Lucy Clarke - Last Seen - A gripping psychological thriller, full of secrets and twists

Sarah placed her hands on the railings. Her bitten fingernails were painted pink, the polish faded at the edges. She looked across the water to the golden stretch of sand ahead of us. ‘Where’s that?’

‘Longstone Sandbank.’ It was flanked by a meandering natural harbour on one side, and on the other by the open sea. ‘You’ve never been?’

She shook her head. ‘We only moved here a month ago. Is it an island?’

‘Almost.’ The sandbank was no more than half a mile long, and was separated from the quay by a fast-moving channel of water. Dotted along its spine were a rabble of brightly coloured wooden beach huts. I always thought it looked as though the sandbank had tried its hardest to escape the mainland – and it had succeeded, except for the slimmest touch of land still tethering it to a wooded headland at its far end.

‘How do you get there?’

‘By boat,’ I said, nodding towards the ferry that was bobbing across the harbour, orange fenders strapped to its sides. The engine growled against the running tide as it motored towards the quayside. We watched as the round-faced captain leant out to loop a rope around a thick wooden post.

‘Wanna go there?’ I asked.

Sarah’s green eyes glittered as they met mine. ‘Yes.’

We climbed on to the wooden boat, handing the captain our fifty-pence pieces, and moved to the bench at the back. Kneeling up on the seat, we rested our chins on top of folded arms so we could watch the wake the ferry created as it pulled away.

I glanced across at Sarah. The sun illuminated her clear, smooth face, and the delicate curve of her small mouth. She grinned at me. ‘Who knew drama club would be so much fun?’

The ferry crossing only took a few minutes and we hopped from the boat and moved down the rickety jetty, our sandals clanking against the wooden planks. Reaching the beach, Sarah’s gaze flitted over the huts as she exclaimed, ‘They’re like little houses. Look! They have proper kitchens – and beds!’

‘You can sleep in them during the summer,’ I told her, pointing out a hut with a wooden ladder leading up to a mezzanine. ‘Imagine waking up here!’

A low, rhythmic boom hinted at the sea that lay on the other shore of the sandbank, so we left the harbour behind and squeezed between two huts, stepping over a set of oars and skirting a deflated dinghy. Immediately the breeze was stronger, blown onshore in salty gusts. Whitecaps ducked and dived, driving small waves to break on the shore. Rocky groynes punctuated the beach, creating a series of small bays.

We kicked off our shoes and walked with our arms linked, tramping through the thick, warm sand. Sarah was a head shorter than me, but she walked with long strides and our steps fell into an easy rhythm. There were pockets of activity everywhere: two young girls buckled into life jackets were dragging a kayak to the shore; an older woman standing in the shallows threw a stick for a muscular, bounding dog; a man in a panama hat struggled to put up a windbreak in the fine sand, using a pebble for a hammer. We passed a family eating brunch at a picnic table, their bare feet dug into the sand, a pile of napkins secured from the breeze by a large pebble. At the hut next door a group of teenage boys lounged bare-chested and tanned, two guitars leant against sun-chairs. I nudged Sarah in the ribs and she smiled into her chin.

Surprisingly, many of the huts were closed, their blinds drawn. I wondered where their owners were – what they could possibly be doing that was better than being here. They looked odd, those shuttered huts, secretive shadows in the brilliant midday sun.

After some time, a craggy headland ended the row of huts and the beach thinned as it wrapped around crumbling sandstone cliffs. We scrambled over a rocky groyne that separated one deserted bay from the next, and walked on the shoreline, avoiding the dark piles of seaweed flagging on the sand.

Sarah paused, turning to face me. ‘Shall we swim?’

I glanced around us; the bay was empty, the water a tantalizing blue. I grinned as I wriggled out of my T-shirt and cut-offs, leaving me in mismatched underwear.

Sarah shrugged off her dress, grabbed my hand, and together we ran towards the water.

My breath caught at the first grip of cold around my ankles. Sarah squealed as a rush of white water engulfed our middles. When a wave came, I dived through it, cold squeezing a scream from my lungs. Beneath the water I glided, the rest of the world closing out. My skin came alive with the bite of the sea, the sting of the salt.

When there was no more air left in my lungs, I broke through the surface, hair slick to my head. The sea fizzed and breathed around me.

Sarah was laughing with her head tipped back.

We let the sea toy with us – lifting us up, then sucking us back with each shelf of water.

‘Let’s catch this wave,’ I said, paddling for a small peak and trying to bodysurf into shore, but I wasn’t quick enough and it passed beneath me. I trod water waiting for the next and, when it came, we both kicked feverishly whilst striking out with our arms. We were rewarded as the wave propelled us forwards, Sarah whooping as we travelled. The wave broke early in a charge of foam and we were sent flailing, legs tangled about arms like rag dolls. I felt myself rolled along the sea bed, my underwear flimsy protection against the ride, and we both surfaced gasping and laughing. We waded out, staggering up the beach.

An older boy with thick dark hair, who I hadn’t noticed earlier, was fishing on the rocks at the edge of the bay. He watched us closely, his gaze both serious and curious. I glanced sideways at Sarah and found she was staring right back at him.

I shivered. We didn’t have towels, so we stood with our arms outstretched to salute the sun, like my mother did in her yoga practice.

Looking towards the beach huts, they seemed like tiny colourful homes whispering of sun-swept holidays. High on adrenalin and the bloom of a new friendship, I announced, ‘One day I’m going to buy a beach hut. I’ll fill it with books and candles and board games and music – and I won’t leave all summer.’

‘Except when you walk over to my beach hut,’ Sarah added. ‘Because I’m going to buy the one next door.’

It was a girl’s wish, that’s all. Beach huts next door, long summers spent on a sandbank.

But neither of us could know that our lightly cast dream would come true – or what it would cost us both.

I wait until midday before I call Jacob; it gives him long enough to sleep off the worst of his hangover, and enough time to feel he’s proved a point by not returning to the beach hut. When I pick up my mobile, I see that I missed a call from Isla last night. There’s no message and I wonder vaguely if she was ringing to apologize.

I scroll to Jacob’s number, press call, and then hold the mobile to my ear, my fingers drumming the kitchen counter.

Oddly, there’s no ring tone – just a recorded voice informing me that they’re unable to connect me, and I should try again later.

Jacob would never switch off his phone. His mobile is like a fifth limb, which he uses with an instinctiveness that eludes me completely. He can point his phone to the sky and name star constellations, or take over the car stereo with a swipe of the screen. It’s unlikely he’s got no signal either, as everywhere on the sandbank is in range. I suppose it’s possible that he’s run out of battery, although we all charge our phones from an attachment that Nick rigged up from the solar panels.

I wonder what to do now. I don’t like the idea of stewing in the beach hut, waiting for him to return. I keep replaying our argument, pausing on the narrowness of Jacob’s dark gaze, and the way he’d yanked his rucksack from the floor, then slammed the beach hut door so hard that the panes of glass rattled in their frames. I’d gone to the window, pressing my fingertips against the cool glass. The beach was in darkness, except for the lantern of a night-fisherman setting up for the evening and the glow of Neil’s boat going out, and I’d watched Jacob slide away into the night, a stranger to me.