Cut You Dead (Dr. Samantha Willerby Mystery #4) - A J Waines Page 0,15

library – because I can’t even afford to buy the publications. I’ve fantasised about bumping into film stars who carry me off to their private islands, being hailed as the next poet laureate, being left a huge inheritance by a long-lost relative. I know it’s all in my head, but at least it gives me some form of comfort.

I reach the end of the mews, thinking it joins a larger road, but it continues round the corner and gets narrower. On one side is an ominous tall building with no windows, on the other is a railing with a gate, overhung with leggy branches. It looks like a scene from a gothic horror movie. As I look up ahead, it’s a dead end.

It’s then I know someone’s behind me.

12

Sam

The Present

Miranda grunted when she opened her front door.

‘You made it then,’ she sniffed, about to turn away. Determined to break the stalemate between us, I grabbed her before she could move off and wrapped my arms around her in a firm hug. Then noticed she held a wet paint brush in one hand and an oily rag in the other.

‘Careful…’ She stepped back without looking at me.

I sighed under my breath. ‘I’m sorry I missed the planning meeting last night. I was… there was something else I had to do.’

‘Something more important, you mean.’

Her eyes smouldered with rage and she refused to look at me.

I’d spent my life walking the finest line with my sister – one drawn with an exceedingly thin nib. And I invariably got it wrong. Many were the times she accused me of interfering, smothering her, bullying even. Often, she misinterpreted what I said or did; regarding my actions as a threat to take away her freedom and stop her from being herself.

Yet I was only ever trying to keep her safe.

She left me, so I hung up my coat, then followed her.

‘Mind where you walk,’ she said to the space in front of her, weaving her way barefoot into the main room. ‘Nearly everything has wet paint on it.’

Miranda’s flat was entirely different to mine: open-plan with bare floorboards and scarcely any furniture. Perfect for an artist. She didn’t even have curtains. Oil canvases lined the room, leaning in stacks against every wall and a black iron staircase spiralled up to the floor above from the corner by the kitchen. She owned the place, but only because Dad had stepped in. Working less than ten hours a week at the art project café, she’d never have been able to afford it. I often wondered how her bills were paid, but got my head snapped off whenever I even tiptoed in that direction.

‘Coffee, I suppose?’ she said, leaving the brush and cloth on a table cluttered with paint paraphernalia.

Miranda had spiky cropped hair, dyed blonde so severely it was now alabaster-white. She was taller than me with chiselled features and could disappear behind a drainpipe she was so skinny, even though she didn’t seem to do any exercise. Much to my annoyance.

‘New rugs?’ I queried, noticing the threadbare Persian-style carpets lying piecemeal across the floor. They looked like they’d come straight out of a skip, but I hadn’t seen them before. Miranda adored items that were ‘pre-loved’. She said she could relate to ‘damaged goods’ – objects that had been disparaged at some stage, but which were now rightly treasured for what they were.

‘You like them?’ she responded, her tone mocking.

‘They’re very… you,’ I said, thinking fast.

Wearing a fluffy jumper over baggy dungarees, she was going through a hygge phase inspired by the Danish craze. It was all about putting comfort and the simple things in life first. Her outfit was at least two sizes too big, but anything looked good on her.

I traipsed after her into the kitchen. It was chilly, with a draft wheezing under the back door, and I shivered. Unlike me, Miranda wasn’t a great believer in keeping the place warm.

‘How’s the prep going?’ I asked.

Miranda had been awarded a special grant to show her paintings outside the Camden Community Art Project for the very first time. Her maiden voyage into the mainstream limelight – and a big deal for her.

‘Pretty cool actually,’ she said, sounding upbeat although her flinty eyes were still steered away from mine. She scooted old wrappers and takeaway cartons from the draining board into the pedal bin. ‘I’ve decided to hold the exhibition here.’

‘What, here in your flat?’

‘Sure, why not? It’s on-trend for up and coming artists to