, hanging from one finger through fear of contamination. Any shame or embarrassment I might have felt have been consigned to history. Chased away by adrenaline.

  I prise the door open and pace down the corridor, eventually finding an open bedroom. Inside, there are signs of life: a crisp packet, abandoned sandwich wrappers, dirty cups. The thick brass key juts out of the lock and I twist it quietly and then press my ear to the door. No one comes but a few doors down from my temporary room, I can hear a flutter of activity. Several voices, a couple of men and a woman talk urgently. I think one of them is the nurse I recruited, Rosie Parsons.

  I shower using half-finished miniatures, scrubbing my skin and scalp raw. It takes longer than I’d like to scrape all the shit off and I can still taste it in my throat, along with something darker.

  Finally clean, I dry off and dress fast, bringing the towels with me just in case they have traces of DNA on them. As I creep back down the hall, I hear a door open behind me. I don’t look back. No one can see my face.

  My hair dries loose and tangled in the heat of the afternoon as I head back towards home. Along the way, I dump the towels in a rubbish bin on the village green and am about to pull away when the reception sputters back and the missed calls start to vibrate.

  Steve. And Karen.

  There’s a voicemail from Steve, his voice hoarse. ‘You need to come home, now.’

  A text message comes through from Karen. ‘I’m really sorry, Steve was trying to find you and I didn’t know what to say. I’m so sorry – I’m sure he’ll understand.’

  For a moment, I imagine taking off. Just leaving their calls to ring out forever more until my phone dies. Better yet, crushing my phone under my heel and leaving it in the dirt.

  But Joe. Always Joe.

  I get halfway home and then pull in to a truck stop to change the plates back. I drive the rest of the way under the speed limit, forcing myself to keep going. Steve will have known immediately that I’d fed Karen a lie. I’ve not been registered at a GP surgery the whole time he’s known me.

  *

  I see Paula’s car parked haphazardly on our drive and pull in behind it. Why would she be here without telling me? Surely if Steve called her in a moment of crisis, she would have at least messaged me. But I remember that I never got back to her to rearrange a postponed brunch and maybe she’s a little sore about that.

  Maybe something has happened to Jonathan. Or Joe – and Steve can’t face telling me? God no, it can’t be.

  I run from the car to the house and as I pass the living-room window, I see Steve with his arms around our sister-in-law. In her hand is one of Steve’s violent gin drinks. Joe hovers in the background. Oh, thank god. But what could it be? What has Karen said?

  As I step into the house, I hear Paula sob.

  Greg

  Monday, 17 August 2020

  He scoops their fat little bodies from the pool as Marianne watches from behind her sunglasses. It’s hard to tell if she’s amused or annoyed. Her book has been abandoned, splayed spine-up next to the generous Aperol Spritz she made herself at eleven in the morning.

  He works tirelessly, refusing to stop until every frog is out and safe, but they seem to have a death wish and just keep appearing. If he can just keep doing this, maybe he can stop thinking about Lina. Maybe tonight he will sle
ep without nightmares about her. Dreams of his hand holding a rusty scalpel as she looks up at him.

  He imagines the frogs piling up, yet more bodies. The pain in his chest squeezes the breath out of him until he feels he could collapse at any moment.

  ‘You have a hero complex,’ Marianne calls over to him as she rolls onto her stomach.

  *

  They eat chunks of focaccia for a late lunch, torn with their hands. On the small wooden table by the pool, Greg has laid out bowls of sliced tomatoes, jewelled with salt. They split open a great bulb of burrata and the cream runs down their chins as they eat it. ‘I could eat just this forever,’ Marianne says, smiling with her face upturned to the sun.

  He gropes for something to say. Let’s just stay here! Let’s hide in Italy, eating burrata and working as waiting staff and frog rescuers! Let’s hide in each other’s arms and forget everything that’s gone so insanely, surreally, dangerously wrong!

  ‘Me too,’ he says finally, spearing a slice of tomato with his fork and sucking it thoughtfully.

  ‘You’re so quiet,’ she says gently, putting her own fork down. ‘Are you OK?’

  ‘I’m just tired,’ he says, shrugging. ‘We were so ready for a holiday, weren’t we?’

  She nods. ‘More than any other year, I think. Maybe we’re getting old.’

  He snorts but sees his reflection in her sunglasses. ‘Maybe we are,’ he says quietly.

  Lina will never grow old.

  Marianne looks away, taking his greying reflection with her, then points to a tiny brown frog drifting towards the pool filter.

  *

  Most evenings, they’ve walked into the nearby town for dinner, still in flip-flops and shorts. The incomparable Italian light softening their features. These walks have generally settled into what he hopes is companionable silence. Taking in the views, enjoying the slow pace, holding hands sometimes. He’s watched her face grow more golden, her freckles emerging and her curls gaining a sheen of gold. Italy suits her.

  Tonight, though, Marianne has dressed up. She spent hours straightening her wild hair and has painted make-up on. The make-up she brought is designed for her usually pale face and it sits like a mask over her tan. The result is eerie, corpse-like. All he can see is Lina.

  In the restaurant, she scrolls through her phone while his brain wheels around, trying to find something, anything, to talk about. Besides Lina, besides that whole deadly mess, he’s also worrying about money – he’s had to take half this holiday unpaid.

  ‘What are you thinking about?’ she asks, finally putting her phone face down next to her cutlery.

  Lina. Death. Guilt. Regret. Fear.

  ‘The frogs,’ he says, too quickly. She frowns and makes to pick her phone back up. Why is she cross? He realises too late that he’s not complimented her and his regret is all bundled with irritation. It was her choice to get dressed up, why am I under pressure?

  ‘You look beaut—’ he starts as the waiter arrives with their wine.

  ‘Sagrantino,’ the waiter announces with a gentle flourish and continues to tell them about the vineyard, the grape – but not the price – as he pours a little for Greg to try. Ordinarily Greg would gesture for Marianne to test it – it’s a bugbear of hers, that old sexist assumption – but tonight he just gulps it back. ‘It’s good, fine, thanks.’

  Marianne frowns and looks back at her screen as the waiter fills their glasses and moves on to another table.

  ‘What are you thinking about?’ he asks, noticing that she’s checking her personal email. She puts the phone back down again, screen to tablecloth, and looks up. In the heat, her eye make-up has run down her cheeks. Coupled with the unnaturally pale face, she resembles a sad clown. A Pierrot staring back at him, tight-lipped.

  ‘I’m thinking about wasted opportunities,’ she says.

  *

  ‘I’m sorry,’ he says in bed, after trying until he’s sore. ‘But I don’t think I can …’

  She says nothing, no sitcom platitudes or patient smiles. Instead, she extricates herself from his legs, his body, and goes to the bathroom to pee.

  Afterwards, Marianne sleeps angrily. He’s never known a person able to channel rage while unconscious. Her eyebrows are locked heavily over her eyes, her hands balled up like fists and her teeth rattle in her head like shaking sceptres.

  He’s losing her, he can feel it. Sand tipping into the bottom of an hourglass, granule by granule so he barely noticed it at first. And he’s losing himself too. He already lost Lina. And for all he knows, the others died too. Not straight away but after, in the days or months that followed, living hard lives with battered bodies and no one checking up on them. He imagines the clients with their new leases of life; what do they tell themselves? Do they ever think of the incomplete bodies that have plugged holes in their own?

  The number of ‘saved people’ has swollen and become a monster inside of him. His naivety hangs like a chain around his throat. Who knows what’s happened to the people released from his tip-offs? Only a few have come through the doors at Hidden Humans and to chase the details from other agencies would arouse suspicion. How many people has he actually helped and how many lives has he helped fuck up, one way or another? He thinks of the frogs, churning up in the filter despite his best efforts.

  Marianne shifts away from him in her sleep, hugging the side of the bed like a life raft. An escape vessel.

  What does he still have to lose that isn’t already weeping like a wound? His marriage is on the skids, his reputation at work is shot. Eloise gave him an official warning for aggression following a tense team meeting just the other week. He knew he should stay quiet but the complacency was killing him, all his colleagues sitting around sipping coffee as if they’ve done enough. All he could think of was Lina. If people like Lina were actually helped, they’d not be such rich pickings for … for … for people like me.

  He rolls over, the sheets feeling gritty and rough on his sunburnt skin.

  I was supposed to be one of the good guys.

  A hot tear leaks out and he presses his thumbs hard onto his eyelids. He doesn’t deserve to cry, to snivel while lying in bed on holiday when he’s the one who could stop all this.

  I will stop all this.

  He crawls over to Marianne, pulls her towards him and folds himself around her. In her sleep, her waist yields and his fingers sink into her flesh. If she were awake, she’d suck in her stomach or whimper with embarrassment.

  He strokes the softness. His wife. Growing, changing, turning over the years together. How could he risk this?

  He kisses her shoulder and makes a thousand silent promises.

  ‘I love you,’ he whispers into her hair.

  ‘Always,’ she murmurs, still asleep.

  Samantha

  Friday, 31 July 2020

  I’m pinned to the spot, staring from the hallway into the living room. Joe stares back at me, takes in my damp hair and pink skin, my wild expression. Steve hugs Paula tight to him as she sobs and I go to comfort her but there’s no room for me, Steve is wrapped around her.

  ‘What’s happened?’ I say, addressing it more to her than him, but she’s crying too hard to answer.

  As I get closer, I see what is laid out on our coffee table, butting up against the coasters. Photos. Printouts of photos. I gasp.

  Jonathan must have taken them at Christmas, while I slept. In some, I can see snatches of my satin pyjamas, a Christmas gift from poor Paula, crumpled under me.

  I exhale and let the fear break inside me. Joe is staring at his aunt, aghast, and I try to catch his eye. He looks bewildered, mortified. I thought I’d left shame behind but I was wrong, it’s eating me alive.

  ‘Steve,’ I splutter. ‘Paula.’

  ‘There are so many of them,’ she sobs, her face still pressed against the meat of Steve’s chest.

  ‘I’m so sorry,’ I manage, my voice coming out in a whisper. ‘Oh god, I’m just so sorry. I never meant to hurt you. Any of
you.’

  ‘Videos too, so many videos on his computer,’ Paula wails, not listening to me. The words trailing into one another as I struggle to make them out.

  ‘Videos?’ I say, my mind cartwheeling as I try to remember that drunken Christmas night. ‘He took videos?’

  It’s Joe who steps forward then.

  ‘Mum,’ he says, tears forming in the corners of his eyes. He shakes them away. I look up at him and he screws up his eyes and turns from me.

  ‘What?’ Steve says, and Paula pulls away to watch, forehead creasing with confusion.

  ‘Mum,’ Joe says more emphatically, pleading now. ‘Are you in these photos?’

  I thought they already knew and now I don’t have time to deny it. They can all see that I’m guilty. I thought they must have recognised me, that Paula would have recognised the gift she’d given me just hours before I slept with Jonathan at Christmas. But they hadn’t worked it out.

  When I looked at these pictures, I saw myself straight away. But I see now that I was just one of many bodies. And I probably could have got away with it if I’d kept my cool, but my guilt is plastered all over my face.

  They didn’t know. And now they do.

  Paula slips from Steve’s arms and sinks to the floor. ‘I’m so sorry,’ I say.

  ‘But I trusted you completely,’ she cries. ‘I confided in you!’

  ‘You were seeing my brother?’ Steve spits. ‘He was the man you needed to touch you?’ His voice is almost mocking, a caricature of me, but driven through with rage and pain.

  ‘Hang on,’ he says. ‘There must have been more than one man. You were with someone else on Jonathan’s birthday, because I was with him.’

  I nod, mute. No good excuse, no comeback. What can I say? Paula stares at me, a new expression on her face. It’s on the spectrum of satisfaction – perhaps relief that I didn’t just target Jonathan? Or maybe some understanding that I stand to lose everything. I don’t blame her, it’s what I deserve.

  ‘So it was just indiscriminate?’ Steve fumes. ‘Taking risks all over the place, no thought of the damage? After everything I did for you!’