Darkest Place Read Free Page A

five-minute walk through the old industrial neighbourhood – long strides, arms pumping, focusing on walking, not thinking, like she’d done for years. By the time she saw the harbour, she was puffing hard.When she reached the restaurants on the boardwalk her legs felt like lead weights and her bones were aching. Not from exertion, not in twenty minutes, but from the effort to keep the itching, scrabbling anxiety at bay. Freaking out could be exhausting, she reminded herself. Only halfway to the headland, she gave up punishing herself and ordered a cappuccino at the last cafe in the row.
    She’d been there twice; it had gas heaters out front and a brew that made her blood flow. Today, she sat at a table in the cold, a warm cup between her palms, watching a tugboat rock and roll in the wake of a container ship and trying to talk herself to calmness.
    It wasn’t about her, she told herself. She’d paid for her sins. She couldn’t change the past but she could begin again. It was why she was here. Why she’d walked away from everything she knew, the small town where her guilt and pain were part of the collective memory. Where every day was a reminder of what she’d done and who she’d been.
    â€˜Perfect morning for soaking up C’s and D’s,’ a waiter said as he collected her cup.
    â€˜C’s and D’s?’
    â€˜Caffeine and vitamin D, essential for good winter health. I’m Reuben, by the way. I’m here every morning.’ He dropped the newspaper from under his arm onto Carly’s table. ‘Stay as long as you like, we’re having a quiet one today.’
    â€˜Thanks.’
    â€˜Another coffee?’
    Carly glanced at the path back, not ready to return. ‘Yes, please.’ Her lovely apartment in the renovated warehouse was meant to be inspirational, a metaphor for her own renewal. But the image wasn’t so appealing now. Yes,it was her fault the door was unlocked – that didn’t change the fact that someone had pushed it open and walked in. All the way to her bedside. Someone who had snuck through the security entrance, or someone from another apartment. Not your average Oh look, that door’s not closed properly neighbour but a man who saw it and took advantage. A creepy guy she lived with.

3
    The warehouse looked like a warehouse on the outside: red brick, flat facade, the peaks and troughs of a sawtooth roof. Old, industrial, ugly. It was the inside that had sold itself to Carly.
    Walking through the dim hush of the foyer, her runners making soft squelching sounds on the polished floors, she stopped in a pool of sunlight and tipped her face to the ceiling. This was what had sold her before she’d even seen the apartment.
    Five storeys of eighty-year-old warehouse: original timbers, the floors stacked like the layers of an enormous cake around a huge square of open space. It’d been a bond store, holding goods for import and export, anything from mine machinery to packaged food, the stuff shuffled around by cranes, up and down through the centre of the building. Now, with the machinery gone, the hollow middle became a massive atrium that looked straight up to vast sheets of glass in the sawtooth ceiling – and the sky looked back, filling the shaft with a cascade of natural light. Staircases zigzagged upwards, suspended walkways connected the landings, and a forest of old timber columnsstill supported the first floor. Standing at the bottom, Carly felt like she was at the base of a labyrinth.
    â€˜The light is fascinating, isn’t it?’
    The voice came from behind her, and as Carly turned, pushing the lethargy and headache to one side, she reminded herself that she had no past here, she could be who she wanted. An older woman was sitting on a bench near the lift. She’d been there yesterday, back straight, well dressed, observing the comings and goings like a gatekeeper. Carly wondered if she was the