UK2 Page 9

  She stops mid-sentence when my face breaks out into a smile.

  "Rowan, he's not coming back."

  A shadow of doubt passes over her face; I don't think I've ever seen a crack in her confidence before.

  "That's what Lottie said. Explain, please."

  So I make her sit down, and I tell her. Everything.

  At first she mocks the whole story and is catty about my daughter, which doesn't endear her to me. But when I tell her that it was Cleary who let the cat out of the bag, she shuts up.

  Cleary had neither motivation to lie nor a hidden agenda; it's feasible because it's true.

  She won't look at me.

  "You want him, you're welcome," I say. "But he's not coming back for you, because he won't ever dare show his face up here again."

  She gets up and starts bustling around, stacking dishes. "Lottie couldn't be making it up? Dex said she never liked him, and you have to admit she's over-excitable."

  "If you make one more derogatory remark about my daughter—"

  "Okay—can you prove it?"

  "I couldn't do so in court, no. But I know it's the truth. And I think you do, too."

  She turns round, leaning on the kitchen worktop. "And you're going to be spreading this story around, are you?"

  "I doubt it. I haven't thought any further into the future than the end of today."

  She shuts her eyes. "Do you really think it's true?"

  "Yes. I'm absolutely sure."

  She frowns, thinking; I wait. Finally, she looks up. "This is a ghastly business, and I really am sorry, Vicky; it must be hellish for you."

  Her words seem empty, somehow. Over the last couple of years my first impression of her has faded away, but now I see her as I did back then.

  "But doesn't this change everything?" she continues. "All we've been through together—okay, it's going be a little awkward between us for a while, but I'm sure we can get past it. All that chummy sisterhood stuff is more important than fleeting affairs with men, isn't it?"

  "Yes," I say. "It is. I didn't forget that; you did."

  I walk out of the room, down the corridor and out through the front door, but I feel her behind me, in the doorway.

  "Vicky," she calls out, and that stops me for a moment, but I don't turn around. "Are you going to tell everyone? Kara? Phil? About Dex and me?"

  I am not sure what I'm going to tell anyone about anything, but I don't owe her an answer. I carry on walking.

  Later, Zoot pops his head in to say that Jax has returned, and he takes Lottie back to the Monk's Head to give Jax the lowdown on the past two days.

  When she comes home, Jax is with her.

  I'm sitting on a groundsheet on the grass in the back garden, just enjoying the sunshine after the rain, and a rush of happiness floods through me when I see them both standing there.

  Jax is holding out a crumpled piece of paper.

  "Letter from Bette, she said to give it to you after we'd told you." He gives a nervous half-grin. "I don't reckon she thought it would take this long."

  His face and hair are dirty, his clothes a bit mucky; I imagine he has been sleeping under the stars. He looks taller, older; I hadn't noticed this before.

  They sit down at either side of me and I open the letter, which is written in a childish hand in purple felt tip, on a piece of paper torn from an exercise book.

  Dear Vicky

  If your reading this it means u know what Dex did. Sorry I never had it out with him b4 me & Cleary left but we were scared. I should of told u but I had to get away hope u understand. Ask Jax to tell u what happened to Wedge. Sorry about Heath he was a lovely bloke. Take care your a good girl & thanx for being a mate.

  Hugs Bette xox.

  So I do, I ask Jax to tell me what happened to Wedge, and after he has I am shocked but glad, and I never thought I could be glad about anyone dying, let alone being killed like that, but the world is a better place without Wedge in it. I pull Jax to me, not caring that he smells a bit like Cleary, because he's Heath's boy and he did that terrible, brave thing to avenge his father. And that's when I fully understand all that my Lottie has been through as well, and I pull her close to Jax and me, too, and finally we're all together, as Heath would have wanted us to be.

  I've always thought that taking a life was wrong, whatever the circumstances, but as this world has changed, so has my outlook. Took a while, but there is no point wailing about life not being like it used to be; we must adapt. What Jax did was right, for himself, for me, for Heath, and for anyone else who might have got on the wrong side of Wedge in the future, because I am sure there would have been others like Kai, Marcus and Heath, and maybe there already have been.

  "I'm so, so sorry," I say. "I should have been a shoulder for you both, but I wasn't, I was selfish and weak and caught up in my own woes; Jax, I failed your dad by not looking out for you, and I'll never forgive myself for that."

  Jax looks relieved to be released from the group hug. "It's alright. I couldn't stand to be round people, anyway."

  His voice is deeper, too.

  "I did fail you, though." I put my hand up when Lottie leans in, mouth open to reply. "I did. I don't want to be let off."

  Lottie grins, in that way she does. "I wasn't going to let you off. I was going to say that you were a total retard for staying with Dex, and if it wasn't for Mac and Martin I'd have gone out of my mind, but I forgive you as long as you promise to start acting like my mum again."

  "I promise."

  I put my right arm around Jax and my left around Lottie, like they're both my kids, and they rest their heads on my shoulders. It feels good.

  "I wonder what Dex will do now," Lottie says.

  I shut my eyes and think of him, on his way down to this new place. "That's my one worry. That someone else will get in his way."

  Jax sits up. "I've been thinking that too. I don't mean to sound funny, but just 'cause you know now, and he knows you know and 'cause he's gone—well, I mean, he still killed my dad. It's not over. Me and Lottie have lived with this since March. We've had to see him, all the time, walking round like he owned the place—that's why I had to go and live at the Monk's. I couldn't stand the sight of him. I kept quiet for your sake, 'cause Lottie asked me to, but this don't make me feel any different about him."

  I can see his anger building up; I have no right to try and stop it. I just don't want it to destroy him, that's all.

  "I still want to kill him," he says, quietly.

  "Fucking right," says Lottie.

  "I know, I know." I take both their hands. "Jax, I can't tell you what you must or mustn't do. I just don't want you to go zooming off and putting yourself in danger, that's all."

  "I won't." He stands up, still holding my hand. "Don't worry. I'm not that much of a dick. I'll think it through."

  I'm relieved, though not totally. "The best thing we can do for your dad's memory is try to be happy. And keep our eyes open so we don't allow people like Dex and Wedge into our lives ever again."

  Jax nods. "Yeah. I'll try." He half-smiles. "It'll be better now. Now he's gone. It will."

  And that, I suppose, is the best any of us can hope for.

  Chapter Thirteen

  Lottie

  They've left, then. Twenty-five of our community.

  Dex, of course. Naomi, Suzanne and the kids. Mural painting Steve, Nish and Ian, Ollie and Glenn. Tom and Alice and their kids and plant remedies. Julie, with Sophia and James. A woman called Trish who arrived in May, with a couple of teenagers; I never knew them. The Lincolns. Flora.

  Mum and I don't want to be around Rowan; we're working on the farm now. Two women called Mel and Wendy are doing the laundry, and Ruby and Scott have taken over the baking. Smelly Bev wanted to, but Rowan said she couldn't have anyone with a lax attitude towards personal hygiene working with food. Bev told her she was a stuck-up bitch, and Rowan said, 'Maybe, but at least I wash my armpits'.

  I hate Rowan but it's true; Bev hums.
>
  I thought Audrey Willmott would want to go with the UK Central group, but she said she's not struggled through the past two years just to up and leave now. Go Audrey!

  We're all glad none of the bikers or the new guys on the barricade have gone.

  I'll miss the Lincolns, in a funny way. No one else. I feel like they've abandoned us. I won't miss Flora. Couldn't stand any more of her smug shite. Couple of months ago, she asked me to get her some crystals if I came across any New Age shops when I was out scavenging. She even gave me a list of the ones she wanted.

  As if.

  Chapter Fourteen

  Doyle

  11pm, August 8th

  I'm under a sleeping bag on a mattress in a big tent, having been shunted off to the camp at Hawes with Madison.

  I know why Barney sent me packing, and it wasn't because Madison needed back-up. He didn't like me spending time with an old mate in case I said something I shouldn't, so he made sure the opportunity didn't arise. Travis and I were only halfway through a basic catch-up about four months in a manor house with a hot chick followed by a bit of gentle farming (him), and eighteen months wandering the countryside alone and friends burning to death (me), when I was given my marching orders.

  I've since wondered if Barney overheard me talking to that sharp kid Lottie. Or if slime-ball Dex did. He's a right Verlander-in-waiting, that one. I am sure he will fit into UK Central as smoothly as Big V's dick slides up Barney's backside. Metaphorically, at least.

  I'm in a bit of a foul mood, not least of all because I had to drive the fucking bus, after only a few lessons. Still, I can do it now. Something else to add to my 'skill set', I suppose.

  Here, much like I did with Barney on Lindisfarne, I sat back and let Madison do the talking. This place is run by a bunch of military alpha-male and female types, and she knows their language. She's carousing with them as I write; a couple of hours ago she came in, slightly pissed, to report that she's taken down the names of no less than seventy—out of around a hundred and sixty—who want to join us, and to tell me to get off my arse and spread the word, so I showed willing for a little while. I met some nice people whose questions I answered in what I hope was a pleasant but noncommittal manner.

  I'm so hacked off about not being able to spend more time with Travis. I gather Aria dumped him. He just said that 'it didn't work out', which is reject-speak for 'she left me'; if you were the one who walked, you always say so. I didn't say 'you're better off without her', even though I thought it.

  Lindisfarne was great. A beautiful place, I liked the people I met (Dex excluded), and they seem to have really got their act together.

  Oh yes, I know why Barney moved me on.

  He's an ape, but he's not stupid; indeed, I had every intention of telling Travis that my boss was Verlander of the Renova Group, our former employers, and that they are the whip-crackers behind UK2. I would have done so that night, over a few private beers, and I would have told him about the microchips, too.

  I'd have cast caution to the wind and told Travis the lot, and Barney saw that.

  I wonder how many will turn up tomorrow. At least I know Travis and Lottie won't be among them.

  August 10th, 2026

  Madison and I returned to Central an hour before Barney last night. We had with us eighty-odd new recruits from Hawes who chose to travel in their own three buses, fifteen we found holed up in a pub on the North Yorks moors—their whereabouts revealed by whichever alpha male Madison shagged the night before—and a few grubby-looking randoms we picked up on the way. That was just a matter of stopping the convoy, Madison saying, 'D'you want to come with us to a place where there's plenty of food and hot water?', and them saying, 'Hell, yes!'

  We deposited our newbies in the holding bay; it was seething, as another team had been out towards Cumbria and come back with nearly two hundred.

  The bay is a huge, hangar-type building, with rows of camp beds and mattresses, chemical toilets and a long trestle table with a tea urn, soft drinks and snacks. Once arrivals have been logged and allocated apartments, they attend induction day with Verlander and Erika, have individual psychiatric and medical assessments, and are then given jobs.

  I was surprised to see a sunburnt Barney stomp in without Dex.

  "Drove down in his own car, gone straight to see Al," I was told.

  Aha. No doubt he will emerge shortly, dressed in his 'In Crowd' t-shirt.

  A few of the new arrivals have caught the eye of Verlander: a pretty little Lindisfarne princess called Flora, the boss man from Hawes and a few other cute young girls. Their names are written in green pen on the whiteboard in Verlander's lair.

  Wonder what the price is, for the girls.

  Barney knocks on my door at lunchtime. I invite him in, even though he's the last person I want to see.

  He flops down in the middle of my couch, arms stretched out across the back, owning it. "What you reckon, then? Went okay, yeah?"

  "Seemed to."

  I walk through the arch into my galley kitchen to get as far away from him as possible without actually shutting myself in my bedroom.

  "A hundred and thirty-odd; not a bad haul for phase one!"

  "Phase one?"

  "Too right." He bangs a fist on a huge, splayed thigh. "Phase-fucking-one!"

  I hate that: when you've indicated that you don't understand what someone means, and instead of giving an explanation they just repeat what they said before.

  "Which is?"

  He chuckles. "It's when we give them the impression that abandoning their shit-hole settlements and living back in the real world is optional."

  I've got my back to him, because I'm getting a couple of beers out of the fridge. I go slow. I open the bottles, and turn to face him, leaning on my worktop. "So how do you persuade the rest of them?"

  "You'll see, when The Terminator returns. I'll be back!" More chuckling, then he beckons me. "Gis that beer then, fucko. Hey, betcha some of our new guests are goin' to be a bit gutted when they see the size of them flats in the Rez Zones!"

  "And that's funny, is it?" I feel sorry for them, in particular the people with kids who left that lovely island. "Do they know about the microchips yet?"

  He puts the bottle to his mouth and glugs half of it down. "Will do by the end of the day. That’s what happened when I got here. We got the induction, all the bollocks about hot showers and opportunities, then, when we was all hooked, they hit us with it." He sniffs, wrinkling his fat nose. "I didn't mind. I'm not going to be doing nothing wrong. I'm UK2 all the way, me!"

  I stroll back into the living area and sit down. "So how would they react if someone refused?"

  "Dunno. Ain't happened yet, far as I know. Well, you don't like it, but you said yes, didn't you?"

  "Okay, then, how about if you took it out?"

  He leans his head back and laughs. "Mate. That geek what inserts them—whatsisname, Jared—he's a fucking medic, he knows what he's doing. You take it out y'self, you could hit summat you shouldn't, bleed to death. You ask Al."

  "I don't think there are any major arteries in your shoulder."

  He sniffs again. "Still could make a serious fucking mess of y'self. You'd need arms like a bleedin' orangutan to sew the fucker up, even if you could see to do it! Anyway, it's like I said to them lot up Lindisfarne, they're better off down here, chips or not. It's all very well at the moment, playing at fucking self-sufficiency, but you look a few years down the line. People will get ill—I mean, fuck it, you could die of some minor infection without the right medicine, couldn't you? And some of them were getting on a bit, weren't they? That black geezer what runs the farm, for one—what if they get heart problems? What if someone has a bad accident? You can't live like that, not indefinitely. So there's more rules here than some might like. Well, that's the price you pay, to actually be a-fucking-live."

  Arse though he is, he has a point. "Tell me about Phase Two. What exactly does The Terminator do?"

  "He has his me
thods." He grins. "Know what I'm saying?"

  "No. What?"

  His grin chills me. "I'll be discussing tactics with Al." He stands up. "Right, I'd better let you get your beauty sleep. Come the end of the week, you're goin' to have over three hundred more little red dots to track and trace!"

  I shut my eyes as he walks out, whistling, and wish, more than anything else, that I had stayed in that little pub on my own, eating noodles and cold peas out of tins.

  Chapter Fifteen

  Dex

  UK Central

  How fortuitous it was that he had an 'out', just when Lottie decided to play Girl Detective. How wonderful he felt driving off down the road, knowing he'd slammed the door shut on that whole unfortunate scenario.

  He sang along to CDs and smiled at the August sky as he drove. Passing Suzanne's car, loaded up with Naomi and the kids, he honoured them with a cheery wave.

  On arrival, some time before the convoy, he sought out and introduced himself to Alex Verlander as the leader of the Lindisfarne community, emphasising his intention to further the aims of UK2 as outlined by Barney over dinner the night before; he had no intention of waiting for an introduction.

  "Barney assured me there would be a position of authority here for me," he told Verlander—a man cut from the same cloth as Barney, though of a far superior weave—during their initial, fifteen minute interview.

  "It's certainly not unlikely," said Verlander. "Barney's one of my key people, I trust his judgement. Tell you what, we'll have a chat tomorrow and see how best you might fit into the UK2 management structure. Meanwhile, we'll get you settled into Hub Residential." He winked. "It's a step or three up from gen pop."

  Dex breathed a silent sigh of relief. No way was he spending any longer than necessary in that dreadful holding bay, which brought to mind a refugee camp for flood victims. A quick half hour to get Naomi and Phoenix settled was enough.