ROAD KILL
Charlie Fox book five
by
Zoë Sharp
For Andy, the reason I’m still here . . .
‘After the traumatic events that took place in First Drop, Charlie Fox is back in England to recuperate. But then an old friend is seriously injured after a motorbike accident (that kills the driver) and Charlie's lethal instincts kick in to find out what the real story is, and who the true target was. It's really quite impossible to put this book down, but what really makes this (and the whole series) shine is how Charlie's kickass skills are rooted in her own femininity and character. So why might this not be published in the US? “Too British.” More like too bad if it proves to be the case.’ Sarah Weinman, Confessions of an Idiosyncratic Mind
Bonus Material
Don’t miss the bonus material at the end of ROAD KILL:
The other Charlie Fox novels and short stories
Excerpt from SECOND SHOT: Charlie Fox book six
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ROAD KILL
One
I swung the sledgehammer in a sweeping arc over my shoulder and smashed it downwards into the wall in front of me, allowing the sledge’s own weight and momentum to do half the work. Every dozen blows or so I stopped to let the billowing dust subside and to take a breather.
It was hard, hot, backbreaking work. Straightening up was something to be approached with caution, hearing the snap and pop as my spine realigned itself. The constant jarring through my hands was starting to make my left arm ache where I’d last had it broken, a year and a half before. I rubbed at it, feeling the calcified ridges on the bones of my forearm, and wondered if there was still a weakness there.
It was a bright Sunday in early August. I’d been beating the hell out of the bedroom walls of my new home practically since sunrise and, as therapy went, it was doing me the power of good.
I propped the sledge in a corner and gauged the time by the shadow the sunlight was casting into the room’s dirty interior. A little after twelve o’clock at a guess. My old wristwatch had clogged with grit and finally given up the ghost days ago and I hadn’t yet had the need, or the inclination, to venture out and get another.
It was during one of these brief periods of inactivity that I heard the distinctive sound of a motorbike being caned up the long dragging hill towards the cottage.
I crossed to the open first floor window, stepping carefully over lumps of fallen masonry and plaster that signified my morning’s work so far, and hung out across the sill. Easier said than done. The cottage was built somewhere towards the end of the nineteenth century with rubble-filled walls of local stone, a couple of feet thick.
The road was almost straight but it dipped occasionally out of sight. Sure enough, as I looked out I caught the flash of a bike headlight as it rose and fell into the undulations and shimmered through the heat haze coming up from the tarmac.
I leaned on my elbows, grateful of the slight breeze stirring my hair and cooling the sweat on my skin, and waited. The road past my new home went on for only another half mile and then became a farm track. The other two cottages in the same row had been recently revamped as holiday lets and were currently empty. If anyone was coming up here on a bike they were either very lost, or they were coming to see me.
The bike drew closer, the tortured exhaust note rising to a thunder, driving out the peace and stillness that normally surrounded this place. In the field over the road a gaggle of fat half-grown lambs scattered before it, bounding stiff-legged to safety.
The rider snapped into view over the last rise without appearing to slow his pace any. I recognised the distinctive shape of the Norton Commando as he thrashed past and waved my hand. The rider’s helmet ducked as he caught the gesture, grabbing a big handful of brake lever.
I held my breath and waited for the inevitable disaster, but it didn’t happen. The rider kept the bike straight and upright and brought it to a fast halt. He described a neat turn in the narrow road without having to put his feet down and came to a stop outside my front door, reaching for the strap on his helmet.
I’d already identified the rider by his leathers and by the bike, but it wasn’t someone I’d been expecting to pay me a visit. I’d known Sam Pickering for years but getting yourself caught up in the game plan of a murdering madman, as I’d done, has a tendency to put off even the keenest admirer and we’d drifted apart. I certainly didn’t know he’d got my new address, that’s for sure.
“Hello Sam,” I called down, casual. “Long time, no see. What brings you up here?”
Sam managed to extricate himself from his old AGV lid. Under it, his beard stuck out at angles and his straggly dark hair was plastered flat to his scalp. “Hell fire, Charlie,” he said, gasping for breath. “You’re a bloody difficult girl to track down.”
The day changed at that moment, grew unaccountably cooler. “What is it?” I said.
He looked up at me then. Perhaps it was because he was squinting into the sun that made him look so fearful. “It’s Jacob and Clare,” he said. “They’ve had an accident. A bad one.”
“Bad?” I straightened. “What do you mean ‘bad’?”
Sam screwed up his face, as though I might decide at any moment to shoot the messenger. “Jacob didn’t make it,” he said at last, heavily. “They’ve taken Clare to Lancaster but apparently she wasn’t looking good.”
“Wait there,” I said.
I ducked back inside, pulling the window shut after me and headed for the stairs, grabbing stuff as I went. My full leathers were hanging on the peg near the back door, but I ignored them. Suddenly I couldn’t hear over the thunder of blood in my ears.
The lean-to off what used to be the cottage kitchen had a doorway just wide enough to squeeze a bike through, so it had become my integral garage. I wheeled my elderly Suzuki RGV 250 straight out into the small rear yard and kicked it into life, letting the two-stroke engine tick over just long enough for me to struggle into my old jacket, helmet and gloves, and slam the Yale behind me.
I fumbled with the awkward latch on the back gate and my temper fizzed briefly, making me lash out at it with my fist. The pain the stupid action caused brought back a measure of sanity. I took a deep breath and tried to force calm on my rampaging heartrate. A morning’s hard physical labour hadn’t made the palms of my hands sweat. Sam had managed to bring that on with a couple of sentences.
He was waiting as instructed as I wheeled the Suzuki out alongside him. He’d put his helmet back on and now he regarded me with some anxiety through his open visor.
“Let’s go,” I said tightly. “Keep up or I’ll leave you behind.”
He managed a half smile, as though I was joking. The Commando’s engine was three times the size of my little RGV, but on the kind of twisty country roads we had to cover there would be little to choose between them. Besides, I was in a hell of a hurry.