Mark Edwards writes psychological thrillers in which scary things happen to ordinary people. Mark has sold over 2 million books since his first solo novel, The Magpies, was published in 2013 and has topped the bestseller lists eight times. His other novels are Because She Loves Me, Follow You Home, What You Wish For, The Devil's Work, The Lucky Ones, The Retreat and In Her Shadow. He has also published A Murder of Magpies (a short sequel to The Magpies) and six books co-authored with Louise Voss.
He will release two books in 2019: Last of the Magpies (the thrilling conclusion to the Magpies trilogy) and Here To Stay, a novel about in-laws from hell.
Mark lives in the West Midlands, England, with his wife, their three children, two cats and a golden retriever.
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They had been driving for an hour before he finally snapped.
‘Can’t you make her shut up?’
Lizzy stared straight ahead, knuckles white as she gripped her knees. They had the windows wound down but the air that blew in was warm and thick and did nothing to blast the tension away. The landscape of south-western France rolled by, vineyards stretching in every direction. They passed a chateau, shadowy in the distance, then drove through a hamlet of crumbling stone buildings. Jeff kept expecting to see blue lights in the rear-view mirror. But nothing. Only the occasional truck, leaping out of the dark like a monster in a movie, setting his nerves jangling again.
‘She’s been through a lot—’ Lizzy began, but he cut her off.
‘She’s been through a lot?’
Lizzy reached across, squeezing his knee. ‘Calm down. If you hadn’t lost your temper back there . . .’
He shot her a look that made her change tack.
‘She loved him, Jeff.’
A gasp, a catching of breath, came from the back seat, and the keening noise that had accompanied them the whole journey – that terrible sound that made it impossible for him to concentrate, to hear his own thoughts – grew so loud he would almost have welcomed a siren, blue lights, the silence of a cell.
‘Shut up!’ he yelled, thumping the wheel.
The keening dimmed, then stopped. She sniffled and he was about to shout again, but she fell quiet.
Now it was silent, he was able to think clearly, to push away the image of the dead boy. So far, since they’d left that burning wreck behind, he’d been acting on pure instinct. And instinct had told him to drive further south, steering clear of large towns, towards the blank patches on the map. For the first hour, escape had been all that mattered, getting distance between themselves and the incident. But it had left him with a feeling he hated.
Lack of control.
The absence of a plan.
Now, though, as the sweat dried on his back and all he could hear was the rush of wind, the smooth drone of their tyres on the road, he began to formulate one.
‘We’re the Robinsons,’ he said, not realising he’d spoken aloud until Lizzy looked over at him. He reached out and took hold of her hand, squeezing. There was love in her eyes. Love for him, for their family.
A family of survivors. It was what they did, whatever the world threw at them. They had been doing this for years.
And they would survive again.
(C) Mark Edwards 2019