Page 112 of Runner 13
‘It was at Long & Windy. There was another runner. Steve. He was right on my tail. Chasing me, chasing me. Normally I’m good at tuning all that out, focusing on my own race. But this guy – he got under my skin. He was brash, liked to chat on the trail – stuff that drives me nuts. He was obsessed by Boones too. Even had a moustache like him.
‘We were running almost side by side on these tight switchbacks. It was so windy. God, the sandstorms here are bad, but this was like gale-force gusts knocking us off our feet. I wanted to stop, but I knew if I did, Steve would overtake me on the flatter sections towards the end. So I kept going. Higher and higher.
‘I was so tired. He was taunting me. Calling out my name. I turned round to tell him to shut up. I raised my hand – not to hit him; I’d just had enough. I wanted to shake him off. Then the wind hit and … bam. He was gone. Off the side, just like that.’
‘Rupert, that doesn’t sound like it was your fault. It was the wind. You didn’t push him. You didn’t kill him.’
‘I could have tried to grab him, catch him, dosomething. But it all happened so fast. I thought – I don’t evenknow what I thought. I thought I had hallucinated it. Maybe he hadn’t been there at all. Maybe he was taking a rest. I convinced myself he was fine and Icarried on runningand I fucking won. I got all this kudos and sponsorship and all these opportunities. But they never even found Steve’s body.’
‘Oh, Rupert, it’s OK.’ I keep repeating his name, hoping he’ll come back to himself, but he’s lost in his story.
‘I didn’t know that Boones had hidden cameras everywhere along the course. He’s got a recording of what happened. It shows me rounding on Steve, raising my hand, then he falls. It shows merecoiling, not reaching out to help him. It shows me continuing as if nothing had happened. If he releases it, that’s the end of my career. I’ll be – well, I’ll be you.’
I swallow. ‘But the man with the gun?’
‘That’s the thing,’ says Rupert. ‘It’s Steve.’
For a moment I’m flooded with relief. Rupert is hallucinating. He’s so riddled with guilt, he’s conjured a ghost – just like how I saw Yasmin running next to me. I can see how much it haunts him.
He’s still talking. ‘Heis what makes this Boones’s ultimate race. Not the promises. But this – sending Steve after us. Finding out how far we’ll go with someone chasing us.’
A shiver runs down my spine. It sounds exactly like something Boones would do. But Steve is dead. Isn’t he?
I hear metal scraping against rock. A few taps, slow and deliberate. Then a voice is carried on the wind. ‘Ruuu-pert,’ it says, dragging out each syllable.
A chill spreads through my body. That voice. There’s so much venom in that tone. So much determination.
Rupert hadn’t imagined it. There is someone out there.
There’s the sound of water spilling, then a crunch of plastic. A bottle flies off the side of the mountain. I watch it arc in the air. Hit the sand.
He’s close. So close. He’s going to be on me and Rupert at any moment.
I lean back against the boulder, trying to make myself as small as possible.
Then, without warning, Rupert makes a run for it. He darts along the ridge, trying to get away. Steve is quick too. He chases after him.
It’s the first time I get a look at who it is – the bald head, the beard that runs along the edge of his chin to give himself a jawline. He’s wearing a Hot & Sandy vest like the volunteers.
That’s where I recognize him from. He was one of the photographers. But while he looked benign before, just another cameraman lining the route, now I can see the tension in that jaw, bulging veins in his neck. The rippling muscles in his arms. The hard glint in his eye.
Steve stops, sets his stance and raises a gun. A real one. He aims, shoots and Rupert goes down, all in the span of a second.
I stifle a scream with my hands. Steve still doesn’t know I’m up here. He doesn’t go and check on Rupert but walks back past where I’m hiding, further along the ridge. With any luck he’s leaving the jebel.
I wait until I can no longer hear his footsteps. Then I go to Rupert, keeping as low as possible.
He’s alive. He’s been shot in the leg, and he needs medical attention. Badly.
You’re the only one who can do this, Adrienne. You have to try.
I summon up all my courage and sneak another look. Fate – luck, a fucking prayer answered – means Steve is facing the other way. He’s not leaving the jebel. He’s waiting, checking something on the ground. A laptop? But why?
A tiny pebble shifts beneath my foot, making the smallest tinkling sound. Steve lifts his head and turns round, and I duck. But he sees me, because his feet spin and he leaps from where he is standing into a sprint towards me.
I explode off my mark, my arms pumping.
He didn’t expect that. I hear my name leave his mouth like a bolt of thunder.
