The Mercer's House (Northern Gothic Book 1) Read Free Page B

comfortable enough, and by six-thirty was wide awake. She rose and went into the little en-suite bathroom, and fumbled for some painkillers in her washbag, to get rid of the nagging headache that was no doubt due to all the beer she’d drunk the night before. Then she returned to the bedroom and looked out of the window as she tossed the pills down with some water. The sun was just beginning to rise, and the skeletal fingers of lilac and grey and gold that crept slowly up from the horizon promised another hot day, although the weather forecasters had been warning that the heatwave would be gone by the weekend. Zanna had a sudden longing to go outside and taste the fresh dawn. She dressed quickly, a dress and cardigan over a swimsuit, then picked up her portable easel and the bag that held her paints, and headed downstairs. She could hear a clinking of dishes from the bar as she passed through the lobby, although there was no use in going in, as breakfast wasn’t until seven.
    Once out in the street, she hurried down to the beach and set up her easel with a small canvas, then pulled out her oil paints and began to work quickly before the sun emerged fully and the scene was lost. After half an hour she allowed herself to pause and regard her work. By now the colours in the sky had faded to a pale mauve blending to blue, and she could do no more, but she was satisfied she’d captured as much as she could. It felt good to be painting again after her long, self-imposed break. She cleaned off the brushes and wiped her hands, then left her things and walked down to the sea.
    The sand and the air were cool, but she was feeling heavy and sticky after her night in a stuffy hotel, and the water enticed her irresistibly. She threw off her dress and sandals and stepped into the water. It was freezing, but she kept on walking until she was up to her knees, then her waist, and then with a gasp of shock she immersed herself fully and began to swim with strong strokes out to sea. She kept going until she had warmed up, then turned back to look at the shore, treading water. The tide was receding, and to her surprise she found she had drifted some way, and was much nearer than she had supposed to the outcrop of rocks, against which the waves were dashing in angry surges. Evidently the tides here were much stronger than they looked, and even as this thought struck her she felt herself caught in a strong eddy, which buffeted her further towards the rocks. She began to swim, but for a few moments the water held her and she couldn’t pull away from it. She kicked hard, fighting against the undertow, which was now pulling her inexorably towards the rocks, and as she did so she again thought she heard voices somewhere nearby. For a second she lost her concentration and glanced around, but there was no-one in the water except herself. She was now near enough to the outcrop to feel the spray from the waves, and she redoubled her efforts. For a long moment she made no headway, then suddenly, just as she was starting to get frightened, the eddy changed direction and she was able to free herself and swim back towards the shore.
    As soon as her feet touched the sandy bottom she stood up, and as she did so she froze for a second, because there, standing by the water’s edge, was the man she had seen the day before, gazing at her intently again. He had a dog with him, which splashed happily in the shallows, and again Zanna had the feeling of a forced stillness, or some kind of repressed emotion. He was closer this time, and she could see him more clearly, and she was disconcerted to find that he was better looking than she had imagined—the sort of man she would normally have been attracted to had he not been staring at her so rudely. As she emerged from the water, dripping and self-conscious in her clinging swimsuit, she once again met his eye defiantly, and he looked away.
    ‘It’s not safe to swim on this side of the rocks,’ he said, by way of