‘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
