He’s out there somewhere. It isn’t the Fregoli, I know it. But I’ve been certain before and I was wrong then.
I am the boy who cried wolf. Nobody will believe me until it’s too late.
‘Nothing,’ I mutter. George tuts.
The second we step through the front door, I am taking the stairs, two at a time, desperate to know that Archie is here. That he is safe. He’s sleeping. Hair sticking up at angles, arm draped over his cuddly lion. I kiss my index finger and press it against his forehead.
By the time I come downstairs, Tash has gone.
‘She didn’t say goodbye? Did she seem all right?’
‘Yes, just tired. We didn’t know how long you’d be upstairs. I’m going to catch up on some work.’
I have showered and scrubbed my skin until it is raw and bundled the clothes I’d worn this evening into the machine and put them on a hot wash. In the black bin outside I stuff my shoes. I’m making coffee when my phone beeps an unknown number. I warily open the text.
You look nice in that red skirt.
It’s as though I have been punched. I double over the sink, phone clutched in my hand.
He is watching me. Was he loitering outside the nursery, watching my reaction through the window as I pulled open Archie’s drawer?
Immediately I think I must call the police. They can’t dispute this new evidence, here in black and white, but then I read the text again.
You look nice.
A compliment, they will say.
Nothing threatening. No crime has been committed.
But I can feel in my gut there’s only a matter of time until one is.
He is clever, this I know from before.
I have to be smarter.
Chapter Thirty
Carly
Then
The second Carly heard Moustache arrive she dragged the twins across to the pile of rubbish in the centre of the room.
‘We have to outsmart them. We have to hide.’
The girls burrowed into the centre of the pile. Pallets and boxes began to slide. Carly caught them before they could make a sound. Arranging the debris over the twins until there were no visible limbs or red hair or tell-tale pieces of clothing on show, Carly tried to carefully slither on her belly after the girls but instantly a crate dislodged with a clatter.
Carly held her breath. She heard a shout. Footsteps heading in her direction. Quickly, she lay on the floor, moulding her body around the edge of the pile. She dragged an off-cut of carpet across herself – it stank. She imagined it was crawling with bugs. Her skin and hair began to itch. Real or imagined insects skittered across her skin. Crawled into her ears. Her nostrils. Her mouth. Tiny feet brushed the hairs on her arms. She suppressed a whimper, resisting the urge to scratch. She felt too conspicuous, exposed, in the middle of the room, but she also hoped that was what would prevent them remaining undiscovered.
Hiding in plain sight.
Carly tried not to think about anyone tossing a match onto this makeshift bonfire. She tried not to think about the flames dancing around that effigy of Guy Fawkes she and the girls had made last year. She tried not to think of anything except home.
Safety.
Warmth.
She waited.
Outside, the rain beat against the flat roof. The wind howled through the broken windows. Footsteps slapped against the concrete floor.
‘This place is incredible.’ She recognized Doc’s voice. ‘Can you imagine the history—’
‘You’ll be fucking history if you don’t find them. I can’t believe you—’
‘Yeah, I know. They can’t have gone far though. One of them was really sick.’
‘You’d better fucking hope they haven’t.’
They grew louder. Closer. Through a sliver of a gap where the carpet met the floor Carly could make out boots. A rush of heat swept up her body from her feet to her prickling scalp.
Please keep still, girls. Please keep still.
Another step, Doc’s foot brushed against the carpet covering her, dislodging a cloud of dust that tickled her nose. She was going to sneeze. She could feel it building.
Building.
Building.
Filling her nostrils. Her mouth automatically opened.
Please, no.
Millimetre by millimetre she raised her hand until she could press her index finger underneath her nose, her heart skittering as the carpet shifted. She prayed no one had noticed. She prayed it wouldn’t slide off her completely.
The rain drummed.
Her heart drummed.
Moustache’s footfall drummed.
‘They ain’t here. Let’s check upstairs.’
Silence, but not relief. The second she could no longer hear them she heard a soft crying but before she could comfort the girls, shush them quiet, she realized it was