never eased up all the time she was talking. Had Mimi slipped, Leo knew it would all have been over.
‘Sit back. Seatbelt on,’ came the voice.
‘Why?’ Leo asked.
‘I keep telling you I’m not stupid. You can’t leap out of the car at traffic lights if you’ve got your seat belt on. And I’ll be watching. You’re my insurance if we get stopped.’
The position of the knife was adjusted so that it hovered over Leo’s hand as she fastened the seatbelt.
‘Where do you want me to drive to?’ Leo asked.
‘Put the car in gear, and leave your left hand on the gear stick. Just get off this crummy estate, and then I’ll tell you.’
Leo put the car into reverse, and felt a piercing pain as the knife cut into the thin skin on the back of her hand. Steering one handed and without looking to her left for fear of seeing the madness in those watching eyes, just inches from her own face, she backed out of the space using mirrors and a lot of hope. She knew beyond doubt that as soon as she had driven to whatever destination was chosen, she would be dead.
She had to think.
Then she remembered something that Tom had said to her when they left his house earlier this evening. She had one chance. It was going to hurt, but there was only one thing she could do.
She put the car into gear, and slammed her foot hard on the accelerator.
* * *
Tom had only taken two steps towards the door when they heard the sound of a car revving loudly and accelerating down the road. The noise lasted no more than five seconds before there was an explosion of sound as metal hit brick with considerable force.
He finally knew what it meant when somebody says their heart leapt into their throat, and he was out of the door and running in an instant. All he could see were the taillights of his Jeep, and smoke pouring from the bonnet, which was buckled to half its size against the brick wall that marked the entrance to this part of the estate.
“Leo!’ he shouted, fear giving him speed he didn’t know he still had.
‘Pat, call an ambulance. Don’t just stand there. Call a fucking ambulance,’ he yelled over his shoulder as he ran. And yet he knew that Pat would be standing watching, open-mouthed.
Fortunately the noise had brought other people from their homes, and out of the corner of his eye he saw a more alert neighbour grab his phone as Tom covered the four hundred yards to the car. He raced towards the passenger door. That’s where he’d left Leo. He gulped back of cry of dismay when he was still fifty yards away. He could see that she hadn’t been wearing a seat belt, and with no airbag her head was protruding through a hole in the windscreen, her neck at an odd angle that in Tom’s experience meant only one thing.
‘Oh no,’ he whispered. ‘Oh God, no.’
He made it to the car and scrambled onto the twisted metal of the bonnet. He could see little but the upper half of a body, and blood. He was blocking out the light from the street lamp behind him, and he tried to pull himself round, sliding all the time on the hot surface. He needed to move so that the light shone on Leo’s face, so he could get to her and check if she was alive. Then he saw it. The hair covering the face was blond and limp, not Leo’s thick dark tresses. He knew instantly who this was, and a brief hope flared in his chest.
He slithered across the bonnet and dropped down at the driver’s side, frantically pulling on the handle. The door wouldn’t budge, but he could just make out Leo’s crumpled form behind the steering wheel. She wasn’t moving, and her head had lolled forward onto the now deflated airbag.
Tom tried the rear door. It only opened inches, but he yanked it as hard as he could, and slid in through the gap. He heard his shirt rip, and felt a sharp sting of pain as a piece of exposed metal tore into the flesh covering his ribs, but he barely noticed. Climbing onto his knees on the back seat, he leaned forward very gently so as not to disturb Leo’s body or the seat in case her spine was injured.