The Doomsday Prophecy. Scott Mariani

       Chapter Five

      Summertown, Oxford That afternoon

      Professor Tom Bradbury shut the front door behind him, put down his old briefcase and laid his car keys on the oak stand in the hall next to the vase of flowers.

      The house was quiet. He hadn’t expected it to be. Zoë should be home today, and her presence was always made noticeable by the hard rock soundtrack that she insisted on blaring at full volume from the living-room hi-fi.

      Bradbury wandered through to the airy kitchen. The patio windows were open, and the scents of the garden were wafting through the room. Remembering the half-finished bottle of Pinot Grigio from the night before, he opened the fridge. Inside was a freshly prepared dish of chocolate mousse, Zoë’s favourite pudding, which her mother always prepared for her visits home.

      He tutted and poured himself a glass of the chilled wine. Sipping it, he stepped out into the garden and saw his wife Jane kneeling at the flower-beds, a tray of brightly coloured annuals beside her.

      ‘You’re back early,’ she said, looking up and smiling.

      ‘Where is she?’

      ‘Not here yet.’

      ‘I thought it was quiet. Expected she’d have got in by now.’

      Jane Bradbury stabbed her trowel in the ground, stood up with a grunt and dusted the earth off her hands. ‘That looks good,’ she said, noticing his glass. He passed it to her and she took a sip and smacked her lips. ‘I wouldn’t worry about it,’ she said. ‘You know what she’s like. She probably stopped off to stay with some friend in London.’

      ‘Why couldn’t she just come straight here? She’s always with some friend or other. We hardly ever see her.’

      ‘She’s not a child any more, Tom. She’s twenty-six years old.’

      ‘Then why does she act like one?’

      ‘She’ll call. Probably turn up tomorrow like the bad penny.’

      ‘You indulge her too much,’ he said irritably. ‘You’ve even prepared her favourite pudding.’

      His wife smiled. ‘You indulge her as much as I do.’

      Bradbury turned towards the house. ‘The least she could do is bloody well let us know where she is.’

       Chapter Six

       The Island of Paxos, Greece The third day

      Zoë Bradbury woke up with a gasp. The first thing she was aware of was the strong sunlight in her face, making her blink. She tried to focus, but her vision was hazy. Where was she?

      After a minute the cloudiness melted away and things were clearer. She was in a bedroom. Was it hers? She couldn’t remember, and that was the strangest realisation.

      She was lying on a bare mattress, a rumpled sheet draped over her. She sat up in the bed and suddenly felt the sharp pain cutting through her side. She winced and clutched at her ribs. It felt as though one was cracked. Her head was on fire and her mouth was dry. She looked down at her palms. They were scuffed and tender, as though she’d landed heavily and put her hands out to protect herself.

      Flashes. Bright lights. Sounds. Places and people. It was all there in her mind, but jumbled and obscure, all shadows and echoes. She vaguely remembered the sensation of falling. Then the impact to the head. She rubbed it and felt the bruise. Struggled to clear her mind. Nothing would come. She blinked and shook her head. Still nothing.

      Panic began to grip her. She couldn’t remember anything. Didn’t know anything about what she was doing here, or, she realised with horror, even who she was. Something had happened to her. A bad fall. Some kind of damage inside her head. She prayed it was only temporary.

      All she knew was that she was in danger. It was the instinctive knowledge of a trapped animal in the presence of a predator.

      That instinct helped her focus. Get out of here first. Worry about the rest later.

      There was nobody in the room with her. But as the breeze ruffled the drapes she saw the man in the chair on the balcony outside.

      The first thing she noticed about him was the gun. It was clasped loosely in his hand, a big boxy thing, pointing right at her. He was sitting facing her, leaning right back in a deck chair in the sunshine, and at first she thought he was staring at her through his wraparound shades. But his chest was heaving slowly, and from the way he didn’t respond to her waking up she guessed he was asleep. At his feet were a bottle of Ouzo and an empty glass. His fair hair blew lightly in the sea breeze.

      Zoë struggled out of the bed, clenching her teeth against the tearing pain in her side. She planted one foot on the tiled floor, then the other. The tiles were cool against her soles.

      The man didn’t move.

      She slowly stood up and stepped away from the bed. Her head was spinning wildly and she reached out to steady herself. She saw that she was fully dressed, in white trousers and a yellow top. The clothes felt grubby on her skin, as though she’d been sleeping in them for a couple of days. The right knee of the trousers was ripped, and there was a smear of dirt up her right side where the pain was. From the fall, she guessed.

      Wobbly on her feet, she reached for the pair of heeled sandals by the bed. They matched the yellow top. Were they hers? She didn’t know. She carried them by their straps as she crept towards the door, praying the man in the chair wouldn’t wake up.

      When she grasped the door handle and felt its initial resistance, she was sure the door would be locked. But then it turned and her heart surged with excitement. The door opened without a sound. There was a hallway outside, and a flight of stairs leading down. She tiptoed across the hall and peered down over the metal rail into the stairwell. Voices, far away somewhere in the house. She heard a woman talking, and a man laugh.

      Her heart was hammering now. She started down the stairs, wincing at every step, her bare feet padding silently on the ceramic tiling. The fear sharpened her mind. She had no idea where she was, but she knew she had to get away from this place.

      She made it downstairs without anyone hearing. Nobody had come running from the bedroom. She was safe – so far.

      At the bottom of the stairs was another door. It was open, and bright light was shining in from outside. She hobbled out, clutching the shoes and her ribs, and found herself standing on a little terrace with potted plants and flowers. Down three steps was the white pebbled beach. The stones were sharp against her feet, and burning hot. She pulled on the shoes. They fitted her perfectly, even though they seemed like a stranger’s.

      She crept down the beach and looked back at the house. It was a pitted white stone block with shuttered windows and a red tile roof. Through the railings of the first-floor balcony she could see the back of the man’s deck chair. Behind the house, a wooded incline rose up steeply to the cliff above. There was no way she could climb it. She looked around her in desperation. The beach was empty. There was a long ramshackle wooden jetty with a small motor boat moored up to it, bobbing gently on the swell.

      She headed for it, her steps quickening. She stumbled in the slim three-inch heels. Kept glancing back at the house. Nobody. She was getting away.

      She made it to the jetty. The boards were solid and she could run better than on the loose stones and sand. She hurried on, the pain in her side forgotten now.

      That was when she heard the yell. It came from the house. A man’s voice, loud and full of rage. She gasped and spun round. Her heart jumped. It was him – the fair-haired man from the balcony. The gun was in his hand. He bounded down the steps to the beach and sprinted towards her, screaming.