She’d planned to put on an Oscar worthy act when she’d got here. Wanting to seem distressed to get her father onside so that he would have a word with Ashley. Only she wasn’t acting now. She was in shock and genuinely terrified that she had almost been killed. Pete could sense it too. The way her whole body shook in his arms. His precious daughter was traumatised.
‘That fucking estate. I knew something like this would happen. It’s not safe, and it’s no place for my daughter. But, of course, Ashley wouldn’t listen to me, would he?’ Pete said. ‘Too busy trying to prove a point that he can stand on his own two feet than to take my offer of a deposit to get you both out of there. Somewhere better, decent, somewhere you belong…’ Pete was furious now. The Griffin Estate was notorious for its crime. Riddled with gangs and drug dealers, it was the last place on earth his daughter and grandchild should be. ‘The place is a shithole. The dregs of the earth live there,’ Pete spat. ‘I should never have let you move in with him. I should have put my foot down.’
‘I know, Dad!’ Shelby said, nodding in agreement. She hadn’t been overly happy about moving in with Ashley over at that decrepit estate either. She’d begged Ashley to take the offer of a deposit on one of the fancy new Riverside Quarter apartments on the river, overlooking Hurlingham Park, which her parents had offered to pay as a wedding gift.
Only Ashley had insisted that he’d get them out of the Griffin Estate himself.
And Shelby had felt she had no choice but to at least show willing and support her new husband’s decision.
Only so far, his great escape from their dingy flat hadn’t materialised. Shelby hated it over there.
But maybe now Ashley would be forced to listen to her father. Maybe now he’d agree to taking the money and starting afresh somewhere better. A tiny part of her felt calmer then, praying that something good would come from tonight and Ashley’s actions after all.
‘And where is he now? Where is that useless excuse of a husband while all this is going on?’ Pete said through gritted teeth, guessing he was up to his usual tricks of being up to no good. ‘Because I’m holding that man personally responsible for putting your life in danger. When I get my hands on him…’ Pete’s words were interrupted as Shelby suddenly doubled over on the floor and cried out in pain.
‘Ouch! Mum! Oh God…’ She clutched her stomach. ‘Something’s wrong with the baby.’ A sudden wave of agony left her breathless, the pain so acute that she felt as if she was going to pass out.
Rushing to her daughter’s side, Janey wrapped her arms around Shelby and helped her to sit on the bottom step of the stairs.
‘What’s happening to me?’ Shelby cried as she stared down at her trousers in horror and eyed the puddle of water at her feet. ‘I’ve wet myself, Mum!’
‘Pete, get the car!’ Janey instructed knowingly, taking control of the situation as Shelby continued to sob and Pete looked fit to murder somebody.
Recognising that her daughter’s waters had broken, the last thing Janey wanted was to panic her daughter any further. ‘Pete! The car, now!’ Janey ordered, grabbing her own coat.
‘Listen to me, Shelby. You’re going to be okay. It’s probably just the nasty shock you’ve had but I think your waters may have broken. Let’s get you to the hospital, yeah, and get them to check you over. Make sure everything’s okay,’ Janey said, doing her best to stay calm and composed as she followed behind Pete, leading Shelby out to the car on the driveway.
‘Oh, Christ, Mum. The baby can’t be coming. Not yet. I’ve still got another month,’ Shelby said as another pain ripped through her.
‘Let’s just get you to the hospital, my darling, we’ll know more then,’ Janey said, helping to ease her daughter into the back seat of the car and giving Shelby a reassuring smile.
Though secretly Janey was fearing the worst. Shelby had been through a horrifically traumatic ordeal this evening, and the baby wasn’t due for weeks. Time was of the essence. They needed to get Shelby and the baby to the hospital, fast.
8
‘I hear you just took down Usain Bolt?’ Detective Constable Ben Holder grinned as Lucy walked into CID’s briefing room, her face still blazing red from where she’d taken a punch.
‘Fancied himself as a bit of a boxer on all accounts too,’ Lucy said, playing her heroics down in front of her colleague. ‘I managed to get a clump for my efforts.’ She laughed, holding her aching jaw.
‘Boxer, athlete and a racing driver too. Busy boy!’
‘Not so busy now for the foreseeable with any luck.’ Lucy grinned, glad of the result tonight. ‘Providing the judge does his job and gives him what he’s due.’
‘Yeah well, we all know how that one can play out,’ Holder said, unable to hide the bitterness to his tone.
He knew as well as Lucy that they could both do their job to their best ability, but at the end of the day it wasn’t down to them what justice would be dished out to each criminal. And sometimes no matter what evidence they managed to gather or how much of a case they built, the criminals still managed to walk free. To get off on a technicality or to plead some kind of ignorance or mental health issue.
Still. They had more pressing things to think about now.
‘Right, everyone gather round. We’ve just had an urgent incident come in,’ DS Morgan announced, standing at the front of the room and gaining his team’s attention. The fractious expression on his face told them all that what he was about to say wasn’t going to be pleasant.
‘An attempted knife attack, at the Griffin Estate…’
‘Gang related?’ Lucy said, recalling the
