Witness

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

Fiona

It was the middle of autumn before Fiona saw the cognitive behaviour therapist. In the intervening weeks she experienced two full-blown panic attacks. The first was in the post office of all places.

She had assumed the sickening terror was linked to Danny’s death, the area it happened and by extension the car where the fear had first consumed her. So walking to the post office to pay her car tax hadn’t worried her in the slightest.

The post office wasn’t even noisy. But it was crowded and hot and cramped. A line of people snaked zigzag style in the cordoned-off aisles. There were two counters working but one clerk seemed to be stuck weighing a mountain of small packets for a customer. No one spoke and the air was tight with impatience. Fiona tried not to breathe in the stale smell coming off the elderly man in front of her. She could see the grime on the collar of his coat and the flakes of dandruff dotted through his hair. The woman behind her wore industrial-strength perfume which was even worse than the musty man smell.

Fiona felt herself gag. She cleared her throat then felt the ground tilt away, thick sweat broke along her hairline, on her scalp, under her arms. The fear came rolling like a wave, unstoppable, all-powerful, climbing her torso, robbing her of breath, of sense. She thought she would wet herself.

She turned abruptly, pushing past the queue, fighting her way to the door. Outside, she doubled over, her heart thundering in her ears, her mouth gummy.

‘You all right, love?’ A white-haired woman with a shopping trolley put her hand on Fiona’s arm. Fiona couldn’t reply, her throat was locked, her chest exploding. She knew there was something she should do, something to remember, but her mind was tangled.

Suddenly her stomach heaved and she vomited on to the pavement. The woman took a step back. ‘You’d better go home.’

Fiona gulped, nodded, her mouth sour, her nose and throat stinging from the acid.

‘Can you manage?’

Fiona coughed. Her breath came fast, rapid. Stars bursting in her eyes, then she remembered: breathe slowly. Joe’s words, the policeman. Fiona tried to master her breath. Took a sip, shuddered, took another tiny sip. Little bird breaths.

The woman frowned.

‘I’ll be all right, thanks,’ Fiona managed. The woman wasn’t convinced but she gave a quick nod and set off with her trolley. Fiona sipped again. Waited until she felt able to move. Then walked home, her legs unsteady, her breath rank.

You might never have another, the cardiologist had said. Liar, thought Fiona, and now what?

Almost as great as the fear of a repeat attack was the dread of becoming housebound. She could live without town and shopping (there was the internet for that) and even without work, which had surprised her as she’d always loved her job, but not being able to walk the fields and the woods, or set out along by the river: to lose that would be intolerable. So the afternoon of the post office meltdown, even though she still felt sick and scalded, she forced herself to go out with Ziggy.

Apprehension wormed about in her stomach and her back was stiff, her thoughts edgy, as she set out. She watched Ziggy trot from scent to scent and they made their way to the nature reserve. There were blackberries, fat and shiny, alongside the path and she had a spare plastic bag in her pocket. She tasted one, the flavour deep and fruity, a perfect mix of sweet and tart. She picked lots, savouring the occasional bite of a thorn from the brambles, her fingers turning purple, gritty with specks leftover from the flowers. She attained a sort of equilibrium. When the bag was half full, she stopped. The juice drying on her hands was sticky.

Sticky like blood. A stab of horror. She flashed back to that day, the shower, peeling the tights from her knees. His eyes, the boy’s eyes. She slewed her mind away, catalogued what she could see, determined to root herself in the here and now. The horse-chestnut cases still green and heavy in the tree; the sycamore leaves dying at the edges, splashed with sooty fungus, tar spot, there every year, though it never harmed the trees; the hen blackbird, dusty brown, seeking food in the mulch beneath the hedge; the whine of a wasp, drunk on rotten fruit. The gradual dying of the year. But this would all renew, return. This was her church. She fought for control and clung to her harvest. With some apples she could make a pie, or a crumble. She wiped her fingers on a tissue, texted Owen, asked him to get some Bramleys and some cream; there was a small supermarket on his way home.

Walking back, Fiona ran into the old American couple with their terriers. She smiled and nodded, her teeth clenched as they nattered about the weather and the deterioration in the quality of the kennels they used. By the time they moved on, her jaw ached with the effort. But she had coped.

Owen arrived back without any apples or cream.

‘Oh, brilliant!’ She rounded on him. ‘I texted you.’

He stared at her, affronted. ‘I didn’t get any text.’

‘How come?’ she demanded. ‘How come you never get my texts? Or do you just ignore them?’ Her voice rising. ‘I can’t make apple and blackberry pie with no bloody apples.’

‘Big deal.’ He slung his bag down, kicked off his shoes.

‘Pick them up,’ she yelled. ‘Put them away.’ She heard the shrill of her tone, hated it.

Owen flushed, glared at her from under his fringe.

She put a hand out, grabbing the post at the bottom of the stairs. ‘Look, I’m sorry. It happened again,’ she said quietly. ‘In the post office, another panic attack.’

‘Not my fault,’ he muttered and went upstairs, leaving his bag and shoes where he’d dropped them.

Three weeks after the post office and she was feeling much better. The medication seemed to be doing its work. She had some minor side effects, nausea and a dry mouth, but overall she felt calmer and safer. She was doing her best to keep a structure to her day. In the morning she did chores, the ongoing housework, then all the things there had never been enough time to do. She was clearing the spare room, sorting through old sports equipment and extra duvets, games and toys that Owen had outgrown, spare shoes. She found a set of watercolours and dabbled at them but her efforts only irritated her. The daubs on the page bore no resemblance to the pictures in her head. They’d been a present for Owen but he’d never shown any interest. If Owen had an artistic bone in his body it was a small and well-hidden one.

The idea of learning a craft, finding a hobby, appealed to her. Something for the afternoons, and those evenings when she wasn’t interested in what was on television. At school she’d loved pottery, the heft of stone cold clay in her hands, the giddy spinning wheel, the magic of the kiln. They’d made coil pots and ornaments, hedgehogs and little dishes shaped like leaves. Pedestrian. But she’d used clay for her O level art project. Made a large vase, the green slip glaze on it luminous, as vibrant as she could get it. Her parents had displayed it on their sideboard but she’d no idea what had happened to it. After they’d both died, when she’d cleared out her mother’s retirement flat, there’d been hardly anything left.

Pottery was impossible on her own at home. No wheel or kiln. The only place would be a night class and that meant going out, meeting people. That frightened her. She completed jigsaws and worked in the tiny back garden. She tried sudoku and crosswords but the afternoons began to yawn and her walks with Ziggy grew longer.

Since the post office she practised walking to the local shops and back every other day. Her own form of behavioural therapy. At first just there and back. Then going into one place and buying something. Then a couple of places. She managed fine. Taking things gradually and helped by the medication, she grew more confident.

Shelley had been more than happy to come round and visit. But she thought Fiona might try going out with her now. A meal maybe? Fiona liked the idea. She was lonely and the thought of Shelley’s anecdotes from work, gossip about the other staff, her smiles, a restaurant meal, would be a welcome change. Would Shelley come to Chorlton, so Fiona could walk there? Could they meet early before it got too busy? Sure. Shelley agreed to all her conditions.

Fiona never even made it to the restaurant. And what made it most devastating, once she’d weathered that black, bleak, overwhelming anxiety and the indignity of cracking up in public, was the fact that there was nothing, not one, single, identifiable element that she could seize on to explain why the attack had come on in that place, a quiet junction of two suburban side streets, or at that time. If there was no particular trigger that set her off then she could be rendered disabled and petrified, suffocating and gripped by dread, anywhere, any time. Nowhere was safe.

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

Mike

With the neck brace on and a sling to support his dislocated left shoulder, Mike wouldn’t be up for driving for several weeks. Ian told him he’d have to let him go. Lay-offs were on the cards anyway and it wouldn’t be fair to the other lads to keep Mike’s place open when he couldn’t pull a fair day’s graft. Mike could hear the relish in Ian’s voice, bubbling under the surface of the words. Ian ran on spite: Mike knew his boss had never forgiven him for the missed deliveries on the day of the murder. And now Ian had his revenge.

‘I’ll try the post,’ Mike told Vicky. ‘See if anything’s coming up for when I’m fit.’ But they were letting people go, too. Combining rounds so posties had longer routes, longer hours, heavier mailbags. Some desk-jockey spouted how a walking pace of four miles an hour should be standard in the postal service, it would improve efficiency and keep the staff fit.

Mike tried the other contacts he had but it was the same story everywhere: short rations, hard times.

He went down the Jobcentre and found out what he could claim and when. He and Vicky spent a whole weekend filling in the forms. Pages and pages. They had to let the tax credit know their circumstances had changed. They applied for free school meals for the kids and got them. Mike had balked at that when Vicky first raised it.

‘School dinners?’ He looked at her.

‘Why the face?’

‘They’ll get picked on,’ he said. ‘The kids on school dinners, they were always the losers.’

‘That’s daft,’ Vicky countered.

‘Cheap pies and soggy mash,’ he tried, knowing that was a lost argument.

‘Not now. Decent meals. And they’d only need a snack at teatime. Every penny counts. We might get free uniforms as well.’

Mike ran a hand over his face and sighed, stared at the fridge behind her, the garish magnets and the kids’ paintings.

‘You’d rather they went hungry?’ She was riled, her eyes sparking a warning.

‘No,’ he protested.

‘Well then?’

‘Just do it!’ He flung a hand at the school meals form, pushed away from the table and walked to the fridge.

‘Bit early, isn’t it?’ Her voice tight as he opened the door.

Swearing, Mike slammed it shut, the fridge rocking, bottles and jars inside clanking.

That he should come to this. A man unable to feed and clothe his children. After years of solid hard work, careful budgeting. Years of being prudent and reliable, responsible and honest – and for what? Now he couldn’t even provide for his family.

The dole officer had the decency to be honest with Mike about the prospects. Over fifty people chasing every vacancy, more if it was above minimum wage.

‘Anything you can do to improve your profile would help.’

He gave Mike leaflets and offered him a special assessment interview. The lad was friendly, polite and sympathetic but they both knew he was on a hiding to nothing with Mike.

Mike’s dad had been on the dole for a couple of years back in the eighties. He’d become depressed and irritable, carping at Mike’s mum about the meals she scraped together, bossing Mike about more than usual. He was in danger of turning into his father. An appalling thought.

Danny Macateer’s murder was on Crimewatch. They showed a re-enactment, and some of what Mike had told Joe Kitson was repeated.

‘I told them that-’ he turned to Vicky – ‘about the car, the colour of the guy’s clothes.’ He’d a sense of delight, a glow of excitement, daft but there all the same.

Vicky looked like he’d slapped her.

‘What?’

Kirsty Young on the telly was talking about how someone must know something, asking them to pick up the phone.

‘The reason no one’s come forward is because it’s a gang thing,’ Vicky said.

‘The lad wasn’t in a gang, they said that all along,’ Mike told her.

‘But those that did it are, and no one will dare say anything. If they do they’ll be punished.’

‘It’s not right.’ He shook his head, not seeing where she was going with it.

‘What if they come after you?’

‘Me? Don’t be thick!’

‘Listen.’ Her face was white, naked. ‘That’s what they do. They have ways of finding out who’s a witness and then they get to them.’

‘What ways?’ He couldn’t believe this.

She closed her eyes tightly, her fists balls of fury. ‘It doesn’t matter what ways, they just do.’

‘Suddenly you’re an expert on gang crime?’

‘Everyone knows!’ Her voice grating. ‘They’ll threaten you, make you stop.’

‘No,’ he argued, putting his hand on her knee trying to calm her. She shoved it away.

‘They could.’ She was taut, ready to snap.

‘Vicky.’ He caught her hand, held it between his own. ‘They’ve not even charged anyone yet. They’re still appealing for help. It means they haven’t got enough to pick the bloke up, not enough evidence. People like us don’t get targeted; he won’t know us from Adam.’ He spoke faster as she tried to interrupt, emphasizing his words, as if the right stresses could force her to change her mind. ‘But until there’s a trial there’s no risk at all. The only reason they’d put the frighteners on someone would be to stop them testifying, and then it’d only be those people they knew. Others in the neighbourhood, families and that. And there is no trial.’ He bent his head, forcing eye contact, her hand warm in his. ‘There probably never will be. Okay?’

She gave a half nod, nothing wholehearted but enough to make him relieved. On the television, the team had moved on to an armed robbery.

‘I can put another channel on.’ He held up the remote.

‘I’m not bothered, now,’ Vicky said.

Mike applied for every job going. He used the advice he got from the lad at the Jobcentre and drew up a CV. He worked out a batch of answers to use for the various questions like: What do you think you could contribute to our company? What are your strongest qualities? and Tell us about your hobbies and pastimes. Why some manager in a call centre had the faintest interest in Mike’s hobbies was beyond him but he played the game. He didn’t get any interviews.

Some mornings he went to the local library, read the newspapers. Every two weeks he had to go in and sign on and have a jobsearch review: give evidence of three steps he had taken each week to prove he was actively seeking work. It was better than in his dad’s time when they queued like cattle at the dole office every week and were viewed with suspicion and condescension by the staff. Mike had gone with his dad once. The place had been full of people whose lives were fragmenting or already in chaos. The air was sour with the reek of poverty, unwashed bodies and clothes, cigarettes and alcohol. The kids there were wild with boredom, their antics prompting the parents to lash out with angry slaps. The men were crazed with frustration, some of them tanked up already. A fight had kicked off and the clerks had sealed themselves in the back and the security guards turfed everyone out until things were sorted again. They filed back in, queued again and finally got seen by some pinch-faced woman whose attitude suggested she tarred them all with the same brush. The feckless, the undeserving poor.

Where Mike signed on now was a purpose-built facility with brightly upholstered chairs, wooden coffee tables, counter staff trained to smile. The culture had shifted even if some of the clients looked like those Mike remembered: the long-term unemployed, the very poor, the ill-equipped. The rest were a hotch-potch: men and women like Mike slung out of work after half a lifetime never missing a day, professional types with their shiny shoes and crisp shirts, or students highly qualified and hungry for a job. But even with the carpeted floors and the computer terminals and the fancy logos Mike felt the desperation among the people forced between its doors. He hated the place and how it made him feel.

A month after the Crimewatch appeal, and Vicky had taken on more clients. Mike now walked Megan to school and picked her up, while Vicky drove Kieran in. She’d got extra work from two residential care homes for the elderly. The Perms, she called them. They all wanted the same hair. ‘Will we be the same?’ she asked Mike one Saturday teatime as she got back. ‘Well, you’ll be bald, but will I suddenly want to look like my grandma?’

‘Bald?’

‘Thinning on top, now.’ She nodded at his head. ‘Ten years be nothing left.’

‘You going off me?’

‘Never.’

‘Prove it,’ he said.

‘Now? The kids are in the garden.’

‘A quickie?’

She rolled her eyes but the smile breaking on her face gave him his answer.

It was on the local news, after the national headlines. A reward had been offered for information leading to the arrest and conviction of Danny Macateer’s killers. Vicky turned to watch on her way out of the room with the dustpan and brush. Mike saw the tension grip her shoulders, saw her lift her chin. But she said nothing. He thought of the shooter, the man he’d seen raising the gun. Was he watching this? Did it make him feel big? Was he sure he could keep people quiet, confident no one would dare speak out and he’d get away with it, or was there that little bit of him waiting for a knock on his door?

He didn’t deserve to get away with it. Scum like that. Whatever Vicky thought, if the police caught him then Mike would be there like a shot. Swearing on the Bible, saying his piece. Doing all he could to help put the guy inside for life.

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

Cheryl

Nana hadn’t been feeling too good. She took herself off to the doctor’s and when she came back she told Cheryl that they were sending her for tests.

Cheryl felt something twist inside her. ‘What kind of tests?’

‘I don’t know, I ain’t no doctor. They just want to check all is as it should be. I’s not getting any younger.’ Nana was folding and unfolding a tea-towel. Cheryl wanted to grab her hands, stop her.

‘I could come with you,’ Cheryl offered, feeling clumsy, not sure how to be.

Nana sucked her teeth and told her she could manage just fine, fine and dandy. ‘Could be weeks, they said, for the appointment.’

Milo fell over, stumbled backwards and bumped his head on the corner of the couch. All cushioned there – so he was fussing more than hurt. Cheryl scooped him up, kissed his cheeks. ‘Hi, Nana, say hi!’ she coached him, swinging him towards Nana.

Nana clapped her hands. ‘Here’s Milo.’ She stroked the child’s face. ‘It’s still dry,’ she said to Cheryl. ‘You taking him out?’

‘Storytime at the library then maybe the park.’

‘Good. Get some bread on the way back.’

‘And milk?’

‘Yes.’ Nana went to her bag.

‘I’ve got some,’ Cheryl said. ‘My benefit’s in.’

Nana nodded, took a coin from her bag anyway, gave it to her. ‘Get him an ice-cream or something.’

Cheryl sat with Milo and half a dozen other mums and toddlers on the carpet in the children’s section. The librarian, Maeve, made the story come alive, even for the littlest ones who were more inclined to crawl away or try to eat the books. She pointed out the details in the big picture book, repeated the simple sentences and encouraged any and all contributions from the children. Each week she finished with some action rhymes which the mothers could repeat at home: ‘Pat-a-Cake’, ‘Incy Wincy Spider’, ‘Five Little Speckled Frogs’ and ‘The Wheels on the Bus’.

Milo crooned along, shouting loudly the words at the end of each line.

When the session was over, Cheryl hung around until the rest had gone then asked Maeve if she could book on to one of the computers. Maeve scanned her card, put her on terminal two and told her to yell if she needed any help. Cheryl picked out a couple of board books for Milo, nothing he could rip up, and settled him at her feet.

She launched the browser then glanced about: someone else on a computer further along, a couple of people scanning the fiction section and three students working at the tables. No one near enough to see.

Cheryl typed in the search bar and hit enter. She felt the skin on her arms tighten and her stomach shrink as the results appeared. Sitting up straighter she clicked the link to the Greater Manchester Police website. Danny’s name was there on the right under Featured Appeals.

Weeks had turned into months and Cheryl had waited for things to change. For the raw, tarnished feeling she had, like she’d done something awful, to evaporate but it remained. It took the shine off everything. It made her throat ache, like she wanted to cry and couldn’t. It had taken her long enough to accept it was because of Danny, because she had no guts, no honour, she was just like everyone else, weak and useless. There were times she hated Nana for her certainty and her principles and her preaching. Knowing she couldn’t match up, came nowhere close.

Cheryl swallowed, she pressed her knees together and followed the link. There was Danny’s picture, the same one that had hung over his coffin at the memorial service. Cheryl read the text.

Sixteen-year-old Danny Macateer should have been starting his A-level studies this September but on Sunday 20 June Danny was shot once in the chest as he crossed the recreation ground by Booth Street in Hulme. He was taken to hospital where he was pronounced dead on arrival.

Detectives have renewed their call for people to come forward with information about Danny’s murder. They are keen to speak to two men witnessed at the scene in a silver BMW. To date neither the car nor the gun used in the shooting have been recovered.

The promising music student was on his way to a band rehearsal when he was gunned down. His twin sister has spoken of the terrible gap that has been left in her life and that of Danny’s family. At an emotional memorial service, teachers, friends and relatives queued up to pay tribute to the boy who had so much to look forward to.

Detective Inspector Joe Kitson, who is leading this investigation, said: ‘We know that there were several people out that Sunday afternoon who may well have seen the car, or the men who carried out this devastating attack. If you were in the area please tell us what you saw, even if it seems insignificant, as it could be crucial for our inquiry.

‘We need your help to find Danny’s killers and bring his family some justice. If you are afraid to come forward for any reason I would like to reassure you that we have protective measures in place so no one ever needs to know who you are.’

A £20,000 reward is available for anyone who provides information leading to the conviction of Danny’s killers.

Twenty thousand. More than Cheryl would ever see in a year but not enough for someone to move away, buy a house, start a new life. Blood money.

‘Okay?’ The voice made her jump; she hit the mouse, closed the browser and swivelled to see Maeve, whose arms were full of books.

‘Fine,’ Cheryl replied, her heart bucketing in her chest, a feeling like bubbles popping in her veins.

‘Good.’ Maeve smiled, moved away.

Cheryl took a moment, waiting for her heart to slow, then went back to the site. There were two numbers at the bottom of the appeal, one for the police and the other for Crimestoppers. She could tip them off, just give them Carlton and Sam’s names, no more than that but it might be enough for the police, enough to stop Cheryl feeling so shabby. She got out her phone, checked she wasn’t being observed and then stored the first number in her contacts list. Her fingers felt thick, uncoordinated, and she kept making mistakes.

‘Woof.’ Milo had found a picture of a dog.

‘Yes, woof.’ Cheryl nodded at him.

She opened the Safety menu on the browser and deleted her browsing history. Logged off.

Outside there was a strong wind and the clouds above, big dimpled shapes, were moving fast. It looked like it would stay dry. Cheryl persuaded Milo into his buggy and buckled him up.

A shadow fell over her from behind. ‘All right, Cheryl?’

Carlton! She rose, losing her balance. He shot out an arm, catching her elbow. ‘Easy now.’ He smiled, a quick easy glint of white teeth, one gold cap. Carlton was a big man, pumped up from time spent at the gym and the regular use of steroids, according to Vinia. He wore a plain white tee and a thin leather and linen jacket, double-breasted, elaborate, expensive. His trainers were gold Pumas, like the ones Usain Bolt, the fastest runner in the world, won the Olympics in.

He let go of her elbow. ‘Where ya bin hiding?’

Cheryl laughed. ‘No place.’ What if he took her phone? Found the number? ‘Just taking Milo to Storytime.’

‘Ya don’t come round no more.’

When she did use to call on Vinia he’d leched her with his eyes, passed ripe comments, smacking his lips. It made her squirm. She’d always made sure to stick close to Vinia, not be caught alone with him.

Cheryl felt the hairs on her arms rise. She knew she must be very careful, and sly and sweet. ‘Responsibilities now. No partying no more.’

‘That right?’ He locked his eyes on hers. His were bright, glassy, a seed of anger sharpening them. She forced a glow into her own, giggled, girlish.

‘Milo, he keeps me busy.’ She edged aside a little so Carlton could see her son.

Carlton hunkered down, his great hand outstretched, cupped, rested like a cap on Milo’s curls. ‘Hey, lickle man.’

Cheryl’s throat closed. She wanted to slap him away. He waggled the child’s head a little.

‘Yah!’ Milo made some sort of greeting.

Carlton laughed, a guffaw that crackled in the air, sudden and loud. ‘Yah! I hear you, man. Fine soldier you make someday. Yes!’

Over my dead body, vowed Cheryl. She felt bile in her throat. Recalled Danny, his fist bumping Milo’s. She stretched her face to frame a smile for Carlton.

‘What’s Mama say?’ He turned from Milo to her, beamed up at her, his eyes fierce, dangerous.

Cheryl laughed as though the thought of Milo being one of his foot soldiers was the funniest thing on the planet. Laughed way too long, high and brittle, but dared not stop.

Carlton stood, nodded to her. ‘Don’t be a stranger, you hear me?’

She nodded. Was still nodding and grinning like some ventriloquist’s dummy as he strode away, his bulk rolling from hip to hip, his head swaying on his neck.

Cheryl imagined Milo grown, a gun under his bed, his arms engorged with muscles like Carlton’s. Milo shot up and bleeding. Herself, like Paulette, burying her boy.

In a corner of the park, while Milo clambered on and off the little play-boat structure, Cheryl punched in the number for the police. She listened to it ring once, then twice, then a voice came on the line. Cheryl didn’t speak, she listened to the voice, all the reassurances it gave, listened to the silence, watched Milo steer the captain’s wheel. Her jaw was rigid, her belly ached, her knees trembled, she was so frightened. Then she ended the call. Deleted the number, feeling shaky and sick, and her eyes hot with angry tears.

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

Zak

He’d done something to his wrist, well – not him but the lads who’d given him a kicking had. And it still wasn’t right. He’d waited a few weeks but if he tried to lift anything it gave way. The pain made it harder to sleep at night. There was a drop-in clinic near the precinct so he left Bess at the house one morning and went there. Early October and drizzle like fog that caught in his throat. Made his cough worse.

The nurse asked him to move it this way and that, pressed it and pinched it, told him he needed an X-ray, he should go to A &E. Zak said he would but could she strap it up for now or give him something for the pain? She put on an elasticated bandage and told him to try paracetamol – no more than eight in twenty-four hours. She said again he really needed an X-ray. It could be broken.

He didn’t bother with A &E, decided it could wait a while longer, might sort itself out. He wore the bandage though, he thought it might help when he was trying to raise some cash, make people more sympathetic. Didn’t work out like that: for all those that felt sorry for him there were another crowd who thought he’d been fighting. Like homeless and drunk and violent were all the same thing.

He did end up in A &E. Collapsed on Corporation Street with pneumonia and pleurisy. He was coughing and fighting for breath, his chest sucking, a stabbing pain behind his shoulder blade and his skin on fire, but he wouldn’t go in the ambulance without Bess.

They argued the toss with him, one of the paramedics going on about hygiene and risks and procedures. The other persuaded Zak to let him call a friend (Midge) who could take Bess to the PDSA, explain the situation. Zak didn’t like it but it was the best offer he was gonna get. They left Bess with a CSO who’d wait for Midge, and had the PDSA address.

It was all a bit hazy at the hospital, he kept nodding off like he was stoned but he hadn’t taken anything. He had one of those blue blankets with holes in, he liked the feel of that, and the way they were all treated the same, all the patients. Might have been bankers or beggars, it didn’t make no odds. They were all in pain, all needed help.

They took his blood and gave him loads of X-rays and told him he’d be in overnight at least and a doctor would see him in the morning. They rigged him up to an oxygen cylinder with a little gadget to put in his nose and started him on tablets.

There were three others in his ward room, two old fellas who slept a lot and a young bloke who only appeared for meals and at bedtime, pushing a drip. One of the nursing assistants told Zak the man had a thing going with a woman he’d met on admission. Kept nipping off to see her.

The doctor didn’t get to him till the next afternoon. She closed the curtains round his bed, giving them some privacy. ‘We’re treating the pneumonia and pleurisy with antibiotics and it’s likely to take a couple more days before your symptoms improve. You’ve also a fractured wrist which appears to have gone untreated.’

Zak shrugged. ‘Can you fix it?’

‘I think so. A plaster cast should sort you out – there doesn’t appear to be any infection there. You’re lucky. How did you break it?’

‘Slipped up.’ Zak thought of the beating he’d had. That cold, sick feeling.

‘You’ve not been treated here before so we don’t have access to your medical records but these older injuries…’

‘Car crash,’ Zak explained, his good fingers working, hard to keep still.

She waited a moment, he could see she had her doubts, but in the end she went along with it. ‘Nasty.’

‘Yeah.’

‘You’re homeless at present?’

‘Yeah.’

‘I can refer you to Manchester Housing, or one of the other agencies for help and advice.’

Zak dismissed the idea. ‘You’re all right.’

‘Sleeping rough isn’t going to do anything for your health.’

Zak squirmed. Waited for the lecture on smoking. Instead she asked if he was a drug user.

‘Nah.’

She didn’t believe him, went on, ‘Because there’s a very good rehab scheme we have links with.’

‘I’m fine.’

‘Smoking cessation?’ She was almost smiling.

Zak laughed and it set him off coughing, the blade turning in his back.

She had one more try, ‘You’re twenty-two. Another ten years and it’ll all be that much harder. There is help available.’

‘Yeah,’ he said, meaning no.

She sighed and got up, tilted her head.

‘I’ll tell ’em you tried,’ he said, ‘on the customer satisfaction survey. Got my vote.’

Apart from fretting about Bess, Zak had a rare old time. A decent bed, hot food. He still sweated all night and the pain in his chest was worse, he was coughing up stuff the colour of rust, but even so. He didn’t mind the broken sleep, it was better than the dreams. One time Carlton had the gun, he was pointing it at Zak. And Zak was talking fast, babbling that Carlton had got the wrong person. Pleading with him. Sometimes it was a gun and sometimes it was a big knife going right through him. Then another time he was locked in the dark, struggling to get up, he couldn’t move, not his legs or his hand, nothing. He was buried. The dark was soil clogging his mouth, his nose and his lungs.

On the third night, Zak finished his tea – chicken casserole, potato croquettes and broccoli, lime jelly and sponge fingers with grapes – and went out for a smoke. He was off the oxygen. It took over ten minutes to walk through the maze to the smokers’ corner. Midge had sent him the PDSA number. After he’d lit up, he rang ’em again. Bess was fine. He thanked the woman and apologized for bothering her, promised to let her know soon as. Could be the day after tomorrow.

Turning to go in, Zak felt a glow, warm inside. Peculiar. In bed that night, while one of the old fellas snored and the other muttered at him to put a sock in it, Zak figured out what the feeling meant. Safe. In here, turning in for the night, waking up in the morning, there was no fear. Except for the dreams. He was safe.

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

Fiona

The therapy wasn’t quite what she’d expected. No digging into her childhood or searching questions about her relationships or how she expressed her emotions. Instead Hazel Fuller began by taking an account of the circumstances surrounding her first panic attack.

As soon as Fiona began to speak, her mind flying back to that hot summer day, the boy on the ground, she found herself growing tense, her muscles retracting, her breath out of synch, words tangling.

‘I’m sorry,’ she said, ‘it’s still so-’ She stopped, wrestling tears. ‘I’m frightened it’s starting again.’ She was stupid, a child in the dark. How had she grown so weak?

‘A natural fear,’ Hazel reassured her. ‘Relax your hands.’

Fiona looked down at her fists, clenched, the knuckles white. Consciously she opened them, palms up.

‘And your feet.’

Fiona laughed, spread her toes, turned her ankles.

‘Breathe out.’

Fiona obeyed.

‘Wait,’ Hazel cautioned. ‘Drop your shoulders.’ She nodded. ‘Now, a steady breath in and draw it down into your diaphragm. And hold, and release.’

Once the breathing had calmed Fiona, Hazel explained that all their sessions would be looking at practical techniques that Fiona could use.

‘What do you know about CBT?’ Hazel asked.

‘I’ve read a bit online,’ Fiona told her.

‘Then you’ve probably seen that there are two elements to CBT – changing how you think and changing how you behave. We enable you to accept that however unpleasant the symptoms are they will pass, that you will not die or have a heart attack, that nothing is physically wrong. And we look at the physiology of what is happening – understanding that helps put it in perspective. As far as behaviour goes, we examine patterns that aren’t helping your condition and teach you ways of controlling your anxiety and rehearsing responses to hopefully minimize the number of attacks.’

Fiona nodded. Grateful.

‘You’re on antidepressants?’

‘Yes.’

‘Those combined with CBT offer the greatest chance of improvement according to the latest studies.’

‘Good.’

‘You’re a midwife,’ Hazel observed.

‘Yes.’

‘Think about your work, times when something unpredictable happens, when the mother or baby is at risk and you need to act quickly. Can you give me an example?’

‘A C-section, emergency Caesarean.’

‘Go on.’

‘If we see signs that the baby is in distress, or we lose the heartbeat, then we have to get the mother into theatre as soon as possible.’

‘A lot of adrenalin?’

‘God, yes.’

‘What’s that like for you?’ She seemed genuinely interested.

‘A bit hairy at times but it’s important to reassure the mum, not to frighten her.’

‘And while you’re doing this what’s happening to you, physiologically?’

Fiona thought. ‘Pulse speeds up, heart too, my mind seems sharper. I think I read somewhere the adrenalin helps you remember things, concentrate better. A survival mechanism?’

Hazel nodded. ‘Now think of something else. Think of losing your temper. Big time.’

Fiona thought of shouting at Owen about the apples and cream.

‘What’s the physiology there?’ Hazel asked.

‘Hot. Sweating, my head buzzing, pulse quicker, everything brighter. It’s the same,’ she concluded.

‘The same response,’ Hazel acknowledged. ‘Fight, flight and fornication.’

Fiona laughed. ‘I knew this – my training.’

‘Of course. But it’s hard to hold on to when you’re so anxious. A panic attack is a flood of adrenalin; it brings all the same changes as you’d find if you were having a blazing row with someone. Or a passionate encounter.’

Chance’d be a fine thing, Fiona thought.

‘The lack of context makes the panic attack both disabling and traumatic but fundamentally there is nothing happening in your body, in your muscles and your central nervous system, that doesn’t happen at other times in response to particular situations – like the emergency Caesarean.’

‘But it feels so different.’

‘Exactly. And our goal over the next few weeks will be to repattern your thoughts about it and re-educate you.’

Fiona left with a set of daily exercises to do. She felt buoyed up by the session, especially at Hazel’s optimistic view of the likely outcome of the therapy.

That afternoon Fiona bought a home hair-colour kit from the chemist’s. She really needed a haircut as well. She was blessed with straight hair but as it had grown longer she’d taken to snagging it back in an elastic band. Until she felt ready to make an appointment at least she could banish the grey hairs salted through it.

She was waiting for the colour to take when Owen got in.

‘Can you do mine?’ he asked her.

‘Have you got a kit?’

He groaned. ‘Didn’t you get one?’

‘No. It doesn’t seem five minutes since last time.’

‘The brown’s showing.’

‘Well, go and buy a kit and I’ll help you. They’ll still be open.’

He didn’t reply but slumped noisily into the kitchen while she went upstairs to rinse the mixture off. She left it down and let it dry naturally while she started tea. Owen loved curry so she’d bought some lamb at the butcher’s and a huge bunch of fresh coriander from the Asian grocer’s. She sealed the lamb and fried the onions and spices, added tomatoes and lemon juice and put the dish in the oven to cook slowly. It was dark by six when she drew the curtains and set the table.

Owen appreciated the meal, cleared his plate of seconds, grunted his thanks and left.

‘Dishwasher,’ she reminded him on his way out of the room.

‘I know!’ he shot back at her.

After walking the dog, she watched a film. She woke feeling disoriented, befuddled. It was eleven thirty, the house was quiet. Owen must be in bed. He never came in to kiss her goodnight any more. She missed that, the physical connection, however brief. She knew he had to grow up, grow apart from her, but hadn’t anticipated how much it would hurt. She was lonely. Lonely for love and physical affection. Aware of the sentiment of self-pity she scolded herself – she’d somuch to be thankful for: a healthy son, good friends, the house. The money she’d inherited from her parents together with a contribution from Jeff, by way of payment towards Owen’s upkeep, meant she’d paid off the mortgage years ago. Since then they had managed on her modest income.

Fiona wondered if she should push Owen to get in touch with Jeff again. Maybe reviving his relationship with his dad would help him in the messy business of growing up. Contact between father and son had dwindled over time. Jeff had a second family now, much younger, and lived in Jersey. Jeff was punctilious about birthday and Christmas presents. He and Owen had exchanged emails regularly at first but that had trailed off. By the time he was twelve Owen was refusing invitations to spend the holidays with Jeff. But it would be so much easier, she thought, to be sharing all this, the animosity and teenage tantrums, with another parent.

In the bathroom there were dark splashes on the sink and the clothes basket and the floor by the toilet. Fiona reeled, grabbed the sink and felt the blood pound in her neck. Owen was hurt, blood everywhere, what had he done?! Cut himself, slit his wrists?! Blink, his blood on her hands, blink, his eyes rolling back, blink, the spasm that shook him. No! She remembered Hazel. Took a slow breath, took it deep. Stared at the black stains and smears and realized it was hair dye not blood. He must have done it himself while she was watching TV. She shuddered with relief. She rubbed the blot from the sink but the marks on the basket and the floor were permanent. Still shaken, but hugely relieved she hadn’t had a full-blown attack, she didn’t trust herself to tackle her son about it yet. Tomorrow would be better.

She showered quickly, towelled herself dry, brushed her teeth. Her hair was shiny, the shade a rich brown. Like chestnuts. If she bought some to roast would Owen eat them? Probably not, with adolescence had come the same finicky appetite as toddlerhood. Junk food and sugary snacks were high on the list of favourites.

She lay in the dark but sleep wouldn’t come, her nerves alive and singing, muscles clenched, her mind darting here and there. She pulled on some clothes and went downstairs. The house was cooler already, made her shiver. She practised her CBT exercises then tried to read. At four in the morning, swaddled in blankets, she took out the folder, Danny’s folder, with all the clippings she had kept. There had been nothing in the papers for weeks now. Four months on and no one had been arrested. She traced a finger round the boy’s photograph, gazed at his smile, at the expression in his eyes. Waiting for dawn.

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

Mike

They had a break-in. Opportunistic. Mike had left the lounge window open. He’d simply not noticed. Set off to pick Megan up from school, rain pissing down and the sky dark as slate. It had rained all day, all week. Patches of water standing on the bit of lawn in their back yard. Their coats steaming on the radiators every night. They only put the heating on for a couple of hours, trying to make savings. Later they sat watching telly with their warmest clothes on, sharing a fleece throw for a blanket.

Mike had done a load of washing that day and had put the heating on early to dry it. The window was open to get rid of some of the moisture in the air, though given the outside was like a hundred degrees humidity anyway who knows if it helped. They’d already spots of black mould in the corners of the kitchen.

The burglars had been in and out in the half-hour Mike had been gone. He didn’t notice at first, came in with Megan, her chattering still, unbuttoned her coat, then his own. Took her through to make her some toast and on his way saw the gap where the telly had been, the aerial cable dangling, DVD player gone, DVDs scattered on the carpet.

Mike swore.

‘Where’s the telly?’ said Megan.

‘It’s gone.’ Mike’s brain was already adding it all up, looking across the open plan room to the windows.

‘Where’s it gone?’

‘Don’t know.’ Mike walked over; saw the drops of water, streaks of mud on the window sill, and marks on the carpet.

‘Why?’ she asked.

‘Because.’ His head was too busy to be dealing with her an’ all. ‘Look, just give us a minute, Megan.’

Megan sighed and moved to her toy box.

Mike checked the kitchen. They’d left the microwave and there was nothing else worth taking. Upstairs looked untouched. No insurance though. They’d let that lapse when it came due for renewal.

How would they manage without a telly? It kept the kids quiet, even Kieran could be soothed by putting on a familiar DVD. Mike and Vicky too, barely any social life but a bit of something on the box or a decent movie was one of their few pleasures.

He made Megan’s toast, gave her some juice and rang his brother Martin. Martin made a living on eBay, pretty much, that and car-boots. He always knew where you could pick up a bargain. Mike explained his predicament.

‘Aw, mate!’ Martin commiserated. ‘How’d they get in?’

‘Lounge window. Never thought. Only gone twenty minutes.’

‘Leave it with us, see what I can do.’

Martin rang back within the hour. He could get them a digital set but it wouldn’t be flat screen, DVD player too. Might have a couple of pixels out but the lot for £95. Cheap as chips. But Mike had nothing. No contingency, no rainy day fund. He imagined saying no, turning down the chance, and then the weeks to come with the four of them out of sorts and climbing the walls.

Mike took a breath. ‘I haven’t got the readies at the moment.’

‘No problem.’ Martin was quick to step in. ‘I’ll sort it. Pay us back when you can.’

Which could be never, thought Mike, the prospect bitter in his mouth. ‘Appreciate it,’ Mike told his brother.

‘Probably be tomorrow,’ Martin added.

‘That’s great. Thanks, mate.’

Mike had expected Vicky to go ballistic when she heard. He even thought about lying to her, for like a nanosecond. Knew he couldn’t get away with it. But instead of blaming him, letting some steam off and giving him a good bollocking for being so thick, she went white. Locked on to the thieves.

‘While you were getting Megan?’ she said quietly. ‘So they must have been watching the place.’

‘What?’

‘Waiting for you to go out. Knowing your routine.’ A big frown on her face. Her lips bloodless. ‘Watching us, then coming in here and taking the only things we’ve got that are worth anything.’

‘Vicky, I’m sorry.’

She wasn’t interested in him, in apologies. ‘They targeted us, Mike, don’t you see?’

‘They were probably just passing,’ he said. ‘An open window, it’s asking for it. It’s down to me, I’m sorry.’

‘Just passing!’ The incredulity laid on heavy. ‘Why would anyone be just passing here, in the pouring rain? It’s a cul-de-sac.’

‘There’s the alley, they could have been cutting through.’

She stopped, her face alert, like she’d just heard something. ‘They must have had a car. That telly’s too big to carry.’

‘Not impossible.’

‘And the DVD player.’

‘There might have been two of them.’ As soon as he said it Mike knew she’d turn that round to support her theory. ‘Look,’ he hurried on, changing tack, ‘they didn’t take anything else. No mess, nothing broken. Martin will sort us out.’

‘You don’t care.’ Her face was flushed now.

‘What?’

‘Strangers, some low-lifes who’ve been watching the place, have been in here, touching our stuff, watching us, waiting for you to leave.’ She’d never been the hysterical type and this sudden melodrama made Mike feel peculiar.

‘They haven’t even been upstairs,’ he said.

‘What if this is about the murder?’

‘What?’ He shook his head.

‘About getting at us, getting at you.’

‘Vicky they nicked the TV, what are you on about?’

She stared at him, her mouth twisted with distaste, derision.

‘Look.’ He stepped closer to her, put out a hand, touched her shoulder. ‘I know it’s a bit of a shock but let’s keep it real. Some scallies took the telly. End of.’

‘No, it isn’t,’ said Vicky, ‘not by a long chalk.’

And she wasn’t wrong.

The other side of Christmas, not that there’d been much festivity in their house but they’d done their best to make it a happy time for the kids. Megan was young enough to be pleased with simple things, cheap toys off the market, the idea of it all. Kieran liked the music. Favourite Christmas songs on his old CD player. Mike and Vicky had debated whether to get him a new one but decided not. The lad loved his old one and they’d learnt the hard way not to force change on him. Getting him into new clothes as he grew bigger was challenge enough. They bought him a second-hand mobile handset in the forlorn hope that it would stop him hiding theirs. And there was one thing that would guarantee his pleasure. An addition to his collection of miniature steam trains. The engines were his passion.

The Museum of Science and Industry in town was a godsend. Full of working engines in tram sheds and railway memorabilia, it was one of the few manageable destinations for family outings. And it was free.

They’d gone there again after Christmas. Kieran’s face went still with appreciation as they stood in the great engine hall or went outside to watch the Planet locomotive chug its way past. His attention was fixed as though he was breathing in essence of steam train.

The families had bought presents for the kids, too, of course and they’d had a big get-together at Vicky’s mum’s. Mike was glad when it was all over and they were back to routine. He hoped he’d get a break in the New Year; find a job, anything for now.

Then, a Wednesday in January, close to teatime, Vicky rang him. Her voice shaking. ‘Mike, we’ve been in an accident.’ Her and Kieran. She’d collected the boy after work, was coming home.

Mike went cold right through. ‘Are you okay? And Kieran? Are you hurt? What happened?’

‘We’re okay,’ she said. ‘They drove right into us, Mike, on Chester Road. They just drove right into us.’ Mike’s throat went dry. He could hear Kieran in the background. The repetitive noise he made when he was upset. Like a moan, half a word. A chant.

‘Who did?’ She didn’t answer. He thought they’d lost the connection. ‘Vicky? What about the other car? Have you called the police?’

‘They didn’t stop.’

‘Have you called the police?’

‘No. They just kept going, Mike.’

‘We still need to report it. We can claim, even if they didn’t stop. That car’s your livelihood.’

‘I don’t want to report it.’ Her voice was edgy. She carried on speaking, her voice lower. ‘It was a warning, Mike. Another warning.’

‘What?’

‘From the gangs. Because of you.’

Mike felt like his head was going to explode. ‘Oh, for Christ’s sake.’ He couldn’t think where to go with this and he hated the stream of fear in her voice. ‘Look, will it start?’

‘I don’t know.’

‘Where’s the damage?’

‘The back, the driver’s side.’

‘Try it. If it won’t start I’ll come and get you in a cab.’

He heard her breathing, then the sound of the engine turning over.

‘Have you got lights?’

‘Yeah.’

‘Check the brakes.’

‘Fine.’ Her voice trembled.

‘You feel all right to drive?’

‘Yes.’

‘Okay. Any problems ring me back. Come home and we’ll talk.’

It wasn’t so much a talk, more of a rant. And Vicky didn’t even wait until the kids were out of earshot like she usually did. Laying into him about the risk he’d taken.

‘Vicky, wait.’ He held up a hand to stop the barrage of words. ‘It was an accident, that’s all. A road accident. Some prat too young to be behind the wheel, or off his head.’

‘It was a silver car,’ she said.

Mike wanted to laugh. ‘There are thousands of silver cars.’

She stared at him. Her lip trembling.

‘A BMW?’ he demanded.

She hesitated then said yes. He thought she was lying.

Megan was calling. ‘Mummy, Mummy.’ Wanting help getting her toy cooker out. The noise was a little drill in his head. Vicky was ignoring her. Kieran sat in the corner, zoned out.

He softened his voice. ‘You’re shaken up.’

‘Don’t try that,’ she snarled.

‘What?’

‘I know what happened, you weren’t there. First they break in and rob us, now they follow me.’

A dart of dread pricked in his belly. ‘They were following you!’ He couldn’t help the ridicule in his tone, didn’t know how else to deal with this fantasy.

‘They must have been.’

‘No.’ He shook his head.

‘They’re dangerous, Mike. They want to stop you. They drove us off the road.’

‘Mummeee!’ Megan began to scream.

Vicky’s face was all screwed up, her eyes shining, the glint of tears. ‘Next time they could kill us.’

‘Vicky.’ He couldn’t reason with her. Maybe when she calmed down. He turned away, went to pick up Megan, who was bawling now and kicking at the plastic cooker. ‘Here.’ He hoisted her up on to the crook of his arm, her face all wet and snotty. He got a tissue, wiped her face, turned her for a cuddle.

‘You’ve got to pull out,’ Vicky said. ‘For the kids. For me.’

Mike’s throat ached. He patted Megan on the back. She laid her head on his shoulder, the sobs had stopped.

‘The lad died, Vicky. I saw it. I told the police. That’s all there is to it.’

‘And you want us to be next?’ Spit landed on her chin.

‘Don’t be daft.’

‘That’s what’ll happen. Walk away.’

‘You’re upset.’

‘Stop telling me I’m upset. Course I’m bloody upset. Some gangster just piled into the car. The car with your wife and your son inside.’

‘It’s nothing to do with the gangs,’ Mike shouted and Megan started in his arms and began to grizzle again. ‘How would they know anything about me? My name, where I live, who you are? That’s confidential. Only the police know that. They haven’t even charged anyone yet. There may never be a trial.’

‘Someone could have seen you. When you were there, that day. Seen you giving your statement.’ Her breath was coming in little bursts, the words broken up. ‘Please, Mike!’

He couldn’t pull out. This meant so much. This was his chance to make things right. Payback. Like an exorcism, cancel out the time before. The time he’d said nothing, done nothing. Played it safe. He couldn’t change what had happened, but this time he’d been given the opportunity to stand up, to do the right thing.

‘They don’t know me,’ he insisted. ‘And if I did pull out how would they even know? What do you want me to do, string a bloody sheet up outside, Mike Sallis is a coward, Mike Sallis won’t be giving evidence?’ She had no answer to that. ‘This is all in your imagination, Vicky.’

‘What, I imagined getting rammed by a car, did I? I imagined swerving and nearly crashing?’

Megan wriggled in his arms, her cries getting louder. ‘Vicky, let’s talk later. It’s just coincidence. Bad luck.’

‘Why are you being like this?’ She spat the words at him.

He felt bile rise. Set Megan down, ignoring her howl of protest. He moved towards Vicky, his skin hot, his arms shaking. ‘I’m doing the right thing,’ he said tightly. ‘If one of our kids was hurt…’

Vicky flinched.

‘… I’d want people to come forward. Any decent man-’

‘Don’t talk to me about decent. What’s decent is protecting your own family, being a proper father and husband. There will be other witnesses. Let them do it.’

Mike shook his head. The thought of pulling out made him weak with shame. Like a dog sidling away, wriggling its back end, craven. He’d lived with that feeling all these years. Now another boy had died and he could pay penance. ‘You have to let me do this,’ he told her.

Her face hardened.

‘We can ask for protection, if that’ll make you feel safer. I can ring them now.’

She shook her head. Wiped her hand roughly at her face. ‘Your choice, Mike. If you carry on, you do it without us.’

CHAPTER NINETEEN

Cheryl

Cheryl had made £30 doing nails that week. Not all profit if you counted the cost of the acrylics and the varnishes and everything. But still a welcome contribution to the household. The television licence had to be paid and even though Nana had been buying stamps at the post office towards the gas and electric, the bill was much bigger than last winter.

Milo got ill in the New Year; his temp high and him sleeping so much, Cheryl got really worried. She called the health visitor and asked her what to do. Flu and winter vomiting sickness were both in the news. The health visitor asked her a couple of questions about rashes and his neck (to rule out meningitis, she said) then told her to use Calpol and plenty of fluids and not to take him out. Nana saw how scared Cheryl was and told her Milo was a fine strong boy. She reminded Cheryl of how sick she had been when she caught glandular fever at the end of primary school. And how the only thing that would cheer her up was lying on the sofa watching the Rug Rats cartoon on telly.

After four days Milo started eating again, but he still had a rattling cough. Nana caught the cough. It kept her inside too. She said the cold wind set it off. She didn’t even get to church. She sent Cheryl to the health food shop to buy black molasses and liquorice roots. She boiled up some mess that looked like dirty car oil and stank the house out. A tonic.

Nana Rose, Danny’s grandma, came round to visit. She’d gone so thin since the murder and her back was bent as though it was too heavy to bear. Nana scolded Rose for venturing out and risking catching the flu but Nana Rose hushed her. The two of them sat side by side on the sofa, holding hands, watching Doctors and turning over for Sixty Minute Makeover. Cheryl tried to imagine herself and Vinia growing old like that. Couldn’t see it. Nana Rose would go back before it got dark at four o’clock.

‘Back home,’ Nana said, ‘it hardly change, sunset near to six every night.’

‘Warm all year,’ Nana Rose added.

‘You had hurricanes though,’ Cheryl said.

‘Oh, yes,’ Nana said. ‘Tearing the roofs off and everything blown every way.’

‘Were you scared?’ Cheryl knew the answers but knew too that Nana and Rose grew happy and mellow remembering home. Cheryl had asked Nana if she’d like to go back for a visit but Nana said it was all changed now. Cheryl thought she’d like to go, take Milo when he was bigger, see where they came from.

‘Yes, we would go in the root cellar of the farm next door and when the wind was shrieking the boys would say it was Satan flying in the wind.’

‘Poppa Joe’s car!’ Nana Rose giggled.

‘Ay! Poppa Joe’s car went up in the tree. So high. And the land there was too swampy for them to put any machines on to reach for it.’

‘And when you came here it was cold?’

‘Like the North Pole! Ice and snow and frost on the windows – on the inside.’

Cheryl made them a cup of tea and Nana Rose told them that the school was building a music centre in Danny’s memory. It was to have spaces for rehearsals and a recording studio and would be open to all of the community not just the school students.

Cheryl left Milo with Nana while she went to the supermarket. In the taxi back the guy was going on about another shooting. Somewhere on the Range. He meant Whalley Range. ‘The Range’ made it sound like a Western, thought Cheryl. Clint Eastwood and Brad Pitt with stetsons. Men of honour cleaning up town. When really the Range was mostly just a poor neighbourhood and the gunfights as pointless and sordid as Carlton shooting Danny. Stupid and deadly.

She didn’t mention the rumour to Nana but watched the local TV news later. Another lad, nineteen this time, shot leaving a bakery. Cheryl didn’t recognize the name or the photo. The report ended with a reminder that police were still investigating the murder of Danny Macateer, seven months earlier.

Cheryl felt ashamed again. The Macateers had to live knowing who was behind Danny’s death but helpless to do anything about it. Everyone just went about their business, all of them in on the dirty little secret. And Carlton and Sam Millins carried on cocky as ever. Big men, hard men, safe behind the wall of silence. Cheryl didn’t like to think about it all, doing an ostrich act like everyone else, but the guilt stuck with her, she just couldn’t shake it off. And there was anger too, useless anger, that it had to be this way.

That Saturday, she and Vinia had a proper night out. Some Breezers at home first, while she did Vinia’s nails and Vinia helped her choose which dress, with which belt and which shoes. Nana sucked her teeth at Vinia’s low-cut top and said she’d catch her death of cold.

‘Not if I find me a nice big man to keep me warm,’ Vinia joked.

‘Be careful,’ Nana told Cheryl.

‘Promise,’ she answered.

They got the bus in, standing room only, everyone piling into town. The club was in The Printworks, three floors, three different sound systems. They knew Tony on the door from school. Not a big guy, fine-featured, soft-spoken, looked more like a dancer than a bouncer. They had a quick catch-up then he sent them in. They headed for the middle floor. Dubstep. The heavy bass pulsed through Cheryl; she felt it vibrate in her belly and her throat. She and Vinia found some friends and joined up. Drinks were pricey but they bought orange, topped it up with vodka from the bottle in Vinia’s bag.

The place was filling up, the music so loud that it was impossible to hear anything. Lip reading and sign language the only way to communicate. Vital conversations had to take place in the corridor or the loos.

In a break between dances, breathless, her heart thudding, Cheryl went out to have a smoke. She passed him on the stairs. He was coming up them, two at a time. Dark golden skin, short brown dreads, almond eyes set off with rectangular glasses, bright blue frames. He wore a simple white short-sleeved shirt, black denims, baseball boots. Flashed her a smile.

Outside she wondered about him: if he was available, if he might be interested, if he was meeting someone.

She stood with Tony and smoked and listened to the racket from inside the club. It had begun to rain, a fine drizzle that settled on her bare arms and shone like glitter. Her hair must look the same.

Back inside she saw him on the stage, on the decks. ‘Who’s he?’ she mouthed to Vinia, pointing at the guy. Vinia shrugged. The girl beside her pulled out a flyer and pointed to a name on the line-up: Jeri-KO.

Cheryl moved closer to the stage, raising her arms above her head as the music gained momentum. Waiting for him to see her, watching for any obvious girlfriend.

Jeri-KO raised his hands, the lights flared white behind him, drenching the audience, casting him in silhouette. He pivoted on the spot. His profile was all smooth planes. The music thundered under Cheryl’s feet, Jeri-KO was dancing now, a voice sample streamed in above the rhythm ‘We know what we want,’ boomed a deep West Indian voice, ‘we want to run free, we want to fly high, we want to get lost in the beat.’ Drums crashed in and the crowd roared. Cheryl threw back her head and swung her hips to the rhythm. A strobe began casting them all as automatons, jerky stop-motion images. Cheryl closed her eyes and danced, the percussion like waves and the melody soaring over the bass.

When Cheryl opened her eyes and joined the rest of the club in applauding his set, his eyes found hers. She sketched a nod, a smile wide on her face. He blew her a kiss.

In the loos Vinia was having none of it.

‘He blew me a kiss.’

‘He can’t see a thing in the crowd, girl, mistake you for his long-time girlfriend.’

‘You’re jealous,’ Cheryl smirked.

‘Nothing to be jealous of.’

Cheryl stretched her mouth in the mirror, touched up her lipstick. She stepped back, swivelled side on and stood tall. She looked fine. Vain maybe but hell – got it, flaunt it. ‘You wait and see,’ she told Vinia.

But when Cheryl went back in he was nowhere to be seen. She felt her anticipation drain away. A little romance would have been nice. She was so lonely sometimes, sure there was Milo and Nana and Vinia but that wasn’t the same.

Now she felt tired and thirsty. She wove her way through the dancers to the bar, waited to be served and asked for a glass of tap water.

Turning back, she caught her heel on something and stumbled forward, losing hold of the glass. It was only plastic so it didn’t shatter but the water splashed all over the back of a woman in hot-pants.

The woman swung round and glared, shouting at Cheryl who backed away saying sorry, her eyes pricking.

Cheryl found Vinia and told her she wanted to go but Vinia wasn’t ready. She dragged Cheryl into the corridor. ‘It’s only just getting going. Stay.’

Cheryl sighed. ‘I’ll get a cab,’ she said.

She stood with Tony. The taxis were slow. ‘Be about twenty minutes for a private cab,’ Tony told her. Cheryl was debating whether to walk along and join the queue at the rank for a black cab, wondering whether that would be any quicker, when he came down the hill at a bit of a run. Slowing, his face opening with a smile as he saw her.

‘You’re not going, are you?’ he asked. She couldn’t place his accent.

‘Thinking of it.’

His tongue was caught between his teeth. White teeth. He laughed.

‘I thought you’d gone,’ she said, knowing this was risky, showing too keen an interest.

‘Took some of my gear back to the hotel.’

‘You don’t live in Manchester?’

‘Bristol.’ He looked about, sniffed. ‘We could get something to eat?’

‘Cool,’ she said, ‘yeah.’ She turned to Tony. ‘Where’s open now?’

He made some suggestions. Cheryl nodded, barely taking them in.

‘Thanks, mate,’ Jeri-KO said. Then to her, ‘Sushi sounds good. Okay by you?’

Cheryl knew what sushi was, raw fish, Japanese food. Never had it. ‘Good, yeah.’ She turned to Tony. ‘See you.’

He winked at her. ‘Take care.’

Cheryl felt the fizz of excitement inside, the dizzy sensation like she’d faint or fall or float off.

‘Is Jeri-KO your real name?’

‘Jeremy – I prefer Jeri. And you’re Cheryl.’

She stopped, surprised. ‘How do you know?’

‘I asked around.’

She smiled. And he took her hand.

CHAPTER TWENTY

Zak

The house was gone. Zak stood there for a minute blinking as if his eyesight had just packed in and would start up again any second and hey presto, there’d be the view as it should be, the house and the trees and everything. Not so.

There was a pile of bricks in the centre of the plot and wooden joists and bits of window frames stacked to the side. All the brambles and the saplings had been stripped away and the bigger trees by the perimeter fence had been pruned. There was a big brazier too, blackened, and Zak caught the whiff of burning wood still in the air.

Zak shivered. The weather was bitter, his wrist ached with the cold, a gnawing pain and he wanted to rub it warm but it was still clad in the plaster cast.

He looked again at the house and shook his head. His sleeping bag had been in there, the spare clothes he had. He knew it would have been freezing in the winter but he could have burned stuff, made like an Indian in a tepee. Now he’d nowhere.

He walked to the PDSA, stopped a couple of passers-by with the mam in hospital story and got £1.50.

Bess was mental when she saw him. Wriggling and licking his face. He knew they didn’t have set charges, ’cos it was for poor people who couldn’t pay for a proper vet, but they liked you to make a contribution. He gave the woman his £1.50, said sorry it wasn’t more.

It was growing dark already as they left. Zak weighed up his options: a shop doorway or Midge’s. He rang Midge. ‘Just a night,’ he asked. ‘I’ll find somewhere tomorrow.’

Midge hesitated. Zak waited, hoping.

‘Can’t be any longer,’ Midge said.

‘Course not. Thanks, mate.’

There was a girl living with Midge now, Stacey, and she didn’t take to Zak, wrinkled her nose and went off to the bedroom when he got there. Midge raised his eyebrows and said she was a mardy cow but not to take any notice.

Later Stacey went out, trimmed up like a Christmas tree, all shiny and gaudy. Midge gave Zak a fiver and he went for chips and jumbo sausages and curry sauce (no sauce for Bess).

Midge had to stay in; he’d business to do. People calling round to score.

Zak and Midge had a blow after the chips. Started Zak’s cough off but he liked the blurry feeling that followed, made him dopey and giggly.

One of Midge’s customers brought a couple of big bottles of cider with him and they shared them and watched Top Gear and a Bear Grylls rerun, surviving in the jungle. Zak got the giggles, then the munchies, but Midge said they had to leave some stuff for Stacey.

Zak slept on the sofa, Bess alongside him on the floor nearby. Midge had turned the lights off but the curtains were sheer and the street light, a fierce blue-white, filled the room with a glow.

In the early hours he heard Stacey come back and clatter around. He smelt toast and bacon and his stomach growled. Bess twitched, raised her head and looked at him. He put his hand on her head for a bit. Then she relaxed again, settled back with a sigh.

Zak had a dream he was with Bear Grylls in the jungle. Bear was picking grubs off the floor and eating them. Zak felt sick and Bear was yelling at him, ‘Eat it or starve, see if I care!’ Then Bear was hitting him, hitting his head and making him feel even more sick. Zak woke up and he was glad he was in Manchester, on Midge’s couch, even if he was dead cold.

In the morning he didn’t see Stacey but Midge made him a fried egg buttie and a coffee. Zak took his pills. Midge asked him what they were but told him there wasn’t much of a call for them. Midge dealt in temazepam and co-codamol as well as weed and E’s. Zak thought he’d keep them anyway, try and sort his chest out for good.

‘Where you gonna go?’ Midge asked him.

Zak shrugged. He hated the hostels and they wouldn’t let him in with Bess, anyway.

‘Maybe another old wreck.’

Midge narrowed his eyes. ‘They’ve boarded up the Narrow Boat,’ he said. Zak imagined the pub, dark, smelling of old fags and beer. Better than nothing.

‘Need somewhere I can get into without too much bother.’

Midge waggled his head. ‘They’ve put grills up.’

They were watching Jeremy Kyle, the people screaming at each other, some lard-arse whinging about his girl’s spending habits, and there was a knock at the door. Midge let the lad in and took delivery of an M &S carrier. Paid him. When the boy had gone, Midge told Zak he was one of Carlton’s runners. ‘You know they put a reward out for Danny Macateer?’

Zak felt a shimmer of unease. Did Midge know something? Had Zak let something slip last night? He’d been pretty wrecked – he hadn’t said anything, had he? Something slithered inside him, a worm in his belly.

‘Twenty grand,’ Midge said.

‘You’d have to be mad,’ Zak said. ‘Even if you did know something.’

Midge agreed. ‘Never live to spend the dosh.’

Twenty grand. Zak’s head swum with pictures. A little flat and him and Bess with all their own stuff. Fridge full of food, the heating on, a power shower. Two bedrooms, one for his mam. He thought of Carlton raising the gun, the lad spinning and falling. Bess barking. Imagined himself turning down a road one day, brought up short, two lads with guns in their hands. Zak putting his own hands up as if palms could stop bullets. The jolts as one then another punched through him. A waterfall of fear and pain and Bess barking, barking as his sight went.

Zak shivered. ‘Suicide,’ he agreed. No one would ever give up Carlton, no matter how high the reward.

That afternoon he set out, went by the Narrow Boat but the grills were heavy duty, a professional job. You’d need power tools to break in there. He walked all round for hours but didn’t see any likely spots. He sat with Bess in the launderette to warm up a bit. The smell was good in there, clean and soapy. He was starving by teatime. He did an hour on the supermarket car park and made a few bob. Bought a double cheeseburger and shared it with Bess. He thought about trying town. They were still building stuff round the canals but the trouble was the security in the new places was really tight. Dogs and nightwatchmen and cameras. A condemned building would be better.

He got the bus over to Longsight, got off on Dickie Road by the street market and walked along Stockport Road to Levenshulme. One or two places did seem derelict but when you looked closer you’d see movement inside, or steamed-up windows, and know better.

Zak’s feet were hurting. He’d got a blister on his little toe. It grew dark and began to rain, soft and fine like a net. He bought some Lambrini and tobacco and Mars bars and food for Bess. Then he found a cardboard box left out for the recycling. Off a new dishwasher. Still pretty dry. He took that and went up to Levenshulme train station. Once the platform was empty, he clambered down on to the tracks and underneath the platform where he could rig up a hidey hole. The cardboard flattened out was their bed. He’d have to get a sleeping bag sorted in the morning.

He slept fitfully. After eleven nothing stopped at the station but the trains ran all night; the vibration singing in his bones before he could even hear the engines, then the rattle and crash and roar and the dust as they came racing through. Freight trains. He couldn’t tell what they were carrying, some had old-fashioned trucks but others were long lines of containers, some with signs he thought might be Chinese.

He’d have to find a place to stay. He’d never make it sleeping rough. The knife in his chest was twisting again and he couldn’t stop shivering, his skin was greasy from the trains, he felt like he’d got diesel in his lungs. He cuddled up to Bess, desperate to get warm. She whined and licked his face. Good dog. He closed his eyes and felt the tickle of her fur on his cheek, breathed in her doggy smell and listened to a police siren whooping through the night.

CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

Cheryl

Vinia told Cheryl that she’d heard Carlton and his boys talking about the latest shooting and the chat coming round to Danny. Carlton bragging how that had sent a message plain and clear to the rival gangs.

‘What message?’ Cheryl asked. ‘That they’re stone killers and they don’t care who they hit?’

Vinia cut her eyes at her, pulled her hand away. Cheryl had manicured Vinia’s nails, was now doing the base layer. ‘You want me to tell you or you just gonna keep interrupting all the time?’ Vinia snapped.

‘Don’t have a fit,’ Cheryl said.

Vinia huffed.

‘Just tell me.’

‘He said Danny wasn’t a player but he was a blood relation to some of the Nineteen Crew. Taking him out would show them this was war. No rules all’s fair.’

Cheryl looked at Vinia. ‘By that reckoning, makes you fair game an’ all. Relation of Carlton.’

‘I ain’t agreeing with it,’ Vinia protested, ‘just saying, that’s all.’

Cheryl hated Carlton for what he’d done, probably hated him more because they were all so weak and helpless around him, no one to raise a voice. Except Nana and even she wouldn’t be so stupid as to do it in the man’s hearing. How come Nana was so brave? Had she been born brave or did she get braver as she grew older?

‘You seeing Jeri soon?’ Vinia held her other hand out. Cheryl checked the nails were dry and began applying the next coat. Vinia wanted sunsets on each nail: real bright, you hear me.

‘He wants me to go down to Bristol next weekend.’

‘You go, girl.’

Cheryl hummed. ‘I’d have to leave Milo, two nights. Nana’d be wiped out. One’s enough.’

‘She can nap in the day,’ Vinia pointed out. ‘You not interested,’ she joked, ‘move over and make room, honey. I’ll get me some.’

Cheryl was unsure, uneasy about going. Not just on Nana’s account neither. She liked Jeri, she liked him so much, but sometimes she wondered why he bothered with her. She’d gone over to Liverpool one time, when he was working, spent the night in a smart hotel and he’d come to Manchester again, a rare Saturday night off when he’d met Milo and Nana.

Nana had gone into holy-roller mode, quizzing Jeri about his folks and his church and all. He was polite with her but didn’t pretend to be religious and Nana made it clear that he was a great disappointment in that regard. She seemed to think his work as a DJ was akin to some loser on a boom box in a shebeen, even when Cheryl explained that Jeri was playing in proper clubs and on the radio and not some illegal drinking den. ‘Got bookings all over, Nana, Ibiza, Japan even. He pays tax. It’s a really good job.’

When Jeri came to Manchester they stayed at the Hilton on Deansgate. Cheryl knew Jeri wanted to impress her and he did. It was expensive, even for someone like him who was used to hotels. She loved it. The bed big as a boat, the yards of carpeting, the thick white bath towels. They ate in the restaurant there that evening, views looking right out over the city. She felt ignorant and clumsy at first, seeing the formal tableware, the bright expression of their waiter in his fancy apron. But Jeri put her at ease, had the same easy friendly manner with everyone, not stuck up. He told her he’d once been a waiter, knew what it was like to get snobby customers, the sort that liked to make you feel small, like they were better than you. She imagined Carlton there in the restaurant, how it would all be about face and impression, scoring points. Every interaction a power play.

When Jeri talked about his music, his face came alive, bright with excitement. ‘Still can’t believe how lucky I am,’ he said. ‘Started out at school, playing on borrowed decks, got to do a couple of music festivals, promoter caught me, liked what he saw and next thing he’s got me a spot in Monte Carlo. Kid off a shit estate up there spinning tunes and they’re all going for it – fat cats and the yachting brigade – chanting my name!’

‘Yachting?’ Cheryl laughed. ‘But you still live in Bristol?’

‘Love it. Moved house though – like a shot. You come down; I’ll give you the tour.’

She smiled. ‘Rags to riches.’

‘Summat like that,’ he grinned back at her.

They’d gone back to their room and got to know each other real well in that wide bed. Jeri laughed when he came, Cheryl cried when she did. And that was just fine.

She was falling for him deep and that was scary, she didn’t see how it could work, him jetting here and there, a big name on the dance scene, and her stuck in Hulme on benefits with Nana and Milo.

Bristol was a step too far too soon. Going there would show she was committed and surely it wouldn’t be long after that, knowing he had won her, that Jeri would cool and turn, moving on to the next girl who caught his eye.

Cheryl finished painting Vinia’s sunsets and made a cup of tea. The milk had run out so she left Vinia blowing at her nails and went along to Sid’s for some.

It was a foggy night; she could smell yeast on the air from the lager plant up on Princess Road. The fog hung in shreds round the street lights and distorted and muffled the sounds: traffic from the main road, footsteps and the cough of a car engine that wouldn’t start.

Cheryl bought cigs and some Murray Mints for Nana. She was 2p short but Sid let her off.

‘I’ll bring it next time,’ she promised. She knew he sent money home to Pakistan.

‘Don’t be daft,’ he told her, ‘it’s only pennies.’

Sid was there from seven thirty in the morning till eleven at night, seven days a week. Cheryl wondered how he stood it – the boredom – even with his telly tuned to some Urdu station.

Cheryl had just left the shop, opening the packet to have a smoke on the way home, when the shot rang out. Jesus! Deafening. A boom that she felt through the soles of her feet, in her teeth. She ducked, instinctively, and ran back into the shop. ‘Oh, God! Oh, no!’ Her heart thundering in her chest, her muscles spasming with fear.

‘Hey!’ Sid was all concern.

‘They’re shooting!’ she shouted. Dread burning in her blood: guns blazing, someone getting killed.

‘No – listen.’

She did, heard a cracking sound, then a droning whistle.

‘Fireworks,’ he said. ‘The big one was a mortar.’

She felt like weeping.

‘It’s against the law to sell them at this time of year,’ Sid said.

‘It’s against the law to shoot people too,’ she snapped, cross suddenly, fed up with it. ‘That doesn’t stop ’em.’

Sid laughed and Cheryl started too, wiping her face and sniffing, still trembling.

‘Are you okay?’ he asked her.

‘Yeah.’ Just scared. Always scared. This was how it would be, she thought, on forever. Like Sid in his shop, day after day, year in year out. Suffocating. Waiting for the next time, the next crack of gunfire, the next death, and the one after that. A whole life holding her breath.

While Milo listened to Each Peach Pear Plum at Storytime, Cheryl looked up the number on the library computer again. Nana was at the hospital seeing one of the doctors there. She didn’t want an audience, thank you very much.

Home again, Cheryl rang the number, her head buzzy and a knot in her belly. When she spoke her voice sounded weird, like it didn’t belong to her. ‘I know who shot Danny Macateer,’ she said, ‘but if they find out I’ve told anyone they’ll kill me.’

She was standing in the front room, at the window, gazing through the net curtains. Nana had the winter ones up, thick, lace effect, a flower design. Cheryl watched a woman walk past carrying shopping, looking worn out.

The man, his name was Joe, told her they would protect her identity.

‘I can’t move away,’ she said, ‘I’ve got family.’

‘That’s fine,’ he said. ‘No one in the area will ever know that you helped us. You will be an anonymous witness; no one will know who you are.’ He thanked her for coming forward, said he understood how difficult that must have been. But how important it was. ‘We will need you to come in and make a full statement,’ he said. He told her where the police station was and said she could choose a time to suit her.

‘This afternoon,’ Cheryl said. She’d go crazy if she had to wait overnight. She had someone coming for nails at one. ‘About three. I’ve got a little boy; I’ll have to bring him with me.’

‘No problem,’ said Joe. ‘Take my mobile number. It’s always on, you can get me wherever I am.’ He read it out. Then, ‘Can I take your name?’

Cheryl felt a chill inside, a giddy feeling, like she might fall over. ‘Do you have to?’ Couldn’t she be anonymous to him, too?

‘I will need it for your evidence but it won’t be shared with anyone else. I guarantee that.’

He waited.

Cheryl looked back into the room: at the mantelpiece with Nana’s fancy gold-coloured clock, her own school photos on the wall, the embroidered mats on the back of the sofa that Milo always pulled off. Within her the fear that if she told him her name there would be no going back. That the room and everything else in her life might be lost.

She pressed her lips tight together, heard her breath shudder. Then the sound of the man’s breath at the other end of the line. She thought of Danny singing his song and the way her legs had weakened when she heard the firework. She thought of Milo. Imagined him not coming home one night. Imagined him growing up without the gangs at his heels. ‘Cheryl,’ she said. ‘Cheryl Williamson.’

Cheryl didn’t know which bus would take her to the police station, or if they even ran on time. So she decided to walk. She guessed it would take about half an hour. She fed Milo early and changed his nappy, got his bag sorted and some juice to take. He had his nap while she did a French manicure and pedicure for a friend of Vinia’s. The girl paid Cheryl and gave her a couple of quid tip, which was cool.

Cheryl was just going to get Milo up when there was a knock at the door. She thought perhaps Vinia’s friend had forgotten something. A man and a woman stood there. In suits. Her first thought was Jehovah’s Witnesses but they weren’t smiling so they couldn’t have been selling anything.

The woman stared at her. ‘Cheryl Williamson?’

They knew her name! Cheryl felt her stomach drop. Were they from the police? Had Joe sent them? Was it a trap?

‘We’re from the Department for Work and Pensions. Can we come in a moment?’ The woman wore dark lipstick, purple, too severe for her face. The man was young and fat with baby blue eyes; he carried a file.

‘I’m just going out,’ Cheryl said.

‘That’ll have to wait,’ the woman told her.

Cheryl let them in; she didn’t know what else to do. Perhaps if they were quick she’d still make her appointment. ‘What’s it all about?’ Cheryl tried to keep the apprehension from her voice. Maybe it would be some scheme they wanted her to go on, access into work or something. But who’d look after Milo? And she’d miss him; he was only a baby really.

‘You claim Income Support,’ the woman said, ‘we have copies of your files here. Your benefit is means tested and you have a duty to report any change in circumstances, including any additional income.’

The man patted the file with one dimpled hand. Cheryl felt her face grow warm.

‘You declare that you have no income from employment but that isn’t true, is it, Miss Williamson? You are running a business from home.’

Running a business! Cheryl nearly laughed but knew that would be a stupid thing to do. ‘No, I’m not,’ she said. ‘What business?’

‘You’re denying it?’ The woman motioned to the man and he opened the file and passed her a piece of paper. She had a fancy pen and wrote something down. ‘A nail salon,’ she said with an edge and made a point of looking over at the trolley in the corner where Cheryl’s polishes and creams, glue and false nails and tools were all kept in plastic containers. See-through containers. ‘Benefit fraud is an extremely serious offence.’

Fraud! How did they know? Had someone shopped her? She felt grubby; they thought she was a scrounger, milking the system, making a mint. It had never been like that, she just tried to help out a bit so they could cover the bills, get things fixed when they broke. Twenty quid here and there. She kept looking down. ‘I’m going to be really late,’ she said. ‘Can I do this tomorrow?’

‘Other work to do?’ the woman said smartly.

‘No, erm, hospital.’ Cheryl felt sick. ‘I’ll have to ring them. Explain.’

‘Hospital?’ The woman frowned. ‘An appointment?’

Cheryl didn’t want her checking up. She stalled for a moment: ‘Just antenatal group. But I’d better let them know.’ The woman couldn’t check whether she was pregnant, could she?

The woman nodded. ‘We could be some time.’

Cheryl rang the number Joe had given her, and he answered quickly. ‘Hi, it’s Cheryl Williamson,’ she said. ‘I was coming in for three but I can’t come now.’

‘Can you tell me why?’ He sounded alert, secretive.

‘They, erm, the benefits people are here.’

‘Cheryl, where are you?’

Didn’t he believe her?

‘I’m at home.’

‘I don’t have your address.’

She hesitated, gave it. The woman was watching her. Had she twigged it wasn’t the hospital? ‘Thanks,’ Cheryl said. ‘I’ll try and make it next time.’

It can’t have been more than five minutes and he arrived. He wasn’t like she’d imagined, he sounded younger on the phone but he was quite old with grey hair and a lot of wrinkles round his eyes. Laugh lines. Cheryl wondered what he had to laugh about, doing a job like that.

The door had woken Milo. Joe introduced himself to her visitors, then suggested Cheryl see to the baby and leave Joe to have a word.

She left the living-room door open a bit and as soon as Milo stopped crying, Cheryl sat on the stairs with him.

The benefits woman was spitting mad. ‘You can’t just tell us to back off,’ she was complaining. ‘Have you any idea what benefit fraud costs the nation every year?’

Joe said something back, too quiet for Cheryl to catch the beginning but she heard the rest. ‘And if you insist on interfering with a witness, I can have you both arrested.’

‘You can’t do that!’ Purple lips was outraged.

‘Oh, yes I can. Though I’d rather not. It does seem rather extreme.’

Cheryl couldn’t resist, she walked downstairs and back into the room with Milo. The couple from the benefits were on their feet, she had circles on her face like she’d been slapped and the big guy was putting the file back together. Neither of them spoke as they crossed to the door. Joe gave Cheryl a little nod.

The woman turned back and spoke to Cheryl. ‘This hasn’t gone away,’ she said. ‘I’ll continue to monitor your case and if you carry on working illegally while claiming benefits we will know about it. You will eventually be prosecuted. I can assure you of that.’ Then she opened the door and they left.

Joe gave a big sigh. ‘If we only put as much effort into making the rich pay tax…’ He shook his head. ‘How are you doing?’

‘Okay,’ said Cheryl.

‘And who’s this?’

‘Milo,’ she answered. Milo played shy, burrowing into Cheryl’s shoulder.

‘I can give you a lift down to the station,’ Joe said.

Cheryl’s belly cramped at the thought of anyone seeing them. She hesitated. He must have seen she was worried because he went on, ‘Plainclothes car, round the corner. And now I have a cover story. Anyone asks, I’m a benefits fraud investigator.’

Cheryl smiled.

Cheryl had to tell him everything. How she knew Danny, and Carlton and Sam Millins. Where she’d been when she spoke to Danny, what they said. Exactly what she saw as Carlton drove his car towards the rec. Where Vinia was, who else was around.

‘If you tell them where I was, they’ll figure out it’s me,’ she said alarmed.

‘Anything in your statement that could be used to identify you will be excluded. So, we might say you were near the shop but not that you were with your friend, or that you had a baby with you.’

A couple of times, when Cheryl thought about what she was doing, what might happen, she nearly lost it. She’d get up and walk about; like she’d explode if she didn’t move. Joe calmed her down. Kept telling her all they could do, would do. She wouldn’t even go in the witness box, just give her evidence on video. Carlton and Millins would never see her. Even her voice would be changed.

‘Make me sound like a man?’ She’d seen stuff like that on television, people in silhouette with growly voices.

‘Maybe.’

He said she’d be able to leave Milo at the crèche at the Town Hall while she gave her evidence. No one would ever know she had done it. He also told her that she was very brave – courageous, he said. And that it took a special sort of person to stand up for justice. Cheryl shushed him, feeling embarrassed, a lump in her throat.

Vinia rang her that evening. ‘Where were you?’

Cheryl froze. ‘What?’

‘I came round, you weren’t in. Your mobile was off.’

‘Hospital,’ Cheryl said. ‘Nana had tests.’

‘Nana was back,’ said Vinia, suspicious.

‘Yeah, I just missed her. Got lost, you know, now they’ve got the new bit open, it’s massive, I was wandering round all over.’

Vinia grunted. ‘You fancy coming out? There’s a twenty-first party on.’

‘Nah,’ Cheryl said. ‘Milo’s teething again.’

‘Man!’ Vinia complained. ‘More teeth! You sure that boy is a child and not some sorta crocodile?’

Cheryl giggled.

‘Later, girl.’

‘Later.’

But it was early the next day, very early for Vinia, who never dragged herself out of bed before noon. ‘Cheryl…’ She sounded weird.

Cheryl realized Vinia was crying. ‘What is it?’

‘It’s Carlton. They’ve arrested him, the police.’

‘What for?’

‘What do you think! Sam too. They were both here. They came first thing, it was still dark. My mum’s going mental.’

Cheryl’s pulse rocketed, she felt her heart play catch up. ‘Do you want to come round?’ Say no, Cheryl prayed.

‘Maybe in a bit. I’d better stay here for now. Somebody must have shopped them, that’s what the others are saying.’

Cheryl’s tongue was thick in her mouth. ‘No one’d dare.’

‘There is a reward,’ Vinia pointed out, sounding sharp again, more like the old Vinia.

‘Maybe they found the gun or something,’ Cheryl said.

‘Nah,’ said Vinia, ‘someone’s looking after it; word is they still got it.’

Suddenly Vinia seemed to know a lot of stuff. Cheryl imagined it; the rest of Carlton’s crew flocking to regroup, swapping theories, backing each other up, all paranoid about who grassed them up. Vinia telling them how it went down, the early morning raid. Them trusting her, Carlton’s sister.

‘Must be hard for your mum,’ Cheryl said. Thinking at the same time that surely Vinia had some relief that Carlton was now locked up. That the man and the trouble he brought might be taken out of her life.

‘Thing is,’ Vinia sniffed, ‘me and Sam, we been hanging out. Get him on his own, he’s all right.’

‘Since when?’ Cheryl couldn’t believe it. She didn’t want it to be true. ‘You never said.’

‘Just recent.’

‘How come you didn’t tell me?’

‘I was going to tell you last night but you wouldn’t come out.’

‘Oh, Vinia.’ Cheryl felt sad. And freaked out – Vinia and Sam Millins together.

‘Lousy timing, huh? A couple of times together and now what – prison visits?’

‘You’re not gonna stay with him?’ This felt bad, very bad.

‘I ditch him now, I think his friends are going to have something to say.’

‘That’s crazy!’

Vinia didn’t answer. Cheryl heard her gulp. ‘Oh, Vinia, oh, man, I’m so sorry.’

‘Me an’ all, girl. Double that.’

CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

Fiona

Joe Kitson rang on Valentine’s Day. ‘You’ll be getting a letter but I wanted to let you know in person,’ the detective said. ‘We’ve charged two men with Danny Macateer’s murder.’

Fiona’s stomach flipped. ‘Oh, God! But that’s great – that you’ve got them.’ She had continued to follow the news reports on the inquiry but there had barely been anything in the local papers recently.

‘It is,’ he answered. ‘They were key suspects from the start, Derek Carlton and Sam Millins, gang leaders, but we had a bit of a breakthrough and the Crown Prosecution Service is keen to go ahead. There’ll be a trial at the Crown Court here in Manchester – the men will plead not guilty. You’ll be called as a witness.’

Fiona felt dizzy but she had known this might happen all along.

‘We need to check your availability,’ Joe said. ‘We’re looking at September.’

‘September!’ Six months away.

‘Couldn’t be any sooner. Have you any holiday plans, family weddings and so on?’

Fiona saw her year stretch ahead – a blank calendar, Owen’s school terms the only route markers. It was as though their social life had withered and died without her on the ball to arrange things. Not even a holiday planned though Owen needed some respite from school or the computer screen. ‘I’ve nothing planned,’ she told him, ‘but I’ll be back at work by then.’

Fiona had been in to talk to Human Resources about a phased return. The CBT and the medication had helped. She’d not had an attack since the New Year. And she’d come round to the view that she no longer wanted to put her life on hold indefinitely, just in case she might have another attack. She told them she’d like to start off on the hospital rota. A choice she never thought she’d make: giving up her patch and the autonomy of being out in the community. Back inside the hospital maternity care was still skewed in favour of intervention and medicalization; the doctors and consultants dominated the culture, the approach.

‘That’s good. NHS?’ Joe checked.

‘Yes.’

‘They’ll usually pay your wages while you’re appearing as a witness but if not you can claim.’

‘What happens now?’ she asked. Suddenly edgy, the court case looming like a threat.

‘I’ll get back to you when the dates are agreed and you’ll be invited for a pre-trial visit. It’s certainly worth doing, gives you a chance to see the court and ask questions about the process. There will also be a needs assessment – someone from the Witness Care Unit will be in touch to see if you need transport or childcare and to arrange special measures.’

‘What?’

‘Arrangements we make for vulnerable and intimidated witnesses.’

Fiona was stung, thinking for a stupid moment that he was remarking on her character.

But he went on, ‘In a case like this where there’s gang involvement, witnesses are regarded as vulnerable and intimidated. So we take special measures to protect them from intimidation and to make sure they can give evidence safely.’

All the talk of safety made her nervous: she felt an unwelcome tingling in her wrists, her nerves pricking and a pressure building in her skull. Fiona thought of the young mother who had refused her entry in the wake of the murder. I just don’t want any trouble. That’s how it is.

‘What sort of measures?’ Her voice shook. She imagined herself and Owen in some shabby safe house, guards with dogs at the gate, bored minders playing cards.

‘You’ll give your evidence from behind screens so although the judge and jury will be able to see you, the defendants and their supporters won’t. You will be anonymous: Miss A or whatever.’

Fiona saw Danny’s face again, the line of his jaw, those golden eyes, felt the slick warmth of his blood on her hands. Her pulse kicked. She wrenched herself away, concentrated on stretching her neck, relaxing her feet, her diaphragm.

‘Fiona?’

‘Still here.’

‘I want to thank you,’ he said. The sincerity, the kindness in his tone brought sudden tears. Daft. ‘Without you we’d never have got this far. And with your help we’ll put these guys away for a long time. Is there anything else you want to ask me now?’

She sniffed, cleared her throat. ‘No, that’s all fine.’

‘Well, any time. You have my number. And thank you again.’

A hard frost still lingered at the water park. Iced puddles were cracked into milky patterns, and the mud on the rutted paths was rimed white. Ziggy barked for the ball and his breath rose like little swags of mist. An easterly wind poked freezing fingers into the slightest gaps in Fiona’s clothes: at her wrist when she raised her arm to throw Ziggy’s ball and at her throat where her coat wasn’t snug enough. She should have worn her scarf. The sky was pearly white, stippled grey here and there, the cloud cover so dense that she could not gauge the wind in it.

Bullfinches and great tits flitted among the bare branches in the copse, robins combed the ground. No sign of spring here yet. In the larger trees the bowl-like birds’ nests and the larger squirrel’s dray were visible. Close to the open water of the lake she found the wind too ferocious, stinging her eyes and making her nose numb. She called Ziggy to head inland to more sheltered paths.

Perhaps they should book a holiday, Fiona thought. She’d made desultory conversation about the idea at Christmas but Owen didn’t seem interested in anything she suggested. Perhaps if he brought a friend, she thought now. Just a week. Even that would be costly, the boys would pay full fare if they flew anywhere. Or somewhere at home – an English seaside break: rain and steamy cafés. The smell of vinegar and candy floss. Owen and friend could go off exploring on their own. And what would she do? The thought of being trapped in a B &B or a holiday cottage with two bored teenagers for seven days in a row made her heart sink. America then? She had cousins in Maine; Owen could hang out with their kids. The travel would cost more but they wouldn’t have to pay accommodation. They would perhaps need to dip into Owen’s university fund to pay for it.

Fiona stopped and watched a kestrel hovering overhead. The bird hung, a black silhouette against the bright sky. Then plummeted. Rose with something in its talons. A mouse or shrew.

‘You get any Valentines?’ she joked with Owen at teatime.

He didn’t answer, just the usual drop-dead glower.

‘If we had a summer holiday,’ Fiona said, ‘maybe you could bring a friend along.’

Owen gave her a sidelong glance, frowning.

‘Just something to think about,’ she said.

‘Where?’ Owen asked.

‘Don’t know,’ Fiona rushed on. ‘The seaside or up to Scotland. Or Maine, to Auntie Melanie’s.’

‘America?’ A whiff of interest.

‘Nothing’s decided. Just be nice to have something to look forward to. But if we did go to America we couldn’t really afford for you to bring a friend, not unless they could pay the fare.’

Owen nodded. He went back to his shepherd’s pie, scooping it up on his fork, his knife untouched. Why did she bother ever setting him a knife, he never used one.

‘The police rang me today.’ Fiona realized she wanted to tell him before he left the table. ‘They’ve charged someone with Danny Macateer’s murder. There’ll be a trial.’

‘You’ll be a witness?’ Owen spoke with his mouth full.

‘Yes.’

‘Who did it?’

‘They’re called Derek Carlton and Sam Millins; they’re part of the gangs. The police had a pretty clear idea of who was behind it all along but they’ve only now got enough evidence to charge them.’

‘How come?’

Fiona shrugged. ‘He said a breakthrough.’

‘Maybe they found the gun,’ said Owen. ‘Or DNA.’ Fiona relished his contributions, these rare and fleeting times when he reverted to human form and was sociable and articulate.

‘Maybe,’ she smiled.

Owen was out that evening, he’d gone to a competition at the skate park. Fiona was reading but her concentration was all over the place. Joe Kitson’s phone call was repeating in her head. All the talk of special measures and protection. She thought of the man she’d identified, the driver of the car, Sam Millins. He had driven the car to the recreation ground and waited at the wheel while the other man shot Danny. They were dangerous people. So dangerous that she had to be hidden from view when she gave her evidence.

A noise from the back of the house jolted through her and she sprang to her feet, gasping in fright. What was it? Was there someone outside? She crept over to the french windows and looked out. Nothing to see in the dark, just the glitter of frost over everything and the bare black arms of the magnolia tree raised to the sky.

CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

Zak

Zak and Bess were sleeping in an underground car park, below a block of flats, been there almost two months. Zak had gone in there one night, after Christmas, walking in through the automatic gates after a car, figuring that the worst that could happen is the driver chucks him out.

He found a store cupboard down there, tucked away in a corner. Full of cleaning materials and things. He thought he’d struck lucky, it wasn’t locked. He moved some stuff about a bit to make space to lie down. He just fitted if he curled his legs up. Then the door opened and there was a guy in brown overalls and a Hitler tache looking at him. The caretaker, a can of woodstain in his hand.

Zak scrambled to his feet. ‘Soz, mate, just looking for somewhere to kip.’ Bess got up, wagged her tail.

‘How d’you get in the gate?’ the bloke asked.

‘Followed a car in.’

The bloke shook his head. ‘Thick as planks, half of ’em. And then they wonder why they get robbed.’

‘I’m not on the rob,’ Zak protested.

‘I could turn a blind eye,’ the bloke said. ‘Few nights, you make it worth it.’

Zak knew he meant for money. He only had about £4 in change. He dug in his pocket, held it out.

‘No notes?’ the bloke complained.

Zak shook his head.

‘That’ll do you for tonight but I’ll be wanting more.’

Zak nodded. ‘Ta, thanks, mate.’

The bloke, he was called Russell, nodded at Bess. ‘He house trained?’

‘She. Yeah.’

‘And you?’

Zak ignored that.

‘You can’t smoke in here.’ Russell nodded to the tins. ‘Hazardous chemicals, fire risk.’

‘Fair enough,’ said Zak.

‘Most of ’em are gone by nine in the morning.’ Russell indicated at the cars. ‘Stay in here till then, then I’ll let you out.’

Zak’s heart skipped a beat. ‘You’re not locking us in! No way.’ If that was part of the deal, then Zak was walking. He’d go mental. He couldn’t be locked up. Never again.

Russell stared at him. He twitched his moustache. ‘If anyone sees you-’

‘I’ll stay in here, I promise.’

He gave a grunt. ‘Make yourself scarce after that. Just press the green button for the gates.’

‘Right. How’ll I get back in?’

‘Be here before six, I’ll let you through.’

After a couple of weeks Russell gave Zak the code of the gates so he could get in himself. Zak’s ‘rent’ was a nice little earner for him. Zak was a model tenant. When he did smoke he nipped out of the store and did it in the garage, kept his dimps to chuck away somewhere else so Russell wouldn’t find out.

It was the worst time of year to be on the streets: the cold and the way it got dark so early. People were tight an’ all, the times after Christmas. Often as he could Zak went round to Midge’s, a chance to get warm, have a brew and a spliff. Stacey was still there and still had it in for him so he had to be careful, not overstay his welcome. He tried to smooth the way by running errands for Midge: a delivery here, picking a package up there.

Today when he and Bess turned up there was a big gang of lads already at the house. Bikes were piled up in the front garden like a scrap merchant’s. Nowhere left to sit in the front room.

Conversation died when Zak walked in. Everyone looked at him and he felt his face burn. He rose on the balls of his feet, nodded to Midge. ‘I can come back.’

Midge shrugged. ‘S’ all right, you can go for some Rizlas, king-size.’ He tossed Zak a coin.

Zak went to the shop and when he came back the lads were gone.

‘What’s going on?’ He handed Midge the papers and change.

‘Carlton and Sam Millins, they’re being done for murder. Danny Macateer.’

Zak stared at Midge. ‘You’re shittin’ me!’

‘It’s true. Picked ’em up the day before yesterday, charged ’em last night, in court this morning. Denied bail.’ Midge ruffled Bess, and Zak blew a long breath out wondering what to say.

‘The rest of ’em, they’re all freakin’ case they get done too, conspiracy and that,’ Midge said.

Zak counted on his fingers. ‘Eight months it must be. Everyone thought they’d got away with it.’ He shook his head.

Midge made a brew and skinned up. When they’d smoked it, he said, ‘Wait there,’ and went upstairs.

He came down with a shoebox, sat on the sofa next to Zak and opened it. Inside, chamois leather. Zak had been expecting trainers, knock-offs or counterfeits. Midge lifted the yellow cloth out, unwrapped it.

There was a gun.

‘Whoah!’ Zak said. A handgun, dull, grey steel, a squat shape.

‘Feel the weight of it.’

Midge handed him the gun. It was heavy, dense, like a stone in his fist. Zak levelled it at the telly, squinted. ‘Is it loaded?’

‘Nah. Look.’ Midge took it from him, moved something and ejected the clip. ‘See.’

‘You selling it?’ Zak asked. Thinking of the next time someone had a go at him. Watching their faces change as he drew the gun. Watching them back down, back away.

‘Nah, just looking after it. Why? Might be able to hire it out, you interested?’

‘You expanding the business?’ Zak joked.

‘Only way to go, see an opportunity, fill it.’ Midge sounded like someone off Dragons’ Den.

‘Might do sometime,’ Zak said, ‘not now though.’ He’d have to save up.

After he left Midge’s, he walked a different way back into town. Came across a carpet warehouse that had reopened as a food and household shop: Value-Mart. He tied Bess up at the door and went in. It was a bit like a cash and carry, brands no one had heard of, plenty of bulk buys. They had everything from shower gel and biscuits to whisky, even a pile of rugs in the central aisle that they’d probably bought as a job lot off the carpet firm. It was a big barn of a place, breeze block walls, metal roof, the back section where the stock was kept separated by strips of plastic sheeting. A guy was pushing a set of ladders along, the sort you could wheel around to get to high shelves. They almost reached the top of the wall, where it met the pitched roof. A row of skylights ran along one side of the roof.

That’s when Zak had the idea. He bought some rissoles, the ones you could eat hot or cold, and asked the woman on the till when they closed. She pointed to a big black and white notice on the wall behind her. ‘Eight till eight,’ she said. ‘Eleven till four on Sunday.’

Outside he sat on a low wall and shared the food with Bess.

The warehouse stood on a plot of its own, an old chain-link fence, broken here and there, surrounding it. There was a drainpipe at the back corner of the building, the corner nearest to him. Across the way was a block of flats and at the other side some other small industrial units. Nothing too close. It wouldn’t be easy – but man, it’d be worth it!

Zak and Bess got in through one of the gaps in the fence. Zak had been begging on Deansgate and raised enough money to buy a little headlamp, like a miner’s light but LED, and a lump hammer from the discount hardware shop in the precinct. Then they’d waited: half an hour in the café, another in the park. Now Value-Mart was deserted, all locked up.

Zak told Bess to lie down by the loading bay. She was out of sight of anyone driving past and it gave her a bit of shelter. ‘Won’t be long,’ he told her, patted her back, ‘good girl.’ She licked his face.

The windows on the block of flats were lit up looking like an advent calendar. Curtains and blinds closed against the night. The industrial estate slumbered in the shadows between street lights, their blue-white glow like the colour from a telly. The drainpipe was a doddle but the climb up the roof from there was treacherous. The galvanized metal was slick with condensation, hard to get a grab on, the undulations on the surface not deep enough for purchase and his bad wrist throbbed with the strain. Zak slipped, slid back, his guts churning. He rammed his feet into the guttering to brake, praying it would hold. Sweat broke out all over his body, chilling quickly.

He decided it would be easier to try going up the very edge of the roof to the apex of the gable, then along the top. He shredded his fingers getting up there but he didn’t fall, then he sat astride the roof and shuffled along until he reached the skylights. He’d counted when he was in the store, reckoned the third one would be best. He positioned himself close to it and looked down. The light of his lamp shone back at him, blinding stars in the glass.

One thing he didn’t know was how the alarm was rigged. Breaking the glass might set it off, some places had sensors for vibration, others only alarmed the entry points, the doors. But even if he was unlucky, Zak reckoned he’d have maybe fifteen minutes before the police showed. Time to fill his bags and get away.

Zak pulled the lump hammer from his pocket and settled its weight in his hand. He gripped the shaft and swung the head down hard on the centre of the pane. There was a ringing noise and the glass crazed a little. No alarm sounded. He hit again, the same spot, and the glass fractured more, lines running here and there, the surface turning white. Three more strikes and the glass had buckled and split, one end peeling down into the maw of the building. Zak used his right heel to hit at the lower end of the frame and the rest of the glass came loose and fell. It made less noise than he’d expected.

Zak peered into the hole. The beams of his headlamp picked up the pile of rugs directly below and the glint of glass on the floor at the side. Zak smiled. He leaned in and flung the lump hammer out to the left, heard it clang against the shelving. He swung his legs round until they were dangling in space. He leaned to his left and bent over to grip the top edge of the broken frame. Then he shifted forward, let go with his hands and dropped, felt the plunge of falling and landed with a whoomp on the dusty rugs. Winded but satisfied he lay looking up, seeing little, only what the thin beams of his lamp picked out. He coughed a bit then clambered down off the pile of rugs.

Waggling his head about to scan as much as he could, he made his way along the central aisle to the front of the store where the public entrance was. There were light switches in the corner there and Zak tried one, then the rest, and filled the place with the blaze of fluorescents.

He had a big laundry bag folded in each pocket. He got them out and set about filling them. Whisky in those cardboard tubes, vodka too. Fruitcakes, some frozen lamb that Midge might like, batteries, a socket set, an electric drill, DVD players and a couple of digital cameras. Dried food for Bess. They didn’t sell fags which was a pity.

He picked up a set of earrings and a matching locket for his mam. Put that in. And a trench coat and a fleece for himself.

When the bags were full he went to get the big ladders.

They were padlocked to a ring in the wall, in the storage area.

He couldn’t believe it! He went to find the lump hammer and came back. He smashed at the padlock again and again and the hammer just bounced off. Then he went for the ring in the wall, battering the brickwork around it, cursing and nearly bawling with frustration. Then the shaft of the hammer split and the head flew off. Useless.

Zak’s head was going to blow up so he sat down on the steps of the ladder and had a smoke. There was no way he could get back up to the skylights, no way. So, he’d have to find another way out. He was worried about Bess, she’d be getting hungry.

There was only one option, he’d have to get out through the roller shutters. Zak ate some fruitcake and drank some whisky while he strung together enough extension cables to reach the shutters that led to the loading bay. He plugged in the drill. His fingers were slippery with blood by now so he fixed up the cuts with plasters from a car first aid kit then turned on the drill. The drill snarled and sparked, dancing off the metal and sheering away, making a shrieking noise swiftly accompanied by the bowel-emptying scream of the alarm system. He kept going, the pain in his wrist gnawing like a cold burn, but the only impact he could make was a series of little scratches and pockmarks on the rippling shutters.

When he stopped he could hear the sound of an engine and Bess barking. He watched the shutters crank open and saw first the legs then the rest of an Asian guy, and two police officers, and Bess wagging her tail.

‘I can pay for the damage,’ Zak told the Asian guy. ‘Or work it off?’ The man swore at Zak in English and some other language and motioned for the police to take him. They arrested him and Zak kicked off, refusing to go anywhere without Bess, swearing that there was no one who could look after her. ‘You make me leave her and I’ll get the RSPCA on yer.’

‘She’ll go in the pound,’ one of the coppers said.

‘Fine, I can’t leave her here, can’t abandon her.’

They walked him round to fetch her and let her into the car with him. Zak told her she was a good girl and she licked his face. ‘It’ll be right,’ he told her. But he knew he was fucked.

They booked him in and put him in a cell and then took him to an interview room. He started trying to tell them that it was a prank gone wrong, that he just wanted a bed for the night, wasn’t after robbing ’owt.

‘The store has internal CCTV,’ one of the coppers said. ‘Light activated.’

The other one winked. ‘You’ve been framed.’

Zak imagined it: his plundering the shelves, the action with the lump hammer on the padlock.

He laid his head on his arms.

‘Sit up, son,’ the copper said. ‘I am charging you with breaking and entering, going with intent to burgle, attempted theft and criminal damage.’ Then he read the caution. He asked Zak if he had anything to say.

‘Will they put us inside?’ His throat was aching and his knee jigging all on its own.

‘Oh yes. You’ll not walk away from this one.’

He’d lose Bess. They’d put him in prison with all the nutters and the hard men. Lock him in. Zak couldn’t stop shaking.

‘Is there anything else?’ the copper said.

‘Yeah.’ Zak wiped at his nose, pressed his hands between his knees, rocking forward. ‘I want witness protection. I seen who shot Danny Macateer.’

CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

Mike

Vicky didn’t see the letter; Mike watched out for it after Joe Kitson’s call. The post didn’t come till lunchtime most days and by then Vicky was usually out doing The Perms. He’d been able to hide it and didn’t let on when she got in from work.

He needn’t have bothered. Granada Reports had it as the top story. Police have charged two men on suspicion of the murder of Danny Macateer in June last year. Vicky turned to him. ‘Did you know about this?’

Mike shook his head slowly.

‘You’ll have to tell them now, Mike, that you’re stepping down, you won’t give evidence.’

Stepping down, Mike thought, sounded weird, like he had some smart executive position that he was giving up to ‘spend more time with his family’. What she should have said was running away. ‘I will,’ he said.

‘You’d better. Now it’s definitely on, we’re sitting ducks.’ She was paranoid again, her eyes like marbles, her face tight. ‘Ring them.’

‘They won’t be there, now,’ Mike told her, ‘I’ll go in the morning.’

‘Promise?’

‘I promise.’

She was still looking at him sideways, her antennae on full alert.

‘I promise,’ he repeated, louder than he meant to.

‘No need to yell at me,’ she told him.

Joe Kitson kept him waiting fifteen minutes which Mike reckoned was fair enough given he’d turned up on spec and the man must be busy.

Joe came out and shook his hand then took him through and along a corridor past various offices and up a flight of stairs. A different place from last time. There were posters and noticeboards along the way: everything from car crime and property marking to first aid training and Drink Aware.

Joe led Mike into a small room. ‘Tea? Coffee?’

‘I’m fine,’ Mike told him.

‘Wise choice,’ Joe smiled. ‘How can I help?’

Mike had practised what he’d say, tried it out in his mind this way and that but not found any way to make it sound right.

‘I can’t be a witness,’ he said bluntly. ‘I can’t do it.’

Joe Kitson just gave a half-nod. ‘What’s the problem?’

‘It’s the wife,’ Mike explained. ‘First off, someone broke in, nicked the telly. Then she had this car crash, she reckons they were trying to run her off the road.’

Joe’s face sharpened. ‘When was this?’

Mike told him.

‘You didn’t report it?’

‘She wouldn’t, and she wouldn’t let me. She thought we were being warned off. I told her she was crazy. That until someone was actually charged there was no risk.’

‘And now someone has been charged…’ Joe supplied.

‘She’s freaking out.’

Joe Kitson gave a soft breath out, looked down at the table between them.

Mike felt crappy. A henpecked husband with no guts. ‘I promised her,’ he added. ‘If it was down to me-’ Mike broke off.

‘These incidents – the burglary, the crash – I’d like you to give me all the details.’

Mike waited for him to explain.

‘I’m ninety-nine per cent certain there’s no link between this case and those incidents but I’d like to nail it one hundred per cent.’

Mike felt a bubble of hope. ‘You could do that?’

‘Building evidence, particularly in a murder inquiry, means looking at people’s actions after the actual crime is committed as well as investigating the crime itself. Keeping tabs on potential suspects if you like.’

‘You’ve been watching them.’ Mike wanted to be sure he understood properly.

Joe nodded. ‘So, take the car crash: with the place and time, your wife’s registration, it may be possible to identify the registration of the other vehicle. Trace the owner. Set your minds at rest.’

Mike felt relieved, until he imagined trying to get Vicky on board. ‘She won’t listen to reason.’

‘But if she had proof? Knew for certain there was no connection?’

Mike allowed maybe she’d rethink. ‘I can tell you where and when and that.’

Joe nodded. ‘Good. Now as for the future – the trial. Like I said on the phone, there’ll be special measures in place to ensure you can’t be intimidated while giving your evidence.’

‘And before the trial?’

Joe held up his thumb, counted it off. ‘You’re not known to the defendants, correct?’

Mike nodded.

Joe stretched out his first finger, tapped it. ‘You work in the area where the crime was carried out?’

Mike shook his head. He didn’t work anywhere, any more.

Joe added a second finger to his tally of advantages. ‘You live in the area?’

‘No,’ Mike said.

Joe lowered his hand. ‘The defendants will not be given your name or any details that could help them identify you.’

‘What about their lawyers? They’ll see my statement and that?’

‘Yes, but they won’t be passing it on to their clients. And remember these guys have entered not guilty pleas. Interfering with independent witnesses would sabotage their position.’

Mike still wasn’t sure, and if he wasn’t, Vicky wouldn’t be. ‘What d’you mean, independent?’

‘You don’t know any of the people involved, you have no possible axe to grind, no ulterior motive, nothing to gain. It’s the strongest form of testimony we can get. Other witnesses with a prior relationship could have all sorts of dubious reasons for pointing the finger and the defence will milk that for all it is worth. Rip ’em apart. Have to, that’s the way it works. But you, you’re the bedrock.’ Joe sat back, studied Mike. ‘Money’s always an issue but if your wife needs further reassurance we are sometimes able to relocate people in temporary accommodation for the duration.’

Mike thought of Kieran, the nightmare that would be. ‘We couldn’t,’ he said. ‘My lad, he relies on things staying exactly the same.’

‘Perhaps other measures? Panic alarms? Talk to your wife about it. We can always get one of our security guys round to beef things up at the house. Meanwhile I’ll get those details from you and set to work eliminating those previous upsets from the picture. How’s that sound?’

Mike felt a flare of optimism. Joe agreed with him, they were not being targeted, and with hard proof Vicky would have to see sense. ‘Thanks, yeah, do that.’

Vicky grilled him when he got home. Mike bluffed his way through it. Yes, he’d asked to withdraw, retract they called it, and he had to give reasons and then they had to look into it. Lots of paperwork and stuff like that, same as everything else these days. He had decided he would wait to hear from Joe about the crash before he tackled her head on.

A week later Joe phoned him. They had traced the vehicle that hit Vicky even though the crash itself hadn’t been caught on camera. The silver Mercedes (not BMW) belonged to a twenty-year-old from Alderley Edge whose parents had more money than sense. Undercover police observation of the major suspects in the murder inquiry had confirmed that all had been elsewhere at the time that Mike’s place was burgled.

Armed with the solid facts, Mike suggested a night out to Vicky; they asked her mum round to babysit. They couldn’t afford to eat out but went to the flicks instead. Watched the latest action blockbuster and had a drink in the bar after. They talked about the kids for a bit, they always talked about the kids. And Vicky made him laugh telling him about some of the daft things her clients had said. He got another round in and some dry-roasted nuts.

‘I heard from the police,’ he told her. ‘It’s good news.’

‘Go on,’ she said, still pretty easy-going.

‘The car crash, they’ve traced the other car. Nothing to do with the court case at all. Total coincidence. Same with the break-in.’

Her face changed, the colour fading from her cheeks, the sparkle in her eyes dimming. Disappointment, then temper, in the set of her mouth.

‘And they’ll give us protection,’ he said, his voice too eager, too brittle. ‘Better locks, panic alarms if we want it, not that there’s any risk, just if we want it. And my name, it’ll be kept out, I’ll be anonymous.’

‘I don’t believe this,’ she cut in. ‘Is this what tonight’s about? You promised me-’

‘Vicky, just listen.’

‘No!’

Mike was aware of the hostility between them and how people around were picking up on it: glancing their way, shifting position. The threat of a domestic in the air. ‘He explained it all to me,’ Mike raced on, a loud whisper, not wanting to shout his business for the entertainment of the bar. ‘We are not at risk, we are not a target. We never were.’

‘Of course he’d say that,’ she countered. ‘He wants you up there. People know it’s not safe to talk, that’s why it’s taken so long, why they had to offer a reward. It’s not safe. Not when it’s a gang thing. And those two are gang leaders!’

Mike groaned, rubbed at his face. Why was she so bloody set on this? ‘I think the police know more about it than you do.’

‘You are so gullible.’ She stood up. ‘Well, I’m not going to watch you risk everything. I’ve already told you – you want to do this, Mike, you do it on your own.’ She walked away, pulling her coat on. The people around watched Mike, pretending not to, to see if he would follow.

He rounded on the nearest table, shouting. ‘Seen enough? Why don’t you buy a bloody ticket?’ He saw the bartender look across, ready for trouble.

There was only one thing left for him to do. Tell her why it mattered to him. Why in this he might have to be as stubborn as she was.

He caught up with her outside. The trees were tangled with blue and white lights, the parade of leisure facilities bristled with neon. The night was cold and clear but he could see only one star.

‘Vicky, stop, wait. I got summat to tell you.’

She looked at him, sighed. Her face washed out by the neon, miserable. She folded her arms across her front. ‘What?’

He shuffled from one foot to the other. The words in his chest like stones, hard to drag up. He blew out. ‘It’s hard,’ he said.

‘What? You having an affair?’ Her face was pinched, wary.

‘No!’ He wheeled away, eyes pinned on the sole star. ‘I want to do the right thing,’ he tried again.

‘The right thing is protecting your family,’ she shot back.

‘Wait,’ he said sharply. ‘Just listen for once, just bloody listen!’

She narrowed her lips, her eyes mean.

He found he couldn’t look at her when he spoke. Anywhere but. ‘I’ve never told you, never told anyone.’ He shivered. ‘When I was at school, there was this lad, Stuart. He was a bit slow, he was-’ Something caught in his throat. ‘He was just a kid. He wasn’t fat or crippled or mucky, he didn’t even wear specs, but there was something about him and he got picked on. Every day.’

She was still. Mike watched a bus pull out, a couple snogging on the top deck. ‘They’d wait for him after school, or at dinnertime. He’d never go to the toilets at school or anywhere quiet, sometimes he’d trail around after the dinner ladies. He got quieter, like he was shrinking, but it just made it worse. Stuart Little.’ Mike named the film. ‘Remember that?’ Mike glanced at her, she nodded.

‘That were his nickname – one of them. A couple of times the teachers found out and people got detention. Or the whole form did. Stuart never told. He knew it’d make it worse. This one day-’ Mike stopped. He didn’t want to say it. He didn’t want to tell her. His fingers were cold, he tucked them under his armpits. Shivered again. ‘It was after school. I saw them dragging him into the changing room. He was crying.’ Mike swallowed. ‘I went home. I didn’t go and tell anyone, I just went home. Had my tea, watched the box.’ Mike’s heart hurt. He tightened his jaw, tried to stop his voice quavering. ‘Stuart wasn’t in school the next day.’ He looked across at the traffic lights, saw them turn to green and the traffic move. He heard a girl’s laugh cutting through the other noise, high-pitched, squealing. ‘He’d gone home and changed out of his uniform and hanged himself from his bedroom door.’ Mike’s voice cracked. ‘And I still never said anything.’ Stuart’s father had found the boy, carried him in his arms out into the street, weeping.

‘Oh, Mike.’ Her voice was full of concern. ‘You were just a kid, too.’

‘I knew right from wrong. I didn’t bully him but I did nothing to stop them. I didn’t get help. And even when they’d driven him to do that, I said nothing. That was wrong. This – the court case, it’s a chance to do the right thing.’

‘It doesn’t work like that,’ she said sadly. ‘You can’t change the past. What happened, that’s awful, it’s really sad, but your responsibility now – it’s not to the lad that got shot, it’s to Kieran and Megan.’

‘The police can protect us.’ It was almost a howl.

She shook her head, her lip curling. ‘You’d take that chance.’ Like he was dirt. Like he’d failed.

They walked home in silence. Not touching. Mike felt soiled, ashamed. All the old feelings. He wanted to weep but he didn’t know how.

He looked in on Kieran, peacefully asleep, and thought of Stuart’s parents, the horror they would carry with them forever. Of Danny Macateer’s parents.

Vicky came in. ‘I meant it, Mike.’ Her voice was fixed, flat. ‘It’s your choice.’

He had no answer.