“You never answered my question,” Ali said, stepping abruptly sideways, out from under Jules’s arm. “What do I get? I know what I can do for you layabouts, but what will you do for me?”
“You talk like you’ve got a stick up your arse,” Jules muttered, for lack of a better response to Ali’s impertinent question. From experience, he was expecting that Ali would try to worm his way out of giving them an answer, or agree eagerly, or say that he’d join only to get them off his back. He’d not expected a goddamn negotiation.
“You talk like an idiot,” Ali fired back before turning his back on them and walking away.
“Can you believe this?” Jules had to laugh. “The audacity of this guy.”
“A three-syllable word, I’m impressed,” Ali tossed back.
The sun was beating down hard, bringing up the sweat on Jules’ skin and igniting his anger, which had been simmering for a while now. He reached forwards, grabbing Ali’s shoulder and spinning him round. The kid was almost knocked off balance, his tortoiseshell of a backpack making him stagger.
“Watch your mouth,” Jules gritted out, his hand clenched tight on Ali’s shoulder. He kept his voice down since they were still out on the pavement, and there were kids walking home and nosy parents milling around, walking slower in the heat.
“Why do we even need this little-?” Jules’ mate started, but Ali cut him off.
“I’ll join your little gang,” he said, not pleading but calm and rational like they were in a freaking business meeting. “But I want something in return.”
“Yeah, what?” Jules snapped. “Protection?”
“That,” Ali said, giving a shrug. “But what I really want is for you to find me somewhere to live.”
Somewhere along the way, Jules had lost control of this whole situation, which had derailed some time ago by Ali’s off-script responses and attitude. And now, Jules was thrown off course again.
“To live? Why d’you-?” Jules broke off, clicking his fingers. “Ah, I get it. Trouble at home, right? Stepdad, is it? Brothers?”
“No,” Ali said. “School bores me. My parents bore me. Find me a house, and I’ll help you.”
Jules grabbed the kid by the collar and shook him hard, like he’d wanted to do since the lad first talked back at him. Didn’t he have any kind of respect? Or, failing that, survival instinct? Jules and his mates could’ve been set on beating the kid to a pulp for all he’d known, and yet he’d still riled them up. It was a good thing that Jules had a longer fuse than some blokes, or Ali would’ve needed carting off to A&E by now, no matter how much they needed him.
But Jules restrained himself, letting go of Ali’s school collar with a light push that made the youngster take a step backwards. He told himself that he was merciful, that Ali would turn out to be useful, and didn’t admit to himself that the look in Ali’s dark eyes unsettled him.
As Jules had shaken the lad, Ali hadn’t resisted, but he’d glared up at Jules with the look of someone much older, someone with violence on their mind. Jules had seen enough looks like that to recognise it. The fact that those eyes were in the face of a scrawny fourteen-year-old somehow made the look more, not less, disturbing. Jules had heard rumours about Ali Pumphrey, but he hadn’t entirely believed them until now.
“You get away from your folks, and we’ll fix you up with a place,” Jules told Ali, folding his arms over his chest. “We’ll find you.”
Jules turned angrily away, feeling annoyed by how uncomfortable the teen had made him. He made to stride away after having the last word, but Ali ruined that too.
“Don’t take too long, Julian Sharp,” he called in his thin voice. “I won’t wait.”
Jules gritted his teeth and slapped the back of one of his friends to get him to stop gawking at the mouthy kid.
“Come on. We’re done here.”
As he walked away, he couldn’t shift the feeling that there were eyes on his back and his tongue fidgeted with his lip ring. He resisted the urge to turn around all the way down the street but, at the corner, he glanced back. Ali stood still on the spot, watching him silently. Despite the hot air and the bright daylight, Jules shuddered.
Two
The heatwave was unrelenting, and I was not enjoying it. Sam thrived in the warmth, happily soaking it up as she ventured out on long jogs and did her daily yoga sessions on the prickly grass of her small back garden.
“Ruddy heatwave,” I grumbled as I came back from a run, dripping with sweat and scowling. The exercise usually left me buzzing, but the heat was too much for me and made my head swim. I gulped down the glass of cool water Sam offered me as she came to greet me at the door, lifting an eyebrow at my complaints.
“You’d much rather it be grey and miserable, wouldn’t you?” she said, half-exasperated and half-fond. “You’re my little raincloud.”
I smiled at that, setting my empty glass down on the side and grimacing at the feeling of my shirt sticking to my chest. Even as a kid, I’d never liked the hot weather, preferring to climb up into a shady tree and suck on ice cubes.
“Go and lie down on the kitchen tiles,” Sam said, shaking her head at me. “That’d cool you down.”
“Not a bad idea,” I smiled, “but a cold shower will sort me out.”
I relished the gush of chilled water, scrubbing my head to get the sweat out of my stubbornly curly hair and staying under the spray until I was shivering. As soon as I got out, I was almost immediately too warm again, and I had to resist the urge to
