A Nice Place to Die by Jane Mcloughlin Page A

the issue. Why doesn’t she see that I can’t just up and leave and start over somewhere else? What would happen to the farm?
    He said, ‘I don’t see why we can’t go to yours. We can tell if there’s anyone there . . .’
    â€˜No,’ Jess said, ‘we can’t.’ She thought, Kevin and Nate might not be there, but Donna and Kylie would be. Mum might not turn us out, but she could easily say something about Kylie. She’s always telling people the kid’s mine. That’s the last thing I want.
    â€˜I share a room with my little sister,’ Jess lied.
    â€˜So?’ Mark said. ‘We’ll be careful not to wake her.’
    He knew as he said it that this was no good. Jess could never keep quiet in the act of love.
    â€˜Can’t we drive somewhere outside the area where no one knows us?’
    â€˜Dad would know from the mileage I’d gone outside the village. He checks the diesel.’
    â€˜Well, fill the tank so he can’t tell,’ Jess said. She felt that Mark was trying to make difficulties.
    He shouted at her suddenly, ‘I haven’t got any money, all right? Don’t you understand anything? I can’t even afford to take you out for the day down to the coast or spend a night together at a bloody bed and breakfast.’ Then, more calmly, he said, ‘How do you think that makes me feel, Jess? It isn’t as if I don’t want to fuck you.’
    Jess was disarmed. ‘I love you too, babe,’ she said. ‘I’m sorry.’
    She lunged towards him, her hand searching his crotch for the zip of his fly. The lights of an oncoming car picked them out.
    With an enormous effort, he pushed her back into the passenger seat. ‘No,’ he said, ‘not here.’
    A lorry drove into the lay-by ahead of them.
    â€˜Quick, I know where we can go,’ Jess said, ‘we can go round the back of Alice’s house. She lives next door to us, but no one ever goes out there at night. There’s a sort of covered lean-to where she keeps deckchairs and things. We’ll be OK in there.’
    Mark hesitated. He didn’t want to go anywhere near Jess’s family, but she was hot for him and he was hot for her and she seemed to think it was all right so it was worth the risk.
    â€˜Who’s Alice?’ he said. He wanted Jess so much now that his own voice sounded funny to him, hoarse and thick.
    â€˜No one,’ Jess said. ‘Please hurry, Mark, or I’m going to come off all over this seat and your effing Dad’s going to see the stain. Drive faster, babe, I’m on fire.’
    Jesus, Mark thought, swerving across oncoming traffic into Forester Close, this girl’s really something.
    He tried to ignore the small voice in his head asking him, this isn’t right. It isn’t what she thinks, I’ve got to tell her. One day. Soon.

THIRTEEN
    F irst thing in the morning Alice came downstairs to feed Phoebus.
    He wasn’t in the kitchen where he usually waited for her, marching up and down on top of the kitchen table with his tail erect and twitching like a water diviner’s rod.
    She checked the cat flap to be sure it wasn’t stuck, but it was working perfectly. She opened the back door and called him. Sometimes if she was earlier than usual he was still outside doing whatever he did when he went out at night.
    He probably caught a bird or a rabbit or something and he’s not hungry, she told herself. She wasn’t worried. Phoebus knew how to look after himself. He’d be back when he was ready.
    By evening, she began to wonder if he’d found himself a new home. She felt rebuffed. She thought that she had not made him happy. Even a stray cat didn’t want to live with her.
    Soon after dark, there was a knock on the front door.
    No one called on anyone after dark, no one innocent. Alice went into the hall and listened at the door for the sound of