by D. E. White
Karen’s phone rang and she snatched it up, one eye still on Holly. She snapped out yes and no and killed the call. ‘Got to get back to the prison. I can’t promise to tell you everything that’s going on, but I will try and level with you, okay?’
‘Why? If we’re being honest … you don’t have to tell me all this.’
‘You’re right, I don’t and I’m sharing a whole lot more than I normally would, because I have a gut feeling you might be key to whatever is about to go down. I also think you need to be careful, Holly, and ring me anytime if you are at all worried about anything.’ Her blue eyes were back to glacial and Holly shivered.
As she watched her cross the road with the other officer, and drive away, Holly thought about her mum. The pain was still there. You never forgot, of course, and at times she missed her terribly, but life went on and you went with it, carrying fresh scars from each new battle. For a while, as a teenager with access to pretty much any illegal substance she wanted to sample, she had been tempted, as Jay had, to blot out her grief with chemicals, or as her dad had done, with alcohol.
But instead she had turned to boxing, which had worked pretty well until Larissa’s murder turned her life upside down once again. Then when Jay went, she’d been almost glad her mum hadn’t been there to see it, hadn’t had to search for her son and then declare him dead. But as she got her life on track, and especially when she was pregnant, when Milo was a baby, she would catch herself thinking how many things she wanted to ask her mum, and how much she would have loved being a gran.
Her phone buzzed with another message, and she saw she had three missed calls, one from Lydia, the others from Cath. What could she say? Apart from, ‘Oh shit, the police think Jayden’s alive and has somehow got Alexi and Roman murdered.’ It was the stuff of fantasy, or nightmares, and she wasn’t sure she could handle either.
Holly glanced in the mirror, and with an effort squared her shoulders and pulled her dark hair into a high ponytail. She raised her arms up for a stretch before stopping abruptly … It was a shock to realise she could slip back into her old routine, the old Holly, so easily. This was her pre-fight prep, when she mentally prepared herself for a boxing competition. She used to do it on a weekly basis. Somewhere deep inside, the fire was still there, and from the sound of the way things were going she was going to have to use it.
The past was dragging her back.
‘If you want to find him, we can try. I’ll go with whatever you decide.’ He paused and glanced sideways at her averted face. ‘Aren’t you glad he’s gone though? It solves a lot of problems.’
‘Yeah, sort of but only if he’s going to get clean. You don’t think he still owes Niko money, do you?’
Devril pulled her back down on the sofa. ‘Niko says he does. He reckons that Jay coughed up for the last lot, then bought a load of gear on credit. He told the boys he wanted a new start so he could be anywhere. Niko’s still pissed though. He needs Jayden, now he’s got nobody to work the North Street area. He’ll fucking kill him if he finds him, for bailing on the business and stealing the cash. Apparently Jayden took all the client contact numbers with him, and just walked.’
Holly turned, her face close to his. His arm was around her shoulders. ‘If he’s really gone I’m glad. I was just worried that … you know that Niko had done something to him. It’s got worse now the Nicholls are hanging around, causing trouble. There was that fight in the park last week and one of the boys got stabbed. This is serious; they aren’t kids with a bit of blow anymore. This is real money and hard stuff.’
‘I know.’ He kissed her. ‘That’s why I’m getting out too.’
She propped herself on her elbow. ‘Where are you going?’
‘Not far to start with, but I’m done with the Balintas and I want my own life. I’ve signed up for a PT course at college. Hell, I’ve got a great body and I reckon I can get people fit if I want.’
‘Modest, too, aren’t you?’
‘Always.’
‘That’s great, Dev, I’m so proud of you.’
‘Yeah, and you with your modelling and boxing. One day I’ll get one of those posh-boy apartments across the river.’
Dreams, stupid castles in the air, and young love. For a few months it actually did go all right. Devril studied and Holly competed, and they went out to all the hot places, with all the right people.
The Balinta family had spent the time consolidating their stranglehold over the surrounding towns, ruling the estate with fear and addiction. Their fragile alliance with the Nicholls led to fights with the other local pimps, and another stabbing made the local news. It led to various arrests. But there was no news about Jayden. He had vanished and Holly and Lydia hoped he really had started again.
Holly had begun to think about taking time out to travel with Devril, maybe apply for university. All her plans pissed off her dad. Donnie, with one child left to take over the business, wanted Holly to work with him. Things had to be kept in the family, he had insisted. The Nicholls’ haulage business, now nicely established in the area and spreading tendrils along the South coast and up towards London, was instrumental in trafficking vulnerable kids and drugs across the county lines, and they were making a fortune. Even though he was drinking more, and working less, Donnie couldn’t bear to see his slice of the action get eaten up.
But Jayden going had released Holly somehow, and she’d allowed herself to dream, to fall more in love with Devril, plan for a life doing anything other than working for her dad. Cath, a teenage mum with twins to look after, was bitter about Jayden’s departure and it was a sore subject. Jayden and Cath had always been linked, on and off, ever since school and most people assumed when she got pregnant he would stick by her. But he hadn’t. The first chance he got, he’d run.
In her heart Holly had felt it might be better this way. Cath was her best friend, but she and Jayden had been toxic together – dabbling in various drugs, joyriding, even a bit of arson down in the derelict warehouses further along the coast. Holly could remember flicking the TV on and watching the flames on the screen towering above the sea. Her brother and his girlfriend, curled up on the sofa, had been busy texting and putting pictures on social media. When she’d asked what they were doing, Cath proudly told her that they were responsible for the fire, adding it was the best high she had ever got when the flames took hold.
‘Holly, it was fucking amazing! The noise and the smell …’ She took a drag of her cigarette. ‘It was so hot I could feel the burn on my face from up on the hill.’
Holly looked at them blankly. ‘Why did you do that?’
Jayden rolled his eyes. ‘Because it was fun, and because we can. Just because you don’t ever to do anything wild, doesn’t mean we can’t break out a bit.’
Cath pretended to be engrossed in her phone. Jayden would often slate his sister, but although she didn’t ever join in, Cath rarely told him to shut up.
And it was all fine, until the day Jayden called Holly, desperate and afraid. And she had failed him. The one time it was true, all she had felt was anger, anger that it would all begin again, anger that her brother could be weak enough to fall back into the junkie trap.
Chapter 12
Holly zipped a hoodie over her uniform, yelled to Lydia that there was pizza for Milo’s dinner, and walked out the door, praying she wasn’t running too late. If she missed this bus, it was a twenty-minute wait for the next. Walking faster, despite the niggling pain in her leg, she sighed in frustration. Normally she would have been running.
Her phone rang, and she fished it quickly out of her bag. Tom’s number flashed up on the screen. It had been such a relief not to have to speak to him since his visit. Emailing over childcare had quickly become a far more efficient and less stressful way of communication.
‘Hallo, Holly. I’ll make this quick, but Beth insisted I should tell you before you heard any gossip.’
Holly waited in silence, heart thudding, her boots sloshing through puddles on the
pavement.
‘Holly? Are you still there? I said Beth wanted me to let you know she is pregnant.’
Without hesitation Holly pressed a button to end the call. Her road, with its steady stream of traffic, the red-brick houses, the scrubby hedges, all seemed miles away. She took a hold of herself. So Beth was pregnant. So what? It could be good news. Tom might lose interest in Milo. She told herself she didn’t care, but it was another kick in the gut.
The pale February sunshine had dragged the weeds from their winter slumbers, and green shoots decorated the grass around the bus shelter. Only a couple of minutes to spare, but she’d made it. She was working a two till midnight shift, and thanked God for the coffee and Haribos that weighed her bag down. Friday night shifts were always busy.
After a couple of days’ respite, her ex-husband had sent a random text last night. It was nasty, vitriolic and totally unnecessary. Holly scrolled through until found it, and replied carefully:
Please stop sending me messages.
That would do. She had asked him to stop, and much as she wanted to add her own brand of vitriol, if she was taking this further she needed to keep control, be blameless. When would Beth find out what an arsehole Tom really was? Pregnant. Jesus, poor girl, being stuck with that control freak. No doubt in a few years’ time he would get bored with her, or she might dare to voice some opinions, or get a job he didn’t like, and she would be dumped as well.
Holly still hadn’t got around to getting another car. The insurance company hadn’t worked everything through yet, though they had promised a rental car whilst the claim was dealt with. In the meantime, the bus was fine. Although her injuries were healing fast, her leg was still slightly sore, and she wasn’t sure if she could even drive again yet.
A couple of men walked past, then an old lady with an Alsatian. She pretended to be engrossed in something on her phone, but she was checking them all out. Maybe Alexi and Roman had pissed someone else off, well, of course they had, but enough to kill them and blame it on Larissa’s murder?
Holly sent a quick guilty text to her dad, saying she hoped he was okay, but not mentioning Jayden. She wondered if he had even answered the door to the police. Probably not. Lydia had been in a right state about Jayden’s son though, and she was heading up to the hospital tomorrow to see the child. The more recent news of the Balinta double murder hadn’t bothered her half as much, except where it might concern Jayden. Holly had tried to talk her out of going to the hospital, still worried that someone was targeting her and the family, but Lydia was having none of it. Family was the only thing that mattered to her and she’d always taken it badly that they’d been unable to help Jayden.
The night of the crash, her fear and confusion at the two jostling drivers, had become blurred in the last week. She had dismissed the idea that either car had been intentionally trying to push her off the road, but unable to get the boy out of her mind, she fitted in a quick trip to the hospital yesterday afternoon, before the school run. The boy was still lying stiffly between his white sheets but this time she had been allowed in, talked softly to him, about Milo, about Jay as a child, about pretty much anything that came into her head.
When she left, she had dropped a quick kiss on his pale cheek and smoothed his brown hair from his closed eyes. Did the child know what she had done the night Larissa was murdered? That it was her fault? The hot rush of guilt, that had been buried for so long, shot right back up into her stomach, nausea making her swallow hard as she left his room, walking swiftly out of the hospital.
It wasn’t just that the whole thing was her fault, it was that when it came down to the wire she had failed Larissa in every sense. Whilst she’d been on the phone to the ambulance, she had been doing nothing but stare at the dead girl, and her bloody hands. It didn’t matter that Larissa had been past help. Holly had stood up in court and explained she had put her hands on the chest and been unable to do anything more. And she’d failed the baby, too. Failed to find it nestled in the cot, lifeless. Everyone had heard how she fucked up. Thank God they never knew the rest.
As the years had gone by, with Devril off the scene and Jayden dead, she had felt safer about her secret. Even confessing to Tom, just before they were married, had seemed like the right thing to do. He had said all the right things, but stashed away her memories to use against her. What would the police say if they knew the truth? Lydia and her dad would never speak to her again if they found out.
Shoving her problems away, she tried to switch gears into work mode. This wasn’t the kind of job where you could drift along with half your mind elsewhere. It required attention to detail and no mistakes. It was one of the reasons she enjoyed it.
As she walked through the doors to the tall, concrete and glass building, she sent Lydia a quick text, saying she would call Milo later to say goodnight. It was a ritual, and something that made her feel less guilty about leaving her son for the night. Not that he cared; in fact, he was always happy to spend time with Lydia, who enjoyed spoiling him rotten.
‘Hi, Holly, how are you feeling?’ Kevin, the security guard on reception beeped her into the main building.
‘Almost better, thanks, Kev. How’s the baby?’ She managed a grin and checked her watch. Ten minutes to go. Might as well be early for once.
‘Settling a bit more now, ta. We’re getting some sleep at last. I heard about your car crash. Did they find out who that other boy was?’
Holly shook her head, not wanting to share, not sure if she was even allowed to. ‘Not yet.’
‘Man, that is weird.’
‘Yeah. See you later, Kev.’
Kevin had worked on security for years now, and was always happy to chat. He was like family to pretty much every employee and Holly had never heard a bitchy comment pass his lips. His wife was dead lucky, and now they had a baby.
Her team leader was busy with paperwork, but he waved and smiled. The huge room was warm and bright, huge picture windows along four sides of the room showed the rain-soaked car park and the cranes on the building site next door.
Holly snagged an empty workstation, and various friends waved and smiled. The big screen on the wall at one end of the room showed the number of calls waiting. As usual it was flickering on red. Although it would be a tough shift, Holly felt herself relax a little. She was good at her job, and she loved it most of the time.
There was time to grab a coffee, take the piss out of Ben from Dispatch, and catch up with her colleague Ruby’s colourful love life before she plugged her headset in, and logged onto the computer. She checked her work emails, deleting most of the boring admin stuff, and pulled up her maps.
‘Hi, babes, you all right?’ Cath was sitting on her other side, and she ended her call and began typing notes.
‘Yeah fine. Is Colleen babysitting?’ Colleen was one of Cath’s elder sisters.
‘She’s got all the kids tonight, but you know what she’s like, she loves it,’ Cath said. She spun her chair round and lowered her voice. ‘You look like someone just slapped you in the face. What’s up? Is it Jayden or something to do with the Balintas? I heard Mason has gone mental and he wants blood from whoever killed his sons, pints of it. And Niko went straight over to the Nicholls’ yard and got into a fight with Rohan and Dixie. He swears it was them that ordered the hit on his brothers. He wants to see someone suffer.’
‘Yeah, you said, but this isn’t to do with that shit.’ Holly leant back in her chair, spinning slightly to her right, whispering as Ruby took a call on her other side. ‘Beth’s pregnant.’
‘No fucking way! That was quick. Or is that why Tom moved on so quickly?’
‘The thought had crossed my mind.’ Holly’s name popped up on the big screen, four from the top, and she took a big slug of coffee. She wondered vaguely about reverting to her maiden name, and decided she probably would. Holly Hughes sounded better than Holly Kendal, and she didn’t want to keep anything of Tom’s, didn’t want anything that tied them together. Tom had always
been so patronising about her ‘call centre’ job, taking it as personal insult that she chose to work, rather than studying for ‘something better’ – as he put it. He really was a total bastard. It was just a shame it had taken her so long to see it.
Her phone pinged and she hit the button, fingers poised over the keyboard. ‘Ambulance service, is the patient breathing?’
As the shift went on, she dealt with the calls methodically, topping up her coffee periodically. The night shift came on at six-thirty and included six new recruits. There were four women and two men, and they were all looking pretty terrified. Welcoming any extra distraction, Holly offered to mentor to one, and was given a pale, nervous girl called Sara. Holly grinned as Ruby promptly introduced herself to the best-looking of the two blokes, practically dragging him over to her computer.
It was a tough job, and staff turnover was high. Most people didn’t last more than a couple of months, and many were lost during the training, simply because they either didn’t pass the exams, or the combination of harrowing calls and shifts didn’t work for them. Holly had quit her degree soon after she and Tom got married. She had been trying to mould herself into the perfect housewife and mum, and couldn’t see any point in finishing a degree when she had no idea what job she was going to get at the end.
Later, when the fighting started, working with Cath at the ambulance service seemed a perfect way to atone for her past failure, and also appealed to the adrenalin junkie in her heart, which she had never quite managed to suppress.
‘Have you got kids?’ A couple of hours later, nearing the end of her shift, Holly had persuaded Sara to relax a little in between calls.
