Read David Raker 01 - Chasing the Dead for Free Online

led me to believe that one day you’d drop everything and walk away. So, if you came back now, I’d cherish you as I always did. I’d love you like I always did. But, somewhere, there would be a doubt that wasn’t there before, a nagging feeling that, if I got too close to you, if I showed you too much affection, you’d get up one morning and walk away.
    I don’t want to feel like a mistake again
.
    I looked at my watch. It was almost six-thirty. In the distance, thunder rumbled across the sky. I folded the letter up, placed everything inside the box and took it with me as I rowed back around to the village.

I drove out of Carcondrock and found a place to stay about three miles further down a snaking coastal road. It was a beautiful greystone building overlooking the ocean and the scattered remnants of old tin mines. After a shower, I headed out for some dinner and eventually found a pub that served hot food and cold beer. I took the box with me and sat at a table in the corner, away from everyone else. There was a choice of three meals: steak and kidney pie, steak and ale pie or steak pie. Luckily, I wasn’t vegetarian. While I waited for the food, I opened the box, removed the contents and spread them out.
    I picked up the birthday card first. The last contact Kathy ever had with Alex. She’d kept it in pristine condition. It was still in its original envelope, opened along the top with a knife or a letter opener to avoid damaging it. I took it out.
    The card itself looked home-made, without being amateurish: a detailed drawing of a bear was in the centre, a bunch of roses in its hands. Above that was a raised rectangle with
happy birthday
! embossed on it, and a foil sticker of a balloon. I flipped it over. In the centre, in gold pen, it said:
Made by Angela Routledge.
I opened it up. Inside were just seven words:
Happy Birthday, Kath. I love you… Alex
.
    Sold @ St John the Baptist, 215 Grover Place, London
. I wrote down the address and turned to the photographs.
    There was a definite timeline. It began with pictures of Kathy and Alex when they’d first started going out, and ended with two individual portraits of each of them, both older and more mature, at a different stage of their lives. I sat the two portraits side by side. The one of Kathy was a regular 6x4, but Alex’s was a Polaroid. When I turned them over, I noticed something else: they had different handwriting on them.
    ‘Mind if I sit here?’
    I looked up.
    One of the locals was staring down at me, a hand pressed against the back of the chair at the table next to me. The subdued light darkened his face. Shadows filled his eye sockets, thick black lines forming across his forehead. He was well built, probably in his late forties.
    I looked around the pub. There were tables and chairs free everywhere. He followed my eyes, out into the room, but didn’t make a move to leave. When he turned back to me, he stole a glance at a couple of the photographs. I collected them up, along with the letter and the card, and placed them back into the box.
    ‘Sure,’ I said, gesturing to the table. ‘Take a seat.’
    He nodded his thanks and sat down, placing his beer down in front of him. A couple of minutes later, the landlady brought my meal over. As I started picking at
    ‘You here on business?’ he asked.
    ‘Kind of.’
    ‘Sounds mysterious.’
    I shrugged. ‘Not really.’
    ‘So, where does she live?’
    I looked at him, confused.
    ‘Your bit on the side.’ He laughed, finding it funnier than he had any right to.
    I smiled politely, but didn’t bother answering, hoping that the less I talked, the quicker he’d leave.
    ‘Just messing with you,’ he said, running a finger down the side of his glass. As his sleeve rode up his arm, I could see a tattoo – an inscription – the letters smudged by age. ‘Boring place to have to come for work.’
    ‘I can think of worse.’
    ‘Maybe in summer,’ he said. ‘But in winter, this place is like a