Scare Me to Death: A Spell-Binding Edge-of-Your-Seat Thriller

By CJ Carver

Digging up the past can be deadly in this “ingeniously plotted, twisty and enthralling” thriller from the CWA Debut Dagger–winning author of Cold Echo (Mystery People).

A homemade bomb exploded mid-air, killing 214 people on board. Thirteen people survived . . .

Sixteen years later one of the survivors is found brutally murdered. It looks like a crime of passion, but DC Lucy Davies knows something is wrong. They were trying to find the bombers.

Lucy’s search for the killer brings her into conflict with her long-lost father—who has his own secrets. Dangerous secrets that Lucy must expose so she can confront a vicious murderer with only one thing on their mind: Keep on killing to stop the truth from being revealed.

The perfect read for fans of authors like Sibel Hodge, Caroline Mitchell, and Tim Weaver.

Praise for the novels of CJ Carver:

“Tell Me a Lie is a fast and ingenious thriller. I’m full of admiration.” —Isabelle Grey, bestselling author of Wrong Way Home

“A fabulously disturbing read! Carver really is a must read writer . . . Totally recommend.” —Northern Crime
 

• Language: English
• Publisher: Open Road Integrated Media
• Release date: Apr 9, 2021
• ISBN: 9781504069793

Book preview

Scare Me to Death

Scare Me to Death

CJ Carver

Bloodhound Books

Copyright © 2021 CJ Carver

The right of CJ Carver to be identified as the Author of the Work has been asserted by her in accordance to the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.

First published in 2021 by Bloodhound Books.

Apart from any use permitted under UK copyright law, this publication may only be reproduced, stored, or transmitted, in any form, or by any means, with prior permission in writing of the publisher or, in the case of reprographic production, in accordance with the terms of licences issued by the Copyright Licensing Agency.

All characters in this publication are fictitious and any resemblance to real persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.

www.bloodhoundbooks.com

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Print ISBN 978-1-913942-41-0

Contents

Love crime, thriller and mystery books?

Praise For CJ Carver

Also by CJ Carver

Sixteen years ago

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Sixteen years ago

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

Chapter 14

Chapter 15

Chapter 16

Chapter 17

Chapter 18

Chapter 19

Chapter 20

Chapter 21

Chapter 22

Chapter 23

Chapter 24

Chapter 25

Chapter 26

Chapter 27

Chapter 28

Chapter 29

Chapter 30

Chapter 31

Chapter 32

Chapter 33

Chapter 34

Chapter 35

Chapter 36

Chapter 37

Chapter 38

Chapter 39

Chapter 40

Chapter 41

Chapter 42

Chapter 43

Chapter 44

Chapter 45

Chapter 46

Chapter 47

Chapter 48

Chapter 49

Chapter 50

Chapter 51

Chapter 52

Chapter 53

Chapter 54

Chapter 55

Chapter 56

Chapter 57

Chapter 58

Chapter 59

Chapter 60

Chapter 61

Chapter 62

Ten days later

Epilogue

Author’s Note

A note from the publisher

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Praise For CJ Carver

‘A shocking, complex and beautifully written thriller and another cracker from the pen of bestseller CJ Carver’

Reader’s Retreat

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‘CJ Carver can do no wrong. Fabulous. Extremely fabulous. Read this series. It’s the best!’

Northern Crime

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‘A fast and ingenious thriller that pits the brilliantly addictive Forrester and Davies against a tense and chillingly real conspiracy… I’m full of admiration’

Isabelle Grey, author

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‘This is an extraordinarily tense, clever thriller. Don’t expect to sleep, because this is unputdownable’

Frost Magazine

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‘A terrific page-turner. Heart-stopping action and a heroine with guile as well as guts’

Harlen Coben, author

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‘Anyone who is a member of a book club should be recommending (Spare Me the Truth) to their fellow readers with great gusto’

Book Addict Shawn

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‘Carver gives us strong heroines battling against the odds, fast-moving plots and a strong sense of place. She deservedly won the CWA Debut Dagger for Blood Junction’

Publishing News

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"I’m so glad this is the first of a series: I want more… and I want it now!’

Julia Crouch, author

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‘Fast, smart and furious… it will have you clinging on by your fingertips. CJ Carver is one of the best thriller writers working today’

Tom Harper, former CWA Chairman

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‘A complex tale of betrayal and deception. CJ Carver writes with compassion about characters she really cares about’

Parker Bilal, author

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‘A top-notch thriller writer. CJ Carver is one of the best’

Simon Kernick, author

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‘A high-wire act of a thriller, with a plot as ingeniously constructed as a sudoku puzzle’

The Lady Magazine

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‘Powerful writing, a gripping plot and a unique setting… outstanding’

The Mystery and Thriller Club

Also by CJ Carver

THE HARRY HOPE SERIES

Cold Echo

Deep Black Lies

THE LIA SHAN THRILLER

The Snow Thief

THE NICK ASHDOWN THRILLER

Over Your Shoulder

THE DAN FORRESTER SERIES

Spare Me The Truth

Tell Me A Lie

Know Me Now

Scare Me To Death

THE JAY MCCAULAY SERIES

Gone Without Trace

Back With Vengeance

The Honest Assassin

THE INDIA KANE SERIES

Blood Junction

Black Tide

OTHER NOVELS

Dead Heat

Beneath The Snow

For Steve, with thanks for the opening sentence.

Sixteen years ago

There was a girl in my seat. A teenager. Ripped jeans, red tassel top, bangles on both wrists. Auburn hair twisted into a knot. Her hands had been painted with geometric henna designs. She was absorbed in her paperback which, I saw, was the bestseller of the year, The Da Vinci Code .

‘Excuse me,’ I said. ‘But I think this might be my seat.’

She didn’t look up.

Even though I knew I hadn’t made a mistake, I double-checked my seat assignment: 27C. Aisle seat towards the rear of the aircraft. Near the rear exits. The safest place to be.

‘Anna asif sayidi…’ I’m sorry, sir…

I backed up for the flight attendant wanting to pass, and tried again, this time moving so that I edged into the girl’s personal space. ‘Hello?’

She glanced up, obviously irritated at being interrupted. Her eyes were an extraordinary vivid green.

I showed her my boarding pass. ‘Maybe we’ve been allocated the same seat. If that’s the case…’

‘No, no.’ Her irritation immediately gave way to mortification. ‘It’s me, sorry.’ She was already closing her book and getting up. ‘I thought it might be free.’ Sliding out of the seat she glanced over her shoulder. ‘I was trying to get away from my extremely annoying little brother, that’s all. Sorry.’

Her accent was clear-cut English, and I assumed the small boy with tousled hair the same colour as hers, who’d suddenly appeared over the headrest behind her, was the brother.

‘Told you so.’ His face was triumphant. ‘Told you someone would come and kick you out. Now you’ll have to play with me.’ He vanished briefly to return with two toy cars which he proceeded to race along the headrest, making loud vroom-vroom noises.

‘You’re the Nissan. I’m the Ferrari.’

The girl gave a long-suffering sigh and rolled her eyes.

‘You think that’s a fair race?’ I asked the boy.

He paused to look at me.

‘I’m assuming you’ve got the Nissan 350Z,’ I said. ‘Three and a half litre six-speed manual, naught to sixty in 5.3 seconds?’

The boy stared at me, round-eyed.

‘The Ferrari, however…’ I bent and had a closer look, ‘…is a lot older than the Nissan. It’s the 308 Dino. It does 7.7 seconds naught to sixty. If I were you, I’d have a rethink about which car you’re going to race against.’

‘Are you a racing driver?’ he asked. His eyes were the same colour as his sister’s and just as arresting.

‘I have raced, yes.’ I didn’t think it wise to tell him that my last race had been in London’s rush hour, chasing a terrorist suspect who’d been hell-bent on attacking the Underground with ricin poison.

The boy turned the Nissan over and looked at its underside. ‘You’d have this one? Seriously?’

‘It may not look as sporty, but the performance is actually pretty good.’ I held out my hand. The boy put the Nissan in my palm. I don’t know what it was, whether it was his solemn expression, reminding me of my own boyhood and my passion for cars, or if it was simply because I was exhausted after the past few days and needed a mental break, but I moved to take the empty seat next to him, raising my eyebrows at the girl to ask if that would be okay.

The girl looked astonished, then delighted. ‘Be my guest.’ She dropped into my seat fast, burying herself back in her book in case I might change my mind.

As I made to settle next to the boy, the woman on his right, sitting next to the window, sprang up. ‘Bub, get back into your own seat right now.’

‘But, Mum…’

‘This gentleman shouldn’t be hassled into doing what you guys want.’

‘He offered!’ the girl protested at the same time as the boy wailed, ‘Mummy, but he wants to play! He’s a racing driver!’

‘Okay, Josh, Bubbles, just cool it. Both of you.’

Both kids fell silent. I turned to see the man I took to be their father studying me. Sandy hair, freckles and laughter lines edged a pair of eyes the same colour as his kids’. He had the seat across the aisle, which meant the family would have been in the same row if the daughter hadn’t debunked.

‘I don’t mind,’ I told him. ‘Honestly.’

He stared a second longer before giving a shrug. ‘Your funeral.’

‘Yesss!’ Josh punched the air as I sank next to him and gave him his first lesson in the technique of motor racing.

‘What’s the most important quality the would-be driver should have?’ I asked.

‘To drive really fast.’

I looked into his shining face. ‘Absolutely. But it’s more than that. And it’s a quality you already have, which is great enthusiasm. Next, you need courage. And mastery over your nerves…’

As flight attendants began closing overhead lockers and preparing for pushback, we played with our cars, the boy asking me questions while I did my best to answer them, and after a few minutes I noticed the girl had risen and was watching us over the headrest. ‘Are there any female racing drivers?’

‘Some of the best drivers are women.’

‘Ha!’ The father snorted.

I ignored him. ‘Check out Sabine Schmitz. She won twenty-four hours of Nürburgring. Twice. And what about Danica Patrick? She’s one of the best NASCAR drivers around and the only woman to win an IndyCar Series race.’

‘Girl power.’ Bubbles grinned at me, raising a hand for a high-five. We clapped palms. Everyone smiled. Inside my chest, I felt muscles beginning to relax. This was just what I needed. To be part of a normal, happy world, with normal, happy people.

Usually I keep myself to myself. I blend in and make sure I don’t do anything that anyone might remember. But I’d just finished an intense week and not having to think about it felt as good as a holiday on a tropical island. Eight bombers had bombed five places in Marrakech last week and I’d been brought in because one of those bombers had been British. The Moroccans hadn’t taken my appearance kindly and although to my face they’d been perfectly polite, they’d been purposely unhelpful. Even though I’m known for being excessively even-tempered, by the end of the week I was anything but. I could have happily strangled the lot of them.

With a final check from the flight attendants making sure we were buckled up, our tables stowed away, we began rolling down the runway and lifting into the sky.

Minutes later – we were climbing through three thousand feet or so – the plane fell suddenly straight down and gave a shudder.

Someone let out a small scream.

For a moment, I thought we might have suffered a bird strike but then the oxygen masks dropped and at the same time, I smelled smoke.

Quickly I snapped my mask into place. Checked that Josh and his parents had also put theirs on. I couldn’t check on their daughter, Bubs, but since it appeared she’d pulled down her mask, I had to assume she was okay too. Josh looked at me, pale-faced and frightened. I winked.

Smoke began to fill the cabin. Acrid, filled with chemicals, it swept from the front like a black tidal wave. Somewhere, wires were melting. A fire was taking hold.

My pulse increased. This didn’t look good. I forced myself to concentrate on my breathing. In. Pause. Out.

The intercom came on. A female voice told everyone to keep calm, assuring us that we were returning to the airport, that we would be landing safely and that the fire emergency services were already standing by. She sounded breezy and confident and I promised myself that if we came through this okay, I’d shake her hand because there was no way she’d know any of that. There’d been no time. She was improvising. Doing her job.

The smoke thickened until I could no longer see Josh’s mum or dad, Josh or my feet. If the fire had started in the avionics bay, which I suspected, then the pilots would be in an even worse situation. They would have donned their full-face masks straight away, but if they couldn’t see their instruments…

I willed myself to keep calm but my heart was hammering, sweat springing over my body.

I thought of my parents. Pictured us on the skiff sailing across Plymouth harbour, Mum’s hair flying, Dad’s eyes alight. I didn’t want them to hear I’d died. I didn’t want to die either. I was only twenty-four. I had my life ahead of me.

My mouth turned dry as the flight attendant began to tell passengers they needed to prepare. As everyone assumed the brace position I turned to Josh, made sure his seat belt was as low and tight as it would go. He couldn’t reach the seat in front of him, which meant he had to put his arms around the back of his legs, his head on his knees.

Everyone fell quiet. Totally silent.

Seconds ticked past.

I checked Josh again, pushing his head down a little more, making sure his knees were pressed together.

Engines screaming, the plane made a sickening lurch to the side.

I leaned close to Josh. ‘If anything happens, I want you to hold on to my hand and I’ll get you and your sister, your mum and dad–’

My words were snatched from me as we ploughed into the ground.

1

Present day

DC Lucy Davies stepped off the train at Bristol Temple Meads, one eye on the flow of passengers pouring along the platform, the other on the man in her peripheral vision who was walking four yards to her left. She’d first seen him when she’d boarded the train at Middlesbrough. Dark blue jeans and black leather jacket. Thickset. Strong-looking. She’d been walking along the platform when she’d glanced around to find him behind her. Their eyes had met for a split second. She wasn’t sure if she’d imagined his flinch, but her nerves tightened when he came and sat in the same carriage. It was the studious way he avoided looking at her that made her spine tingle.

Was he a problem?

A biting wind cut her cheeks as she approached the stairwell leading beneath the tracks and to the exit. She wished she could have driven to Bristol – she would have felt safer in a car – but since her Corsa had a faulty water pump and was with the mechanic, she’d been forced to use public transport. As she walked, Lucy willed herself not to look at the man keeping pace with her.

You’re paranoid, she told herself. Just because he resembles the man that kidnapped you last year doesn’t mean anything. Yes, I know his family cursed you, that his mother swore to have you killed, but it doesn’t mean that every solid-looking, dark-haired bloke is out to get you.

Does it?

Her shoulder began to pulse where her kidnapper had knifed her. She’d had twenty-five stitches and was lucky the knife hadn’t lacerated any tendons or done any lasting damage. She’d been working a murder case last year and when she’d got close to exposing the killer, they’d kidnapped her, stuck her in a hole and left her to die. Thank God she’d been rescued or she’d be nothing but a pile of rotting clothes and bones.

Before she committed to the tunnel she brought out her phone, pretending she’d just received a text, and slowed her pace. The man slowed with her.

Nerves now shrieking with alarm, she kept hold of her phone and began pushing through the crowd, panic building. She had to get out of here.

‘Sorry, sorry.’ She barged ahead, her overnight bag banging into people as she passed. A quick glance over her shoulder showed the man wasn’t far behind.

Lucy was almost running when she exited the station, her pulse pounding.

‘Lucy!’ Mac was waving but her attention was on the man, who’d followed her outside. He was walking straight towards her, eyes focused over her shoulder and then he was past her, and climbing into the back of a taxi…

Her knees went weak.

Definitely paranoid, dammit. When was it going to stop?

‘Lucy?’ Mac was by her side. ‘Are you okay?’

‘I just…’ She made a vague gesture at the taxi, which was completing the loop in the station forecourt. ‘Thought that man… but I was wrong.’

Mac looked at the taxi, then back at her, expression concerned.

‘I’m fine,’ she said brightly, even though her blood was still pounding. ‘How are you?’

‘Worried about you.’

DI Faris MacDonald. Mismatched grey eyes, curly brown hair and a serious expression. Her fiancé. They were to be married this time next year. A spring wedding. Some days she could hardly believe that the copper she’d met three years ago on a team-building exercise in Wales, the copper she’d fallen madly in love with back then, was going to be her husband. And she his wife.

They’d both been in relationships when they’d conducted their wild, out-of-control crazy love affair, which hadn’t made Lucy proud, which is why she’d ended it. But then Mac turned up at Stockton-on-Tees Station as her DI. Each time she saw him it had taken every ounce of self-control not to think about the spectacular sex they’d had and even more willpower not to look at him longingly as a lover, but as a work colleague. She hadn’t wanted to be professionally undermined by sleeping with her boss, but above all she hadn’t wanted him to truly get to know her. She’d suffered from moods as her mother called them since she was a little girl and was scared that if he saw her at either end of her mood spectrum, he’d dump her.

She’d had to drag her courage from the bottom of her boots to open herself up to him, and even now it made her anxious. Especially since Mac had purposely left Stockton and taken up his old job in Bristol to give them space. If it hadn’t been for her, he’d never have moved back.

‘Please don’t worry.’ She reached up and kissed him. It still surprised her how soft his lips were and she closed her eyes briefly, absorbing herself in the feel of him, his taste. Anything to try and forget the fear that had flooded her.

‘But if you’re still…’

‘I’m fine,’ she repeated.

‘…having flashbacks, you should see someone.’

‘They’re not flashbacks. I just get a bit on edge when I see someone similar, that’s all.’

Lucy tried to make light of it. She didn’t want to see a shrink. Yes, she’d had a few nightmares but she wasn’t that bad.

‘I know someone you can talk to.’ He pulled her into his arms, held her close. Kissed the top of her head. ‘She’s a friend of mine. Really nice.’

Lucy leaned back in his arms. Sent him an arch look. ‘A friend? What sort of friend?’

Mac looked baffled.

‘Not this sort of friend, I hope?’ Lucy wound her arms around his neck and twined her body close, sliding one of her thighs between his and taking his lower lip between her teeth, gently biting it.

Mac’s eyes darkened.

‘No.’ His voice was hoarse. ‘Definitely not that kind of friend.’

He practically carried her to his car. They didn’t speak as he drove. Nor did they say a word when they reached his apartment. They made love with a silent, intense passion born out of separation and distance, and when Lucy came she curled her fingers at the nape of his neck and said his name. ‘Faris.’

‘Lucy.’

‘God, I’ve missed you.’

‘And I you, my love.’

Later, wearing one of his shirts, she poured them both wine and took the glasses into the sitting room where Mac had lit the fire. When she’d first seen the logs, twigs and branches ablaze she’d chastised him – Bristol was in a smoke control area – and he’d laughed. She’d been totally taken in by the faux gas fire.

They talked about their weeks. Mac had charged a suspect with murder after the body of a fifty-two-year-old man had been found earlier in the week. Lucy was in the thick of trying to track down a gang for a series of acid attacks in Middlesbrough.

‘Thank God it’s Friday,’ she murmured.

They rang Hotline Thai Takeaway. Ate red and green curries, prawn crackers, jasmine rice. Lucy was scraping her bowl of black sticky rice pudding with mango – her favourite – when her phone rang. She looked at the display.

‘Mum,’ she told Mac. She wasn’t sure whether to answer it or not. The last time they’d spoken, they’d rowed.

‘Say hi from me.’ He began picking up plates and moving them into the kitchen, making it clear he thought she should answer.

Lucy sighed. Mac was right. She couldn’t ignore her mum. They may have quarrelled, but she still loved her to bits.

‘Hi, Mum.’

‘Lucy.’

One word and Lucy bolted upright, eyes wide open, her mind suddenly flaring with colour. She’d been diagnosed with a type of synesthesia where a cognitive pathway led to an automatic, involuntary reaction of colour when she was stimulated in some way. Usually, the colours became most intense when she was under duress or struggling to find a connection in a particularly complex police investigation. Right now, the colour was shimmering a warning amber.

‘What’s wrong?’

‘It’s, well… It’s Rambo.’

‘Rambo?’ Lucy repeated, frowning. ‘You mean Ricky Shaw?’

She’d gone to school with Ricky, otherwise known as Rambo because of his obsession with the fictional action-adventure hero. At twelve years old, Ricky had been the fattest kid in class but then he’d grown his hair long, donned a sweatband, a US Army field jacket and combat boots. It had been his uniform until he’d left school and although he’d looked pretty daft – his stomach was a dough ball compared to Sylvester Stallone’s six-pack – he was so earnest and endearingly polite that the nickname had been given out of affection as much as ridicule. Lucy guessed it was a good move on his part because it was certainly better to be called Rambo rather than ‘that fat Asian kid’.

‘He’s murdered someone. A woman.’

The policewoman in Lucy knew that people were capable of anything but the kid in her reacted differently. ‘What?!’

‘He’s at Kensington Police Station. He wants to see you.’

2

‘K ensington?’ Lucy repeated in surprise.

‘That’s right.’

The last Lucy had heard, Superintendent Magellan had been promoted to Chief Superintendent and was now working out of the posh shop, as she thought of it. It had been Magellan who’d kicked her out of the Met, and it was only thanks to her old boss that she hadn’t been fired, but ‘voluntarily transferred’ to Stockton. It had been a particularly traumatic and horrible time and Lucy had as much desire to see Magellan again as to swim in a vat of turds. In fact, she’d take the turd-swimming option any day. At least it would smell a lot sweeter.

‘Why me?’ Lucy asked her mother. ‘I haven’t seen Ricky for ages. And it’s not like he was my best friend or anything.’

‘You were at school with him.’

‘Well, yes. He was in my year and we shared classes, but I never really knew him.’

‘Come on, Lucy. He wants you to–’

‘I can’t see how I can help,’ Lucy overrode her. ‘It’s not my jurisdiction, remember?’

‘But I told Jaya you’d go!’

Jaya had been her mother’s friend for as long as Lucy could remember. They’d become comrades at the school gates when they’d discovered they were both single mums. However, where Lucy’s dad had buggered off to Australia with a yoga teacher called Tina, Jaya’s husband had run off with another man. Even now, Lucy’s mother reckoned she’d got off lightly in comparison.

‘Oh, Mum…’ Lucy rubbed her forehead.

‘She’s depending on you, you know.’

Lucy wasn’t going to fold over any kind of emotional blackmail. She hadn’t seen Mac for three weeks, dammit. Why should she have her weekend hijacked?

‘I’m not with the Met any more, remember?’ Lucy firmed her resolve. ‘Tell her I’m sorry, but I can’t help.’

Small silence.

‘You’re not saying that because of… well, our last conversation?’

Lucy blinked.

‘I know I was