by Jacqui Rose
Usually she would’ve had a shower at Lydia’s but she’d seen all the calls from Harry and Vaughn and so she’d decided to leave without washing, wanting to get back as soon as she could. Which had been the other reason why she hadn’t let Harry touch her earlier, besides not wanting him to. He would’ve known, she was certain of it, certain that Harry would sense that she’d been with another man … men. And whether Vaughn had been there or not, Harry would’ve happily beaten her to a pulp on the spot. She’d been lucky and slightly surprised that instead of insisting on sex like he usually did, he’d just stomped off out of the house, moody and angry.
Sighing at the thought, she looked up at the built-in digital clock on the wall, wishing she could just lie in the bath and shut out the world, shut out Tammy’s bombshell. Instead, Tia finished off washing herself before quickly stepping out of the bath. With a heavy heart she dried herself with the thick, fluffy cream towel, fighting the temptation to talk herself out of what needed to be done. But the problem was, she didn’t know how much time she had, if any, and even though she really wanted to go and speak to her sister instead, to try and persuade her to see sense, she knew with Harry being out, this might be the best opportunity she might have of getting out without Harry or Vaughn.
Glancing at her phone and pushing the thought of her sister to one side, Tia saw another text from Wan. Deciding not to read it, she hurriedly dressed in a pair of skinny jeans and a grey marl cashmere sweater. Tying her hair in a ponytail, Tia slipped on her Gucci sneakers before creeping out into the hallway, and making her way silently downstairs.
At the front door, with her heart racing, Tia listened out again, checking for any noise in the house, but all she could hear was the steady hum of the distant London traffic. With her hand shaking, she covered the alarm with her scarf to mute the sound of the beep as she turned it off. Then, glancing one more time up the stairs, she opened the door and stepped out into the cobbled mews, shutting the door behind her before hurriedly running up the street.
What Tia Jacobs didn’t see, was her sister Tammy watching her leave from the upstairs bedroom window.
23
Having made her way to the private resident car park located a few streets away in Upper Wimpole Street, Tia drove through London, grateful the traffic was light as she made her way up the Finchley Road and along the Hendon Way.
Getting to Brent Cross and trying to persuade herself what she was doing was the right thing, the only thing open to her, she eased her white Range Rover onto the M1, putting her foot down on the accelerator as she headed for the tiny village of Jockey Row in the heart of the Hertfordshire countryside, which was just under an hour’s drive from her house.
Glancing at the time and with a sense of foreboding, Tia turned on the radio, trying not to think about anything as she headed up the motorway. The problem was, she couldn’t help but think about Tammy, about Harry, about Vaughn and moreover, she thought about herself and what a fool she’d been getting herself into her own mess. Now she had no idea when or how it was going to end …
It was pitch black as Tia turned off her lights and parked along the grass verge of Clements End Road, a country lane just outside Jockey Row and just under a quarter of a mile from the farmhouse that Harry owned.
Never having been afraid of the dark but shaking from the idea of what would happen if she were caught or if Harry even found out she’d left the house, Tia got out of the car.
There was an unsettling silence and it was almost like she could hear the sound of her own heart beating. Using her phone as a torch she made her way up the lane, carefully walking alongside the ditch towards Harry’s property, which he’d purchased a few years back.
It was cold and as Tia’s eyes adjusted to the dark, she could see her own breath as she hurried along.
At a small copse, she turned off the lane and battled her way through the dense brambles and bushes, feeling them snag on her clothes and hair.
Making it through to the clearing, she found herself standing in one of the fields, which was overgrown with grass and weeds, from where Harry had neglected to care for it. From where she was, she could just make out the outlines of the farmhouse, barn and outhouse on the fifty-acre property.
She took a deep breath and tried to push aside her nerves as she continued to walk, feeling the first drops of rain as she clambered over one of the wooden fences before turning up a hidden gravelled path …
Five minutes later and thinking that it hadn’t been the smartest of ideas to choose to wear her sneakers, Tia, with her feet cold and now wet, froze as she saw the farmhouse front room light on. Shit.
A huge part of her wanted to run back to the car, wanted to get back to the relative safety of her house, but she knew she needed to do what she’d come here for. After all, she wasn’t sure when she’d get another opportunity and she’d come this far; it would be stupid to turn back now. But if Harry was here and he spotted her, then it would all be over anyway.
Turning off the light from her phone, and feeling the sweat begin to run down her back as she saw one of Harry’s cars parked near the old oak tree, Tia cautiously approached the house, knowing that she needed to keep to the far left side of the rose bushes if she didn’t want to be spotted.
Trying not to let her imagination get carried away as images flashed in her mind of what Harry would do to her if he caught her, Tia continued to duck down low as she sneaked towards the outbuildings on the other side of the house, trying not to stand on anything that would make even the slightest of noises.
Suddenly, she stopped as she heard a sound. Voices coming from within the house. Then a scream … There it was again, but it didn’t sound like whoever it was, was having fun and messing about. They sounded frightened. Scared.
Although Tia knew she shouldn’t, knew she should just keep on going – because after all it wasn’t anything to do with her – she found herself turning around and going back to the house.
Pushing herself up against the wall Tia, her heart racing, stood in the pouring rain as she tried to work out how many people were inside. And more importantly, who was inside.
She could feel herself shaking, and she knew it wasn’t just from the cold and wet. But she was glad it was raining – at least it was less likely she would be heard over the sound of it hammering down against the roof.
Listening again, Tia crept along the side of the large, weatherboard house. Getting to the kitchen window, she slowly, cautiously peered inside. She could see the kitchen was a mess, as if there’d been a non-stop party. Bottles of wine and beer cans were strewn along the expensive worktop. She could also see neatly cut-up lines of what looked like cocaine and on the marble table there was a large bottle of vodka and overflowing ashtrays. On the floor, in the centre of it all, lay a naked woman; motionless.
Tia gasped, panicked and worried for the woman, and she immediately started to run towards the side door to see if she could help, but almost straight away, she stopped. Frozen. What the hell was she doing? How could she go inside? How could she explain to Harry what she was doing here? But then, how could she just let this woman lie there? She had to do something.
Pulling out her phone, with hands shaking Tia quickly began to dial 999. But no sooner had she started, did she stop once again. She couldn’t. She just couldn’t. There was no way she could bring the police or the ambulance or anyone for that matter, here.
As she fought back the tears her mind was racing. She had no idea what she was going to do. She had no one she could call, no one she could turn to for help. For a moment, Vaughn came into her mind, but what could he do?
A noise behind her made her break her thoughts. Someone was coming! Shit! Shit! She could hear the footsteps in the hallway of the house. Her mind whirled. There was no way she could run back to the trees without being seen if they were on their way outside.
Then, looking at the large-leafed pink rhododendron bush, which reached nearly up to the bedroom window and spread acr
oss most of the side of the house, Tia quickly pushed herself into the dense shrub, feeling the scratches of its branches against her skin at the same time as the door was opened.
Through the thick foliage she could just about manage to make out three people. She recognised the smaller one as one of Harry’s men, the other she didn’t know, and of course she knew the third one only too well. It was Harry himself.
She listened to him speak. ‘For fuck’s sake, I just don’t need this shit.’
‘Sorry, boss, I dunno what to say. She just passed out. I was sitting there and she just started freaking out, then the next thing I know she just bleeding well collapsed.’
‘Just get her the fuck out of here. The last thing I need is some dumb bitch in my kitchen. She makes it look messy.’
‘No problem, boss, I’ll sort it.’
‘Well make sure you sort it quickly.’
The next moment Tia watched the two men go back inside, leaving Harry with his back to her just a few feet away. She saw him light a cigarette and she listened to him humming like nothing had happened. He was close, so close, and she was frightened to even breathe in case he heard her. If she moved, if she made even a tiny shift to the left or the right, he would know she was there.
Subtly shaking, she closed her eyes, desperate to try to calm herself down. Even that, even her shaking would make the branches move and rustle and if he did see her hiding in the bush, it wasn’t as if it would be easy to explain what she was doing sneaking about. The idea of what he might do terrified her.
‘Where do you want her, boss?’
Hearing the men come back outside, Tia opened her eyes, shocked to see them dragging the naked woman out. She bit down on her lip as she continued to watch and listen.
‘Well not in my fucking car like that,’ Harry snarled as he walked towards them. He bent down, roughly slapping the naked woman’s face, causing her head to loll to the side. ‘For fuck’s sake. She’s well out of it. Get her away from here. I don’t need this shit.’
‘You think she needs a hospital, boss?’
Tia saw Harry glare at his paid goon. ‘A hospital? You fucking mug! And who’s going to take her there? Are you? Cos I ain’t playing Florence Nightingale for any stupid little whore, and I certainly ain’t going to worry about what happens to her. All I care about is you getting her out of here. Now shut the fuck up for a minute and let me think.’
‘Boss, I just think—’ The man hadn’t finished his sentence before Harry raised his fist and gave him a sharp, quick jab to the mouth. ‘I said shut the fuck up … She’s still breathing, she’s still alive, ain’t she? So what’s all the fucking panic about?’
With his mouth split and blood trickling down his chin, the man nodded. ‘You’re right, boss … sorry. I don’t know what I was thinking.’
‘No, none of us fucking do … Now look, I’m not responsible for the silly bitch OD’ing and I don’t need a fucked-up hooker in my house. So, as long as she don’t die on my doorstep, I don’t care what you want to do with her – just get her out of here. Now I’m going inside, I got to make a few phone calls and when I come back out, I want her gone.’
‘No problem, boss. I’ll put her in my car and drive her somewhere, dump her, some other chump can deal with it.’
‘Good, well I’m glad we’ve got that sorted, now fuck off out of my face.’
Harry stormed back inside.
24
With the rain pouring through the rhododendron bush, Tia stood in shock. She had no clue what was going on and had no clue either who that woman was. But one thing she did know was that she needed to get back to London as soon as possible – at least there she would have time to think, get her head around what she’d just seen. For now though, she also knew she needed to get what she’d come for.
Hearing the man’s car drive off and certain that Harry was inside the house, Tia sneaked out of her hiding place, dashing across the wide, gravelled path before darting into the shadows.
Trying to push the image of the woman out of her head, she ran through the woods across to a small, agricultural outhouse. She paused only for a moment before quickly punching in the numbers on the rusty padlock. Rusty, not due to neglect but due to the fact that it suited Harry to make it look like it was a disused place of no interest to anyone.
The lock came off easily and Tia moved swiftly inside, edging her way past the old tractor, another ruse of Harry’s to make it look like the place had long ago been abandoned. Squeezing past the tractor, she used her phone’s torch light, making her way to the end of the building where she bent down and lifted a pile of empty wooden crates out of the way, careful not to make any noise.
Having moved the crates, she lifted the wooden flap, which was cut into the floor, to reveal the way down to the basement. With her heart racing, she stepped onto the ladder and carefully made her way into the darkness.
As quietly and as quickly as possible, Tia stepped off the last rung and shuffled and squeezed past empty wine crates, piles of old boxes and bags. All part of Harry’s plan.
Coming to a pile of tarpaulin stacked up in the corner, Tia began to move it and jumped only slightly at the sight of a rat scurrying past. She took a deep breath and steadied herself, crouching down and pulling the tarpaulin away to expose a cupboard which, like the entrance to the building, had a rusty-looking lock.
With her hands still shaking, she leant her phone against the side to give her some light as she undid the lock and pulled open the tiny cupboard.
Inside was a trunk, which she slid out slowly. She flinched at the sound it seemed to make along the concrete floor.
She flicked open the catches of the trunk and pushed up the lid, immediately taking a deep breath as she saw what she was looking for. Cocaine. Three large bags of cocaine. Harry’s cocaine.
Her hands hovered over them as every part of her wanted to turn back, but it was too late; she knew that. She was already in too deep, and there was no getting out of the mess she’d started. And again, she had to push the thought of Harry out of her head.
Taking one of the bags out of the trunk, she swiftly pushed it in the backpack she was carrying and in its place she put a bag of white powder, a mixture of crushed-up products she’d put together to look identical to the cocaine.
Of course she knew if anyone tasted it, snorted it or smoked it, Harry would know straight away it wasn’t coke. But for the time being it was certainly better for it to look like all the bags were there rather than gone.
She wasn’t sure when Harry would open the trunk, especially as he’d been out of the drug-dealing game for some time. Forced out by the Russians, he’d been focusing on counterfeiting and money laundering instead. But when he did eventually look, and he would, she wanted it to look as normal as possible. Though she wasn’t sure how much a single bag of cocaine this size was worth, she knew it would be something towards the two hundred thousand plus mark and therefore she certainly had to make sure that the finger of blame wasn’t pointing towards her.
Taking the other two bags of cocaine and exchanging them for the fake bags of powder she’d brought along Tia felt sick, hoping that by some miracle when Harry did notice, she would be long gone. She didn’t even want to begin to think of what he’d do to her if he knew she was stealing from him.
Closing the trunk and sliding it into the cupboard again, Tia put everything back just as it was. She glanced around and once certain nothing looked different, she hurriedly made her way out of the building and back up into the darkness where she raced along the path and through the woods, all the time checking over her shoulder.
Coming to the fields, Tia paused for a moment to catch her breath. She pulled out her phone and quickly wrote a text.
I’ve got it.
The moment she saw it was sent, she deleted the text and with the wind and the rain gearing up, Tia Jacobs began to run.
It was dark and it was still raining as Alfie crouched down by his car. He’d parked
in the woods quite a bit back from where the grey Audi he’d followed was parked, but it was certainly close enough to get a good view.
He’d been following the car for a good few hours now. In West Hampstead it had pulled over and Wan – but not the girl – had got out, so he’d continued tailing it all the way to a small village in Hertfordshire. Then he’d waited in a lane for a couple of hours and just as he’d decided to head off home, thinking nothing more was going to happen, he’d seen the same Audi speed out of the property. So, keeping a discreet distance, he’d set off again and found himself by a waste ground on the edge of Essex.
Still crouching and well hidden, and feeling the strain in his knees, Alfie watched whoever it was drive off. He stood up and rushed down the steep ditch and up the other side, scrambling through the dying bramble bush to the open wasteland.
Pulling out his gun from his pocket, Alfie hurried across the rubbled grounds. He looked behind him, but all he could see was darkness.
At the spot where the Audi had parked, Alfie looked around.
He’d watched the driver stand by the car’s trunk for over ten minutes, and he’d been convinced that he’d seen whoever it was get something out of it. But maybe he’d been mistaken – after all, it was dark and it had only been the Audi’s car lights that had given off any illumination. But then, why did they come here? Why drive the car to the middle of nowhere without good reason?
Looking around again, about to put his gun away, Alfie froze as he heard a slight noise to the far side of him. He pointed his gun and slowly crept along, all the time keeping alert, ready to make a move as he stared into the night.
‘Fuck!’ Unintentionally, he shouted loudly as he tripped over something, sending him sprawling face forward onto the cold, wet ground.
Scrambling up, he felt for his gun and grabbing it, he spun around. But there was no one there … He couldn’t see anyone but he’d definitely heard a noise. He looked again and he thought he could just make out a shape on the ground. Yes, over there, he could see something.