The Long Call (Two Rivers #1) - Ann Cleeves Page 0,9

man be so good at so much? Where had his confidence come from? In contrast, he felt endlessly incompetent.

‘I should go,’ Matthew said. He’d loaded the plates into the dishwasher. At least he could do that much. ‘I’ve sent Ross and Jen to track down the relatives. We still don’t have a name for the man.’ He pulled on a jacket. Outside it was clear and still, with a slice of moon and stars sharp in the night sky. The only lights came from Instow and Appledore on the far shore. ‘Don’t wait up. It could be an all-nighter.’

And Jonathan wouldn’t wait up. He’d potter with his projects and go to bed when he was tired. Matthew, however, couldn’t settle when Jonathan was out. He’d fret, watching out for the headlights sweeping past the bedroom curtain. Sometimes Jon would go to the folk club in the pub in the village, drink too much and walk home, arriving almost as it was getting light. Then Matthew would pretend to be asleep and say nothing. His mother had nagged and his father had hated it.

Chapter Four

JEN LET ROSS DRIVE THE FEW miles to Ilfracombe. He took it for granted that he’d be behind the wheel and sometimes she couldn’t be arsed to make a fuss. Besides, it meant she was free to text the kids and check they were both in, doing homework, and that they’d foraged for something to eat. They were old enough to fend for themselves now and they’d always been resilient and self-contained; they’d had to be.

She still got anxious, though. Guilty because she wasn’t there, cooking something nutritious, making intelligent conversation as they ate together. But they weren’t the perfect family you saw in TV sitcoms and they never would be. She’d tried doing the selfless wife and mother thing when they lived in Merseyside and it had nearly killed her. Literally. That didn’t mean that she didn’t wish she could be better at it, more organized, there more for them. It wasn’t that she liked work better than she liked Ella and Ben. Not exactly. But work gave her life structure and meaning and she needed it. Without it she’d go crazy.

They texted her back. Yes, they were both in. Yes, they’d found pizza in the freezer. No, they weren’t planning to go out again. When they’d first moved to Devon and they were younger, Jen had found a string of childminders for them, but the women she’d employed had been used to polite kids and parents with regular hours. Despite their professional smiles, they’d struggled with Jen’s rackety Scousers, their bad language and their independence. In the end, Jen had made do with Adam, a sixth-form lad, who was happy to babysit for pocket money as and when needed. It wasn’t ideal. Often, Jen had come home to chaos, Adam on the sofa, engrossed in his phone, while the kids ran riot upstairs. Or the three of them squabbling over the controls of a computer game. They’d survived. Adam had headed off to university and still came back to see them when he was home, though the kids were independent now. Occasionally she had sexy dreams about Adam, who’d turned into a very fit young man.

She was still thinking about Adam, the tight bum in the skinny jeans, when they crossed the roundabout on the high ground at Mullacott Cross. It felt like a bit of Exmoor up here, even though they were so close to the town and the descent into Ilfracombe. There were hedges, bent by the westerly wind, and lambs. Once Ilfracombe had been a grand seaside resort, with elaborate gardens and hotels and a paddle steamer that carried passengers along the Bristol Channel to Somerset and South Wales. With cheap flights to the Mediterranean available so readily, it had faded, lost its purpose. The tourists had fled to Spain and the Greek islands instead. Now, the place was trying to find a new role.

The town was surrounded by hills and the lights of the place seemed held in a deep bowl directly below them. They drove past big villas, which had been turned into guest houses called Sea View or Golden Sands. Most had ‘No Vacancies’ boards, not because they were full but because this early in the season their owners had decided it wasn’t worth opening. Ross followed his satnav into the town centre, stopped at the top of a long, steep street of three-storey terraced houses, beautifully proportioned but