‘What did I tell you?’ Suzie said when a reply to her message appeared on Holly’s phone screen. ‘Hey, baby,’ she read it out with a sneer. ‘All clear, come now. Can’t wait to see you. Kiss kiss.’
‘I don’t get it.’ Holly’s brow puckered in confusion. ‘How does he know it’s you?’
‘He doesn’t. He thinks it’s my secret lover. So he’s playing smart, pretending to be me to lure the man round to the house.’
‘Why?’
‘So he can kick the shit out of him and teach us both a lesson,’ Suzie muttered, tapping 999 into the phone. ‘Police, please . . . Hi, yeah, my ex is on the run for attacking me earlier and I’ve just come home from hospital and found him in my house . . . No, I’m at a friend’s across the road, but he’s definitely there . . . Because I left my phone at home, and when I sent a message to it he replied pretending to be me . . . Look, I know it sounds weird, but I haven’t got time to explain. I saw him at my bedroom window a minute ago, and he’s got a gun . . .’
Eyes wide with fear when Suzie had given her details to the operator and ended the call, Holly said, ‘Has he really got a gun?’
‘No, course not,’ Suzie said, getting up to peek out of the window again. ‘But if they think he has, they won’t mess about. Now shush with the questions and let me watch.’
Terrified that Rob was going to come after her when he found out that she’d helped Suzie to set him up, Holly wished that she’d followed her mum’s instructions and ignored the door.
As Suzie had predicted, the police didn’t waste any time responding to her call. Two dark vans arrived a short time later, minus the usual lights and sirens, and parked around the corner, out of sight of the house but in view of the flats. Several officers in riot gear piled out, and some went round the back while the others crept past the fences of the other houses to approach Suzie’s from the front.
‘Armed police!’ one of them yelled when they were in position. ‘Come out with your hands where we can see them!’
Suzie and Holly both jumped when a battering ram was slammed into the door. Two booms and it flew open, then the officers rushed inside. Lights went on all over the house and dark figures moved stealthily through the rooms.
‘Got him!’ someone called out. ‘Front bedroom! Unarmed . . . Unarmed!’
More shouts followed, all indecipherable, and Holly chewed on her knuckles as she waited in dread for the sound of a gunshot. Several anxious minutes passed before two police officers appeared, manhandling a handcuffed Rob through the hallway and out onto the path.
‘I haven’t done anything!’ he was protesting. ‘She’s lying about the gun – just like she lied about me attacking her earlier. She likes it rough; that’s how she gets her kicks. But I never meant to hurt her, I swear! It was just a stupid sex game that went too far!’
‘Lying bastard,’ Suzie spluttered. ‘We weren’t having sex; he’d gone off his head ’cos of those messages!’
Holly’s phone started ringing on the coffee table and they both dropped to their haunches when the glow of the screen lit up the room behind them. Crawling over to shut it off, Holly accidentally accepted the call instead, and she glanced at Suzie when a woman’s voice drifted out, saying: ‘Ms Clifton, it’s Janet Moore – the police operator you spoke to earlier. If you’re there, can you pick up, please?’
Suzie nodded and Holly slid the phone over to her.
‘Hello?’ Suzie whispered, as if scared that Rob might hear her, despite the fact he was still loudly protesting his innocence outside. ‘I know, I’m watching them now . . . Oh, really? Sorry, I honestly thought I saw one . . . Yep . . . No, that’s fine. Thank you.’
‘What did she say?’ Holly asked when Suzie ended the call.
‘They didn’t find the gun, so they’re going to search the house,’ Suzie said. ‘And they want to talk to me.’
‘They won’t come here, will they?’ Holly asked, worried that one of the neighbours might see them and mention it to her mum.
‘I didn’t tell them where I was, so they couldn’t even if they wanted to,’ Suzie said, looking out of the window in time to see Rob being bundled into the back of a police van. Tutting when loud bangs came from inside, she said, ‘I bet the idiot’s been on the whisky. He always goes crazy when he drinks that shit.’
The bangs faded as the van pulled away, and Suzie released a tense breath before turning to Holly.
‘Right, I’d best go and face the music. Thanks for helping me out, hon; I really appreciate it. And thanks for the loan of the clothes. I’ll leave them in a bag on top of my bin so you can pick them up on your way to school. If I don’t get arrested for wasting police time,’ she added with a grimace.
Hoping that Suzie wouldn’t get into trouble, but relieved that it was over, Holly showed her out – praying, as she closed the door behind her, that the woman would keep her out of whatever came next.
9
As promised, Suzie had left Holly’s jumper and jogging bottoms in a plastic bag on top of her bin the following morning. Hoping that no one spotted her taking them and marked her down as a bin-rat, like the junkies from the next block who rooted through everyone’s
