Somewhere to Hide (The Estate, Book 1) (7 page)

‘I’m doing my best, Archie,’ Cathy replied. ‘Go in and I’ll deal with them.’

‘Yeah,’ shouted Jess. ‘Run along to wifey.’

‘Enough, Jess! Get in the house, right now!’

Jess staggered a few steps further. ‘Okay, okay,’ she muttered. ‘I’m going. You can bring cheap-date along. It’s pathetic that she can’t take her ale. She’s sixteen.’

‘And you’re seventeen. Neither of you should be drinking yet!’

Cathy pulled Becky to her feet. But Becky wasn’t co-operating. She dropped to the floor again.

‘I can’t,’ she sobbed.

‘Yes, you can.’

‘No, I…’

Cathy pulled on Becky’s arm. ‘You’ll have to help me, Jess,’ she said.

‘Who do you think I am?’ Jess marched off as quickly as she could. ‘I’m not her bleeding babysitter.’

Cathy sighed and struggled with Becky on her own. ‘Come on,’ she encouraged as they made it to the gate. ‘Nearly there.’

‘I’m sorry.’ Becky was crying loudly now. ‘I didn’t mean to get into trouble. I’ve never dr–drunk vodka before.’

Cathy finally got her into the house, closing the front door behind her with a sigh. She guided her up the stairs and into her bedroom, all the time wondering if she would get a phone call or a letter from the housing association. She hadn’t had either for a while so it was bound to happen soon. Not all of the residents in Christopher Avenue were thrilled about Cathy helping out young girls in trouble.

She pushed open the bedroom door and Becky collapsed on top of her bed. Cathy took off her shoes, pulled the duvet from underneath her and covered her up. She ran a hand over Becky’s forehead. The poor child was white, her lips dry. Mascara ran in lines down her cheeks; red lipstick was smeared around her mouth. She watched her for a few moments before heading back out of the room. One thing was certain: she’d be having words with both of them in the morning.

She’d reached the door when Becky screamed.

‘Don’t leave me! I feel sick again.’

Cathy sighed loudly, wondering if she’d ever get to bed that night. ‘You need to calm down, Becky. You’ll be fine once you’ve slept it off.’

‘No… I…’ Becky suddenly sat upright, a look of horror contorting her face. ‘My baby! Oh, God, I’ve killed my baby again!’

Cathy froze. Did she say – oh no. Please, not that.

‘Lie down,’ she told her, ‘and get some sleep.’

‘But my baby! Cathy, please tell me I haven’t done anything to hurt it!’

CHAPTER SIX

Cathy had just drifted off to sleep when she was awoken by a loud noise. She listened: there was someone banging at the front door. She flicked on the light. For Christ’s sake: it was two am.

‘Liz!’ Another bang. ‘Liz! Get out here now.’

Cathy flung her bedroom window open and peered down. ‘Will you stop making that bleeding racket!’ she whispered loudly. ‘It’s Kevin, isn’t it?’

‘So what if it is?’

‘She doesn’t want to see you.’

‘So? I want to see her.’ Kevin peered up. ‘And who the fuck are you? Where’s my daughter? CHLOE!’

‘Be quiet or else you’ll have the whole street awake!’ From her position up high, Cathy could see exactly how Kevin McIntyre could intimidate his wife. He was tall, broad and very capable of his bad boy role, his angry temperament ready to take on the world. In his drunken rage, he was neither attractive nor unsightly, just plain old nasty.

‘I don’t give a stuff if I wake up the whole frigging universe! Liz! LIZ!’

‘Will you lot ever shut UP!’ The window opened across the street again. ‘I’ve got to get up at five thirty. At this rate, it won’t be worth going back to sleep.’

‘Mind your own business, you nosy bastard!’ Kevin yelled across to Archie Meredith. ‘I’m staying here until I see my wife. LIZ!’

‘I’m warning you, Cathy. I’ll be on the blower tomorrow. I’m sick of this every bloody night.’

‘Look, Archie. I –’

‘Piss off, you wanker!’ Kevin shouted and then turned back to Cathy. ‘Tell her to come down or I’ll kick the fucking door in.’

‘Come back in the morning when it’s light and you’re sober.’

But Kevin wasn’t going anywhere. He pulled back his head and yelled.

‘LIZ!’

‘I’ll have to go down to him. He won’t let up until I do.’

Cathy turned to see Liz standing in her pyjamas, a cardigan clutched tightly around her middle.

‘No, he’s really drunk at the moment. Maybe you’d be better speaking to him tomorrow, when he’s calmed down.’

Liz shook her head, close to tears. ‘He knows where I am now. He won’t give up until he’s seen me. And I don’t want to get Chloe upset. She’s still asleep but she won’t be if he carries on.’

Cathy threw on her dressing gown. ‘I’m coming down with you but you’re not to open the door.’

‘But –’

‘You know full well what he’s capable of. Don’t give him the chance.’

‘If I don’t see him now, he’ll come back again and again. Then where will I go?’

‘I’ve told you, you can stay here for as long as you want. I’ve dealt with his kind before and –’

Kevin shouted through the letterbox, making them both jump. ‘I know you’re in there. I just want to talk.’

Before Cathy could stop her, Liz was down the stairs and opening the door the inch the chain allowed.

‘Liz! Wait!’

She followed quickly behind to see the door shooting out of her hands as Kevin kicked it hard. He grabbed Liz by the throat and slammed her up against the wall.

‘You bitch!’ he seethed. ‘You can’t fucking leave me!’

Liz put her hands over his, trying to loosen his grip. ‘Stop it!’

‘Let her go!’ Cathy grabbed the hockey stick that she kept behind the door and whacked it across the back of his knees.

Kevin’s legs buckled and he sank to the floor, letting go of Liz.

‘You mad bitch!’ he cried.

Liz gasped for air.

Cathy stood with the stick poised to strike again. ‘Thought you’d like a taste of your own medicine. It hurts, doesn’t it?’

Kevin stepped towards her but Cathy stood her ground.

‘Come any nearer and I’ll use it again,’ she warned. ‘You can’t control me like you’ve controlled her.’

Kevin rushed towards Cathy and she swung the stick again, this time cracking him on his shoulder.

Liz stood rigid, her back against the wall as she watched Kevin stumble. She stared at Cathy in awe. Where the hell did she get her strength?

‘Are you going or am I calling the police?’ Cathy addressed Kevin, again poised to strike with the stick.

Kevin used the banister to pull himself upright. ‘I’m going,’ he said, rubbing at his shoulder. ‘But I’m warning
you
,’ he shot round to look at Liz, ‘I’ll be back and when I do I’m not leaving without you or my daughter. You have no right to take her from me.’

‘I have every right!’ Liz screamed suddenly in a rush of adrenaline. ‘I won’t let you see her.’

Kevin smirked nastily. ‘You can’t watch me every minute of the day.’ In a flash, he grabbed Liz’s arm.

‘Mummy!’ They all looked up to see Chloe. She was sitting on the landing, her arms wrapped around her knees. Tears poured down her face.

Kevin hid his anger towards Liz in an instant and smiled. ‘Chloe! Come down here and give your dad a kiss.’

Chloe shook her head fervently, her eyes squeezed shut.

Liz pushed past Kevin and ran up the stairs. ‘Please leave us alone,’ she said as she took Chloe into her arms. ‘Look at what you’re doing to her. She’s so traumatised by what’s happened that she’s having nightmares.’

Kevin raised his arms in exasperation. ‘I’m going,’ he said. ‘But I will be back. You can count on that.’

‘I wouldn’t count on anything if I were you,’ Cathy retorted. She held open the front door. ‘Time to leave, I think.’

Twenty minutes later, after checking again on Becky, Cathy lay in her bed, wondering if that would be the last time she’d have to get up tonight. What a week, and it wasn’t over yet. Thank God it was Thursday tomorrow. There was nothing more grounding than a visit to the cemetery. Maybe she should take Jess and Becky with her, she thought, as she turned over. If they continued to behave as they had done tonight, either one of them could be joining her husband six feet under.

She switched off the bedside lamp and lay awake in the darkness, relishing the silence. The room was lit by a pale glow from the lamppost outside the bedroom window. It gave everything an eerie glow but she didn’t care. All she wanted to do was sleep.

Despite the nocturnal goings-on, Cathy was still up at six thirty the following morning. She frowned when she spotted a letter on the mat inside the front door. It was too early for their postman to have completed his round.

As she drew nearer, she noticed it was an envelope. She turned it to both sides but it was blank. Inside, a note was written on white paper with blue lines, the kind found in any newsagents or stationery shop. The message was clear and simple, written in capital letters.

‘I AM WATCHING YOU’

Cathy frowned again: only four words but with a hell of a meaning behind them. She wondered how long it would be before Kevin McIntyre would give up the fight. In her experience, some men didn’t bother coming after their women at all. Some caused trouble for a few nights. Very occasionally it took longer, involving the police and intervention from the courts. She had a gut feeling that this was going to be a long drawn-out affair and decided to hide the note for now. She lodged it inside her diary and pushed it to the back of the kitchen drawer. It wouldn’t be wise to let Liz see it yet: she’d been through enough last night.

Another hour later when she heard floorboards creaking upstairs, Cathy left for the cemetery. She wanted to be alone with her thoughts before drowning in everyone else’s, once their days started and they unburdened their problems onto her.

But the quiet roads gave her more time to think about last night. She couldn’t stop seeing the anger on Kevin’s face as he had his hands around Liz’s neck. Equally, she couldn’t rid herself of Liz’s sheer look of terror.

Finally, she arrived at the church and parked up. Emerging into the graveyard, she breathed in the unmistakeable smell of freshly cut grass. It had become customary for her to count the rows as she walked slowly along the pathway, turning right at number seven. Rich had been laid to rest in the sixth grave along.

‘It’s another lovely day, Rich,’ she spoke aloud with no awkwardness. ‘We’re having quite a run of them for April.’ She dropped to her knees in front of the gravestone, cleared away last week’s flowers from the base, rinsed out the steel water holder and carefully arranged the fresh blooms in their place, all the time chattering on.

‘We’ve got a really lively bunch in the house right now,’ she added. ‘I’m beginning to feel nearer to sixty years of age than forty – I’ll be grey before my time at this rate with all the worry. Still, I must admit I was feeling low when Cheryl got sent down – you remember, she got six months – but now it seems I might have bitten off more than I can chew. Becky is barely sixteen, and do you know what she told me last night? She’s pregnant! Then there’s Liz. She has a daughter Chloe, who’s only eight. She’s such a quiet little girl. Her father has been handy with his fists. I don’t know all of the details – I don’t want to know them really – but I have to be there to listen if needs be, don’t I? And sometimes that means asking awkward questions, but still. I suspect he’s been hitting Liz for a long time, the bastard.’ She paused for a moment before grinning. ‘I gave him a good seeing to last night. No one messes with Cathy Mason, do they?’

Her thoughts out in the open, Cathy kneeled for a while in the peaceful surroundings. Looking around, she noticed quite a few people now. A couple with a baby in a pram walked past and she smiled at them. How she wished she were still part of a couple.

As the light wind played around with her hair, it almost seemed as if Rich was standing right beside her. She often felt that way. Sometimes she even turned her head expecting him to be there; expecting him to reach out and place a hand on her shoulder. Cathy wished she could talk to him one more time, so he could tell her that everything was all right – that what she’d done was only to protect him. Only Rich could put her mind at ease. After all, there were no secrets between them now.

Half an hour later, Cathy stood up. She raised her hand to her lips, kissed her fingertips and gently touched the top of his headstone.

‘I’d better be getting back and see what those girls have to say for themselves about last night’s escapades. Wish me luck. I have a feeling I’m going to need it.’

CHAPTER SEVEN

It was half past ten when Becky showed her face later that morning. Cathy and Liz were sitting at the kitchen table. She sat across from them.

After some thought on the matter, Cathy had decided to give her a second chance. It had been her first night after all and she knew Becky was only partly to blame.

‘You look a little green,’ she said. ‘Are you okay?’