What Happens at Christmas

by Evonne Wareham

  The third man had dodged past them and already had the outer door to the back alley open. A non-descript white van stood waiting, motor idling, sending a plume of white exhaust fumes into the chilly night. The back doors were hooked open.

  A shock of confusion laced with alarm speared through Drew’s system. This isn’t right. It’s supposed to be a car, not a van. He turned towards the man who had spoken. ‘Hey, guys, can we just hold on a minute here—’

  The sudden blow to his abdomen from a bunched fist doubled him over, gasping for breath. Shit, shit, shit.

  There was a brief stinging pain in his neck. Insect bite? In December?

  His feet scrabbled ineffectually on the tiles of the alley as the three men hoisted him into the van. The doors slammed shut. Drew’s head swirled as the engine revved.

  Not an insect bite. A needle.

  This is for real.

  The world swung drunkenly as he struggled to his knees. Reaching for the door handle he caught it, wrenching it down. Nothing happened. His grip fell away.

  They were nosing forward, out of the alley and into the late evening traffic, when everything finally went dark.

  Chapter Six

  21 December, Daybreak

  He was trapped in the middle of an earthquake.

  His head was spinning and he couldn’t see, couldn’t breathe. Panic spiked. He fought it. You have to think.

  Even getting that far hurt. Better if he could drift back into the welcome darkness …

  Not happening.

  Whatever drug he’d been given – and he recognised it for a drug from the pounding in his head and the disgusting chemical taste in his mouth – it was wearing off. Slowly his senses were coming back and his mind was beginning to process. He couldn’t see, and breathing was difficult, because there was some sort of bag over his head. The world was moving in a stomach-churning fashion because he was being half dragged, half carried over uneven ground. The persistent buzz from somewhere near his left ear resolved itself into low-pitched rumble.

  ‘Bloody, buggering hell, the bugger weighs a ton!’

  Drew’s left side dipped a little. Whoever had charge of that side was flagging.

  ‘Shut up and keep moving.’ That was the right side.

  ‘We should have been out of here hours ago.’

  ‘And whose fucking fault was that?’ Heavy breathing and grunting, as they heaved him over some sort of low obstacle. Where the hell are we? ‘Sodding flat tyre. Your sodding sister and her poxy sodding van.’ Another heave.

  ‘My sister’s kid. It’s my sister’s kid’s van,’ Lefty corrected. ‘Kyle – my nephew. He wasn’t supposed to know we borrowed it.’ A disgruntled huff. ‘You should have let that bloke help. At that farm. He wanted to. Dead keen to get us out of the way of his gate.’

  ‘Oh yeah. Thanks very much, mate. Don’t mind if I do.’ In amongst the laboured breathing Mr Right’s voice dripped sarcasm. ‘Yeah, I got a tool kit. I’ll just open up the back. No worries about the unconscious bloke lying next to it.’

  ‘We could have said he was drunk or something. Christmas – everyone gets drunk at Christmas.’

  Mr Right didn’t even bother to answer that one.

  It sounded as if his captors had had a rough night.

  Know the feeling.

  Drew took as deep a breath as he could manage inside the constrictions of the hood. They didn’t seem to have realised he was coming round. He was more or less awake, but there was still an uncomfortable swimming sensation as they heaved him along. Doggedly he concentrated on keeping his body limp. If they thought he was still unconscious, he might hear something useful.

  Spy School 101.

  There was a sudden curse from Lefty as he stumbled over something. It was all Drew could do to stop himself bracing for a fall. Mr Right was made of sterner stuff and kept them all more or less upright. ‘Mind what you’re doing!’

  ‘Can’t we just dump him here? It’s well off the road.’ Then something Drew couldn’t make out. A low grumble that sounded like ‘bloody trees’ and ‘leaving the van’.

  ‘Nah.’ Mr Right was still dragging them forwards. ‘The hut’s all ready, so he can’t get away.’

  ‘I dunno …’ Drew had the impression, head drooping and through the folds of the bag, that Lefty was looking around him. ‘We dump him there, and he can’t get out, is he gonna get that hypo thing?’

  ‘Hypothermia?’ Mr Right filled in. ‘Nah. Anyway, it’s not our problem.’

  Their progress had slowed to a crawl. The ground seemed to be getting even rougher and Mr Right was doing most of the work. He was big.

  The second guy, the one with the needle.

  ‘But what if he – you know – if something, like, goes wrong.’ Lefty’s voice rose on the last word.

  ‘Not. Our. Problem. We’re just delivery. What we’re getting paid for.’ There was a pointed edge to Mr Right’s voice.

  ‘Yeah, but—’

  ‘Just doing what we was paid for.’ Mr Right repeated. ‘None of this is down to us. We was hired to take the bloke and bring him here. All part of the stunt, innit?’

  ‘Yeah – but – the stunt was those other guys.’

  ‘Different stunt.’

  ‘But why—’

  ‘Look it’s all for publicity, innit? Them celebs get up to all sorts of weird shit to get themselves noticed. Just shut up and get it done. We’re making a thousand apiece for this. Pick up the bloke and deliver him. And that’s it.’ Mr Right was breathing heavily again. ‘What happens then is nothing to do with us. For fuck’s sake, let’s just get it finished and get out of here. I think his head moved just now. If he’s coming round we got to get him in that bloody hut before he wakes up proper. So shut up and get a move on.’

  Busted.

  They set off again at an increased pace.

  Hanging limply between his captors Drew digested the price that had been put on his head. Four thousand, assuming the third guy and the driver got the same rate. Someone was prepared to shell out four thousand pounds to make the kidnap real. A slow, cold shudder went through him, bile rising in his throat. Oh, God, don’t throw up. Think! Somehow you’ve got to get out of this.

  Mr Right and Lefty had been told it was a second stunt. They probably think you’re in on it – weird shit. Could he admit to being awake, tell them it was all a mistake, offer them more money to take him back? Would that work? If he made a break for it, would they bother to chase after him? Lefty, possibly not. Mr Right? He wasn’t sure Mr Right entirely believed the story about the stunt, but he was damn sure he’d stick to it.

  Where the hell were they? Was it still night, or was it daylight outside the confines of the hood? He focused his senses. The sacking was thick, but not that thick. He had the feeling that what was out there was daylight, not darkness. If he strained hard to listen, over his captors footfalls and heavy breathing, he thought he could hear birdsong. Something soft and papery scuffed against his feet. Fallen leaves? Were they in woodland?

  He caught himself up with a jerk that he hoped wasn’t distinguishable to the two men hauling him along. He had to concentrate on getting out of this, not falling into the writer’s trick of assessing experience as material, for God’s sake!

  If you get free, can you run for it? He’d mapped out plenty of fights and escapes on paper, then choreographed them with stunt men and martial arts experts, but he’d never done any of that stuff in cold blood and for real.

  Trying it out on two men in a wood with a sack over your head is not a good place to start.

  Owning up that he was awake and striking a bargain was the best bet. Plus you can get a name. The person who paid for this.

  He was about to straighten up and stand on his own feet when there was a sudden yell, his left arm was yanked hard and then it was free. From the sounds and the cursing, Lefty had gone down. On pure instinct Drew straightened and swung on the balls of his feet, giving Mr Right a hefty shove. Mr Right let go, with
another volley of curses.

  Both arms free, Drew powered forward, scrabbling at the covering over his head. He raised it enough to get mouth and nose free, wincing as he pulled it higher and the brightness of a low winter sun hit his eyes. Squinting, he could make out shapes and a blur of colour.

  The edge of a wood. Straggling trees. Grass. A hillside.

  The fallen branch caught his ankles, half swung, half thrown from behind. He pitched sideways, off the rough path, in a tangle of limbs. The sack fell back over his eyes.

  The boot hit his ribs before he could roll away.

  Mr Right.

  Gasping for breath he grabbed Right’s leg, pulling himself up, or the other man down, he wasn’t sure which. They swayed together for a moment. Right’s hand closed on his throat, dragging him upright. Drew hauled in an agonised breath. ‘Not stunt …’ He sucked in more air. ‘Pay you … more.’

  ‘I don’t give a shit, you stupid bastard.’ Right’s voice was soft, low and deadly. ‘Getting this done.’

  The edge of the hood twitched. Drew tried to raise his hand, to block the move. ‘No … I …’

  The needle stung against his neck. Two sets of hands closed on him. Lefty’s back. The thought formed woozily. Will he listen? ‘I’ll pa …’

  Before he could finish the word, everything faded to black.

  Chapter Seven

  21 December, 8.30 a.m.

  The Christmas hamper, emblazoned with the logo of a famous London department store, was huge. So big that the delivery man staggered a little under the weight as he pulled it loose from the back of his van.

  ‘Where do you want it, Miss?’ He threw a dubious glance at the cottage at the end of the row, shrouded in scaffolding, with a pile of rust-stained radiators stacked in the tiny front garden. The builders had already begun to strip the dark grey Welsh slates from the roof.

  ‘Um.’ Lori was distracted by the sight of her sister’s name on the prominent gift tag. What’s going on? ‘Can you put it in the back of my car?’ She gestured to the open boot of her Fiesta. There was just about room. Remembering her manners, she added, ‘Please.’ It wasn’t the poor man’s fault that the sight of Lark’s name sent her heart somewhere down to her boots. The delivery man grinned. ‘Right here, next to the box from Carluccio’s?’

  ‘Er, yes, thanks.’ Lori bent to shift the other box further into a corner.

  Why does your family think you need all this food?

  To be fair, the present from her parents and her brother, as well as the edible Italian goodies, included a cashmere sweater in a soft pearly grey. In a spirit of goodwill – it really was a lovely sweater – Lori was assuming her mother had chosen it because she remembered that it would echo the colour of her elder daughter’s eyes. It was two sizes too big, but that meant she could get plenty of layers on underneath it. Although when the cottage had its new heating system …

  ‘Sign here, please, Miss.’ The delivery man was holding out an electronic pad. Lori scrawled something that didn’t look anything like her name on the small screen, but the man seemed happy with it. He clambered back into the cab of his van and made off down the little cul-de-sac as Lori leaned into the back of her car to look at the tag again. The hamper was definitely from her sister and with a message she hadn’t noticed. ‘Hope you both enjoy it.’ Both? Was Lark assuming she was still with Frazer?

  ‘Not going to starve then?’ Lori jumped as Paulie walked past from his truck, with a couple of lengths of copper pipe over his shoulder. He nodded towards the boot with its cardboard boxes.

  ‘No,’ Lori agreed. She looked doubtfully at the hampers. ‘Not that I’m going to be able to do anything much with them until you’ve finished and I get my kitchen back. I hope there’s nothing perishable in there.’

  ‘Nah. It’s all Christmas puddings and fancy jam and tea and stuff, isn’t it? My Mam has one every year, pays into it weekly at the club. Not a posh one like that though.’ He grinned. ‘Think there’s any booze in it?’

  ‘Possibly. It seems to be heavy enough.’ She was looking for any sign of a list of contents when a yell from the cottage made her turn. Mike, the lanky apprentice, was standing in the doorway, peering out from under the scaffolding.

  ‘You ready to turn the water off, boss?’

  ‘Yeah. I’ll be there now, in a minute.’ Paulie put the pipes down carefully, so they lay along the edge of the path. He rubbed his hands down his overalls. ‘You about set to go?’

  ‘Just need to get Griff in his basket and I’ll be out of your hair until the end of the week.’

  ‘No problem.’ Paulie grinned. ‘Last time I saw Griff he was asleep on the roof of the old privy, down the garden. Will you be okay to get him in the box or should I send Mike along?’

  Lori shook her head. ‘Thanks, but Griff will be fine. He’s the most placid cat I’ve ever come across.’

  Lori was coaxing the boot of the Fiesta to shut over the unexpected gift when a large black car nosed its way into the narrow road in front of the row of cottages and parked behind Paulie’s truck. A big black car with a lot of chrome and an expensive looking shine to it. Lori’s heart-rate picked up as the back door opened.

  ‘Lori!’ Lark was as beautiful as ever. Cascading blonde curls, eyes like a startled doe and the pink and white complexion of a porcelain doll. Lori stifled a small sigh. It wasn’t that she envied her younger sister her looks or her lifestyle. She was quite happy with her own life, thank you, but when she was around Skylark … she had a brief flashback – herself, age fifteen. Their mother, standing in the kitchen looking up at her. ‘Your build is more … athletic, darling.’ If athletic is wide shoulders and small boobs, then athletic is what I am.

  Her sister’s cream wool coat had a deep fur collar that was almost the same colour as Lark’s platinum hair. Lori knew for a fact that her sister had a little help with that. Her natural colour was closer to Lori’s dirty blond. The coat swept dramatically all the way to the floor, a vision straight off the Russian steppes.

  Is someone casting for a remake of Anna Karenina?

  Automatically Lori checked behind her sister, expecting a small figure to be scrambling out of the back of the car. The implications of the hamper were suddenly becoming clear. Oh no! Not now.

  ‘Darling.’ Lark flowed forward to engulf Lori in a blast of expensive scent, and then leaned back, holding her at arm’s length to survey the worn tracksuit and washed-out fleece, with the broken zip, that Lori was wearing to move furniture. ‘Oh sweetie, what are we going to do with you?’ She tilted her head up, face turning tragic. ‘And you’ve been cutting your own hair again.’

  ‘My hair is fine.’

  Something that felt distressingly like panic was building in Lori’s chest. She breathed deep, trying to make it evaporate.

  It worked.

  Sort of.

  ‘Lark, why are you here?’

  ‘To wish you a happy Christmas, of course.’ Strangely the easy response wasn’t doing anything for the panic. It was rising again. Just say no. Lori stepped back, out of her sister’s embrace. And breathe.

  The doe eyes, which missed nothing, unless they wanted to miss it, had noted the hamper. ‘Oh good, my present arrived. I have a few little things—’ She waved towards the car that had brought her. ‘But we can get them out in a moment. Maybe someone could help my driver …’ She paused, as if expecting a flunky to appear at her elbow – possibly in uniform. Lori stifled a grin as, almost on cue, Gareth, Paulie’s plasterer and tiler edged past them, behind Lark. He raised his eyebrows and grinned at Lori before sauntering up the path, heading for the sounds of hammering and Radio One that were coming from the back of the house. Lark, looking put out, turned her attention to the cottage as if she’d only just noticed the scaffolding. ‘Darling, what are you doing?’

  ‘New roof, new heating, new flooring. After the flood,’ Lori explained, knowing from the blank look that her sister remembered nothing of the storm that had swept through t
he village, ripping tiles from the roof and sending water down through the back of the house and up from a blocked drainage ditch two fields away. The new kitchen and two new windows were add-ons that Lori could just about afford, as the builders were on site, but she wasn’t going into that much detail.

  Lark had already lost interest.

  ‘That man …’ She waved her hand to the side of the house, where Gareth had disappeared, perfect eyebrows drawn together in a frown and perfect mouth pouting.

  Lori knew immediately what the grievance was. ‘He’s gay.’

  ‘Ah.’ Reassured that her powers to stun were not slipping, Lark smiled. It was like the sun coming out.

  Oh no, no, no. Do not let her talk you into anything.

  Her sister’s butterfly attention had returned to the scaffolding swathing the house. She surveyed it doubtfully, the hint of a frown back to disturb the unlined brow. ‘I expect it’s … er … fun. Like camping out,’ she suggested brightly, with the tiniest suggestion of concern buried in the depths of the blue eyes. Only a sister would know it was there. Oh hell. Lori took another deep breath. The panic subsided abruptly, replaced by dogged determination. Whatever it was her sister wanted, and she had her suspicions, the answer had to be no.

  ‘Lark,’ she asked the question again. ‘Why are you here?’

  Skylark laughed, and it really did sound like the tinkling of fairy bells, as one enraptured theatre critic had declared, after witnessing Lark’s portrayal of Titania. She patted Lori’s arm. ‘To see you, of course. And Misty.’ She looked around. ‘Where is she? Where’s my little girl?’

  The edges of Lori’s vision seemed to go black. It was much much worse than she’d thought. In everything she’d imagined, she’d never imagined this. Her voice, when she found it, was hoarse and scratchy. She could barely get the words out. ‘Misty isn’t here.’

  ‘What do you mean?’ For a split second confusion shifted across Lark’s perfect face. ‘Oh, you mean she’s with a little friend? On a play date?’ she pronounced the words carefully, and with a shade of triumph, as if they were something in a foreign language, looking down at the slim rose-gold watch adorning the equally slim wrist. ‘Look, I don’t have too much time. My plane – can we go and fetch her?’