Alex Day - The Missing Twin - A gripping debut psychological thriller with a killer twist

Abruptly taking leave of Zayn, Edie sloped off to the bar for her shift. The afternoon dragged, each order an irritation, every customer an inconvenience. She kept looking around, anxious for any sign of Vuk, simultaneously expecting – hoping – that at any moment Laura might also reappear, a taunting smile on her face, wondering what Edie was making such a fuss about, decrying that anyone might have so much as noticed her absence.

‘Where on earth have you been?’ Edie would ask.

‘Here and there, shooting the breeze,’ Laura would reply, and that would be that.

So much for the idea that twins are psychic. Edie had never been able to read Laura’s mind. She banged down glasses and crashed piles of plates together for several long hours. ‘Edeeee,’ remonstrated Stefan. ‘You need be careful. You break something.’

‘Yeah, sorry.’ Edie began shoving handfuls of clean cutlery into the grey plastic tray on the table behind the bar. ‘I’d slow down but Vlad always tells me I’m letting the team down if I do that.’ She smiled self-righteously at the long-suffering Stefan as she flung down the last handful of forks.

‘You are a good worker, Edie,’ countered Stefan, his voice eager and anxious at the same time. ‘I’ve told Vlad that.’

‘Thanks, Stefan,’ said Edie, turning to survey the tables and assess what needed doing next. A tiny glow of pleasure seeped through her, despite herself. Stefan’s praise was nice to hear; at least someone appreciated her.

And then she saw him.

Vuk was making his way across the dry, powdery sand that edged the beach. Tall and upright, attracting admiring gazes from every woman around, just the sight of him turned Edie’s stomach upside down. Haphazardly depositing a pile of teaspoons on the counter, she raced towards him.

‘Vuk!’

He looked in her direction. Flying across the loose, shifting sand, Edie could not focus on his expression. She arrived at his side, grabbing his arm and hanging onto it while she caught her breath.

‘You are in a hurry today, Edie.’ The few words he spoke were always in impeccable English, learned during a few years he’d spent as a student in Leicester. She looked up into his eyes and saw the outline of herself, perfectly reflected in his black pupils. He smiled his lop-sided smile and she melted.

‘Oh, Vuk, I’ve been desperate to find you. I’ve missed you so much.’ As soon as the words were out, she regretted them. She mustn’t put Vuk off by being too available, too clingy; she’d made that mistake before. But he just riffled her hair with one of his dextrous hands and smiled, albeit somewhat distractedly.

‘Let’s go and get a drink,’ she suggested hastily, to cover up her over-zealous greeting. ‘I could do with one.’

She squeezed her fingers around Vuk’s. His hands were so big, so strong and muscular. They were hands that could cope, that could fix things.

The bottles that Edie fetched from the bar bled with condensation and foamed pale and yellow as Vuk poured the beer into glasses. Edie stuck her finger into the middle of the spume and circled it, observing how the frothy bubbles attached to her skin and then quietly imploded and melted away. It reminded her of the tops of the breakers on the Atlantic beaches of home, where she and Laura would wave-jump, shrieking from the cold and even more so when they landed and felt the squirm of a disappearing crab underfoot. How James had longed to join them when he was small but their parents had said it was too rough. It must have been hard for him, Edie suddenly realised, to be always on the outside looking in, always chasing after them but never quite catching up. A bit like how she felt about Vuk right now. She seemed to be doing all the running.

‘Edie, you should not play with your food and drink. It’s not hygienic.’

Edie smirked in pseudo-embarrassment. ‘Sorry, Vuk. I forgot you were Mr Clean.’ She put her finger in her mouth and sucked it, long and slow.

She expected a reaction to her provocative action but Vuk merely lit a cigarette and began to smoke.

‘There’s something I need your advice on,’ she ventured tentatively, looking up at Vuk through her eyelashes and pushing out her chest in her skimpy T-shirt. Rather than dropping the flirting as a reaction to Vuk’s seeming indifference, she intensified it.

Vuk raised his eyebrows infinitesimally in response. Edie nearly snapped with exasperation.

And then he reached out and ran his thumb and forefinger around her cheek and chin and along her lips.

Finally! Satisfied that he wanted her and that she had his attention, she was able to say what was burning her tongue.

‘I don’t know where Laura is.’

Vuk’s eyes creased as they narrowed in perplexity. ‘Edie, you are talking in riddles. I don’t understand.’

Remembering again that Zayn was still the only other person who knew about Laura, she qualified her explanation. ‘Laura’s my twin sister, she came yesterday but now she’s gone. I’ve been half-expecting her to turn up all day but there’s still no sign of her.’

Edie put her fingertips to her forehead, covering her eyes. She shook her head, took a deep breath and slid her other hand down Vuk’s forearm.

‘So what do you think I should do?’

Vuk took a long draught of his beer.

‘Nothing.’

‘Uh?’ Edie’s surprise made her inarticulate. Surely Vuk could do better than that.

‘She has gone travelling again,’ he continued, laconically. ‘That’s all,’ he shrugged.

‘But I don’t understand why she would have done that without telling me,’ protested Edie, flinging her arms in the air. ‘Why would she? Why would she come one day and leave the next? It doesn’t make any sense.’

‘You are twins. Don’t you know?’ Vuk drained his glass and made as if to get up from the table.

‘NO!’ Edie slammed the palms of her hands on the table. ‘That’s all just bollocks. Of course we know each other inside out but we, like everyone else on earth, need a telephone or a computer to have a long-distance conversation. Cut the “twins are psychic” crap – everyone does it and it really annoys me.’

Her anger rolled off her like the hot breeze from the nearby fan. And then dissipated as Vuk pushed his chair back and picked up his sunglasses from the table.

‘Wait, where are you going? Is that all the help you’re going to give me?’

‘I have an appointment. See you later maybe.’ Vuk was already making his way towards the side path that led away from the beach and up into the resort. All he ever had was appointments, business to conduct. Where was the time for her?

‘You need to stop fussing, Edie,’ added Vuk as he retreated. ‘Laura is okay. You just look after yourself.’

Edie slumped into her chair, her head in her hands. And then sat bolt upright, her eyes widening with horror. No, no, no. Surely the thing she’d dreaded hadn’t happened? There had been something so strange about the way Vuk dismissed the whole story. He knew something, she was sure of it … could Laura possibly have got her hands on him so soon? But even if so, it still didn’t explain why she had completely vanished, he would hardly be keeping her prisoner.

Edie hauled herself out of her chair and started to make her way up the sandy brown slope of the hill towards her room. She was tired after such a short night’s sleep and, as well as her suspicions about Vuk and Laura, she couldn’t get his words out of her head. ‘ Look after yourself.’ What had he meant by that? If anyone needed minding, it was Laura. Why on earth should she, Edie, need looking after – and if she did, why not by him?

‘I don’t understand,’ stammered Fatima, feeling her legs go weak. ‘It can’t be right. I – we – always have money, we – my husband was an accountant; he had many clients. Of course not the same as it used to be …,’ her voice faltered.