A Place Of Safety Page 3

  ‘One or two odd jobs,’ she said, and shook the masonry from her hair.

  ‘When I play for Liverpool I’ll be rich,’ he said. ‘But I suppose we need the money now.’

  They threw their bags on the back seat and got into the Mini. ‘Don’t you worry, big man, these divorce cases pay well.’

  ‘You don’t like them though, do you, Mum?’

  Her new car purred. ‘I like them well enough.’

  ‘What about all those children you used to help?’ he asked.

  Lilly sighed. ‘Someone else will represent them.’

  ‘And you really don’t mind?’

  Lilly smiled and set off down the lane.

  When she dropped Sam at school, he turned to her again.

  ‘I’ll be there,’ she laughed. ‘And I have something for you.’ She handed him a small plastic bag and watched the joy on her son’s face as he unpacked a pair of brand new Nike goalie gloves.

  * * *

  The bench is hard and cold but Artan is prepared to wait all day. Anna leans against him, her cheek against his chest, her bony arm around his waist.

  They watch for the telltale green blazers that separate the boys from Manor Park from the local kids.

  ‘Tell me if you see them,’ he says.

  She nods slightly, her cheek grazing the zip of his jacket.

  The air buzzes with lunchtime chatter. Two boys in hoodies spar in the road, pretending to land karate kicks. Their friends shout encouragement and shower them with sweets and crisps. When they spot the strangers on the bench and whisper to each other.

  ‘What you looking at?’ shouts one.

  Artan doesn’t reply, but the look on his face sees the boys off.

  He feels Anna’s body tense against his own.

  ‘What?’

  ‘There,’ she says, her gaze directed towards four boys in green.

  ‘Are you sure?’ he asks.

  Anna nods. ‘The dark-haired one and the redhead.’

  ‘I thought you said there were three.’

  ‘I did,’ she says. ‘He is not there.’

  They let the boys buy some drinks and follow them at a safe distance.

  The boys lark about all the way back to school. The redhead is in charge. His voice is the loudest and he punches his friend on the arm just a little too hard. When the other cries out, he laughs in his face and calls him ‘gay’.

  ‘He reminds me of Gabi,’ says Anna.

  ‘Don’t ever say that name.’

  Anna leans against him. ‘Sorry.’

  He pushes her away and wraps his hand around the handle of the gun. Its feel is familiar, like an old friend.

  Jack pounded forward, the rhythm of his feet beating in his head. One, two, three, four. It was relentless. Yet oddly comforting.

  He’d taken up running six months ago, when the doc told him his blood pressure was borderline dangerous. He’d also been told to curb his drinking—but you could only do so much.

  He surged through puddles and oil slicks, oblivious to the mud catapulting up his calves, concentrating instead on his breathing. One, two, three, four. He thought it would lose its attraction once the summer skies had disappeared but oddly he found the grey streets and lanes even more enticing.

  He’d lost nearly a stone already, which was no small feat considering how good Lilly’s cooking could be. He smiled at the thought of her licking cake mixture from a spoon.

  He’d call her later, see if she and Sam fancied catching a film. She’d sounded distracted yesterday, worried about the boy at the hostel. She was always so committed to these kids she worked for. Took it all to heart. It would do her good to do less of that kind of work.

  He remembered that Sam was playing a footie match at the school this afternoon. Maybe he wouldn’t call her. Maybe he should surprise her…

  * * *

  Jack watched Lilly stamping her feet against the cold. Most of the other mothers were dressed in green Hunter wellies and puffer jackets, cashmere scarves wound around them. Lilly, however, had obviously come straight from work and was in her suit and leather-soled boots. She looked freezing and jigged from side to side. The playing fields were exposed on all sides and the wind ripped across unchecked.

  ‘For the money you lot pay, you think they’d give you better weather.’

  Lilly smiled at Jack. ‘How did you know I’d be here?’

  ‘Sure, I’ve been tapping your phones.’

  She laughed, her breath swirling around her face.

  ‘I hope you don’t mind,’ he said. ‘Me coming, not tapping your phone.’

  She tucked her arm through his. ‘Of course I don’t mind. And Sam will be thrilled to see you.’

  ‘Where is the wee man?’ he asked.

  ‘They’ll be on in five minutes. If we haven’t all died of hypothermia.’

  He took off his leather jacket and wrapped it around her shoulders. ‘You need a proper coat in this weather, Lilly.’

  ‘Yes, Dad.’

  Now Jack was freezing but he couldn’t have cared less. He was here with his woman, and a fine one at that, watching her son play football. It felt like…he hardly dared to think it, but it felt like a family.

  More parents arrived and boys from the senior school, come to cheer on the little ones. A couple were larking about, braying like donkeys. The biggest really fancied himself, despite his frizzy orange hair. He puffed out his chest like a robin, arrogance tattooed across him. Jack hoped Sam never turned out like that, but he said nothing. Lilly already tortured herself over the whole private school thing, but her ex-husband insisted. Jack knew better than to get involved.

  The hedge is thin, autumn having stripped it down to its spindly skeleton. They push their way through it easily and head across the lawns.

  Artan glances up to the main building. A mansion house of smooth brown stone, ivy-clad. Each wooden sash window is freshly painted white. Could this really be just a school?

  To the left, three beech trees are losing the last of their leaves, the ground below carpeted in bronze and gold.

  A man in uniform holds out a machine to suck them up.

  ‘What is that?’ whispers Anna.

  ‘A vacuum cleaner.’ Artan shakes his head. ‘A vacuum cleaner for leaves.’

  Still this country can amaze him. Back home, his mother didn’t even have one for the house. She swept with an old broom, as her mother before her had done.

  ‘These people,’ he says, ‘they have no idea how lucky they are.’

  ‘Quick, before someone sees us,’ she says.

  They march towards an outbuilding, but it’s too late.

  ‘Oy,’ the man shouts. ‘Oy, you two.’ He throws down the leaf machine and stamps over to them. ‘What d’you think you’re doing?’

  Artan opens his arms. ‘Sorry. English no good.’

  ‘I see,’ says the man. ‘You’re from the agency. Well, you’re late.’

  Artan and Anna freeze. What is an agency?

  ‘You’re here to work?’ says the man, and pretends to sweep up.

  Artan thinks again of his mother and laughs.

  ‘Right,’ the man points to some sheds, ‘grab some rakes and get yourselves back out here.’

  ‘Rakes,’ repeats Artan.

  ‘That’s it. Now get a move on.’ The man shoves Artan in the small of his back. ‘Bloody foreigners.’

  Artan continues to smile, but his right hand has tightened around his gun.

  The crowd cheered. Not exactly a roar, more a cheerful smattering of clapped hands, but it made Sam smile all the same.

  Lilly waved at her son across the pitch and his face lights up at the sight of Jack beside her.

  Was it her relationship with Jack that had finally put to rest all the arguments with David about who had done what to whom? Or was it the sight of his girlfriend, bleary-eyed and exhausted from their baby daughter’s teething, that had seen off dusty resentments?

  Things felt right. New, somehow.<
br />
  Lilly laughed aloud at her flight of fancy.

  The opposing team from the village school won the toss and the match began.

  ‘Come on, Manor Park,’ Lilly shouted.

  ‘Yeah,’ shouted one of the boarders, ‘let’s show these chavs what we’re made of.’

  Lilly pretended not to hear but saw a few Manor Park parents smirk. Why did these people have to be so bloody self-important? Why did they have to look down on others just because they had less cash?

  ‘The ball wasn’t that bad,’ said Jack.

  ‘What?’

  ‘A mistimed pass, I’ll grant you, but they’re only nine.’

  It was a blatant attempt to divert her. Lilly laughed and pressed her cheek against Jack’s shoulder.

  At the far side of the grounds some parents were walking towards the pitch. They were late and would get it in the neck from their son after the match. As they came nearer, Lilly could see that they were both in overalls. Not parents, ground staff. The school had an army of them to trim and mow. Never before had fifteen acres been so well manicured, and never before had Lilly seen a woman among their ranks.

  ‘Great save,’ shouted Jack, and Lilly tore her eyes back to the game.

  ‘What happened?’

  ‘Number eight made a great run up the wing and chipped it in the left corner, but Sam just got his fingers to it.’

  Lilly smiled. ‘Since when are you into football?’

  ‘Thought I was a rugger bugger, did you?’

  Lilly spluttered. ‘Definitely not.’

  ‘What then?’

  Lilly pretended to appraise him with an earnest eye. ‘Fly fishing?’

  ‘Go on with you, woman,’ he said, pushing her away with one hand and pulling her back with the other. ‘I’m too sporty for that.’

  ‘Sporty?’

  Jack flexed a non-existent bicep. ‘Pure muscle.’

  ‘From lifting pints,’ said Lilly.

  She was about to make another remark when she again caught sight of the couple in overalls. They had stopped about one hundred metres away and were deep in conversation, heads bent together. Their hair was the same dark chestnut, thick and shiny, dancing in the wind. Suddenly the man pulled the woman into his arms. Not like lovers, but proprietorial, like a father with his daughter. Or a brother and his younger sister. He embraced her tightly, as if he were holding the pieces of her together. In turn she surrendered to him, wishing to be engulfed.

  When the woman turned her head to the side, Lilly saw she was very young, very beautiful, and very, very frightened.

  Jack felt the electric current of tension ride through Lilly’s body.

  ‘Are you okay?’

  ‘I don’t know,’ she said.

  He followed her eye-line to a couple of teenagers moving towards them. The girl was striking, with creamy skin and almond-shaped eyes. He noticed the boy too, his face grabbing Jack’s attention with its complete lack of expression.

  ‘Do you know them?’ he asked.

  Lilly nodded. ‘From the hostel.’

  ‘What are they doing here?’

  ‘I don’t know.’

  But she did know.

  Maybe they had got a job at the school? It made sense, didn’t it? They lived nearby and anyone could cut grass, sweep up leaves.

  ‘She swallowed her alarm and waved in their direction. Artan.’

  He didn’t look up, but whispered something to the girl and kissed her cheek. Then he strode off, not towards Lilly but over to the group of noisy boarders. The girl stumbled after him.

  Jack looked from Lilly to the couple and back again.

  ‘Speak to me, Lilly. What’s going on?’

  She looked into his eyes, her own shining with fear. ‘Something very bad.’

  They ran towards the couple until they were almost upon them. Only then did Lilly see the gun.

  The shot rang out, incongrously clear in the graphite sky.

  Jack quickly assessed the situation. The girl had a gun, which she held out at arm’s length, both hands shaking around the handle. The boy held his above his head and whirled around, trying to regain his footing from the recoil of the gun and the panic that had clearly grabbed him. A kid was down. One of the boarders.

  Someone screamed, then someone else, and soon the air was teeming with the horrified cries of parents surging from the sidelines towards their boys.

  ‘Stop,’ the boy screamed, but they ignored him and swarmed forward.

  The boy pointed his weapon towards them. ‘Stop.’

  ‘Everyone stay still,’ Jack shouted.

  One of the dads reached out to his son, caked in mud and weeping.

  ‘I said be still. Now.’

  Everyone froze. Silence fell, punctuated only by the muffled sobs of the injured boy.

  Jack opened his arms, his palms to the sky, and approached the girl.

  ‘I’m the police,’ he said. ‘Put down the gun.’

  She panted hard. Her body convulsed. Her arms could barely hold up the gun, yet she kept it trained on a boy in the crowd. His eyes were wide in his freckled face. Not so arrogant now.

  ‘Put down the gun,’ Jack said.

  She shook her head.

  Jack held out his hand. ‘Please.’

  He laid his hand under the gun and wondered if he was about to die.

  He held his breath.

  She dropped it into his palm.

  Slowly, very slowly, Jack turned towards the other assailant. ‘And you too, son.’

  The boy laughed. It was harsh. ‘Do you know what they did?’

  Jack glanced towards the group of boarders. ‘Why don’t you put the gun down and tell me?’

  ‘She knows,’ said the boy, pointing the gun at Lilly.

  Jack heard the sharp intake of her breath and terror coursed through him.

  ‘But she said nothing would be done.’ He looked at Lilly with pure venom. ‘That the police would do nothing.’

  Jack inched between the gun and Lilly until his chest was in the firing line.

  ‘Maybe she was wrong,’ said Jack.

  The boy shook his head and wheeled the gun back towards the boarders, his sights on the largest. The redhead.

  ‘This piece of shit does not deserve to live,’ he spat.

  A stain spread across the redhead’s groin. ‘Don’t shoot me.’

  ‘Put the gun down,’ Jack shouted.

  The boy shook his head again. Almost imperceptible, but Jack caught it. There was a shift. Conversation was at an end.

  Jack watched the boy’s finger touch the trigger as if in slow motion. He knew what he had to do. He raised the gun in his own hand, conscious of its weight, its girth. He closed his eyes and discharged two rounds. When he let the light in, the boy lay on the ground. His shoulder gaped, blood and bone splattered over his overalls. An ugly wound, enough to disarm him, not fatal. But the boy didn’t move until Jack turned his lifeless head and saw the second wound, clean and perfect at the left-hand side of his temple.

  ‘Are you okay?’

  Lilly stood in the doorway of her cottage, bewildered.

  Penny Van Huysan stood in the dusky shadows and pushed her carefully highlighted hair behind her ears.

  ‘Are you okay?’ she repeated gently.

  Penny was another Manor Park parent. She was girly, giggly and chichi. She knew what everyone’s husband did for a living and could spot a Christian Louboutin pump at two hundred yards—yet she chose to spend her time with Lilly rather than the other Yummy Mummies.

  They had formed a bond during the Kelsey Brand case, when Lilly’s life imploded and Penny had proved an unlikely form of support. She was flanked by Luella, who had all Penny’s shallowness but none of her charm or compassion.

  ‘Lilly?’ said Penny. ‘Can you hear me?’

  When Lilly didn’t reply Penny and Luella exchanged glances and ushered her inside.

  ‘Is Jack here?’ asked Penny.

  Lilly shook her head
.

  Penny ran a glass of water and pushed Lilly into a chair. Lilly gulped it down. She hadn’t even realised she was thirsty.

  ‘He had to go back to the station, to explain what happened.’

  ‘And what did happen? People are saying a gang from the hostel tried to shoot everyone?’ said Luella.

  ‘No, no,’ said Lilly. ‘There were two, a boy and a girl, just kids.’

  ‘But there was a shooting?’ Luella asked.

  Penny put her hand on Luella’s knee.

  ‘The headmaster specifically told us not to gossip about this.’

  ‘We’re not gossiping,’ said Luella.

  ‘He doesn’t want the press getting hold of this and descending on us.’

  ‘No one wants that,’ said Luella.

  Lilly could see she was desperate to extract information. That was the only reason she had come.

  ‘Is Sam in bed?’ said Penny.

  ‘Yeah, he didn’t really see what happened, but he was shaken all the same,’ Lilly replied.

  Luella persisted. ‘So what did happen?’

  Penny frowned a warning but Luella waved her away.

  ‘We’ve a right to know.’

  Lilly sighed. Luella would not be put off, so Lilly might as well fill her in before the school bongo drums went into overdrive.

  ‘Like I said, they were just kids.’

  ‘But they were armed,’ said Luella.

  ‘Yeah. Jack disarmed the girl, but the boy wouldn’t…’ She paused, unsure how to explain. ‘Jack had to shoot him.’

  ‘Dead?’ Luella almost screamed.

  ‘I don’t suppose Lilly took his pulse,’ said Penny.

  Lilly smiled. ‘You’re right, I didn’t, but I’d say he was dead. The wound to his head was too serious to survive.’

  ‘Jack must have thought the situation was pretty grave,’ said Penny.

  ‘It was. The boy might have shot someone else,’ said Lilly.

  Luella could barely contain herself. ‘Someone else! You mean he’d already killed someone?’

  ‘I don’t know. They took someone off in an ambulance.’

  ‘Who?’ asked Penny.

  Lilly squeezed her eyes shut, picturing the boy, white and still on the stretcher. ‘A pupil. One of the boarders. Charlie Stanton.’

  Silence fell on the three women as the enormity of what had happened at their children’s school sank in. At last, Luella stood up and dusted down her skirt. She had obviously processed the information.