Shiver Sweet (29 page)

“Actually, she needs
both
of us.  Please help me.”

Her shoulders rose against mine.  “Tell me what to do.”

“Let’s shuffle across the room,” I said.

“My feet are taped to the bed.”

Damn.  “If we lean to one side d’ya think you’ll be able to see under the bed?  God knows what horrors are under there, but hopefully-“

“I doubt Sarah has a knife.”

“Just try, will you?”  I leaned to the left until my arm was resting on the floor.  “Anything?”

“Wait a sec.  Ouch, my elbow, and something’s sticking in my...”  She groaned then gasped.  “Sit up, sit up.”

“What is it?”  I raised myself up.

“Can you feel my back pocket?”

“What’s in it?”

“My lighter.”

I brightened.  This was the only time I was thankful she’d started smoking again.  “Shift your arms to the side.”  I felt for her pocket, stuffed two fingers in and gripped the lighter.  “Keep still.”  I pulled it out and spun it in my fingers until my thumb sat on the striking wheel.  “This might hurt.”  I flicked the wheel to strike a flame, pressed the gas button and blindly angled the lighter at Nicola’s wrists to burn the tape.

“Shit, ouch,” she cried.  “Careful.”

“Sorry.”  My nervous thumb slipped off the gas button.  I struck it again.

Nicola pulled at the tape and wriggled behind me.  “Ooh... that’s hot,” she said, then her wrists pulled apart, but were still attached to mine.  “Let me try.”  Nicola took the lighter. 

Heat stung my wrists.  “Ouch.  Jeez.” 

“Sorry, sorry.”

I gritted my teeth.  “Keep going.”  Some seconds later, we were free. 

I twisted around and rubbed my sore wrists.  “Good job.  Hurry.”  We untied our feet, and I scuttled across the room to Sarah’s chest of drawers.  “Help me?” 

Nicola raced over and we pushed it up behind the door.  “What now?” Nicola asked.  “The window?”

I grabbed the phone, scrambled across the room and knelt in front of the phone socket.

“It’s broken,” Nicola whispered.  “Leave it.”

I plugged the phone into the cracked socket.  No dial tone.  “Find me a...”  I rooted through Sarah’s basket of niknaks on her desk while Nicola pushed the sash window up and stared out. 

“Oh God,” she groaned.  “Think we can make those bushes?”

“Aha.”  I found a flat metal hairclip. 
This will do.
  Back on my knees and with shaking hands, I unscrewed the plastic faceplate from the wall socket using the slim end of the hairclip.

“Christa, we’re wasting time.  Let’s go.”

I shook my head.  “That’s concrete down there!”

“Then let’s... run to my room.  We could climb down the trellis outside.”

“They’ll hear us on the landing.”  With a final turn, the faceplate came off. 

“What the hell are you doing?”

“Saving us.”  If my internet had not died earlier in the year, causing me to phone my provider and complain, I would not have known about the second phone point concealed behind the faceplate, used by engineers to test the line. 

And there it was. 

I plugged in the phone and held the receiver to my ear.  “It’s working.”  I smiled up at Nicola and dialled 999.  “Police, please,” I said, then turned on hearing a rumbling sound in the walk-in wardrobe.  I dipped down behind the desk and waved at Nicola.  “Hide.”

While I whispered on the phone, Nicola picked up a tennis racket and flattened her back against the wall behind the wardrobe door.

I covered the mouthpiece to whisper to Nicola.  “Nic!  Be careful.”  I turned my attention back to the phone.  “We’re being held hostage.  Four or five men.  They killed my husband and...”  A light thud came from inside the wardrobe and something rattled.  My pulse quickened. 

“What should I do?” Nicola asked.

I got to my feet, still talking on the phone, and tried to push the desk up to the wardrobe.  Something stopped it moving.  “Yes... yes.   Willow Lane.  We’re in a bedroom.  Hurry.”  I hung up, grabbed a heavy book and steeled myself for attack.

Nicola, wielding the tennis racket high, fumbled with the nob and yanked the wardrobe door open.  “Jeez.”  She jumped back and pressed a hand to her chest.

My eyes flew wide open as my daughter stepped out of the wardrobe.  “S... Sarah?”  Oh, crap.

“Mum?”  She frowned.  “What are you doing in my room?  What’s all the noise downstairs?”

I ran over and enfolded her in my arms.

The stairs creaked.  “No!  Don’t do it,” a man yelled.  “If we get caught...”  Grunts, thumps and scuffling noises indicated a fight had broken out.

Sarah flinched in my arms.

“Oh hell.”  Nicola raised the racket and faced the door.  “We have to hurry.”

A volley of footsteps pounded up the stairs.

I gripped Sarah’s shoulders and looked at her.  “Keep your voice down.  There are some bad men in the house and we have to leave.” 

She gaped at me.  Horror entered her eyes. 

I nodded to the wardrobe.  “How did you get in?”

Her voice wavered.  “Th-the...”

I shook her.  “Tell me.  Now.”

“L-loft hatch.  John boarded it out so I could...”

Of course!
  “Excellent.”  I shooed her into the wardrobe.  There was a chair beneath an open hatch in the ceiling.  “And then?”

“The skylight,” she said, clutching my arm.  Her eyes pooled, threatening to spill over.  “There’s trellis and... roof on-“

“The utility room,” I finished for her.  I kissed her head.  “Step up.”  I helped her onto the chair and raised her up to the hatch.  “Nicola,” I beckoned.  “Come on.  You’re next.”

She turned from staring at the door, dropped the racket and ran to me.  As I pushed her bottom and kicking legs up to the hatch, the bedroom door rattled.  I gasped.  Oh, no.  I stepped onto the chair, locked my arms and shoved Nicola harder until she was through.

The door thumped against the chest of drawers and then a man behind it yelled, “Stop.  This is insane.” 

I heard a metallic-sounding click.

Holy fuck.  A gun?

I lost balance.  The chair wobbled.  I slipped and fell off, twisting over on my foot.  Pain zipped through my ankle.

“You’re going too far.  You’re drunk.”  This was scab-man, I recognised his voice. 
Is he finally speaking up for us?
  “Killing wasn’t the deal.  Not again.”

“Grow some balls,” Dale said.

“I’ve got balls.”

“Then get bigger ones.”

“Screw this” another man said.  “We’re outta here.”

“Piss off then.“ 

Several sets of feet thundered down the stairs, twice as loud in our silence.

Have they gone? 
I tensed on the floor, laying on my front, half in and half out of the wardrobe.

Faint shuffling on the landing, the creak of wood and...  I raised my head to look at the door.  Oh shit.

With a monstrous thud, the chest of drawers crashed onto its side.  The door rammed it repeatedly, forcing the chest across the carpet.  The barrel of a gun poked through a gap in the door, followed by a hand with plasters around the fingertips, an arm, then head and shoulders. 

Blazing eyes found mine.  The gun swung my way.

I rolled forward into the room and took cover behind the bedroom door.  My heart threatened to pound out of my chest.

“Christa!” Nicola said.  “Come on.  Give me your hand.”

I panted.  “Go!”

“Not without-”

A gunshot rang out, blasting a hole in the wall left of the wardrobe.  A picture frame shattered.  Debris rained down.

Nicola screamed.

I covered my ringing ears and pulled my knees up to my chest, shuddering. 

“Go!” I yelled. 

“Let me in,” Dale said.  “Or shall I go and grab that daughter of yours from the bridge by the canal?”

Hell, what?  My heart practically stopped.  He must have read her text on my mobile that I’d left downstairs.  Thank goodness she’d come back, but she was still in danger.  I’d rather die than let him anywhere near my daughter. 

I had to make a move.  Quick.  I glanced around, saw broken glass from the picture frame on the carpet and grabbed two nasty looking shards.  I took a deep breath of courage, and threw myself at the door, crushing Dale’s arm in the gap. 

He yelled.

With a shaking hand, I sliced his inner wrist with the glass, opening up a long nasty gash.  Blood spurted.  He yelled louder.  I flinched and wobbled on my ankle, losing pressure on the door.  My hands were bleeding and shook so much I dropped the glass. 

His arm disappeared back through the gap. 

I slammed the door shut, flicked off the light and hopped back behind the door, heaving.

“Brian!” a female screeched from below. 

Brian?
  W-wait.  Was that... Claire? 

“Where are you?” her high-pitched call echoed up the stairs. 

Holy shit.  My brain fogged.  Why would...?  “Get out, Claire!  He’s a got a gun.”

Lighter footsteps charged upstairs.

“Claire!” I called again. 

The top steps creaked.  “Dale, you idiot!”

Wait... what?   A cold shock gripped my heart. 
She knows him?

“What the hell are you doing here?” he asked.

“Where’s Brian?  You better not have-”

He snorted.  “You stupid cow.  She knows who you are now.  What if she...”

“You’re bleeding.  Look at your hand.”

I heard voices, a commotion in the back garden through the window.
 Is that Nicola?  The police?  Please, please.

Muscle-seizing fear pinned my bottom to the floor.  Did I have the strength to push the chest back against the door?  Would I make it to the wardrobe on my ankle?  I had to try.  Knees trembling, I pushed up, took a deep lungful of air and limped across the room.  Barely a metre before making the wardrobe, the bedroom door flung open and crashed against the chest.  A switch clicked, lighting me up from above.

“Don’t move.”

I shut my eyes tight and froze.  A hellish shiver skipped across my shoulders.  He had a gun on me, I knew it.  Swearing in terror, I limped around to face him.

Dale staggered in; one hand pointed a gun at me, the other was bloody and pressed to his chest.

Claire burst in behind him.  All boobs and legs, heavy perfume and booze, a frenzied panic filled her black-rimmed eyes.  “Wait.”  She clasped his forearm and forced him to lower the gun.

I let out a long breath.

“Claire!” Dale said.  “What are you doing?”

She stood hand on hip and scanned the room.  Her predatory eyes stopped on me.  “Where is he?”

CHAPTER 31

CHRISTA

“Claire, please,” I pleaded, inching backwards.  “Don’t do this.”

She barged in front of Dale, further into the room, only the upturned chest of drawers was between us. 

I bent forward to think and catch lost breath.  “Brian’s all yours.”  Is that what she wanted to hear?  “You don’t have to kill me.  I won’t go near him ever again, and I won’t say anything to anyone about this.”

Dale huffed.  “Sure.”

I inclined my head toward the phone point.  My dry throat swelled and clogged.  “The c-cops are on their way.  I called them,” I choked out.  “Leave!”

Dale rubbed his temple with the gun and stumbled sideways.  He’d lost a lot of blood and could barely move his right arm.  Blood pooled on the carpet.  “Crap.”  He shook his head then blinked rapidly at me.  “You’ve ruined my sister’s life and fucked up my arm.”  He raised the gun again.

Oh no... oh no.

My pulse pounded in my ears.  My life was in the clutches of a drunken psycopath and his delirious jealous sister.  What would stop them shooting me right now?  What could I...  I swallowed hard.  “Brian,” I whispered and glanced at the window.  That’s what she wants, that’s what I have to make her believe.

Claire snapped her head that way.  “He’s here?  Where?  Out the back?”

I challenged her hard, unblinking eyes, giving her my best ‘stuff you’ grin.  “Toss the gun downstairs and I’ll call him in.”

Her expression creased.  She snatched the gun from Dale and pointed it at my face.  “Call him.  Now.”

I froze.  Oh, shit.

“Here,” said a voice behind me. 

Whoa, what?  My breath caught.  I gaped over my shoulder. 

Brian swung down out of the loft hatch and landed in the room. 

Holy shit.  It was
him
I heard through the window.

His eyes burned and his jaw clenched.  He grabbed my wrist and pulled me behind him.

Claire stared at Brian, her eyes sharp, yet brimming with tears of love... or pain.

I clung to Brian’s back through his shirt.

“I’m here, Claire,” Brian said softly, stepping closer to her.  “Give me the gun, let Christa go, and come to me.”

My heart chilled. 
Come to me?  What’s he doing?
  “Don’t trust her.  She’s in on it.  Her brother killed John.” 

Brian glared at me.  “Shut up!  I don’t love you, Christa.  Claire knows I’ve been confused.” 

I gasped.  My trembling legs threatened to give out.

He faced her again.  “Right, Claire?”

Dale grabbed Sarah’s cow-print pyjama bottoms off the floor.  “Don’t listen to him.”  Blood gushed from his wrist where the flesh had split.  He wound the fabric around it and collapsed.

“Dale!”  Claire bent to help him, then stopped and pointed the gun my way.

“You know why I came here, Claire.” Brian said, his voice low, composed.  “To protect Sarah from-“ he nodded my way.  “
-her
, and her sleazy ways.” 

Me?  Sleazy?  Oh, heck.  Did he mean my shower scene?  How did he know about that?

Claire bit her lip.

Brian reached a hand out.  Passion entered his voice.  “You’re the one I want, Claire.  Let Christa go, and I’ll get you and your brother out of here before the police come.  He needs a doctor or he’ll die.”

Claire stared at Brian with unabashed intensity.  The gun shook in her hand.  “I just want you to love me, not her.”  Her eyes, filled with loathing, raked me from head to toe.

“And I do love you.”  Brian pulled a pair of panties out of his pocket, dangled them off his finger and beckoned her.  “I kept them.  See?  I want you.  I know that now, after... after being with you tonight.  Let me help.”