by Sian Rosé
Sensing Ronnie’s presence, the man’s screams grew louder. His constricted torso shuddered inside the restraints, the chair rocking loudly against the neglected, blood-soaked floorboards.
Bile crept up into Ronnie’s throat as he forced himself to wield the bloodied metal shovel that was propped up against the bedroom wall. Minnie had found it in the shed at the bottom of the garden and had been using its rusted edge to make slices on the man’s flesh.
“I’m sorry,” he whispered as he approached the screeching man and lifted the shovel high above his head.
The first collision of the weapon and the man’s neck was not hard enough. It just about broke skin; the tiny dribbles of blood barely noticeable in amongst his black-red pasted jugular. But still, he let out a high-pitched howl of pain that made Ronnie’s hands tremble and sweat against the handle of the shovel.
“YOU BASTARD! YOU BASTARD!” his victim cried, heavily-accented voice ripping through the stagnant air. “GO TO HELL. GO TO HELL. I HOPE YOUR WIFE GETS RAPED IN THE ARSE AND YOUR SON BURNS ALIVE.”
Ronnie’s brow furrowed into a frown as he absorbed what the hysterical man had just said. He knew, logically, it should upset him. He should be furious that this pathetic worm had even put the horrific notion of his baby burning to death into his head.
But Ronnie felt no rage.
In fact, quite the opposite.
A burst of adrenaline released in the back of his brain, his grip tightening on the handle of the shovel. The overwhelming feeling of power tore through him like a tidal wave, making him almost crazy with the thrill. The thrill of knowing that he was in charge. His victim had given up begging because he knew that in just a few seconds, he’d be dead.
Gone, on Ronnie’s terms.
It was a delicious realisation that dawned so suddenly on Ronnie, in spite of the last few weeks of watching Minnie torture their landlord. He had struggled to understand her and had thought that her abuse of this innocent man was needless.
Holding that shovel above his head, seeing him writhe and succumb to his bloody fate beneath him made Ronnie get it.
The world had proven time and time again that it was against Minnie and Ronnie. It wasn’t fair, and there were no rules.
It was either destroy or be destroyed.
And it felt good to be in control.
He realised, at that moment, as he sent the shovel crashing down again as hard as he could, that it felt good to destroy.
Ronnie even found himself smiling as all of the Polish man’s severed neck arteries began to spurt fresh, warm blood into the air like a hissing red firework display, spattering his face and hands.
Chapter Fifty-four
2019
Ross, Julie, Minnie, and the three eldest Garnet kids hovered anxiously in the hallway, keeping the front door open, exposing the grey suburban scenery outside in all of its rain-drenched glory. Underneath his breath, Zach whistled an uneasy tune, whilst Stella stifled a chuckle, and their mother shot them both daggers of warning with her eyes.
Around twenty minutes after the two fathers had dashed from the house in opposite directions and had started searching the street for the missing girls, Paul was lumbering back up the pathway to the house, his eyes red and watery, expression deformed with terror.
“I can’t find her, I can’t find her…” he repeated to himself like a mad person as he scrambled up the drive and back over the threshold of the front door. He lunged himself in Ross’s direction and fell into his chest.
“Can I go check on my dog now?” Stella yawned, apparently indifferent to his dramatic performance.
“I’ll phone the police,” Julie said, voice quivering as she started for the door.
Instinctively, Zach held out an arm and caught his grandmother’s frail forearm, causing her sagging face to drop suddenly.
Minnie slammed the front door behind Paul and whirled around, folding her arms across her chest as she sealed them all inside the house. “No police,” she said to her brother pointedly, “that was the deal.”
Ross’s mouth fell open, “what? Min, you can’t be serious? My daughter… your daughter, has gone missing.”
“They’ll just be playing somewhere,” Minnie shrugged, “Flo is always off on misadventures. It encourages independence.”
In spite of the indifference she projected, there was a slightly lower octave in her voice which sounded strangely sunken, which only her three kids picked up on. It was a sound they didn’t get to hear very often in their mother’s voice because she was always so fiercely defensive of showing any kind of emotional weakness.
But it was there regardless.
The change in her voice.
The sign that Minnie was worried.
Paul whirled around, jabbing a finger dangerously close to Minnie’s face. Tears spurted from the corners of his eyes, the fear and heartbreak so vivid in his pupils that Minnie almost, oh so briefly, felt sympathy for him. Images of Stella in her awful, terrible state the previous day kept attempting to penetrate her skull, but she deflected them all, skilfully, refusing to accept that she had anything in common with other parents.
Too afraid to accept that maybe she was human.
Maybe she could feel some compassion for somebody that wasn’t her family, her team.
Minnie didn’t want to feel anything, for anybody or anything else.
“Maybe you deem it appropriate for an 8-year-old to be out on their own on the streets, but we certainly do not,” Paul bellowed, pushing himself out of Ross’s grip and taking a step towards her. “How can you be so fucking calm, exactly? Anything could have happened to them! Don’t you ever watch the news?”
Stella yawned, deliberately loudly, as if to make a point. She rolled her eyes and held up her phone, shaking it in the midst of the small group.
“Can everyone just chill the fuck out? I have a phone. I can call my sister.”
A short, sharp pause went by as Ross, Paul and Julie each stared in shock at the pretty young teenager and her casual use of such foul language.
Paul was the first to speak. “Your eight-year-old has a phone? Well, that’s just fantastic. Great parenting, you should write a fucking book!” he scoffed at Minnie.
Minnie laughed, “bet you wish you’d gotten yours one now, though, eh?”
“Just stop this!” Ross raised his voice over them, training his eyes first on Paul, then on Minnie. “Seriously, this is getting us nowhere. Stella is going to phone Flo and get the kids to come home. It’s going to be fine. Minnie says Flo goes out and plays alone all the time, so obviously, she just didn’t realise it would be a big issue.”
Paul opened his mouth to make another indignant retort, but he was silenced by the ring of the phone that Stella had put on loudspeaker and was holding up in the air, balanced on her palm.
The phone rang out for a few moments, which felt like a few hundred eternities as they listened intently, breathing frozen as they waited for the line to connect. Just as Minnie was sure the call would go to voice mail, there was the voice of a young girl that broke the intense atmosphere.
“Hello?”
Minnie heaved a sigh of relief, privately delighted at the sound of her youngest daughter’s voice. “Hello, darling. It’s Mummy. Where’ve you got to, my sweet?”
“Is Annie with you?” demanded Paul, his voice hostile, undifferentiating between child and adult.
“Of course she is; we’re best friends now,” replied Flo, her voice as sickly sweet as warm treacle. “Annie, it’s your dad; sounds like he’s worried…”
“I’m here, Dad.”
Paul let out a loud, animal-sounding cry that was pregnant with a hundred different emotions. He even collapsed to his knees, causing Zach and Lloyd to raise their eyebrows at one another and stifle a laugh.
“Annie, honey, we were worried about you,” said Ross sternly, “you didn’t even tell us you were going out. And you know you don’t go anywhere by yourself.”
“Sorry, Da
ddy,” Annie replied in a muffled voice; the tone of a naughty child caught in the act.
Ross sighed and patted Paul’s head. “It’s okay. We’re just glad you’re safe. Where are you?”
“In the woods,” chimed in Flo. Minnie could hear the grin in her voice, and it made something in her gut wrench.
“Oakwood?”
“That’s the one.”
“Right, stay where you are. I’m coming to get you now,” said Ross grimly. He leaned over the sideboard, searching for the keys to the old motor home. His face folded into a deep frown of confusion as he scanned the mass of metal for the familiar Spice Girls key ring.
“Paul, where are the keys?”
“I left them on the sideboard.”
“Well, they’re not there now…”
Julie tutted and shook her head, scooping up her own car keys and dumping them into Ross’s palm. “For goodness sake, just take mine. This is no time for arguments. Go and bring those little girls back now.”
Ross obeyed, leaving behind the rest of the group, feeling the uncomfortable tension that had been brewing between them all earlier, resuming with a vengeance. He sucked in a lung full of fresh air as he exited the house and slammed the front door behind him, then briskly walked down the drive to the neat garage beside the house.
But before he could get to the car, Ross did a double-take as he passed the motor home.
His heart thumped loudly in his chest as he glimpsed three crudely drawn initials scratched into the surface of the coloured metal that somehow seemed to glisten in the shiny, drizzly day.
Had they been there from earlier? Maybe they’d missed them in the rain and the excitement of finding his long-lost sister.
Or maybe they were new, etched onto their camper van as some dark predator watched his little girl and niece wandering off alone together in the big, open, wide world.
RIP.
Chapter Fifty-five
Spring, 2001
Before all of the bad things began happening, Minnie had not realised just how intense and just how disturbing something as simple as a knock on the door could truly be. Alas, she was quickly beginning to realise that, when you are guilty of crimes, a lot of things suddenly become absolutely terrifying.
Going to the supermarket… a phone ringing… the sound of sirens… her baby boy showing any sign of illness… because Minnie knew that she would never be able to take him into a hospital. Not without there being lots and lots of questions. Questions that would unravel all of their hard, emotionally taxing work and land them in exactly the place they were struggling to keep out of.
Needless to say, when there was a loud, hard rap at the front door one cold January morning, Minnie felt as though her soul had slipped from her body and out of her arse. Ronnie was out, trying to reconnect with the dodgy contacts that had landed them in the shit in the first place. Apparently, the shit that went down with Steve was a one-off, a freak accident. And it was not as though the two had any choice. After all, it was their only hope at earning more money- no legitimate job would employ Ronnie with no documents.
Alone and afraid, Minnie froze into place, baby Zach continuing to suck hungrily from his bottle as she became rigid on her place on the sofa.
Had the police finally tracked Ronnie down? Was she wanted for Steve’s murder? Or was it some kind of welfare check on their Polish landlord that would potentially unearth everything?
Like a ninja of sorts, Minnie tucked the baby into her chest and crept down onto the floor so that she was lying flat. The knocking continued. The sudden loud noise, in combination with the change of position, seemed to upset the baby, who immediately began to scream at a rate louder than Minnie had previously known possible from his tiny lungs.
Whilst she scrambled about with the bottle, attempting to force the teat back into her son’s mouth, the knocking became louder and more insistent. As if trying to join in, Zach’s cries also just became louder and more insistent.
“JAKUB?” an accent-twanged voice suddenly called shrilly through the letterbox. “JAKUB?”
“Fuck…” hissed Minnie, trying to press herself further to the ground, out of the light that streamed in through the bay windows in the living room.
Then, the sound of metal turning in a lock.
The front door was opening.
“Oh, fuck,” she moaned quietly, twisting her head as she hurried gingerly to her feet and scanned the modest living room, her vision blurring as panic overwhelmed her senses.
She scrambled for the nearest, most likely weapon- a broken lamp that had since been disconnected from the wall. Clutching the heavy base with one hand, she held Zach’s whimpering body in the nook of her opposite arm and forced herself out of the living room and into the short hallway.
“Jakub?” the voice called out again, quieter but nearer.
“Whose there?” Minnie called out, forcing herself to sound much braver than she felt. Blood drummed in her ears as she continued down the passage until a darkened silhouette in the front door stopped her in her steps.
“Minnie? It’s you?” the voice asked, a hint of excitement trickling into the unfamiliar female’s expression. The woman stepped forward, revealing a plump, short figure and a rounded, well-creased face. Like crystals set into her face, her eyes were bright blue and seemed to twinkle, even from metres away.
She looked kind. Safe. Weak. But Minnie knew better than to judge a book by its cover. “Who are you?” she asked again, her words softening as she met the unexpected visitor’s gaze. “I don’t recognise you,” she added, uncertainly.
Her guest smiled, then gasped as she noticed Zach. “My grandson!” she squealed, “oh, my precious baby boy!”
Minnie tugged Zach out of the light, dropping the lamp to hold him closer, shielding him with both arms. If the old woman was offended, she didn’t show it. Instead, she just cocked her head and clasped her hands together.
“I’m sorry, I did knock. You not hear? I am Jakub’s mother. I visit from Poland…” the woman paused briefly and glanced around the hallway, “I arrange with Jakub months ago, but he not answer calls. Is he okay?”
It was at that moment that it suddenly dawned on Minnie that this was the Polish landlord’s mother who’d grown concerned when her son had stopped answering phone calls. This was a welfare check. But why was she saying that Zach was her grandson? Did Jakub have a baby too?”
Her confusion must have shone through her face, because the woman quickly began talking again, “I’m Maria. So nice to be meeting you finally. I’m so pleased that Jakub has a girlfriend… Jakub has told me lots about you… sent me pictures…” she delved into her pocket and withdrew a purse. From inside it, she brandished a small, folded photograph enthusiastically in the air so that Minnie could see it.
Instantly, her heart plummeted, and her breath got stuck inside her throat, causing her to gasp involuntarily.
The photograph was of her and Zach lying nestled in bed together on one of the first mornings of living in Jakub’s flat. Her eyes were closed, her mouth ever-so-slightly open, indicating that she was asleep. Zach looked so tiny, buried in Minnie’s hold, even as she slept.
“Something wrong?” Maria frowned, lowering the photo.
“No,” blurted out Minnie, shaking her head a little too vigorously. “No, it’s just… that’s a bad photo of me,” she forced a convincing smile.
Maria laughed and glanced at the photo again, “it’s… how you say? Very real. Beautiful!”
Minnie cleared her throat and stood awkwardly as thoughts raced hard around her brain, far too quickly for her to concentrate or articulate a response.
So, Jakub had been taking photos of her whilst she slept, then telling his mother that she was his girlfriend and that Zach was his son.
Her instincts had been right.
He was just another sick fucker. Another liar.
She’d told herself that she had done the world a favour by finishing him off.
*
A few hours later, Ronnie was stepping wearily through the same front door that Maria had let herself through. His eyelids were heavy; his soul drained from another fruitless day of attempting to sort out the delicate, crumbling mess that his life had been reduced to. So rundown, he didn’t even notice the unfamiliar perfume that clung to the air in the hallway.
He’d led Minnie to believe it would be fairly simple for him to get some kind of under-the-table job. He didn’t want her to worry. Not when she was so heavily pregnant. Her going into stress-induced early labour would be the very last thing that they needed.
Ronnie sighed and shut the front door, dropping his rucksack by the front door and lumbering heavy-footed down the carpeted hallway. The reality was that the few contacts he had had from before were dangerous people. He would not risk being put through the kind of pain and humiliation that he had endured before. Even the people he had been put in touch with before, who he considered to be mostly harmless, wouldn’t go anywhere near Ronnie because of the rumours surrounding his altercation with Steve- the mysteriously murdered crime lord.
Not even eighteen, and it felt to Ronnie that his life was already over. It was nothing but a hopeless, broken shambles. If it wasn’t for Minnie and Zach, he’d hand himself in. At least he’d no longer be worrying about money or getting caught by somebody else.
Just as Ronnie approached the archway to the kitchen, Minnie suddenly ducked out of it and came quickly towards him, her face flushed as though she had been rushing around.
“Don’t freak out,” she said in a hushed tone.
“Famous last words,” smirked Ronnie, humourlessly, although a fist tightened on his guts like an iron vice. “What is it?”
Minnie groaned and rubbed her forehead, “Jakub’s mother came by.”
“Who the fuck is Jakub?”
“The Polish guy.”
“Ah, right.”
“Turns out,” said Minnie grimly, “he had been taking photos of Zach and me when I was asleep. Sending them back to Poland, making out as though I was his girlfriend and Zach was his son.”