“Not really. Where are you from? You don’t talk like they do around here either.”
Marc knew a deflection when he heard one. “Do I sound a bit Welsh? I lived in Swansea till I was sixteen, and I’ve never quite lost the accent.”
“How many years ago were you sixteen?”
“Too many.”
Jamie tilted his head and regarded Marc with a speculative gaze. “You’re one of those blokes who looks the same for twenty years.”
“That a compliment?”
“Depends how old you are.”
Marc chuckled and eased the yellow Punto around one of the long bends that made the area’s roads so attractive to bikers. “Well, I’m not going to tell you. You can work it out yourself if it’s that important to you.”
“It’s not.”
Ouch.Marc turned his attention to Jamie’s age instead. On the plane, he’d figured him to be barely out of his teens, but in the cold light of a dreary January morning, it was obvious that Jamie was older. “You’re twenty-five.”
Jamie’s eyebrows shot up. “Am I?”
“Yup, or thereabouts. I thought you might be younger for a while, but you don’t speak like the little shits that hang around the hospital, even without the accent.” Guessing the age of a man had always been Marc’s gift when it had come to weeding out men of fighting age on overseas operations, though he’d left the rest of the profiling to Nat. Not that it had ever seemed to matter. How many young boys had he seen with an AK-47 in their hands? It was clear that Jamie had lived hard, one way or another, but at least he’d been spared that.
Jamie said nothing to Marc’s guess, which said everything. Marc let him be and concentrated on keeping the ride as smooth as possible, though he had no real idea where he was going. They were on the road to Matlock Bath, but he’d promised Jamie an extended journey, so it seemed a shame to take him straight home.
He settled on a detour to Wirksworth, a nearby market town with a café that did a cracking all-day breakfast. Jamie might not be hungry, but after a weekend of pain and morbid moping, Marc was famished.
He parked up outside the town, near the local quarry. Jamie frowned. “Where are we?”
“Wirksworth. Come on. Get out.”
Jamie got out of the car and was by Marc’s door in a flash, holding out the crutches he’d snagged from the back seat. “One or two?”
“Two. It’s muddy, though, so you’ll need to watch your own equilibrium.”
“You want to go hiking?”
“Not hiking.” Marc slid his arms into his crutches and looked up to face Jamie’s obvious scepticism. “I want to show you something. It’s not far off the path.”
Jamie stared at Marc like he’d grown horns, and then shrugged, like the effort of resisting was too much. “Come on, then. Whatever it is has got to be better than staring at my own dick all day.”
Marc had no answer to that, and the implication that Jamie would like to stare at a dick that wasn’t his own was a scenario he couldn’t quite contemplate. He led the way to the wrought iron gate and let Jamie open it for him. The site he wanted Jamie to see was a hundred yards into the quarry grounds. He pointed at the tiny coloured flags fluttering in the wind. “In case I don’t make it that far, that’s where I want you to go.”
“You make it sound like you’re going to die before we get there.”
Marc had felt like death on his way to the hospital that morning, but Jamie’s spiky company was proving a welcome distraction. “I’m not going to cark it, but the mud might do me in. Just trust me, and go up there, okay? It’s a special place.”
He waved Jamie forward, signalling that he’d follow, though he was half-tempted to ditch his crutches and take his chances in the mud. The masochist in him could handle the pain of his healing wound, and he was used to the rest. Had to be, because it wasn’t going anywhere.
Jamie loped ahead and up the shallow hill. With Converse on his feet and his hands thrust into the pockets of his thin denim jacket, he was about as far from a hiker as Marc could imagine, but he moved with grace, his long limbs carrying him artfully over the rugged terrain, and even if Jamie missed the point of the sacred place ahead, Marc was glad he’d brought him.
He caught up with Jamie by the stone circle that local children had decorated with painted wooden birds. Dinner-plate-sized rocks had been arranged in a maze and a huge engraved stone urged anyone who passed to make their way to the centre and find their inner peace.
Jamie was already in the middle, staring at his feet. It would’ve been easy for Marc to hop across the stones and join him, but he couldn’t bring himself to break the ritual of slowly circling the maze. He left his crutches at the entrance and limped around until he came up behind Jamie.
The urge to slide his arms around Jamie’s waist was strong, but he settled for gently resting his hands on Jamie’s shoulders, and bracing himself when Jamie leaned back against him in return.
“I can’t find it,” Jamie said softly.