by Mark Tilbury
And then an absurd thought: baby Jacob had kicked her. She propped herself up on one elbow and watched Hannah crawling towards her with something sharp and shiny in her hand.
Scissors! She’s got the scissors, Sweetcakes!
Connie wasn’t quick enough. Hannah brought the scissors down in an arc and stabbed her in the right-hand side of her neck. A thousand white-hot needles tattooed her brain.
She tricked you, Sweetcakes. Tricked you like one of those dirty little sneak-thieves that wait down a dark alley at night to rob you of your purse.
Hannah pulled the scissors out of Connie’s neck and lunged again. This time, the blades struck home just above her left breast. Connie screamed and dug her nails into Hannah’s cheek. She gouged the flesh.
The sneak thief broke free. Connie watched her scurry across the basement on all fours.
Good job she never stabbed you in your good eye, Sweetcakes. You’d have been reading braille for the rest of your life.
Was that supposed to offer her comfort? She pulled Da’s gun from the waistband of her trousers and flipped the safety catch to off. She tried to take aim, but tears blurred her vision and turned the sneak thief into fuzzy twins.
Shoot the bitch.
Connie wiped her good eye, aimed as well as she could, and fired. Her effort was rewarded with a blood-curdling scream. The sneak thief was clearly better as dishing out pain than she was at taking it. Wasn’t that always the way? She scrambled to her feet and wiped fresh tears out of her good eye. ‘I’m going to kill you. So help me God, I’m going to kill you.’
Steady, Sweetcakes. If you kill the sneak thief, you’ll kill baby Jacob.
Connie didn’t care. She didn’t trust the Wolf anymore. All his fussing and faffing about germs hadn’t exactly helped, had it? No. It had only made her forget how dangerous the little bitch really was.
The sneak thief looked at her with eyes full of spite. ‘I need a doctor.’
‘Shut up.’
‘Please.’
‘This isn’t the first time you’ve attacked me for no reason,’ Connie reminded her. ‘But it will be the last. As God is my witness, it will.’
‘You’re fucking mad.’
Connie took a wide berth around her and sat on the basement steps. She needed time to assess the situation. Take control. She touched the handle of the scissors with one trembling hand. She wanted to pull the blades out.
Might be best to leave them in there, Sweetcakes. You don’t want another open wound left at the mercy of infection.
Connie touched the wound in her neck. ‘I think that particular horse has bolted.’
The sneak thief sucked in breath through clenched teeth. ‘What the fuck are you talking about?’
‘Shut up. Just shut up. I’m not talking to you.’
‘Jesus. I—’
‘How could you do this to me? After all I’ve done for you?’
No comment. The last refuge of the sneak-thieves of this world. For now, the Wolf also exercised his right to remain silent, leaving Connie on her own to face her nemesis.
Chapter Thirty-Five
Ben pulled into the courtyard at Sunnyside. He sat in the car and tried to clear his head. Outside, a ferocious wind whipped up flurries of snow. There was no distinction between land and sky anymore, just a vast expanse of whiteness that seemed both virginal and deadly.
Now what was he supposed to do? March into Connie’s office and demand to know where Maddie was? He gripped the steering wheel tight enough to turn his knuckles as white as the snow outside.
Why don’t you phone first. See if Connie’s there?
Not a bad idea. Better than just showing up and confronting the woman. He pulled out his phone. Low battery. Shit. Just his bloody luck. He brought up the menu anyway and called Sunnyside.
After an eternity, which probably lasted no more than half a minute, a woman answered. She sounded as if she’d just run a marathon. ‘Sunnyside… Lisa… speaking.’
‘It’s Ben. Ben Whittle. I saw you the other day...’
A small laugh. ‘How could I forget. You upset Connie’s dad.’
Ben didn’t want to be reminded of that fiasco. ‘Is Connie available?’
‘No. She called in sick.’
Ben stomach flipped over. ‘Sick?’
‘Yeah. Must be something serious. She’s meant to be taking her dad home tomorrow. Judging by the weather, we might all end up snowed in.’
‘Did she say what was wrong with her?’
‘Allergic to Christmas, probably.’
Ben didn’t laugh. ‘What about Crowley? Have you seen him?’
‘Not for a few days. Hopefully Connie’s sacked him. Good riddance to bad rubbish, I say.’
‘Is there any chance you could give me Connie’s address? I really need to speak to her.’
‘Hang on a minute, I’ll go and look it up on the computer.’
Ben stared out the windscreen. If anything terrible happened to Maddie, he wouldn’t be able to carry on. She was his future. His reason for getting out of bed in the morning. He’d loved her from the very first time he’d seen her at youth club. Loved the way her beautiful green eyes seemed to be so full of sunshine when she smiled. The way she made him feel when she laughed at his lame jokes. The way she encouraged him with Old Joe, his ventriloquist dummy. The way her hand sometimes brushed against his when he helped her to serve refreshments. The little electric shock that travelled up his arm and went straight to his heart.
‘Hello? Ben?’ Lisa’s voice sounded distant. ‘Are you still there?’
‘Yeah. Hi.’
‘She lives at Fourwinds Cottage. That’s in Lower Pewsey. I’ve got the postcode if you want it for sat nav.’
Ben did.
‘OX14 4BU.’
‘And Lisa?’
‘Yes?’
‘Can you do me a favour?’
‘Sure.’
‘Don’t tell her I’ve been looking for her.’
Lisa laughed. ‘I wouldn’t tell that cow if I passed wind.’
Ben thanked her. He switched off the phone and put it on the passenger seat. He pulled slowly out of Sunnyside and ploughed a path through the ever deepening snow. The road back to Feelham wasn’t too bad, but he barely got above ten miles an hour as he negotiated the narrow country roads leading out to Lower Pewsey and beyond. The wipers just about managed to shovel the snow off the windscreen.
According to the sat nav, he was just over two miles away from his destination when an uprooted tree halted his progress. ‘Shit, shit, shit!’
Turn around.
He looked behind him. No way. The snow was banked up everywhere. Four or five feet high in places. Barely enough room to turn a bicycle around. The car stalled.
You’ll have to call someone. Your dad? The cops, maybe?
Good idea. Except the bloody useless thing was dead. He held it up in front of his face, as if trying to charge the battery by wishful thinking. ‘Please don’t do this to me.’
The phone didn’t seem to care that he was stuck in the middle of nowhere. It seemed to care even less that his girlfriend’s life was in danger. He threw into the passenger footwell. ‘Useless heap of shit.’
You have two choices: you can either wait here and hope someone comes along, or you can get out of the car and walk to Fourwinds.
Ben wasn’t dressed for an expedition in a snowstorm. His suit was already soaked, and his brogues were hardly designed to trek across snow. To make matters worse, his bad knee was throbbing like a bastard. He waited a good ten minutes in the vain hope that someone might come along and raise the alarm. But, of course, no one else seemed stupid enough to try to negotiate these treacherous roads in the appalling weather.
He got out of the car. The wind ripped the door out of his hand and then slammed it shut. The snow came half way up his shins, immediately soaking through his trousers and creeping down the backs of his shoes. Within half an hour of setting off, his body wanted to give
up and go back to the car. His teeth were chattering hard enough to break fillings.
One foot in front of the other. One step at a time. Maddie needs you.
A huge gust of wind hurled snow into his eyes. His arthritic knee buckled and almost folded in on itself. Pain burrowed deep into his joints. By the time he reached a fork in the road, he’d already fallen over three times. On the last occasion, he’d been sorely tempted to give in and just let the snow bury him.
Which way now, for God’s sake?
Two choices.
Three, including back to the car. The thought of firing up that engine and turning the heater on full blast was almost too much to bear. He looked over his shoulder. The whole world was painted white. He closed his eyes. The world was still painted white.
Go left!
Ben went left. Every step seemed to suck his feet deeper and deeper into the snow. He trudged on through the wintery wilderness. His simple philosophy of putting one foot in the other now seemed like a mammoth chore. His brain failed to coordinate his feet.
Gasping for air, he stood in the middle of nowhere and surveyed the vast white landscape. ‘Where am I?’ The words came out fused together. ‘WhereamI.’
You’re where you’re meant to be.
He gazed into the distance. It might help matters if he removed his shoes and took off his soaking wet socks. They were bogging him down.
Keep moving.
Easier said than done. Especially when you didn’t know where you were heading. The place began with an ‘eff’. He was sure of that. ‘Forty winks’, maybe. He tried to wipe snow out of his eyes, but he only succeeded in raking a nail across his cheek. The wind kissed the wound with razor-blade lips.
Keep moving.
He wrenched one foot out of the snow. The one that wasn’t attached to his arthritic knee. He put it down a few inches ahead of the other.
That’s good. Now the other one.
He looked at the hole in the snow where his other foot was buried. It seemed such a long way down. Like one of those fishing holes in the Arctic Circle. He pulled with all his strength and yanked it free.
Don’t stop.
Ben hobbled on. One painful step at a time. He started to develop a pathological hatred of snow. At one point he was actually convinced he was walking across the frozen wastes of the North Pole, dangerous predators lurking beneath the ice waiting to eat him alive.
Piranha fish. Razor sharp gnashers ready to strip you to the bone in seconds flat.
Ben stopped. He couldn’t go any further, piranha fish or not. He bent over and rested his hands on a snow-capped wall. He sucked icy air into his burning lungs. It would be so easy to just sink to his knees and roll over in the snow. Roll over and die.
Maddie needs you.
‘Maddie’s gone.’
She loves you.
‘What’s l-love got t-to do with it?’
There was a brick pillar next to the wall. Jutting out from the snow, the sharp edges of a wooden plaque. Ben wiped the snow away and revealed a name. Fourwinds Cottage.
He straightened up and saw a snow-covered bungalow about fifty feet away.
Fourwinds Cottage?
A large, black crow sat on top of a TV aerial bolted to the chimney. The bird cawed. A harsh screeching sound that sliced the sky in two. Halfway up the driveway, there was a car sitting in about two feet of snow. The car seemed to call to him, offering shelter and warmth. Ben staggered towards it, his soaking-wet socks squelching in his shoes. Icy water leaked down his back. Wind howled across the fields.
Ben hunkered down near the back wheel of the car, shielding himself from the wind. His breath came in shallow bursts. Now what did he do? There was a hollow thud. Ben peered around the back of the car towards the bungalow. Maybe Connie Sykes was shooting at him. He pleaded with the wind to stop howling. Shut its great big frosty gob for just one second and let him think.
The noise came again. Louder this time. A dustbin falling over? A tree? A gate ripped from its hinges?
Several more thuds. And then a muffled voice: ‘Help me.’
He was hearing things. Had to be.
‘Help me.’ This time the voice was more defined. A woman’s voice.
‘Wh-wh-who is it?’
‘Ben?’
Ben didn’t answer. Connie Sykes might be playing tricks on him. Messing with his head.
‘Ben? It’s me. Maddie.’
‘M-Maddie?’
‘I’m locked in the boot.’
Ben forced himself to stand. He swept snow off the boot lid with his arms. Every movement felt as if a flare had been set off in his joints. ‘I can’t f-find the boot c-catch.’
‘It’s in the front of the car. Down by the handbrake. The passenger door’s unlocked. Hurry!’
At first he thought the passenger door was locked, but it was just frozen to its seal. It took his last reserves of energy to pull it free. He fell to his knees and fumbled around the handbrake for the release button.
All done. Maddie was safe now. As safe as bungalows. Now he could crawl inside that lovely, warm car and go to sleep.
No. You have to get Maddie out of the boot.
Ben forced himself to stand. His body had aged fifty years. He hobbled back to the boot. He suddenly realised that he was no longer shivering. Maybe he was immune to the cold.
Maddie had already climbed out of the boot. ‘You took your time, Ben Whittle.’
Ben tried to smile, but his lips were frozen. ‘Jesus, Maddie, wh-what happened.’
‘We’d better get inside the car. Phone for help.’
‘I haven’t g-got my phone. The b-battery was d-dead. I left it in the c-car.’
‘Where’s the car?’
‘W-way back up the r-road. There was a tree b-blocking the road. I c-couldn’t get past it.’
‘Come on; let’s get out of this wind. I can’t hear myself think.’
Maddie reached through from the passenger seat and unlocked the back door. She helped Ben onto the backseat and then climbed in beside him. She closed the door and turned to look at Ben. His lips were a nasty shade of blue. His eyes rolled back in his head, and then came back again, like some sort of macabre fruit machine.
‘What h-happened?’
Maddie told him a brief version of events. About the visit to Crowley’s mother and how Connie Sykes had turned up at the mobile home brandishing a gun and taking her and Crowley hostage. ‘Then she put me down in the basement with Hannah.’
‘H-Hannah’s here?’
‘Yes.’
‘She’s s-still alive?’
Maddie nodded. ‘Connie wants her baby.’
‘Why?’
‘Because she’s a bloody fruitcake.’
‘H-how does Crowley f-fit into all this?’
‘He was blackmailing Connie.’
‘Why?’
Maddie shrugged. ‘Over some films, I think. So how did you find me?’
Ben told Maddie of his visit to Agnes Crowley. How she’d described the mystery policewoman. ‘She d-described Connie to a t-tee. Especially her eye. I knew for sure it w-was her.’
Maddie touched Ben’s cheek. ‘Your pupils are dilated.’
‘S-so?’
‘I think you’ve got hypothermia. There’s a blanket in the boot. I’m going to get it and cover you up.’
‘I’m all r-right. I don’t f-feel c-cold anymore.’
‘That’s what’s scaring me. I won’t be a minute.’
By the time she returned, Ben’s eyes looked glazed; his breathing was shallow. ‘Ben?’
His lips moved slightly.
Maddie wrapped the blanket around his shoulders and tucked it in around his legs. ‘Ben? Don’t go to sleep.’
‘Schleep.’
Maddie shook him. ‘Ben? Stay awake. Talk to me.’
Ben’s head flopped to one side.
Maddie lifted it back up. ‘Come on, Ben. You’ve got to stay awake. Please!’
Ben opened o
ne eye. ‘L-love you.’
‘I love you too. Now stay awake. I need to go inside and see what’s happened.’
Ben looked as if he was trying to figure out the meaning of life. ‘Huh?’
‘Stay awake. Okay?’
‘S-stay awake.’
‘I’ll be as quick as I can, okay?’
Ben nodded slowly.
Maddie kissed him on the cheek and left him flirting with unconsciousness on the backseat of Frank Crowley’s Mondeo.
Chapter Thirty-Six
Connie needed a doctor. Someone to pull those scissors out of her chest and treat the wound. A doctor with a hypodermic needle full of morphine and a pocket full of antibiotics. She didn’t fancy having a go at it herself. She didn’t want another open wound. The one in her neck was probably already turning septic and poisoning her bloodstream.
Try to stay positive, Sweetcakes.
That was all right for the Wolf to say. He wasn’t the one sitting here at the mercy of infectious disease. He wasn’t the one who was going to have to start again from scratch if the sneak thief died. She’d already had to abort the birth once. Five years ago next March. The experience had left her both traumatised and frustrated. The original birth mother had been a homeless girl. Connie had first seen her in Oxford sitting on a moth-eaten blanket and begging for loose change. The Wolf had told her to befriend the wretch and take her home. Connie wasn’t sure at first. The girl lacked pedigree; that much was evident by the haunted look in her eyes and her lowly position on the streets.
‘You were the one who said I had to choose carefully when we were back in Yarmsworth,’ Connie had reminded him, after a particularly lengthy argument. ‘What’s changed?’
Time’s ticking, Sweetcakes. Beggars can’t be choosers.
Connie had responded, somewhat tartly, that it was all right for the Wolf to expect her to ‘choose a beggar.’ Anyway, what if the girl had a drug habit?
She won’t have a drug habit locked in the basement, will she?
