On the couch, her hands over her ears as the argument raged, Amy snapped and slammed her fists down on the cushions. ‘Shut up, both of you! This is getting us nowhere.’
‘Yeah, well, you shouldn’t make out like I’m the bad one,’ Mark muttered. ‘They might believe you, but they don’t know what you’re really like.’
‘To be honest, I don’t care what you think about me any more,’ Amy told him wearily. ‘I just want to find my daughter.’
‘Can you think where he might have taken her?’ Steve asked, swallowing the rage that had almost propelled him to smack his one-time best mate in the mouth.
‘No.’ Amy shook her head, her mind racing over various possibilities. ‘I’m trying to remember where he’s taken me in the last few months, but I was out of my head most of the time, so it’s all hazy.’
‘Well, you’d best hurry up and start thinking,’ said Mark irritably. ‘The longer he’s got her, the more chance he’ll have to hurt her.’
‘Do you think I don’t know that?’ Amy glared at him. Then, standing, she marched towards the door.
‘Where are you going?’ Steve called after her. ‘You’re not going on your own – we’re coming with you.’
‘I just need the toilet,’ she lied. ‘I’ll be back in a minute.’
Steve turned to Mark when she closed the door and shook his head. ‘This is all your fault, this. You’ve got no fucking clue what you’ve done to that girl, have you?’
‘What I’ve done to her?’ Mark retorted indignantly. ‘You saw the state of the kids when I took them.’
‘What did you expect? You abandoned them! And now you’ve got the cheek to stand here and make out like—’
‘Steve, she’s going!’ Layla interrupted, struggling to pull herself up out of her seat when she saw Amy running down the path. ‘Quick, go after her!’
Aware that Steve and Mark would follow when they realised she had sneaked out, Amy ran down the road and hid in an alley until Steve’s car had driven past. Then, zipping up Kelvin’s freshly washed hoodie, she set off in the opposite direction. Yates had said that she would know where to find him, but she didn’t have a clue. But she wasn’t going to find him by standing there thinking about it.
As she walked, a cold feeling of finality began to settle over her. Mark had been her world since she was fourteen years of age, and even after everything that had happened because of him her heart had still ached at the sight of him. But he’d made it quite clear that he considered her responsible for all this, and that had killed off the last stupid bit of hope she’d been harbouring of them getting back together in the future. Whatever happened now – if she even managed to get out of this alive – there was no going back. Mark was as dead to her as she had obviously been to him for the last few months.
37
Cassie’s tear-swollen eyes were stinging from the effort of trying to keep them open. Uncle Lenny had taken her to his flat after leaving Jenny’s and they had stayed there for ages, which had been horrible because it smelled bad and there were flies everywhere.
He had been nice to her to start with, giving her a can of Coke and a packet of crisps, and putting the TV on so she could watch cartoons while he smoked his strange-smelling cigarettes and sniffed his medicine powder. But, after a few hours of constantly getting up to look out of the window, he’d started to pace up and down the room and talk to himself. And that had scared Cassie, so she had tried to shrink herself into the corner of his dirty couch in the hope that he might forget she was there.
But he hadn’t forgotten, and when it started to get dark he’d taken her back down to the car and driven her here. Although she hadn’t realised where here was until they reached the house, because he’d parked a few streets away and made her walk through the field before lifting her over the back fence. Then she’d known, and her heart had soared at the sight of Bobby’s old bike sitting where he’d left it in the middle of the overgrown grass alongside her old skipping rope and headless Barbie doll. But the joy had quickly turned to sorrow when Yates opened the back door and pushed her inside.
In her dreams, Cassie always saw the house as it had been back when they were still a family. But the reality was shockingly different from those happy memories. It smelled even worse than Yates’s flat and, as dark as it was, she could see heaps of rubbish everywhere she looked. And without electric or gas, there was no TV to watch, or heating to take the chill off. But, after telling her to lie on the sofa, Uncle Lenny had brought down the quilt off her mum’s bed and covered her with it, so at least she was warm now.
As the faint, almost forgotten scent of her mother rose to her nostrils now, she lost the battle to stay awake and Yates, whose eyes had long ago adjusted to the dark, smiled to himself when he saw that she’d fallen asleep.
It wouldn’t be long now.
He’d made a mistake going to his own flat, but he’d forgotten that Amy had never actually been there. Still, she’d find him now, he was sure, because mothers were like that. Where their children were concerned, they had an inbuilt radar. At least, decent mothers did. The alkie bitch he’d been cursed with wouldn’t have spat on him if he’d been rolling on the floor in front of her with flames coming out of his eyes. But Amy loved her kids, so it wouldn’t be long.
Amy’s legs felt like jelly by the time she reached the house. She’d been walking around all day, and had just about given up on ever finding Yates.
After leaving Steve’s place she’d gone to Levenshulme, to see if anyone at Hawaii had seen him or heard from him. It had been closed, so she had gone to Moss Side instead, to The Beehive pub where Mark had told her he’d first met Yates. Nobody there knew where he lived – or, at least, they weren’t about to tell her if they did. So, from there, she’d walked aimlessly around the streets of Moss Side in the hope that Yates might drive past and see her. But he hadn’t. So now, finally, she had come home. Not because she expected Yates to be here, but to ask Marnie if she knew where he might be.
As she was walking past her own house en route to Marnie’s, a movement at her living-room window caught her eye and, even though she couldn’t see him, she instinctively knew that it was Yates.
Heart in her mouth, she turned and walked up the path.
Yates opened the door before she reached it and stepped aside to let her in before closing it again – quietly, so as not to alert the neighbours that something was going on. Then, turning to face her in the dark hall, he peered at her closely, a mess of conflicting emotions raging through him.
He knew she was scared: he could feel it and smell it. But there was a glimmer of defiance in her eyes, and her chin was raised as if she was ready for a fight. It was as if the old feistiness which had first attracted him to her had returned, and that excited him.
But it didn’t mean he was going to let her get away with making a fool of him.
‘So, the wanderer returns,’ he said, grinning nastily as he took a step towards her. ‘What’ve you got to say for yourself?’
Amy forced herself not to flinch as his breath enveloped her face. Her instincts, which had been dulled for so long, were sparking back to life with a vengeance. She sensed that he wanted to punish her for escaping him, but the fact that he hadn’t yet made a move made her wonder if she might not be able to turn the situation around. It would be tricky, because he wasn’t stable at the best of times, but even if he ended up killing her, she had to try – for Cassie’s sake.
‘I had to get away,’ she told him quietly. ‘My head was messed up, and I needed to sort it out.’
‘Is that right?’ Yates drawled. ‘And you really thought I’d just let you walk out on me?’
‘No, I knew you’d find me,’ said Amy, keeping her voice even and calm. ‘But I had to get straight, or I wouldn’t have stood a chance.’
‘A chance to what?’ Yates narrowed his eyes. He’d been waiting for this moment for weeks, had dreamed of torturing her and making her beg for mercy. But she was acting as
if she was here of her own free will, and that threw him.
‘To sort this mess out,’ said Amy, choosing her words carefully because she sensed that she was only going to get one shot at this. ‘I’ve been doing a lot of thinking since I left, and I kind of understand why you got so mad at me. You were good to me after Mark left, and I was horrible to you. But you should have given me a bit more time.’
‘For what?’
‘I don’t know.’ Amy shrugged. ‘To get to know you, I suppose. Mark’s the only lad I’d ever been with before you, and I felt guilty.’
‘He cheated on you,’ Yates reminded her. She sounded sincere, but no one had ever been truly sincere towards him before, so he wasn’t sure he could trust her.
‘I know.’ Amy sighed. ‘But I don’t care any more; I’m over him. So where do we go from here?’
‘Are you fucking with me?’ Yates was staring at her intently. ‘’Cos you know I don’t like being fucked with, so if you are, you’d best quit while you’re ahead.’
‘I’m too tired for games,’ Amy told him wearily. ‘If you’re going to do something, just do it. I’m not going to fight you. I just want to see Cassie and make sure she’s all right.’
‘Course she’s all right,’ snapped Yates. ‘What did you think I was gonna do to her?’
‘I didn’t mean it like that,’ Amy replied quietly, annoyed with herself for upsetting the fragile balance she’d achieved. ‘I just meant it’s late, and she must be scared. She’s not used to being away from her dad for so long.’
‘Yeah, well, she’s fine,’ Yates muttered. ‘Fast asleep.’
Amy licked her lips. ‘Can – can I see her?’
Yates pursed his lips and carried on staring at her for several long moments. Then, jerking his chin towards the living-room door, he said, ‘She’s in there.’
‘Thanks.’ Amy gave him a tiny grateful smile.
Her eyes brimmed when she entered the room and saw her daughter’s silhouetted shape beneath the quilt on the sofa. Treading carefully to avoid tripping on the rubbish that was strewn all around, she tiptoed across the floor and knelt beside her. It was the first time she’d seen her in months, and she couldn’t believe how much she’d grown. This child and her brother owned Amy’s heart, and she couldn’t believe that she had put them at risk. But whatever happened next, she would make sure that no harm came to them. And if the price of keeping them safe was to offer herself to the devil body and soul, then that was what she would do.
Yates was standing over her. Turning her head, Amy gazed up at him with tears streaming down her cheeks and whispered, ‘This is all I ever wanted, you know? That’s why it didn’t work out for us, ’cos it was killing me not to have them with me. But it’s too late now,’ she went on, regret thickening her voice. ‘They belong with Mark now, not me.’
She turned and gazed down at Cassie again. Then, taking a deep breath, she said, ‘I’ll come back, if that’s what you want. And I promise I’ll stay. But you’ve got to let her go home.’
‘Why should I believe you?’ Yates asked. ‘What’s to stop you from running off again the minute my back’s turned?’
‘What would be the point?’ Amy asked. ‘You’d only take her again.’
It was the wrong thing to say, and Yates switched in a flash.
‘You don’t really want to be with me at all,’ he spat. ‘You’re only saying you’ll stay to stop me from getting at her. I should have fucking known. You’re all the same, you slags. Tell me what I want to hear, then shaft me the first chance you get. Well, fuck you if you think I’m falling for your lies.’
Amy realised that she’d messed up, but she had to try and rectify it before he went crazy. So, making a massive effort to keep the terror from her voice, she looked him in the eye and said, ‘I’m not saying it’s going to be easy, ’cos it isn’t. You hurt me, and it’ll take time for me to trust you again. If this is going to work, you’ve got to respect me. I don’t want any more drugs, and I won’t sleep with men for money again. If you want me, you’ve got to meet me halfway.’
The pressure was building in Yates’s head again, and her words were bouncing around his brain like bullets. No woman had ever spoken to him like this before. Marnie never shut up, but everything she said was a lie designed to con money out of him. Amy was different. She always had been. That was why he’d had to break her the first time around: because she’d refused to give him a chance. But now she was offering what he’d wanted all along: the chance of a real relationship; just the two of them; no brats, and no lingering yearnings for her dickhead of an ex.
It could work.
‘Dream on, you little mong . . . she hates you, just like the rest of ’em did . . . Just like I did . . . And if a ma can’t love her own son, no one can!’
‘Shut up,’ Yates muttered, backing away from Amy. ‘Just keep your fucking mouth shut and let me think.’
Amy nodded and turned back to Cassie, praying that he would say they could start over. It would be hell on Earth, but she owed it to the kids.
Behind her, Yates sat down and pulled his wrap of coke out of his pocket. Unable to wait, he tipped a heap onto the back of his hand and snorted it straight up his nostrils. It smashed into the back of his throat like a burning freight train, and he grimaced as the pain ripped through his head. But, seconds later, the fog cleared and he knew he was back in control.
‘Get over here,’ he ordered. ‘And don’t even think about saying no, or you know what’ll happen.’
Amy squeezed her eyes shut as bile rose into her throat. Then, taking a deep breath, she said, ‘Not here. Not in front of Cassie.’
Yates gritted his teeth and clenched his fists. But then, standing up, he said, ‘All right, upstairs, then. And hurry up about it.’
38
In desperate need of a wee, Marnie paid the driver, hopped out of the cab and rushed inside the house.
She’d been pissed off when Lenny walked out on her that morning, and her mood had deepened as the day dragged on with no word from him. Karaoke always cheered her up, so she’d readily agreed when her sister had rung to ask if she wanted to go. But it hadn’t cheered her up this time. If anything, it had made her feel worse.
She was barely even showing yet but she felt like a beached whale, and she was sick to death of feeling nauseous all the time. And she was obviously throwing off mumsy vibes already, because not one single bloke had given her the eye all night. Not even the pissed-up rugby players who had been groping everyone from her fat sister to the bog-eyed, buck-toothed barmaid. And, to cap it all, she hadn’t even been able to have a proper drink, because her sister had gone all pregnancy-police on her.
After relieving herself, Marnie came back downstairs in search of alcohol to take the edge off her depression. But a faint sound when she walked into the living room stopped her in her tracks. Sure that it was coming from next door, she walked over to the wall that divided her house from Amy’s and pressed her ear against it.
It sounded like a child crying, but how was that possible? Amy hadn’t been back to the house in weeks, and the kids had been living with Mark for the best part of a year.
But that was definitely a child she could hear. And it didn’t seem like anyone was in any hurry to see what was wrong with it.
Curiosity getting the better of her, Marnie opened the door and tiptoed through the grass to take a peek through Amy’s window. It was pitch dark in there, so she couldn’t see anything. But she could hear the child even more clearly now.
She stepped over the small fence, walked up to Amy’s door and knocked a couple of times. She got no answer, but the crying stopped abruptly, so she raised the letter-box flap and called: ‘Amy . . . are you in there?’
When dead silence came back to her, she retreated back to her own house, wondering if she’d imagined it. Lenny talked to himself sometimes, as if he was having a conversation with someone invisible. Maybe it was a ghost?
Marnie tutted as the thoug
ht entered her head, and told herself to stop being so stupid. It was no ghost, it was definitely a real child she’d heard. And the only explanation she could think of was that Amy was back, and Mark must have let her have the kids for the night – and she’d gone back to her old tricks and left them on their own.
Angry now, she pulled her phone out of her bag and rang Amy’s mobile. It was switched off, so she called Mark instead. It was possible that Amy was asleep and hadn’t heard her knocking but, with her history, Marnie would rather be safe than sorry.
In a light sleep on Steve’s couch, Mark was jolted awake by the sound of his phone ringing. They had hit a brick wall in their search for Amy earlier, and after several hours of driving around had decided to come back here and wait for Yates or Amy to contact them. Hoping that it was one of them now, he sat up and snatched his phone off the table.
‘Mark, it’s me,’ Marnie said before he could speak. ‘Sorry if I’ve disturbed you, and I hope you don’t think I’m speaking out of turn, but I’m a bit worried.’
‘Why, what’s up?’ Mark was wide awake now. ‘Is it about Cassie? Have you seen her? Was Amy with her?’
‘I haven’t seen them,’ said Marnie. ‘But I’ve just heard Cass crying, and no one’s answering the door. I’m not being funny, but if you’ve let Amy have her for the night, I think you’d best come and check on her.’
‘What about Yates?’ Mark asked, already pulling his jacket on. ‘Have you seen him?’
‘Why?’ Suspicion leapt into Marnie’s voice. ‘What’s he got to do with anything?’
‘If Cassie’s there, he is an’ all,’ said Mark, trotting up the stairs and tapping on Steve’s bedroom door. He felt bad for disturbing them, because Layla had looked worn out when they got back. But if Marnie was right, he needed Steve to drive him over to the house.
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