hand-baskets and filled those with some more tins and bottles. She gave a couple of lighter basket-loads to Jacob to struggle home with, filled the wheelie bag, and stacked another couple of baskets full of supplies on top of it.
As they emerged out of the convenience store on to the cul-de-sac, they saw several people warily approaching the entrance, presumably lured by the sound of the padlock being shot off and the glass shattering. The nearest to them, an old couple, eyed the pair of them cautiously.
‘Is the shop uh . . . open now?’ the old man asked.
Jacob, grinning, piped up. ‘Yup, open for business.’
The old couple nodded gratefully and quickly disappeared inside.
‘We should go,’ said Leona, ‘it’s going to get busy here.’
They headed out of the cul-de-sac and turned right on to Holland Park Avenue, towards the Shepherd’s Bush roundabout. They passed a few people along the way, who eyed their plunder with interest, and hurried along swiftly in the direction they had come from.
‘We need to be careful,’ she said, ‘when we get closer to home, there might be some who will try and take what we have.’ She patted the bulge on her hip, the heavy, cold lump of metal there felt reassuring.
Heading back past the grand town houses, Leona saw dozens of people curiously emerging on to their balconies and the twitching of countless curtains and blinds. The streets might have been all but deserted, but there seemed to still be plenty of people around, hidden away in their homes. At least here there were.
They approached the roundabout, the crows still sitting atop the big blue thermometer in the middle, watching events with idle interest. Leona spotted someone in the middle of the road up ahead, walking around the central island briskly.
A woman in a white, cheesecloth skirt, holding her shoes in one hand, her back to them as she rounded the grassy island and began to disappear from view.
Her hair, her movement, it was all so very familiar.
‘Mum?’ she called out, but not loudly enough. The woman carried on, leaving them behind. Leona could only see her head bobbing around the far side of the roundabout’s island.
‘Mum!’ she shouted, her voice breaking. The cry echoed off the tall buildings either side of the road and the woman on the far side of the roundabout stopped dead.
She turned round, and looked back.
Even 200 yards away, her face just a distant pale oval, Leona recognised her.
‘MUM!’
The woman looked around, uncertain where the cry had come from. Leona let go of the wheelie bag and waved frantically. The movement caught the woman’s eye, and a second later, Leona heard what sounded very much like her mother’s voice; a mixture of surprise, shock, joy and tears.
‘Leona?’ she heard the woman ask more than say.
‘Oh my God! . . . It is Mum, Jake! It’s Mum.’
Jacob dropped his basket as well, some of the tins and bottles bounced out on to the road - unimportant to them now. She grabbed her brother’s hand and ran forward down the road towards the roundabout, completely unaware that her face had crumpled up like a baby’s and she was crying a river of tears, just like her little brother.
They collided into each other’s arms a moment later, a three-way scrum of flailing arms and buried faces.
‘Oh God, oh God!’ sobbed Jenny, squeezing them both as hard as she could. ‘Thank God you’re all right!’
Leona struggled to reply, but her words were an unintelligible syrupy mewl.
‘Mummy!’ cried Jacob, ‘I missed you, I missed you.’
‘God, I missed you too, sweetheart. I was so frightened for both of you.’
‘We’ve been in a battle,’ said Jacob. ‘It was frightening.’ Jenny looked into Leona’s face, and her daughter nodded, her lips curled, tears streaming down her cheeks.
‘Leona? Honey?’
She swept a sleeve across her face. ‘Yeah, they attacked the house. We nearly . . . we nearly . . .’
‘We nearly died Mum,’ Jacob finished helpfully. ‘But we’ve got a real gun now,’ he added brightly.
CHAPTER 81
11.35 a.m. GMT Heathrow, London
It could almost have been any normal midsummer’s morning there in Terminal 3’s departure lounge, thought Andy. It looked unchanged since last time he came through here two weeks ago, on his way out to Iraq to make that assessment on the northern pipeline and pumping stations. However, this time round, the shops and places to eat were closed, the metal shutters pulled down, and beyond the large floor-to-ceiling viewing windows, the tarmac was a hive of activity.
He