We present an extract from The World's End, the new thriller by Karen Fitzgibbon.
Grace Doran heads for a weekend away to the picturesque village of Castle Cove with her friend Sarah. Sarah's latest boyfriend has invited them to stay at The World’s End - one of the finest holiday homes that overlooks the sea. A pleasure trip to a nearby island turns out to be full of peril and will mark Grace and her companions lives forever...
Grace carefully stepped down from the boat onto the jetty. There was still no sign of Stephen. Nor could she see Sarah for that matter. What the hell? Where was everyone? A cold chill spread up the back of her spine as she sipped her drink. Could it be possible that she was alone on this island? And, if that was the case, how had it happened? She told herself she was being ridiculous. She had cruised over with four other people, on a boat, and that boat was right in front of her. So, unless everyone had swum back to the World’s End, they were still here, on the island.
She ambled back along the jetty and climbed up the ladder onto the boat. She tried to get a better view of the island’s coastline. The beach wrapped around the island so that she couldn’t see any further from where she was and there was no sign of the small boat from earlier. She looked in the other direction, noticing nothing but a mound of great big rocks. The hire boat man had advised that the rocks were uneven and too dangerous to climb so the guys couldn’t have taken that path.
Grace sensed, rather than heard, that there was someone behind her. She slowly turned around. She relaxed when she saw who it was.
"Jesus! You scared the crap out of me!" She laughed in relief. "Where have you been?"
"Sorry, I didn’t mean to frighten you. God, it’s so warm today! I need a glass of water. Do you want a glass?"
They descended the steps to the cabin.
****
Grace observed the plane gliding through the sky. The vessel appeared to float as it moved effortlessly through puffs of white clouds in acres of blue. She wondered about the people on board, who they were and where they were going. Whoever they were, she was sure they couldn’t see her on the beach below. She could not feel her feet anymore. She must have blacked out, but she had no clue for how long. She felt a sharp pain as she tried to lift her head and she closed her eyes tight, gritting her teeth to silence the scream.
What had happened? She had been on a boat, she knew that much, and she had been drinking red wine. Grace didn’t like red wine, but she knew that is what she’d been drinking. And there had been a lot of laughter. One of the men had been telling a story, she couldn’t remember the details, but the others had roared with laughter. There had been food. A barbeque? She remembered falling asleep on the sand, and then she was back on the boat. And there was a guy, wasn’t there? He had been watching her intently. He had made her feel nervous. Had he moved a little closer to her, whispered something in her ear? Or had he touched her neck? She had pushed him away, maybe a little too harshly. But she hadn’t meant to be harsh. She had walked away from him. An image came into her mind and then it was gone. But she felt sure that someone had been watching her.
She was surrounded by sea, everywhere she looked. How the hell was she going to survive this? She tasted the bile in the back of her throat and she inhaled as much air into her lungs as she possibly could to alleviate the sour taste. She was going to die out here, she was sure of it. And nobody would know where she was or what had happened to her.
The World's End is published by Poolbeg Press
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