Written In Blood

Chapter One

The nervousness that had afflicted Lucy Goulding since she left her parents' house seemed to grow with every step. She had set out with just a single butterfly fluttering about her stomach, but now she was almost at her destination her stomach roiled and churned with what seemed like thousands.

Her nervousness was made all the worse by her lack of familiarity with the feeling. She was the only daughter of the richest family in the village, was worth more than anyone she went to school with, and was one of the most attractive people she knew; because of that she had never encountered a situation where she couldn't do or have what she wanted, the result of which was that she had been given little cause to experience nerves during her young life.

A loud tut made Lucy forget, momentarily, about the butterflies in her stomach. She looked around without slowing and saw Constance Hawkins in her front garden. The elderly woman was shaking her head disapprovingly, and when she saw where Constance's gaze was fixed, on the point where her micro mini-skirt stopped, Lucy grinned. It amused her to think that she was probably showing more leg publicly than Constance had ever shown in private, and the thought buoyed her and made some of her nervousness disappear; if her outfit was disapproved of by Constance Hawkins then she had chosen the right one.

"Afternoon, Mrs Hawkins," Lucy called out cheerfully, before the overgrown hedge that surrounded the house next door cut off her view of the old woman.

Zack Wild's fingers danced over the keys of the laptop before him. He was far from a speed typist, he couldn't even touch-type, nonetheless he was rapidly filling the screen with words. His attention was diverted from what he was doing by a sudden flash of colour, which he saw out the corner of his eyes; lifting his head to look out the window, he saw nothing. He had just decided that it must have been a bird when the doorbell rang.

He cursed the interruption, and tempted to ignore it; he was on a bit of a roll with his writing and didn't was to lost his momentum. The courtesy his parents had drilled into him during his youth wouldn't permit him to do so, however.

It might have been easier for him to ignore the doorbell, if he was still living in Southampton, where the person at the door was as likely to be someone from a charity, pestering for a donation, or a political canvasser, as a genuine visitor. Here in Oakhurst, though, the odds of the person at his door being a genuine visitor were much higher. With an unhappy sigh, Zack pushed his chair back from the desk and got to his feet.

The greeting that rose to his lips died there when he caught sight of the person on his doorstep. The first thing he saw was a pair of tanned legs, followed by a black micro mini-skirt that was only a little bigger than a belt, then a red top, cut low to show off the cleavage and so skin-tight he couldn't help thinking that it must be at least one size too small. From the skirt and top his eyes took in the rest of the figure, which he liked very much – he could not remember the last time he saw someone in such a revealing outfit, at least not in person - before moving up to the face.

He quickly cut off his thoughts when he saw how young his visitor was. She had the body of a woman, but it was clear from her face that she was a teen, no older than sixteen. He was at a loss, he couldn't think why such a provocatively-dressed teen should be on his doorstep at any time, let alone at a quarter past two on a Friday afternoon, when he was sure she should be at school.

He swallowed, ungluing his tongue from the roof of his mouth, and forced his gaze back to his visitor's face.

"Hello," he finally managed to say.

"You're Zack Wild," Lucy said excitedly, the last of her nerves gone, now that she was there and she had seen how he looked at her – the same way almost every other male, regardless of their age, did.