Love and Liability (Dating Mr Darcy - Book 2) (17 page)

“How long have you been on the streets?”

“Nearly three months.” She pointed to an alley up ahead. “There’s a squat over there. No one’s using it.”

They followed Sharon down the alley, skirting piles of rubbish and a couple of discarded tyres as they made their way towards a row of rubbish bins behind a cash-and-carry store.

“First things first,” Will said to the girls over his shoulder. “Let’s find dinner.” He pulled on a pair of gloves and lifted one of the bin lids, then took out a Maglite from his duffel and flashed it around inside.

“The big stores keep their bins locked,” Zoe explained to Holly. “The smaller ones don’t, usually.”

After a couple of minutes, Will unearthed some fruit and out-of-date crisps and several plastic bottles of water. They took their haul and went to find a place to sit.

On a grass verge behind an empty car park, they settled down to share their dinner. It all tasted surprisingly good.

“How do you know so much about skip-diving, anyway?” Holly asked him as she took a swig of lukewarm bottled water. She pulled her sweater closer. With the sun down, the wind cut right through her. “You said you ran away.”

“When I was fourteen,” he said. “New York, London — when you live on the streets, it doesn’t matter where — it’s all the same. You do what you have to do to survive.”

Zoe stood up abruptly. “We’d best blag that squat before someone else does. We can’t stay here. Besides,” she added as she pulled up her hoodie, “it’s getting cold.”

They went to the squat, located in an out-of-business tyre store, and got in through a back window. Discarded pop-bottle tops and bits of tinfoil with candle stubs littered the floor.

Will took out a lighter and lit a couple of the candles. “It must’ve been quite a party.” At Holly’s enquiring glance, he added, “Heroin.”

Her eyes widened.

“It’s not the Savoy,” Sha observed, “but it’ll do.”

“Beats the street.” Zoe lowered her rucksack. “You can’t sleep anywhere in central London these days. The coppers won’t let you.”

“Do you mean they run rough sleepers off?” Holly asked.

“Yeah, they do,” Sharon said. “And they use water cannons and hose down your spot, so you can’t stay.”

Zoe reached in her rucksack and withdrew a blanket and tossed it to Holly. “Here, you’ll want this.”

“Thanks, but…what about you?” Holly asked.

She indicated the bedroll attached to the bottom of her rucksack, then turned away and knelt down to unroll it. “I’ll crash here. I’m knackered.” As if to illustrate her point, she yawned. A short time later, her breathing grew slow and even.

“I’m done for, too.” Sharon took out her sleeping roll and lay down next to Zoe; in minutes she, too, was asleep.

Shadows danced on the walls as Will and Holly began, haltingly, to talk.

“Where are you from, Will?” Holly asked him as she wrapped herself in the blanket and sat — gingerly — on the floor.

“New York… South Brooklyn.” He sat next to her and stretched out his legs. “Red Hook, to be exact — known back in the nineties as the ‘crack capital of the America’.”

“Wow. That’s a tough neighborhood.”

He smiled slightly. “It’s a long way from Park Avenue.”

”How’d you get into photography? Did you always know you wanted to take photos?”

“My uncle gave me his old Leica when I was twelve. He taught me the basics. I took that camera with me pretty much everywhere. So yeah, taking photos is a passion of mine.” He glanced at her quizzically. “What about you? Did you always want to write?”

She nodded. “I used to make up stories and pass them to my friends in geometry. Mr Baxter nearly caught me, once.” She leaned back against the wall. “What do you think of Zoe? Bit of a hardass, isn’t she?”

“That’s putting it mildly,” he agreed. “She’s like a hedgehog, all prickles and bravado and big, scary boots. But under all the attitude, she’s basically just a scared kid.”

“I used to see her every morning on my way in to work. One day I brought her a coffee and a muffin. She looked at me as if I was mental. But eventually we talked, and… I don’t know. I wanted to learn her story. Maybe help her, if I could.”

Will leaned forward, his expression serious in the flicker of light from the bits of candle. “You’re a good person, Holly,” he said. “You care. Most people don’t.”

“I don’t know if I’m good, or just stupid.” Holly sighed and added, “You know, Will, Zoe likes you. You’re good with her. You…get her.”

“I like her too. She’s a great kid.” He looked as if he might say more, but instead he fell silent.

Zoe stirred, and Holly glanced over at her. “Zoe?” she called out softly. She hoped the girl hadn’t heard what Will said. She suspected Zoe had a crush on him; she’d seen the glances of longing she cast his way whenever she thought he wasn’t looking. But there was no answer; Zoe was asleep.

“So, how’s your love life, Miss James?” Will ventured, apropos of nothing. “Any boyfriends?”

Holly glanced at him and raised her brow. “According to the office rumours, I could ask you the same question.”

“What? If I have any boyfriends?”

She nodded cautiously, and he laughed.

“Well, you can squash the gay rumours,” he replied. “No boyfriends. No girlfriends, either,” he added, and grinned. “No one.” His smile faded. “Not yet, anyway.”

“I’m seeing someone,” Holly told him, “but he got drunk on our first date and did a striptease in the middle of karaoke night, and fell off the stage onto a table full of food. I drove him back to mine afterwards to sleep it off.”

Will raised a brow. “Sounds like quite an evening.”

“It wasn’t his fault. The owner kept sending free whisky shots out to the table. When we left, Alex could barely stand.”

“It sounds as if your friend isn’t much of a drinker.”

“No,” Holly admitted, “he’s not. He was mortified.”

Will pushed himself to his feet. “There’s nothing worse than overdoing it on a first date,” he agreed. “Except for the hangover the next day. Come on, it’s time we got some sleep.”

Holly stood and unfolded the blanket Zoe had given her. She shivered and eyed the needle-strewn floor with misgiving. “Do you want the floor, or the chair?”

Will had his back to her as he withdrew his sleeping bag. He turned and handed it to her, along with his jacket. “You can sleep next to Sharon and Zoe. I’ll take the chair. That way I can keep an eye out.”

“But…you need your jacket. And you need to rest, too.”

“I can sleep anywhere, Holly. I lived on the streets for five months.” He reached out and took the thin tartan blanket Zoe had given her. “Don’t worry about me. I’ll be fine. Now put on that jacket and get some sleep.”

“Damn, but you’re bossy,” Holly complained as she put on his jacket. It hung to her knees.

“Get used to it. Now, go to sleep.”

And with that, Will yawned and turned away, and settled himself in the chair to try and get some rest before daylight.

Chapter 25

“You’re late.”

No one could utter those two words more cuttingly than Sasha Davis.

“I know, sorry,” Holly apologized as she hurried past Sasha on the way to her cubicle. “The man in the shelter cot next to mine snored all night, so I didn’t get much sleep. Good thing they booted us out at seven, or I’d still be asleep.”

Sasha lifted a brow but said nothing.

“So what was it like?” Kate asked, and leaned back in her chair. “Did you meet any fit homeless blokes, or were they all mental?”

“They’re people,” she said shortly, “just like you or me.”

“Sorry,” Kate replied, taken aback. “I’m just having a laugh, Hols.”

“I guess I don’t find homelessness very funny.”

Kate exchanged glances with Sasha. “Well, consider me put in my place, then. And no, don’t bother to thank me for covering for you — for two bloody days — while you were gone.” She turned away without another word and began tapping furiously on her laptop.

Great
, Holly thought as she sat down and switched on her own laptop,
now
I’ve not only pissed Kate and Sasha off, I’ve pissed Zoe off, too.
When she’d seen Zoe that morning, sitting on her customary bench across the street, Holly had waved. Zoe had looked at her without expression and turned away.

And the thing was, Holly fretted as she opened a blank document in Word, she had no idea why Zoe was angry with her. During their two days together, things had gone well. Holly had filled half a steno pad with Zoe’s input. In their time together, they’d become, perhaps not best friends, but…friends.

Now they were back to square one.

But as Holly caught up on two days’ worth of emails, apologized to Kate, promised to go to the pub with her and Will after work, and began the rough draft of her article for Sasha — all of it done amidst numerous interruptions — she soon forgot about Zoe, and became immersed in describing firsthand what it was like to sleep rough on the streets of central London.

“If you offer a reward, Mr Russo,” Detective Sergeant Watts informed Marcus with a frown, “you’ll bring out every crackpot and nutter in England.”

“I don’t care.” Marcus was adamant. “I want my daughter found, and money’s the best way to do it. There’s no problem that can’t be solved if you throw enough cash at it.”

Personally, DS Watts didn’t agree, but he made no comment as he scribbled a note on his pad. It was Saturday morning, and past time for his smoke and his bacon sarnie. “So — you’re offering a fifty-thousand-pound reward for information leading to the safe return of your daughter, Poppy Russo. Anything else?”

“No. Just find her,” Marcus said, and his voice cracked. “The thought of my girl out there on the streets somewhere, alone for the past three weeks, scares the shit out of me.” He levelled a beseeching eye on DS Watts. “Find her, and bring her home. Please.”

DS Watts clasped him on the shoulder. He had a daughter himself, after all. “We’ll do all we can to bring Poppy home, Mr Russo. I promise you that.”

Why, Holly wondered with a scowl, had she agreed to come out to the pub with Kate and Will tonight?

As she trailed behind them into the Fox and Cheddar on Friday evening she longed for only one thing — her nice, comfy bed. After spending the last two nights sleeping on the street and a shelter cot, she was desperate for a good lie-in.

But she owed Kate; after all, she’d covered for Holly at work for the past two days.

They found a table and sat down, and Holly hung her handbag on the back of her chair and glanced over at Kate. She was laughing, exchanging flirtatious banter with Will, and basically ignoring Holly — and she wondered if Alex was, perhaps, right. Was Kate really out to sabotage her and steal her job?

“What’ll you have, ladies?” Will asked as he stood to make his way to the crowded bar.

“Just a half-pint for me, please,” she answered. “Thanks.”

“Not me!” Kate announced. “I want a pint. I’m getting as pissed as a kumquat tonight, I am.”

“Lovely,” Holly observed with a roll of her eyes as Will went off to fetch their drinks. “Our first time out with the new photographer — and you’re getting trolleyed?”

“Why not?” Kate said defensively. “I had a bloody hard week, what with covering for
you
for two days. Sasha drove me mad. I deserve to get pissed.”

Holly shrugged. “You might as well. I plan to nurse this half-pint all evening, anyway.”

“Why? You’ll miss out on all the fun.”

“One, I’m too tired. Two, I have to finish the homeless article tomorrow so I can turn it in on Monday. And three — someone has to keep her head on straight if you get trashed.”

“Here we are, ladies.” Will returned and set down two pints and Holly’s half-pint. “I saw Mark at the bar with Padma just now.”

“Oh, I’m
so
sorry,” Holly said in mock sympathy.

“You don’t like him?”

“It’s more that he doesn’t like me. He and Sasha have an exclusive membership to the ‘we hate Holly’ club.”

“Why?” Will asked, genuinely puzzled. “You’re great.”

“They think she’s posh,” Kate said, and sipped her beer, “because her dad owns all those department stores.”

“He doesn’t own them,” Holly said irritably, “he co-owns them. And so what? It’s nothing to do with me, or my job.”

“Your family own department stores?” Will echoed, impressed. “Nice. Which ones?”

“Dashwood and James,” Kate supplied, and took a long sip of her lager. “They’re not as big as Selfridges, of course, but their store on Sloane Street has four storeys, and a doorman.”

“Yes, and we nearly lost our arses last year,” Holly pointed out. “Don’t forget to tell him that bit.”

Kate shrugged. “Still — you’ve always got the family dosh to fall back on, haven’t you? Not many of us can say that.”

“I can’t help it if my family have money, Kate!” Holly snapped. “Why don’t you stop being such a jealous cow?”

“I think, ladies,” Will said quickly as Kate glared daggers at Holly, “that we should all have something to eat, don’t you? Who wants chips?”

“I’ll go,” Holly gritted, and stood up. If she didn’t get away from Kate right this very minute, she’d dump that bowl of peanuts on the table right over her improbably dyed red head.

When she returned five minutes later with a basket of chips and a bottle of vinegar, Kate had nearly finished her pint.

“C’mon, Will, let’s dance,” Kate invited him as a Joy Division song began playing. She stood and took his hand and led him out onto the tiny dance floor.

Poor Will
, Holly reflected. He wouldn’t know what had hit him until tomorrow morning, when he woke up in bed with Kate — probably with a massive hangover, too.

Should I warn him?
she wondered as she watched them dancing together in the crowd. No, she decided. He was a grown man, and it was none of her business what he — or Kate, for that matter — got up to after hours.

Still — running into Will in their bathroom tomorrow would be decidedly awkward, to say the least…

It was then that she saw Sasha Davis come in. She was alone, with the latest designer handbag on her arm and an expression of boredom on her face. She scanned the crowd until her eyes came to rest on Will, who was laughing at something Kate had just said.