‘Haven’t decided yet,’ Rob said, feigning boredom. ‘Anyway, is that it? Only I’ve got stuff to do.’
‘Are you with her?’ she demanded. ‘That tart who’s been messaging you?’
Amused that she was directing her anger at the girl he’d met at the pub a few nights earlier, even though she’d read all the messages and must have known that it was him who’d done all the chasing, Rob said, ‘It’s none of your business who I’m with. And I’m going now, so—’
‘Please don’t leave me!’ Angie blurted out. ‘Please, Rob. I love you, and I’m sorry. Just give me a chance to—’
Smirking, Rob cut the call and chucked the phone back into his rucksack. Then, lighting a cigarette, he took a deep drag and slid his gaze along the row of windows until he located Suzie’s.
Suzie’s spare room was smaller than Holly’s room at the flat, with barely enough space for the single bed, bedside cabinet, tiny vanity table and slim wardrobe it contained. But where Holly’s room reeked of mildew, this one smelled fresh; the bedding looked clean, and the curtains fitted properly so there were no gaps at the top or bottom.
‘Try to put everything out of your mind and get some sleep,’ Suzie counselled. ‘I’ll fetch you some pyjamas so you can get comfortable.’
Holly smiled, but it slipped as soon as Suzie left the room, and she tested the mattress with her hand before wandering over to the window. Rob’s words were still going round in her head, and she felt guilty for dragging Suzie into her mess. Suzie had insisted she didn’t mind her being here – and she must have meant it, because she’d been angry when Rob tried to make her go home. But it was nothing compared to the anger she’d seen in Rob’s eyes before he walked out, and she dreaded to think what he’d do if their paths ever crossed again.
Still, he was gone now, so she did her best to put him out of her mind and, opening the blinds, she leaned on the windowsill and gazed down at the garden. A square of grass with a narrow flagstone path leading from the back door to the gate, it was the same size as every other garden on the block. But, unlike the others, which all had flowers and plants lining their borders and were decorated with birdhouses and pretty garden furniture, Suzie’s was plain, as if she couldn’t care less about it.
A red and yellow plastic swing set and matching slide occupied the garden to the left, alongside a Disney Princess-style Wendy house, and Holly felt a twinge of envy in her stomach as she looked down at them. She and her mum had never lived in a house with a garden. The closest they’d come was a junk-cluttered backyard at one of the terraced houses her mum had rented a couple of years back, but it had been overrun with rats so she’d never dared open the back door, let alone attempt to play outside.
Mind drifting, she wondered how different her life might have been if her dad had stuck around. He must have been nice for her mum to have been so heartbroken over losing him, and she imagined he would have had a really good job – like Bex’s dad, who spoiled her rotten because he could afford to. They’d have lived in a big posh house, like Bex’s; with a monkey-puzzle tree and a two-car driveway at the front, and a massive garden at the back where her dad would play with her when he came home from work; building a tree house for her, while her mum – who would still smile like she had in the old photo – cooked dinner for them and washed and ironed his and Holly’s clothes for work and school the next day. And . . .
The fantasy evaporated when she caught a movement in her peripheral vision, and she jerked back from the window when she saw Rob standing at the mouth of the alleyway. He was staring straight at her, sucking on a cigarette, and she shuddered when he gave her a sly smile before walking away.
Unnerved, she quickly closed the blinds – at the exact same time the door opened behind her.
‘Here you go.’ Suzie handed her a pair of black satin pyjamas. ‘And you left these in the bathroom.’ She passed over Holly’s phone and key. ‘Your screen lit up when I picked it up. I think someone’s been trying to call you.’
Thanking her, Holly clutched the items to her stomach.
‘Don’t look so worried, hon,’ Suzie said softly, stroking her cheek. ‘We’ll get this sorted, I promise.’
Holly nodded, but she couldn’t see how this was ever going to get resolved. She’d felt justified for arguing with her mum earlier, but now all she wanted to do was go home, crawl into bed, and forget any of this had ever happened.
The doorbell rang and Holly jumped.
‘Don’t panic,’ Suzie said. ‘If it’s your mum, chances are she’ll have calmed down. But stay up here, just in case. I’ll call you down if I think she’s ready to be reasonable.’
Suzie backed out onto the landing and closed the door, then jogged down the stairs, fluffing her hair with her hands as she went. She thought it probably would be Josie, but she was hoping it might be Rob. She didn’t blame him for walking out after she’d as good as told him to keep his nose out, but this was Holly’s business, and the girl had asked her not to tell him anything, so her hands had been tied.
It was neither Josie nor Rob, it was PC Spencer, and Suzie’s stomach clenched at the sight of him. Had Josie reported her for keeping Holly here against her wishes? Oh God, why hadn’t she listened to Rob and sent the girl home? Kidnapping was a serious offence, and she didn’t want to end up in prison because she’d been too stubborn to admit Rob was right.
‘Hi.’ Spencer gave her a nervous smile. ‘Hope I’m not disturbing you, but we called in at the hospital to see Ms Evans and they told us she discharged herself last night. No one’s answering at the flat, so I wondered if she might be here?’
Relief washed over Suzie, and she shook her head. ‘No, they’re not here,’ she said, hoping that Holly didn’t decide to come downstairs and prove her a liar. Spencer had allowed her to get away with pretending to be Holly’s aunt last night, but if he got wind of what had happened since and decided to hand the case over to social services, she was screwed.
‘OK, we’ll try again later,’ he said. ‘If you see her in the meantime, can you ask her to give us a call?’
‘Yeah, sure,’ Suzie agreed. ‘Any news on her attacker?’
‘One of our units picked up a guy who was acting suspiciously in the park at the back of the estate in the early hours,’ Spencer told her. ‘The lads who disturbed Ms Evans’s attacker didn’t get a look at his face, and she can’t remember anything about it, but his height and build matches the lads’ general description, so we want her to take a look at some mugshots – see if it sparks any memories.’
‘Oh, she’ll be pleased about that.’ Suzie smiled. ‘And I’m sure she’ll be happy to help if it means he gets what’s coming to him. If I see her before you, I’ll let her know.’
Spencer nodded his thanks and backed up a step, as if about to leave. Then, hesitating, he lowered his voice and said, ‘Can I ask how well you know Ms Evans?’
Suzie remembered Rob’s warning about the cops not messing about when it came to kids, and decided that it might be wiser to put a bit of distance between herself and Josie.
‘We’re not overly close,’ she admitted. ‘I’ve only lived here a few months so, obviously, I don’t know her all that well. Why?’
‘I hope I’m not speaking out of turn,’ Spencer said. ‘But does anything about her strike you as . . . odd?’
‘In what way?’ Suzie tilted her head.
Spencer pursed his lips as if considering whether to tell her what was on his mind. Then, seeming to decide against it, he shook his head and said, ‘Nothing, forget it. Just ask her to give us a call.’
‘Will do,’ Suzie said.
As she watched Spencer walk over to his car, which was parked across the road, she frowned when she noticed his colleague, PC Bennett, staring at her from the passenger seat. Something about the man unnerved her. It was like he could see right through her lies, and she had no doubt that he’d have called social services in last night, if it had been up to him.
Quickly closing
the door, she chewed her lip as she mulled over the implications of Spencer’s question. The man had only spoken to Josie once, as far as she knew, and, given that Josie had just regained consciousness at the time, he surely couldn’t have expected her behaviour to be ‘normal’. But he’d obviously seen something abnormal about her for him to ask if Suzie thought there was something odd. She could easily have told him that she didn’t think Josie was odd so much as barking mad, but he was likely to slap that protection order on Holly if he thought she was in danger, and Suzie could end up in a heap of trouble if they found out that the woman had left her here and Suzie had covered for her.
‘Damn it!’ she muttered, wishing again that she had listened to Rob.
‘Was it her?’ Holly whispered from the top of the stairs.
Looking up, Suzie sighed and shook her head. ‘No, it was PC Spencer. They think they might have caught the bloke who attacked your mum and they want her to look at some photos, but she’s not answering the door.’
Holly came down a few steps, and Suzie could see the fear in her eyes when she asked, ‘You don’t think she’s done something stupid, do you?’
‘No, of course not,’ Suzie reassured her. ‘She’s probably sleeping and didn’t hear them. But maybe I should take your key and go over, just in case. Not because I’m worried,’ she added quickly when Holly’s face fell. ‘I just want to make sure she hasn’t collapsed again. OK?’
Nodding, Holly went back to the spare room and fetched the key.
Carol was jogging down the communal stairs with a dog on a leash when Suzie entered the foyer of the flats, and Suzie leapt back in fright when it lunged at her.
‘Tyson, heel!’ Carol ordered, using both hands to hold it in check. Then, scowling at Suzie, she said, ‘If it’s the girl’s mam you’re after, she ain’t in. I saw her go out five minutes before the coppers showed up.’
‘Thanks,’ Suzie murmured, eyeing the dog as she slid her back along the wall. ‘Don’t suppose you know where she was going?’
Snorting softly, Carol said, ‘No, ’cos I ain’t nosy like some I could mention, and I don’t spend all my time spying on me neighbours and threatening to dob them in for stuff they haven’t done.’
She stalked away at that, and Suzie blew out a breath of relief and straightened herself up before heading up the stairs.
Gee turned the corner just as she reached the last step.
‘Oh, hi,’ he said, smiling down at her, his straight white teeth gleaming. ‘We’ll have to stop meeting like this or people are gonna start talking.’
Struck again by how handsome he was – even more so than Zayn Malik, who she’d googled after Holly had remarked on their likeness – Suzie returned his smile and self-consciously touched her hair.
‘I was, um, coming to see Holly’s mum,’ she said. ‘Your neighbour – the big woman with the dog from the second floor – said she saw her going out. But I’ve got Holly’s key, so I thought I’d check everything’s OK while I’m here.’
‘Were those coppers looking for her?’ Gee asked. ‘I wasn’t being nosy, but I noticed them calling at yours after they left here.’
‘Yeah, they think they might have caught the bloke who attacked her, and they want her to look at some mugshots.’
‘That was fast.’
‘Yeah, it was,’ Suzie agreed. ‘Josie doesn’t really remember anything, but they’re hoping something might click if she sees his face.’
‘Finger crossed it’s him, then, eh?’ Gee said. ‘Beasts like that need castrating. Sorry if that sounds extreme,’ he added when Suzie’s eyebrows rose. ‘But I can’t stomach blokes who think it’s all right to abuse women.’
‘Same here,’ Suzie murmured, wondering what he would think of her if he knew she’d let Rob back into the house after he nearly killed her.
‘Right, well, I’d best let you get on,’ Gee said, stepping aside to let her ascend the last step. ‘Have a good day.’
‘You too,’ Suzie said, watching as he trotted down the stairs and out through the door.
Remembering why she was there, she walked along the corridor to Holly and Josie’s flat and rang the bell. No one answered, so she knocked a couple of times and then called through the letterbox to let Josie know it was her. Still nothing, so, after looking around to make sure none of the neighbours were watching, she slotted the key into the lock.
‘Josie . . .?’ she called out as she entered the dingy hallway and closed the door.
She waited for an answer and listened out for the sound of movement, but all she could hear was a tap dripping. Wrinkling her nose at the stench of damp, which seemed to get stronger every time she came in here, she tapped on Josie’s partially open bedroom door. Again, no answer came, but she could see the bed through the crack and Josie wasn’t in it, so she pushed the door a little wider.
‘Bloody hell . . .’ she muttered under her breath as she gazed around at the mess, which, impossibly, seemed even worse in the cold light of day. ‘You are one lazy bitch, Josie.’
Her foot clipped an empty vodka bottle when she stepped further into the room, and she shook her head in disgust when it clinked against the others and she saw how many there were – all one litre, with an unreadable Russian-looking name on their labels. It was no wonder Spencer had thought Josie odd; the silly cow’s brain had probably been addled drinking that toxic shite.
After checking the floor on the other side of the bed to make sure Josie wasn’t lying there, dead or dying, Suzie was about to head out and check the other rooms when something caught her eye and made her stomach clench. The dressing table drawer, which had been crammed full of underwear when she’d seen Holly bag a few things from it for her mum, was now empty. And the wardrobe, when she switched her gaze to that, seemed to contain fewer clothes than it had last night.
‘Oh, Josie, what have you done?’ she whispered. ‘You stupid, stupid woman!’
31
Still angry about Holly fucking his plans up, Rob called in at a pub after leaving the estate. Further irritated when he reached the bar and remembered he’d spent the last of his money on the fags and wine he’d left at the house, he looked around for someone to tap and smiled when he spotted Kev Burton sitting alone at a table in the corner. The man was a friend of a friend and Rob had only met him a couple of times. But they had got on OK, so he made his way over.
‘All right, Kev?’ he greeted the man breezily. ‘Long time no see. How’s it going, mate?’
Kev glanced up from the phone in his hand and narrowed his eyes when he saw who it was. ‘Fuck’re you talking to me for, dickhead?’ he grunted. ‘Thought I was a cunt and you wouldn’t piss on us if I was on fire?’
‘You what?’ Rob screwed up his face as if he didn’t know what Kev was talking about. ‘Who told you that?’
‘Don’t bother denyin’ it,’ Kev snarled. ‘Decca told us, and I’d believe him over you any day of the week, so do one before I put me foot up your arse.’
As big as Rob was, Kev was bigger – and hard as fuck – so Rob held up his hands and quickly backed off. Just wait till he saw Decca, he fumed as he made his way back to the bar where he’d left his rucksack. He was the one who’d slagged Kev off after he’d found out the cunt had shagged his ex, and Rob had only agreed with him to make him feel better. So much for loyalty, the two-faced bastard!
Pissed off that no one else he knew was around to ease his thirst, Rob gave up and set off for his mum’s place, hoping that she might have got bored of Reg and chucked him out by now. He didn’t really want to stay there, because his old bed had fucked his back up the last time he’d slept on it, and his mum’s nagging had almost driven him insane. But he was starting to feel hungry again, and she was a great cook, so he figured he could put up with her for a bit. Plus, it was her benefit day, so she’d be ripe for tapping up for a few quid.
Reg was still there, and Rob’s blood instantly started bubbling when the man answered the door and tried to send him away w
ith a flea in his ear, telling him he wasn’t welcome and that his mum didn’t want to see him.
‘Where is she?’ Rob demanded. ‘If she don’t wanna see me, she can tell me herself.’
‘She’s not in,’ Reg said, blocking the doorway with his obese frame. ‘And I won’t have you or your lady friends coming round here trying to bully her. She’s your mother and you ought to have more respect.’
‘Bully her?’ Rob repeated, pulling a face. ‘Behave, you fat twat.’
‘You don’t scare me, boy,’ Reg spluttered, his jowls wobbling.
‘Listen here, Churchill,’ Rob sneered, thinking the man looked like the nodding dog from the advert. ‘She’s my mam, and I ain’t having a cunt like you, who thinks shagging her gives him some sort of rights, keep me out of the house I grew up in. So, if I was you, I’d back the fuck up or—’
A vehicle pulled up at the kerb behind Rob before he could finish, and he groaned when he glanced round and saw that it was a police car.
‘What’s going on?’ one of the two officers who got out asked as they walked up the short path.
‘Sorry for calling you out when I’m sure you have far more important things to be dealing with,’ Reg said, his ingratiating tone bringing a snort of derision from Rob. ‘This young man is my partner’s son, and there was an unfortunate incident last time he was here and she was forced to eject him. She’s out shopping at the moment and I’m under strict instructions not to let him in if he turns up – which, as you can see, he has. I anticipated trouble, so I rang you as soon as I saw him coming through the gate.’
‘And has he given you any trouble?’ one of the coppers asked, hooking his thumbs into the sides of his stab-vest and staring at Rob.
‘He threatened me,’ said Reg. ‘He seems to think I don’t have the authority to keep him out, even though I live here and his mother told me not to let him in.’
‘You’re a fucking liar,’ Rob spat, glaring at him. ‘I haven’t threatened you, and my mum would never bar me from the house. What you even doing here, anyhow, you ponce?’
Witness Page 19