The windscreen wipers sweeped angrily from side to side, battling each violent raindrop as the heavens continued to open on that wet, torrential evening in April 1996.
“Sweeped” should be swept.
Personally, I feel this sentence is a little long given that it doesn’t say much - I think shorter, punchier sentences would be better- and the blunt way that the date is plonked on the end reads a bit like a cliché (very “it was a dark and stormy night back in blah blah blah year”).
The violent raindrops doesn’t work for me; I think you could probably find a better metaphor although I’m not sure it’s needed. I think the windscreen wipers sweeping angrily is enough on its own.
I don’t think an evening can be torrential; torrential refers to the rain itself.
…on that wet, torrential evening in April 1996. Everyone had been expecting an early heatwave that bank holiday weekend and the evidence of that was clear as Tom Williams watched the young adults of the town stumble clumsily across the pebble stones in and out of the various bars on Epney Road, shielding their summer clothing with last minute umbrellas and holding jackets over their heads.
The use of “that wet, torrential evening” and “that bank holiday” so close together is jarring for me.
The sentence starting “Everyone had been expecting…” is WAY too long and wordy. It’s hard to follow and doesn’t paint a picture for me; I had to re-read it to try and actually imagine the scene.
Pebble stones = cobblestones?
”Last minute umbrellas” doesn’t work for me. Why are they “last minute”? Why are people taking umbrellas out when they are expecting a heatwave?
He was amusingly reminiscing his own youth as Ruby Collier yanked open the door and threw herself down on the back seat with a grateful sigh.
“Amusingly reminiscing” sounds as though the fact he is reminiscing is itself amusing. I think you are trying to convey a sense that he’s amusing himself by reminiscing about the days when he was stumbling in and out of those same bars and getting caught in rain etc but it doesn’t come across.
I think I would have introduced the fact that he was a cabbie before this point; I was a bit “ooh hang on, why?” when she got in the car, but then it’s not a huge payoff when the big reveal is just that he’s a cab driver and she’s a customer.
He had been a cab driver for 25 years at that point and knew every street within a 15 mile radius. So when she asked to be taken to North Street he knew exactly what route to take.
As above, I’d have introduced his job before this point.
This is also a lot of words that don’t tell us much, but also don’t offer anything in the way of atmosphere, suspense building, scene building etc. I’d cut this.
She had been his eleventh passenger that night, a night that had been nothing out of the ordinary. Except it wasn't
Just double check your grammar here. Also it doesn’t make sense the way I think you’re intending. “Except it wasn’t” isn’t right I don’t think. “Except” obviously implies you’re revealing that things weren’t as they seemed, but then “it wasn’t” would mean that he was right first time, it wasn’t out of the ordinary. Does that make sense?
twenty years later it still haunted him and he still hated the association.
What association? This bit is unclear to me.
Hanging around his neck like an unwanted burden that refused to go away like a wasp buzzing around his head.
”like a” twice in one sentence doesn’t work. I don’t think you need a simile here; it feels a bit forced.
Because he had been the last link in the chain. His name was forever tainted to that night.
“Tainted to” doesn’t make sense. “Tainted by”? “Connected to”?
After he dropped Ruby Collier to her destination on the outside of a disused train station, nobody ever saw her again.
I don’t think a cabbie would drop a young woman who’s potentially been drinking in bars (I’m assuming she’s young because you talked about the young adults of the town at the beginning.) off at a disused train station and think that it’s perfectly normal and safe.
I like this as a paragraph closer, and it’s intriguing. I think it could be more impactful in terms of style. This is the second time you are using her full name. I would use her full name once and then use a description of her for the other reference. I’d probably keep her name at the end because it feels more reminiscent of a missing person news report i.e. factual. “At 11:23pm, he dropped Ruby Collier off at X,Y,Z and she was never seen again.” Something along those lines.
I like the premise and I think this could be a great opener with some tweaking!