Chapter 6
Sabri Carter didn’t think she’d ever understand people who voluntarily entered the English sea from mid-September through to late June.
Personally, she wouldn’t go in the water off the Cornish coast at any time of year – had these people never read a sewage report?
– but when the temperature was less than twenty degrees?
‘Is it an ethnic thing?’ She turned onto the main road that would take them back to the Royal Cornwall.
Steph, the paramedic at Sabri’s side, had been scrolling through her phone. ‘Come again?’
‘Swimming in winter,’ Sabri said. ‘They were all white, those women, did you notice? I’ve never seen anyone with my ethnicity in cold water. Anyone of colour, for that matter. Too much bloody sense.’
‘None of them had a BMI below thirty. I’d say that was more of an issue.’ Steph kept her voice low, although the communicating window was closed. ‘You need body fat to go into cold water. Probably why it’s mainly women who do it. More fat than men. As a rule.’
Steph, a native Cornish woman, had a BMI that was dangerously high, but Sabri didn’t mention it.
‘Except our friend in the back,’ she said instead. ‘She’s skin and bone. No wonder she got cold.’
The lights ahead changed, forcing Sabri to stop abruptly. ‘Have you come across that CFR before?’
She was thinking back to the tall blonde woman who’d met them on the beach. The second Sabri had laid eyes on her, she’d felt uneasy.
‘Don’t think so, why?’ Steph was scrolling again.
‘I thought she looked familiar. But not in a good way.’
Steph glanced up. ‘She’s a recently retired nurse. At least I think that’s what she said. You’ll have come across her at some point.’
Steph was probably right. But there was something about the woman, about her no-nonsense practicality, her subtle bossiness, her poise, even crouched on damp sand, that was – no, not just familiar – deeply unsettling.
‘Tara Webb.’ Steph was glancing down at notes now. ‘That’s her name. Ring any bells?’
‘None at all,’ Sabri answered truthfully. The name meant nothing. The woman herself, though? There was something there. She was sure of it.
Sabri’s phone rang as she pulled in to the ambulance bay. Knowing she’d have to wait to be unloaded, she answered it. ‘Hey, babes. Where are you?’
The sixth-form college her eldest attended reserved Wednesday afternoons for sport. Seventeen-year-old Maddy, who didn’t have a sporting bone in her body, usually went home to pretend to study.
‘There’s a letter for you,’ Maddy said. ‘I thought it might be about that job.’
The job had been a long shot. A first-aid instructor with a big multi-national firm. It would mean more travel than Sabri was used to, but the kids were all older now. Importantly, it would bring an end to shift work, and a ten-grand increase in salary.
‘Go on, you can open it.’ Sabri glanced sideways at Steph.
She hadn’t mentioned applying for jobs to any of her colleagues.
While they all moaned regularly and frequently about the work, taking active steps to leave might be seen as something of a betrayal.
Steph, unsurprisingly, was scrolling through TikTok.
Not waiting to be told twice, Maddy was tearing open the envelope.
‘Oh,’ she said, sounding disappointed, and Sabri felt an answering tug in her own insides.
‘Mum, listen to this. It says, “This is your token. Keep it safe. Tell no one. On the event of my death, it entitles you to an equal share of my wealth. Good luck.” I mean, what the actual?’
Sabri had only been half listening. She made her daughter read it again.
‘Signed by a Logan Quick,’ Maddy concluded. ‘Do you know him? Is he a long-lost relative? An Indian prince? Have we got rich relations?’
An Indian prince called Logan Quick? Bless that daughter of hers.
‘Sweetie, it’s a scam.’
‘No, it looks really official. It’s from a firm of solicitors. Can I call them? Oh, there’s no phone number.’
‘Scam.’
‘And there’s an actual token. It’s got some sort of weird writing on it.’
‘Put it in the bin and get on with some work. I’ll be home by four. Love you.’
‘But, Mum—’
‘Bye, love.’ Sabri ended the call with a heavy sigh. Maddy would get no work done that afternoon.