Lone Wolf - Robert Muchamore Page 0,41

smartphone lying on the bed. The screen said Imelda.

‘Must have rushed out if he left his phone,’ Ning said, as Fay stepped out on to the landing.

Clay might not have had his phone, but Ning was scared because there was a chance he’d gone to grab a weapon and she’d be a dead duck if he shot through one of the closed doors. She backed up to the wall and reached nervously towards a door handle. It was another bedroom, with a dozen pairs of immaculate Nikes lined up along the back wall.

Fay went for the other door, but it moved before she got there. A muscular arm snatched Fay’s wrist and yanked her forward into a cramped bathroom. She tried aiming the gun, but the jerking motion knocked her off balance and her back slammed painfully against a towel rail inside the bathroom as her gun flailed out of control.

Ning remembered CHERUB teaching her to create as much space between herself and a loaded weapon as possible. But she was fond of Fay and acted on instinct, charging into the cramped bathroom, as Clay twisted the weapon out of Fay’s hand.

The handgun landed on a lemon bath mat, as Clay and Fay wrestled near the edge of the bathtub, getting tangled in a clingy shower curtain. Clay drove up with his legs, knocking Fay back towards the sink, then strained to grab the gun. But Ning got there first, hooking the pistol with her oversized shoe, sending it spinning between her legs and stopping when it reached the hallway carpet.

Fay lunged at Clay, but he pushed her off and shoved her through the tangled curtain and into the bottom of the bathtub. Clay stood up to charge at Ning, but she swiped him around the head with the butt of the pistol.

The blow sent Clay to his knees in front of the sink, blood welling around a cut as Fay sat up in the bathtub. Ning took a half-step forward and stuck the gun in Clay’s face as he thought about making another move.

‘You’re too young to die,’ Ning said firmly. ‘Put your hands on your head.’

Clay’s face stayed angry, but Ning eyeballed him until his palms rested flat against his shaved head.

Ning spoke to Fay, trying to sound manly by deepening her voice but not too sure if it just sounded idiotic. ‘Is there a phone around? Has he called anyone?’

The two girls both glanced around, looking for a handset. They didn’t find one, but Ning did spot a can of pepper spray standing between the bleach and the toilet brush.

‘This what you came in here for?’ Ning asked, as she inspected the packaging and flipped off the lid. Clay winced when she aimed the nozzle at his face, but she just laughed and handed it across to Fay, who seemed dazed as she stepped out of the bathtub, clutching ribs that had banged painfully against a handrail.

‘Thought Hagar might have managed a gun for his little brother,’ Fay scoffed.

‘There’s nothing here for you girls,’ Clay said.

Ning sighed inwardly: so much for passing themselves off as young men.

Fay had regained her composure, and held the pepper spray menacingly as she stood directly behind Clay.

‘I’ve been watching this place for a while,’ Fay said. ‘Plenty of comings and goings. And now you’re gonna show us to the safe.’

‘Ain’t no safe here,’ Clay said.

‘I think there is,’ Fay said, touching on sarcasm. ‘Unless all those visitors were coming here for tea and cakes.’

‘You see any safe?’ Clay asked.

Ning and Fay were certain there was a safe in the house, because Warren said that his cousin had helped to install it. Unfortunately, Warren didn’t know where the safe was, and Fay hadn’t been able to work anything out while surveying the building from outside.

‘You’re gonna tell us where that safe is,’ Fay said firmly. ‘Then you’re gonna open it for us.’

Clay sucked air through his teeth and shook his head. ‘No safe here. You’re tripping.’

Although Ning had acquitted herself brilliantly during the tussle, Fay still regarded her as a subordinate and insisted on taking back the pistol. She kept the gun on Clay’s back as they escorted him downstairs.

Ning began a hunt while Clay sat on the sofa with Fay standing guard.

The fact that Warren’s cousin was a carpenter was a major clue. Ning started by looking behind a couple of pictures on the living-room wall, then moved into the kitchen and checked inside all the cabinets.

She was about to head