Scared to Death: A gripping crime thriller you won’t be able to put down. Kate Medina

Чтение книги онлайн.

СКАЧАТЬ His voice so low that it was almost inaudible. ‘Not particularly.’

      ‘So why the Army? Why did you join?’

      He sighed, like a teenager whose mother was hassling him. ‘Because people like me don’t have choices. The Army seemed like a good way of getting out.’

      ‘Getting out from where? Where did you grow up?’

      ‘Birmingham.’ The soft accent. Midlands – of course. She should have recognized it.

      ‘Do you have family?’

      ‘A mother.’

      ‘Father?’

      ‘He died when I was three.’

      ‘I’m sorry.’

      ‘It didn’t affect me. I never really knew him.’

      Jessie knew that wasn’t true. Abandonment always affected children, however it happened. She knew that well enough from her own childhood.

      ‘Does your mother still live in Birmingham?’

      ‘Yes.’

      ‘Are you close to her?’

      The first sign of warmth and light that Jessie had seen in his soft hazel eyes, but the words thrown out insouciantly, entirely at odds with his expression. ‘What’s that got to do with you?’

      She felt as if she was butting her head up against a wall. A smooth, featureless, wall, plain white, no finger-holds, nothing to get a grip on. Her office felt oppressive suddenly, a room shut up for too long over winter, which it had been. The shower had passed, sunlight breaking through the bank of grey clouds outside. Standing, Jessie unlocked the window and hauled up the lower sash. Cool, damp air eddied through the gap.

      ‘Can I go now?’ Ryan asked, narrowing his gaze against the sunlight.

      ‘Not yet.’

      ‘Why not?’ he hissed.

      The sudden flare of aggression surprised Jessie, gone almost as soon as she’d registered it. He had seemed too distant, too closed down for aggression. She made a mental note.

      ‘Don’t I get a choice?’ he finished.

      ‘Unfortunately you gave up your right to choose when you joined the Army.’

      His mouth tightened as if she had unwittingly put her finger on a nerve.

      ‘Ryan, Blackdown’s commanding officer, Colonel Philip Wallace, referred you to the Defence Psychology Service. As you can see, there’s not much information in your file.’ She held up the single page. ‘So why don’t you tell me why you think he sent you.’

      Jaw muscles clenched under his skin.

      ‘I’ve never even talked to him.’ He stretched his arm straight above his head. ‘He’s God isn’t he? And I’m down here somewhere.’ The hand moved to graze the carpet. ‘Pond life.’

      If he’d had no verbal contact with Wallace, had he talked to someone else about his feelings, or had his behaviour been noticed? ‘Did you talk to someone else at Blackdown about how you’re feeling?’

      ‘I’m not feeling anything.’

      ‘There must be a reason that you’re here, that you were referred.’

      Ryan’s arms tightened around his torso, but he didn’t reply. Everything about his posture telegraphed intense feelings of discomfort at Jessie’s questions.

      ‘Who did you talk to, Ryan?’

      ‘No one.’ His gaze found the window. Jessie let him stare. After a moment, his gaze still fixed on the outside, he murmured, ‘He approached me.’

      ‘Who approached you?’

      ‘The chaplain.’

      That wasn’t in the file. She made a mental note.

      ‘What did he say?’

      ‘He said that it’s his job.’

      ‘To keep an eye on new recruits?’

      ‘Yeah. Their spiritual health, mental health, all that crap.’

      ‘What did you talk to him about?’

      Another shrug. ‘Stuff.’

      ‘Can you tell me?’

      He shook his head. ‘They’re supposed to be confidential, aren’t they? My discussions with him? I should have known not to talk to him.’ Ryan slumped in the bucket chair, started kicking at the carpet with one of his combat boots, muttered under his breath. ‘Fuckin’ kiddie fiddler.’

      Catholic. Kiddie fiddler. The chaplain must get that all the time – an occupational hazard. Jessie continued to look at Ryan, but he didn’t add anything else. She waited, the silence growing heavier.

      ‘Do you believe in God, Doctor Flynn?’ he asked suddenly.

      Jessie took a beat before answering. She had been raised a Catholic, sent to a convent school, but she had never seen any evidence that the people around her lived by God’s word. Had seen no evidence at all of the existence of a just and gentle God. The only God she had experienced persecuted and destroyed.

      And God will use this persecution to show his justice and to make you worthy of his kingdom, for which you are suffering.

      Persecution without justice.

      ‘No, Ryan, I don’t believe in God.’

      Ryan looked up and their gazes met for a fraction of a second before he looked away again. Minute progress, but progress all the same.

      ‘My mum spent time in a mental home, you know, when I was younger. Perhaps madness runs in the family.’

      ‘No one is saying that you’re mad.’

      ‘But it does run in families, doesn’t it?’ he murmured. ‘Madness?’

      ‘There is no such thing as madness,’ Jessie said quietly, her gaze finding the window. ‘There are disorders, some caused by physical factors, chemical imbalances in people’s brains, some caused by psychological factors, such as bad experiences in childhood.’ She fought to keep her voice even, feeling the tension rise, the electric suit tingle against her skin. Madness. ‘They can all be treated, but the patient needs to be willing.’

      She thought that Ryan would have switched off, be picking at his beret or kicking at the carpet again, but when she looked back from the window, she saw that he was watching her intently.

      ‘Well, perhaps I am.’

      ‘Willing?’

СКАЧАТЬ