WILL TIME WAIT: Boxed set of 3 bestselling 'ticking clock' thrillers (81 page)

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?”

CHRISTA

“C
laire,
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 psychopath 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.”

No.  Wait.  This is lies... but... he’s been
with her tonight?

Claire sneered wickedly at me, clearly enjoying my shock and
discomfort.

“If Christa dies, we can’t be together,” Brian said. 
“She’s like a sibling to me.  You know what that’s like, right?  So
to shoot her, you’ll have to shoot through me.  Give me the gun.”

Silence, like ice, froze the room. 

I glanced nervously over Brian’s shoulder at Dale half-cut
and slumped on the floor, and at Claire waving the gun.

“Bullshit,” Dale said, his face screwing up with pain. 
“He doesn’t love you at all, Claire.  He’s playing you.  Shoot ‘em
both and let’s get out of here.”

Brian opened his arms to her.  “We have to move, she
called the cops.” 

Claire looked from Brian to Dale, weighing things up. 

Brian nudged me and whispered, “Go.”

“W-hat?” I said.

“Go.  Now.  Go to Sarah.”  He nudged me again
then said to Claire, “Let’s go back to your place and finish what we started.”

Tears streamed down my cheeks.  I didn’t want to leave
Brian but...  I backed up to the wardrobe.

Claire bit her bottom lip, took a step closer to Brian and
lowered the gun.

Dale kicked her.  “Rachel, snap out of it.”

“Rachel?” Brian choked out.

“Yeah,” Dale said.  “That’s her real name.”  He
faced her again.  “Brian doesn’t want you, and he’d want you even less if
he knew the truth.”  For a moment, his words deadened the room. 
Claire glared at him so hard it was obvious Dale had hit a nerve.

“Truth?” Brian said.  “What truth?  There’s more?”

He grunted then raised his eyes to Brian.  “You’re
Sarah’s father.”

My breath rushed out in a cough.

Brian looked at me and froze.  Shock broke across his
face. 
Did we hear that right?

Claire’s hand flew out to silence Dale.  “You idiot!”

Dale let out a light, sickening laugh.  “Jeez! 
You people are so dumb.”  A triumphant smile crossed Dale’s face before
pain washed it out.  He lay there, half lucid, bleeding into the
carpet.  “Brian definitely won’t want you now, sis.”

Brian snapped unfrozen.  Grinding his jaw left to
right, his gaze shot back to Claire.  “W-wait...  How? 
Why?  Is this true?”

“Of course not,” I said against his shoulder.  
How
can it be? 
I felt sick.
 

He glanced back at me.  “You said it was impossible.”

I clawed his top.  “It is.  The dates... Steph...
she’s a nurse.  She said there was no way that...”  Tears trickled
and I bit my lip in thought.  But why would Dale even think to make that
up?

Claire waggled the gun at me, then looked down at Dale, the
distortion in her face answered my question. 

Oh, heck.  My stomach dropped like a free-falling elevator.

“Steph manipulated you,” Dale said, glowering at me. “She
lied, covered it up, and the slack cow doesn’t even know what she’s done.”

Claire looked at Brian and tilted her head to one
side.  “Babe, don’t listen to him.”   She glared down at a pale
and clammy-faced Dale.  “Why are you doing this to me?”

“Because, dear sister, your head’s stuck in cuckoo
land.  Brian will never be yours.  You won’t believe me, so I had to
find a way for you to see it for yourself, in his face.”  He scowled at
Brian.  “He’s a liability.  He knows too much, shoot him now and help
me out of here.”

Tears spilled down Claire’s face as her pained eyes sought
Brian’s.

“I’ll take care of you, like I always do,” Dale said. 
“Shoot ‘em.  Do it Claire.  Do it now.”

“No,” she cried.  “I-I can’t.”

Brian and I glanced at each other, trying to gauge if we
could get the gun.

Just as I heard sirens in the distance, Claire and Dale
launched into an animated argument, exchanged insults, and Claire dropped the
gun. 

This was our chance.

Just do it, Christa.
 I stepped out from behind
Brian, steeled myself to dive for the gun, but...
 
Dale rolled over
and grabbed it.  Death waved our way once again.  I screamed and
ducked.  Claire knocked Dale’s arm.  Air whooshed over my head and a
bullet slammed into the wardrobe door above me.

Brian dropped to the floor and wrapped his arms over my
head. 

Claire snatched the gun and squirmed out of Dale’s leg
hold.  She kicked him in the stomach.  His head hit the wall and he
heaped into stillness on the blood-stained carpet. 

Claire tripped and fell onto the bed. 

“Trust me,” Brian said.  He pulled me to my feet, put
his palm on my chest and pushed. 

I stumbled into the wardrobe, banging the back of my legs on
the chair. 

Swinging the gun blindly, Claire staggered off the bed and
gulped air.  “Brian?  Brian?” 

“I’m here, babe.  I’m not going anywhere.”  He
turned to me.  Brows bunched low over panicked eyes, he mouthed, ‘run’.

I reached a hand out.  “Come with me.”

“Brian?”  Claire’s voice was louder than a
banshee.  Eyes filled with tears and off balance, she aimed the gun my
way.  “If you’re messing with me, I’ll put a bullet in her head.”

Scared, I shrank back.

In a tone ripe with distaste, he said, “I’m not.”

Sarah.
  Her sweet face flashed into my mind,
pulling on me.  I stood the chair upright, stepped on it and raised myself
up and through the loft hatch.  Sobbing, I scrambled along the boarded
floor with just enough moonlight to see my way.  Brian didn’t follow. 
I climbed out of the skylight.  Cold air hit me as I dropped to the flat
snowy roof, landing on my weak ankle.  I cried out.  Clutching my
foot, I looked up, waiting. 
Please, Brian, get out of there.
 

The sirens blared louder now, the police were here. 
Hurry.

A shot rang out through the dark night.

“Brian!”