The Wilds: A Novel

Book 3: Detective Elin Warner Series

by Sarah Pearse

Genres: Women's Fiction; Psychological Thrillers

Synopsis

THE NEW ELIN WARNER THRILLER FROM THE NO.1 SUNDAY TIMES BESTSELLING AUTHOR OF THE SANATORIUM AND THE RETREAT

If you lose yourself in nature
Make sure you can find your way back...

Kier Templer lives her life on the road. Dubbed 'the monster's daughter' after her mother's infamous crime, she's left her hometown and twin behind. One thing still ties her to her brother - the maps she creates and sends him of the places she's been. But then she vanishes from the Portuguese national park, with no map and no trace.

Detective Elin Warner arrives in the park ready to go off-grid and forget the stalker who has been shadowing her steps. When she discovers Kier's final, disturbing map, Elin can tell Kier didn't vanish by choice, but in the wilderness she has to tread carefully. The few strangers on the lonely campsite seem to close ranks against her questions.

Elin must untangle the clues Kier left to find out what really happened. But when you follow a trail, you have to be careful to watch your own back...

Release date: July 16, 2024

Publisher: Pamela Dorman Books

Print pages: 368

Sample

Prologue

The van comes to life at night: there’s a warmth inside when the lights are on, an intimacy that makes me feel cocooned. It softens the van’s hard edges: the blocky, utilitarian shapes of the stove and fridge, the packets of food stacked up by the sink.

But it’s also the time of day when I feel most vulnerable.

The van reveals everything when shadows start to creep over the land outside, the lights illuminating exactly who I am, what makes me tick. Not just my possessions—my books and paintings, but my foibles and routine. Every little movement I make.

Although I try not to think about it, it’s frightening, imagining what the van looks like from outside, small, isolated, the sole thing lit up among the darkness.

I glance through the window. The park is almost properly dark now; trees nothing more than opaque imprints against the sky. Night seems to creep over the land quicker here, a sudden plunge into gloom.

Even in dusk, this has become my favorite part of this place—this view—the river snaking

a line through the valley, the trees behind rising to villages at the foothills of the mountain. Cloud seems to permanently hover above the roofs, as if the houses have taken a breath, collectively exhaled.

I turn back, my gaze pulled to the piece of paper on the table in front of me.

With every line I’ve drawn, I’ve left pieces of myself. First kisses. The rooftop hideout. Bonfire fields that turn the sky to glow.

For a moment, I’m transported back to when I first arrived. Sticky spills of warm beer. Laughter.

I smile. It falters.

A noise from outside. Not the usual soundtrack to the national park—birdsong, leaves being dusted down by the wind—but something more deliberate.

Footsteps, scuffing through the dirt.

All at once, the small space inside the van becomes even smaller, walls contracting, closing in. The space no longer seems cozy; but cloistered, airless.

I hold my breath, send another glance through the window.

The darkness outside reveals nothing. Only shifting shapes, the faint outlines of branches reaching out to one another.

But then there’s a clang. Metal on metal.

My insides fold, then fold again. I remember what Mum used to call it: gut origami.

Standing up, I snatch the piece of paper from the table, frantically looking around.

I need to hide it.

Bending down to the cupboard, I bump into the shelf and knock over the salt grinder. The lid isn’t screwed on properly, and salt scatters across the floor.

When I drag my gaze up, there’s a face at the window.

My body does a hard stop. Blood, breath, heart—nothing moves.

Despite the shadows, I can see it: anger.

I take a breath but make no move to run. No surprise, more resignation.

Perhaps, deep down, I knew it would end like this.

Maybe, from the very beginning, the narrative was set.

You can’t outrun a monster.

I should have known that from the start.

 

1

KierDEVON, JULY 2018

Iread the other day that people who like to travel have a certain gene. An actual, bona fide, wanderlust gene.

It’s called DRD4 7R and it apparently influences your dopamine levels, your tolerance for risk-taking—basically, the behaviors common in people who love to travel.

Now I’m checking out everyone, no matter what tribe—the luxe travelers, the culture vultures, the vanlife crowd—imagining us all sharing the same piece of rogue DNA.

I told Zeph about it yesterday and he laughed. Said the only thing we all have in common is that we’re escaping something. Or someone. It’s a Zeph thing to say, to veer into melodrama. It’s the chef in him, his friend said. They’re creatives, thrive on emotion, drama.

His friend’s right, I think: Zeph’s cooking our breakfast now, all big, bold gestures

that leave no room for doubt. Loudly cracking the eggs against the pan, he drops them into the tomato stew to poach.

Huevos rancheros. Our favorite. The best thing to cook in a van. Eggshells tossed in the trash, Zeph rubs his head, palm rasping against his buzz cut. His features soften, he’s done the hard work, making the stew itself—frying the onions to translucency, adding peppers, chilies, and garlic, then bay leaves, tomatoes, seasoning. It’s now thick, reduced.

Lifting a spoon to his lips, he tastes, smiles. I can’t help but smile too. I love watching him cook; it’s the only time he isn’t fighting a part of himself.

“Nearly there.” Sensing me watching, Zeph reaches for a buckwheat pancake, lightly frying it in the pan on the other burner, already sizzling with fat. “Hungry?”

“Starving.” I look out to sea. The breeze is tearing navy slashes through the turquoise, ragged lines pulling from left to right.

We designed the van so that the kitchen faces out, to take in views like this. And this view is something special. Although I’ve traveled all over, this stretch of Devon coastline will always be my favorite—tiny coves of sand and pebble, rust-red cliffs, and trees that creep right down to the water.

I learned to swim in this water; kissed in this water; washed bloody, rock-grazed knees in it. I feel the rhythm of it inside me even when I’m miles away.

Zeph hums under his breath as he switches off the burner. Eggs done, he takes the pan to the table, balancing the pancakes and a bowl of grated cheddar on his arm.

I follow with the stew, place it on the table, pushing aside the map I’m working on.

Heaping cheese on the pancake, I spoon egg and stew on top, then greedily push it into my mouth. Texture first, the bite of the pancake, soft egg, before flavors hit, little fireworks of taste. “Amazing.” I wipe my mouth, take another bite.

Zeph smiles, blue eyes creasing at the corners. This is what he does; takes something that could be ordinary and makes it explode in your mouth. He was a chef until a few years ago, ran a successful restaurant in New York. His thing was doing meat and vegan food together way before vegan became fashionable.

Soon, his vegan stuff was all people talked about. For a while, he was everything. He was named Best New Chef in Food & Wine magazine, did a TEDx Talk, made it into Forbes’ list of All-Star New York Eateries three years in a row, and was even nominated for Rising Star

Chef in America by the James Beard Foundation.

He told me stories of celebrities who’d book out the entire restaurant, all show, and ones who came in incognito, cap pulled down low over their face. I looked him up online and found hundreds of articles—insider and feature pieces, various interviews and reviews on social media.

It became a thing for a while for people to go in, have their photo taken with him. You know the kind of shots—moody-looking chef, over-enthusiastic guest getting a little too close.

And he looked good in these photos; just the right kind of sweaty, one of those ironic nineties bandanna things in a lurid print that popped against his whites.

A stark contrast from when we met, during what he always describes as his “downward spiral.” I was in Italy, Liguria, traveling. He was on a break. Burn out, he told me, but I later found out he’d been fired.

On the back of three years of rumbling complaints, a sous-chef sued him. After nearly severing his finger with a knife, the sous-chef tried to leave to go to hospital, but Zeph asked him to superglue it together instead. The final straw apparently, after months of warnings from his backers. Bad press. People want a bad boy, but not too much. The superglue story went viral, and the tide turned against him. He became a pariah.

Not to me. The night we met he charmed me. Cooked up fat shrimp on the grill and told me stories that not only made me laugh but stole my heart piece by tiny piece.

“So, I want your thoughts on the map.” I take out the canvas, lay it on the table. I’ve painted it for my brother, a surprise wedding present for his fiancée.

“Beautiful.” He forks egg into his mouth. “She definitely doesn’t know about it?”

I shake my head. “She thinks I’m just working on the stationery for the wedding.”

It will be Penn’s surprise, but it’s no surprise to me that this will be his gift to her. These maps…they’re our thing, me and my brother.

My love of cartography started with my mum’s map collection. Her family were nomads, and she told us she hated leaving the places she loved. Places that held memories and places that were memories in themselves. Her way of carrying them with her was to take maps to remember them by.

I spent hours studying them as a kid, rolling the place-names over my tongue, working out their geography in my head, but after a while, I realized that while they told me about the place, they revealed nothing about her, what she’d done there, where she ate, danced, who she loved. What set her heart on fire.

So, for Mum’s birthday, I decided to paint our map of our town: places where we’d

left little pieces of our soul.

The landmarks weren’t hospitals or garages, but the bakery I went to with Mum while Penn was playing cricket. My grandparents’ house, where Christmas came alive in games and laughter. The beach where I learned to swim, where I’d come to have the last normal conversation with our mother, a place that even now, when I think about it, the words float above my head like stars.

My favorite thing to do with friends is to get them to draw their own map. It reveals so much about who they are, what they value. I’ve discovered that while most people move somewhere for practical reasons—budget, commuting distance—what ends up on their maps are the places that creep into their souls, places that make them feel alive. Free.

Work rarely features, even with people who say they live for their jobs. Instead, they draw their parents’ home, the gym that became their only contact with the outside world after their partner died, or the park where they chew the fat with friends every Friday.

Zeph’s still examining the map. “You’re nearly done?”

“Just about, only the last few points. I’m going to show Penn at the weekend, see if there’s anything he wants me to add.”

A pause. He pushes his plate aside. “So now you’ve finished, are you going to start the artwork for the book?” An edge layers his voice. Zeph’s talking about the cookbook. Luxe van food, street food. The kind of thing you can cook on a two-burner. A collaboration: his recipes, my illustration.

“Course.” I tear at the last pancake, dip it in the stew. “Have you done something different? More garlic, maybe, in the stew?” Dipping my fork in, I make a fuss of tasting it.

It’s the knife that forewarns me—the clatter of it against the plate.

I stiffen.

“Different?” He mimics me. “Have you done something different?” Standing up, he grabs his plate. “Let me guess, it’s not quite right, is it?”

Time slows. I’m suddenly acutely aware of everything; the hot pulse of the blood in my temple, the acute angle of his plate—tipped toward the floor, the watery, rusty rivulets of stew slowly dripping down the china.

I’m conscious of any tiny little movement of my face, as if somehow the right expression might have an impact on what’s to come next.

“If you don’t like it, you know what you can do—” He gestures tossing it out of the van, a wonky smile sitting alongside those words, his lips drawn tightly across his teeth, his eyes darting between me and

the sea beyond.

I continue to fork and then chew. Don’t make eye contact. Not right now. If you don’t say anything, do anything, then nothing can be misinterpreted.

As he shakes his head, walks away, I remind myself: This is what you like; people with fire in their belly.

It’s what this is, a result of his passion. Passion that, for now, has nowhere to go.

This idea he has for the book, it’s a good one. It will fly. That’s the phrase he uses.

We’re going to fly, Kier. Our relationship, the book, it’s all going to fly.

2

ElinPARQUE NACIONAL, PORTUGAL, OCTOBER 2021

“Are we close?” Elin Warner comes to a stop at the crest of the trail, her eyes tracing the narrow route winding up the peak ahead.

“Yeah, you can just about see the Airstreams from here.” Isaac, her brother, raises a hand, points. “Up there, on the right, above those trees.”

Following his gaze, she squints. For a moment, the Airstreams are hard to distinguish from the hillside, bruised with shadow, but as the light shifts, she glimpses one, sunlight bouncing off its metal flank. 

“Let me guess, best view in the house.”

“Top of the world.”

She absorbs it all: seven hundred thousand square meters of Portuguese national park spread over four granite massifs. Huge forests of pine and oak, steep valleys rising to dramatic, rocky peaks. Beautiful, but daunting.

A vast, unconquerable mass. With every step, every turn, the park throws up more—more land, more trees, mountains playing out echoes of themselves. This kind of scale has always terrified her. Places so big that individual detail fades away and all you see is the mass.

Elin thinks about what Isaac told her earlier, about people disappearing here. You could imagine it—being seamlessly absorbed into the depth and breadth of the park.

They keep walking, following the dusty, scrubby path as it winds up the hill.

Striding ahead, Isaac picks up the pace. A few minutes in, the nagging in her rib tips over to a dull throb. “Hold on, I need a minute.”

Isaac stops, rocking back on his heels. He runs a hand through his dark curls.

The gesture’s so familiar, for a moment time slips. They’re kids again, all three of them. Everything’s right with the world.

Shaking the feeling loose, Elin pulls her water bottle from her pack. She flips the cap, takes a long drink.

“Better?” Isaac’s watching her.

“Yeah. Just the rib complaining…we’ve done a lot the past few days.” Too much, she thinks, remembering the doctor’s warning. Take it easy.

But that’s the last thing she’s done. Since they arrived at the park yesterday morning, she’s thrown herself into it—the first hike to the hut, the longer one today to the Airstreams.

She couldn’t help it. Each step she’s taken, every hill they’ve climbed, feels like she’s putting distance between her and life back in Devon. The past few months…they’d been tough. A challenging case, her first real case as a Detective Sergeant since her career break, the split with her ex, Will.

She needed this, wanted to squeeze the most from every moment.

“Sure? We can stop for a bit before we do the last section.” Isaac looks at her, a hesitancy in his eyes. It’s been like this since they arrived in the park—not quite treading on eggshells, but an almost formal politeness to their conversations instead of the banter you’d expect between siblings.

But that’s natural, she reminds herself. It’s still fragile between her and Isaac.

Raw and new. Bar a few phone calls and messages, they’d been pretty much estranged until recently. Four years of minimal contact, awkward conversations. This trip…it’s a baby step, one she’s wary of screwing up.

They had form on that. Trips gone wrong. Last year, visiting him in Switzerland, Elin had ended up investigating the murder of Isaac’s fiancée, Laure.

Hardly the dream reunion.

“Sure.” She’s about to put the bottle away when there’s a movement in the copse of oak trees a few feet away.

A sudden flash of color.

Elin slowly exhales as a deer darts across the track, a dark blur against the foliage.

Pulse slowing, she feels relief, yes, but disappointment too; stupid to think she’d outrun it by coming here. These past few months, looking for what’s lurking in the shadows has become the default, as automatic as breathing.

“This place keeps catching us out, doesn’t it?” Isaac watches as the deer disappears into the woodland, sending a cluster of low-hanging branches shuddering.

“At every turn.” The park was full of tricks like this: Abandoned buildings appearing between the trees. Swirling pockets of fog. Roadside shrines with colors that can pull the breath from you.

They start walking again.

“You been doing much of this since you got out of hospital?” Isaac asks.

“A bit…gentle stuff. Running’s off the cards for the foreseeable, so I’ve been walking instead.” She looks at him sideways. “I was about to ask the same question, but looking at you, I reckon I know the answer.”

“Yeah.” He smiles. “Did a lot over the summer…trail running too.” He’s playing it down, Elin thinks, examining the lines of muscle in his legs. There’s a solidity about him. A new kind of strength. “It’s helped, you know, since Laure.”

“How’s it been going?” she asks tentatively. “I know we’ve not really talked about it.”

“All right, I’m getting there.” Abruptly, he turns, pointing out a bird swooping low above them. “Looks like some kind of swift,” he murmurs.

Too much too soon, she thinks, watching him.

She’s not going to push it.

Getting to know each other again…it doesn’t have to be something hurried. Pressured. This is what this trip is about—taking their time, feeling their way. The next few weeks are just about the two of them.

The two of them and this, Elin thinks, looking around her.

The track ahead is winding, forking, and then forking again. Branches encroaching over the trail that drew you in while simultaneously pushing you back. An enigma, like every part of this landscape.

A few days in, she had the feeling that, like Isaac, she hasn’t even scratched the surface.

3

KierDEVON, JULY 2018

“Guessing there’s no need to knock.”

Every bit of me lurches. He’s stood just outside the open door in high tops, jeans, a threadbare T-shirt, a wide smile on his face.

My twin brother, Penn.

Woody barrels out from between my legs, nearly knocking me flying. Penn bends, scratches his back, screwing up his eyes as the dog lunges up to lick his face.

“What about me?” I don’t want just a hug, I want to breathe him in, meld him to me.

Straightening up, he wraps his arms around me. “Fuck, I’ve missed you.”

“Same.” I hold him for a minute before we pull back, stare at each other. It’s always like this when we’ve been apart. Intense scrutinization, trying to work out if we’ve missed anything new. But apart from a haircut,

fair hair cropped a little shorter, he’s unchanged.

Penn clears his throat, embarrassed at what I can see are tears in his eyes.

“Softie.” I blink back my own.

“No Zeph?”

“Swim. He’ll be back in a bit.”

Penn nods. “So how is it traveling with someone? I want the inside story, not the PR lines you’ve been palming me off with so far. Must be hard, seeing as you’ve only got me to compare with…always pretty seamless—”

“Yeah, yeah.” I roll my eyes, but traveling with Penn is seamless. The first camping trip I took with him was to Spain, near the cliffs. We arrived after dark, but it was spectacular in the morning, watching the waves crashing to the shore, the blue skies that seemed to go on forever.

Early mornings when you’re camping always hold something raw and special. An Earth-fuck, my friend calls it. When you’re so at one with nature, it becomes out of body. Transcendental. The world hitting you full in the face, striking the very primal part of you.

You never get it in a house. By the time you’ve checked your phone, drunk your coffee, it’s too late. Blinkers on.

“So, do I get a tour?”

“Course. This wood paneling on the ceiling and floors is all new…we put the kitchen by the doors so Zeph can see out when he’s cooking.” Penn runs his hands over the wooden countertop. “The kitchen’s bespoke.” I point out the cooktop, drawers underneath, the oven below the countertop, the sink and shelves above loaded with oils and spices.

“And sleeping is back here.”

Poking his head into the back, he laughs. “Let me guess, this was your idea.” He nods at the hollow carved out above for my books.

I point at the driver’s area. “So was this. The front seats swivel round, and you can flip out this desk to create a makeshift office.” I take him through the rest of our hacks. The jet boil. Gel pads so our pots and glasses don’t fall when we’re moving. Fridge, water heater, cup hooks. The wall library for our books and maps.

I’m talking fast, too fast, because under his gaze, everything seems slightly smaller, shabbier. It’s not him. He’s not judging—I am. I’m comparing it to

their Victorian terrace by the estuary. I want his approval, for him not just to like it, but to feel a flicker of jealousy to verify I made the right choice.

But there isn’t a flicker; instead he’s kind. Too kind, too hearty. It’s forced, and that’s a bad sign. He’s now exclaiming, overemphasizing. Loving it all. No one could love a gel pad that much, let alone want one for their own house. He even asks me to send him the link.

Beneath that overenthusiasm is pity; he feels sorry for me. Sorry that at thirty-three I can’t settle, and he’s trying to cover it up.

Straightening, he knocks his head on the plant I have hanging from the ceiling, sending it wildly swinging backward and forward. “This doesn’t get claustrophobic at all?”

Finally, a criticism. My shoulders sag in relief.

“Only if you don’t get on with each other.” A rasping laugh.

Penn and I turn. Zeph’s back, shirtless, a towel wrapped around his waist. Smiling, he stretches out a hand to Penn. “Nice to finally meet, and sorry for the late arrival, I…” His words fade as he pauses, looking between us. “Nonidentical…I don’t know…”

People often say that. Despite the fact he’s almost a foot taller than me and a bloke, Penn and I share something you can’t quite grasp in photos. How we smile, eyes creasing up at the corners, the brow furrow when we’re concentrating on something. I like to think it’s the sheer amount of time we’ve spent together, subconsciously mirroring each other. Genes, together with the alchemy of time.

“Beer?” I ask, but as I turn, I trip over Zeph’s foot. An awkward dance as I try to right myself.

“What were you saying about it not being claustrophobic?” Penn laughs and I notice his eyes tracing Zeph’s tattoos.

Zeph tenses. He’s not always good at people taking the piss.

“That’s only because you’re here,” I say quickly. “Zeph and I on our own. It…works.”

“Come on, it can’t be all hunky-dory.” Penn grins. “I love Mila, but if we were stuck together twenty-four seven in a place this size, I think we’d both lose the plot.”

I shrug. He doesn’t get the mutability of it all; how the van changes when there’s more than two of us in it. The space contracts. On our own, Zeph and I have a rhythm, a way of not getting under each other’s feet.

“We make it work.” Zeph changes the subject. “So, how’s the wedding planning going?

Must be on the home stretch now.”

“Yeah, thank god. No one’s getting out alive if it goes on any longer.”

“That bad?” Zeph laughs.

“It’s the detail that gets you in the end. When you start having to decide on exactly the number of flowers in each bouquet.” Smiling, Penn looks between us. “So…you two next?”

The question lingers before Zeph shakes his head. “Not there yet. We’ve only been together”—he looks to me—“what’s it been, nine months? Ten? No time.”

Penn tenses. I can tell the sentiment will piss him off. He hates flakes. Especially male ones. A legacy of a childhood like ours.

There’s an awkward silence before Zeph loudly cracks his knuckles. “Right, I’m going to shower. I’ll join you in a bit.” This is a cue; another thing you learn in a van. When to give each other space.

I look at Penn, grab another beer from the fridge. “Let’s go outside.”

We sit on the director’s chairs in front of the van, Woody beside us, and contemplate the view. The cove we’re parked up in is at the center of the bay, and it’s beautiful—a shimmering curve of water sheltered by tree-covered cliffs still unspoiled by development.

I take a swig of beer. “So, how’s it been down here? Busy?”

“It was. Tourists have thinned out in the past few weeks.”

“In prime season?” I watch the woman running past us. She’s making easy work of it as she navigates the rocky path above the beach; an effortless, rhythmic motion, cropped blonde hair shifting about her face with each stride.

“You haven’t heard?”

I shake my head, my eyes shifting back out to the beach. Burned sunbathers. Swimmers. Three sailboats marking a course.

“The boat murders. A couple of girls killed, out at sea. Messed up by the propeller.” His eyes skim over the water. “One of them was found not too far from here. They reckon it’s someone called Hayler.”

I shudder. “So maybe not the ideal lovers’ location.”

Penn catches my eye. “Is that what you two are, then, lovers?”

“You’re probing.”

He grins. “Maybe.”

“Come on, I know you’re itching to give your verdict.” I ruffle Woody’s ears.

“Hard to tell after a few minutes, but…” He exhales. “Wouldn’t really have put you together. He seems a bit…stressy.”

A beat passes. “Honestly, he’s good, Penn. We…fit.” My voice pitches higher.

Penn looks at me. The air between us is fat and heavy, like a sponge. I want to squeeze it, let the weight fall away.

Beer has pooled on the top of his can. He slurps it away. “Ignore me. You know

what I’m like, K, since Mum, when you meet someone new…I worry.”

Mum. I swallow hard. “You can’t vet everyone.”

Penn gives me a crooked smile. “I can try.” He looks back to the sea. “So, you’re coming to ours on Saturday, yeah? Show us the stationery?”

“Yeah. I’m picking up the final designs in town tomorrow. I—” I break off. Zeph’s appeared, now dressed, hoody thrown on over his shorts.

“Room for one more?” he says.

“There is, but I’m going to have to be antisocial.” Penn drains his beer, stands up. “I’d better head. Mila’s cooking.”

“Sure?” As I stand up, Zeph winds his hand around my waist, pulls me in close. He does this when we’re around other men, stakes his claim. But as his hand comes to rest against my spine, silver rings pressing against my flesh, all I can think is: This is my brother.

Penn’s face scrunches up like he’s seen something bad. “Right, I’m off.” He loudly crumples the can between his fingers.

Zeph steps forward. “I’ll take that.”

“Nah, won’t trouble you. There’s a bin up here. I’ll see you Saturday.” Penn smiles, but the rhythm in his speech sounds off. Too slow. Staccato.

The dog lurches after him, but I call him back.

I hear the can unkinking beneath Penn’s fingers as he puts distance between us, the metal making loud, random pops as he walks.

4

ElinPARQUE NACIONAL, PORTUGAL, OCTOBER 2021

“Okay, so you missed this part of the hike out.” Elin falters as the dirt track ahead peters out to a steep drop. Taking a few steps forward, she peers over the edge and then pulls back, her stomach lurching.

A river.

In any other circumstance, the frothing white water would be the main attraction, but her gaze is now pulled instead to the bridge on their left, a crooked stone arch that looks like it’s seen better days.

“Never seen anything built quite like that before.” Moving closer, she examines it disconcerted. “Looks like a random pattern.” Stones, rimmed with moss, are haphazardly stacked one on top of another to form the arch. Halfway down, some are bulging, weeds pushing between the cracks.

“Medieval.” Isaac stops at the entrance to the bridge. “Locals call it the Devil’s Bridge. Meant to have been built by the big man himself. ...