The walk back is excruciating. Every time I try to lower my arms, the tiger guy jabs the barrel of his gun in my back – hard. I get the message. I guess ensuring our hands are in the air as we walk keeps us off balance. Hard to run with your hands up. I can’t even look at Libby. How can anyone be afraid of water, for Shaka’s sake? That’s like … that’s like being afraid of the air we breathe or the food we eat. She was probably just too chicken to jump. If we’d taken a run at it and we’d tucked our legs up as we jumped, I’m sure we would’ve been just fine. We could’ve been halfway across the river by now, instead of on our way back to that dank, rank basement.
I can’t bear the thought.
Maybe Libby feels about bodies of water the same way I feel about dark, enclosed spaces. When I told her we should jump into the water, she looked like she’d rather saw off her own leg than follow my suggestion. And the way she kept insisting that I should go and leave her behind … I glance at Libby. She’s staring straight ahead. I think she really meant it about me going without her. Did the river really bother her that much? Stupid question. If it didn’t, we’d both be all the way across it by now.
Oh hell! There’s the house we escaped from. The only one where the bottom windows aren’t boarded up. I slow as we approach it. The gun jabs into my back again, pushing me forward. In their rush to come after us, they left the front door wide open.
‘Where is she?’ the tiger asks the rabbit, his voice gruff.
She?
Who are they talking about? Libby’s right here beside me.
We enter the house, back in this prison that smells of piss and old food. A single dim bulb provides the only light in the hall. I hate this place. Tiger and Rabbit push Libby and me forward, past the living room, towards the basement door. I can’t do this. Go back down to that basement? I can’t do it. I won’t. I’m about to turn and take my chances when footsteps sound behind us. I look round. The man in the fox mask emerges from the sitting room – but he’s not alone.
Three men – all Noughts – follow him out, each armed with a gun. None of them is wearing a mask. One Nought has curly red hair and a matching trimmed moustache and beard. The second Nought wears his blond hair in locks tied back and extending down past his shoulders. This one has mean eyes. Dead eyes. The last Nought guy is bald and wearing black jeans and a black short-sleeved T-shirt revealing upper arms each the size of one of my thighs. I stare, thrown at the sudden sight of them.
‘Libby!’ the fox calls out urgently.
The person in the fox mask isn’t a man, but a woman. I blink in surprise. How did I miss that? Shocked, Libby spins round and utters one bewildered word.
‘Mum?’
fifty-four. Libby
* * *
I recognize her voice straight away. ‘Mum?’
The fox stumbles towards me, still wearing her mask. The rabbit steps in front of me, reaching out to her.
‘Misty? What the hell—?’
His voice … Ohmigod! I was right. Back at the harbour wall, when Rabbit Man threatened us, I thought I had to be going crazy, that my ears were deceiving me. The voice had sounded so like Pete’s but I dismissed it as my imagination playing tricks.
It all clicks into place now. Mum – and Pete …
‘Libby, run!’ Mum calls out.
Without warning, I’m hauled backwards and pushed to the floor.
BANG! BANG! BANG! BANG!
The sound is explosive. Deafening. Like the end of the world. Troy’s body covers mine as the guns go off. Ears ringing, heart pounding, I struggle to stand back up. I have to get to Mum.
‘Libby, for Shaka’s sake! Stay down,’ Troy hisses, his breath warm in my ear. His voice is coming at me through cotton wool. I can barely hear him over my thundering heart and the continuing sound of explosions over my head. I turn my head, the only part of my body I can move. The fox is looking down at the blooms of red spreading out across her light grey hoodie. Mum pulls off her fox mask as if to get a better look, her expression pure shocked surprise – and bewilderment. Such bewilderment.
‘MUM!’
Mum drops to her knees, her eyes now on me. Then she pitches forward – and is still. Behind her, Pete is already on the floor, his mask lying beside him as he looks out of the front door, staring out into nothing for all time. His gun still in his hand, Tiger Man is lying next to him. His mask is still on but he isn’t moving.
I stare at Mum’s body, both of us frozen in the moment. It’s so clear now. My own mum and Pete snatched me off the street and kept me in a basement, just to get money out of my dad. No explanation or confirmation required. I know Mum and I know the reason why she did it. The moment both Pete and I found out who my dad was, it was inevitable that she’d pull this kind of stunt. Maybe Pete put her up to it. Maybe he didn’t. Was it my threat to go through my trust-fund bank account that prompted Mum to try and rinse Dad for more cash? Or maybe it was my promise to ask if I could go and live with him instead. My own mum did this to me, put me through all this, and for what?
For money.
Lousy, stinking money.
The man in the tiger mask. I didn’t know him. One of Pete’s lowlife friends who agreed to help for a slice of the pie? Probably.
My mum … My own mum did this to me. That knowledge carves its way through me, slicing and dicing. This house, this situation is a monument to just what Mum thought of me. I was a means to an end, nothing more.
‘You two, get up.’ Combat boots fill my vision as the men who emerged from the living room stand before us. Troy shifts off me, then gets to his feet before grabbing hold of my hand to pull me up.
‘Keep your hands where we can see them.’
Mum …
I turn to go to her, but Troy pulls me back, frantically shaking his head.
‘That’s my mum!’ I cry out. ‘She needs me.’
‘Stay where you are, unless you want to join her,’ the massive bald guy sneers. The other two men peel away from him, one heading up the stairs, the other down into the basement.
‘Sh-she’s dead?’ I whisper, my eyes on Troy.
Grimly, Troy nods at me.
I dig my nails into my palms. Not enough. The pain isn’t enough. I dig harder, raking so deep I draw blood. And still it isn’t enough. I open my mouth – and a howl rises up from the very depths of my soul. It erupts from my mouth, the cry of a wounded animal.
‘Shut the hell up!’
I can’t stop. Even when the bald man takes a step towards me, his arm raised, I can’t stop. Out of the corner of my eye, I see Troy move forward, but he isn’t fast enough. The bearded man slaps my face so hard I stagger and fall. My cheek burns. I can taste blood in my mouth. The whole world tastes of blood. Troy is at my side in an instant, kneeling down to cradle me in his arms.
And me? I just want to die, but my scream dies before I do.
I clutch at Troy’s arm, trying to merge his flesh with mine. If I let go, I’ll sink, my mind pulled under by ragged, jagged, scrapping thoughts of my mum and what she’d done. If I let go of Troy, I’ll surely sink, never to rise again. I glance over at the bodies on the floor. Yes, one of them really is my mother. I’d thought … I’d hoped … Mum lies still, eyes closed, entirely too motionless to be asleep.