Page 90 of The Housewarming

It looks OK. He could walk out now, but no, someone will see him. It’s better if he was never here. If he goes the back way, he can return for her later, walk straight in the front door, as if to collect his tools. Hopefully before the police get here. It’s not perfect but it’s all he’s got.

He runs to the back fence, hides a moment behind the dilapidated shed. A quick scan of the bedroom windows – no one, so far as he can make out. There’s no time to wait; he’ll have to take his chance.

He climbs, jumps, lands in Ava and Matt’s back garden. He is behind their shed, panting, when he hears Ava again, this time close by.

‘Abi? Are you in the garden?’

She is metres away. He hears the crackle of something underfoot as she paces up the lawn.

‘Abi?’ She is closer still.

He holds his breath, his palms flat against the sap-sticky back of the shed. Oh God.

‘Abi?’ Her voice alters as she pushes her face to the window of the shed. She is so near. The urge to make himself known, to throw himself at her feet and tell her what’s happened almost overwhelms him. A wincing sound escapes him. He closes his eyes tight, as if by not seeing he will become unseen. Her footsteps recede, her calls growing distant. A moment later, the back door slides shut with a low roll and a soft thud.

‘Oh God,’ he breathes.

Another second, sweating, panting, he clears the next fence. Again he is hidden behind a shed, the cramped space strung with cobwebs and dropped pine needles. He was right. These spaces are small, too small to bring the bag over this way. And he cannot wait until dark. He will have to take it out later in plain sight, as if it’s simply a bag of tools. There’s no choice. He’ll have to stash it somewhere until the heat dies down. It. Her. Abi. His little darling.

One, two, three, seven, eight, ten fences. He is crying, he is sweating, his T-shirt drenched, his overalls torn where he caught them on a nail. He reaches his own back garden – his super-shed on its perfectly level concrete base, his garden furniture, the brick barbecue he made.

Bella will have left for work.

He hopes.

He digs his keys from his overalls pocket, unlocks the back door, opens it. The house is still, silent. But even so, he calls out to his wife.

No reply.

His phone is on the table. He texts Adam, his labourer, tells him the concrete mix hasn’t arrived, to not bother coming till Wednesday. Two days, to be sure.

Another idea comes to him. He thumbs a WhatsApp to the group Jennifer set up.

Hi J and J. Just to let you know I’ll be in a bit later today – have to pick up some stuff from the builders’ merchants. Best, N.

He studies it a moment. It sounds like him, yes; he’s pretty sure it sounds like him. He presses send.

He strips naked and loads every item into the washing machine, finds where Bel keeps the detergent and sets it to wash. Up the stairs three at a time. Under the shower, he scrubs himself near raw, biting down hard on his bottom lip, forcing himself to stay in the moment. He can’t lose it. He has to keep focused.

He dries himself and puts on fresh clothes, clean white overalls. He is still panting like a racehorse, still crying, still stopping himself from crying. Everything is loud, everything throbs in his head. He has no idea what he’s doing, is as clear-eyed as a gunman. His focus terrifies him. He blows out a long jet of air, his jaw clamped shut.

A hammering at the door.

‘Neil? Bel? It’s Ava. Help. I need help.’

He steels himself. A second, two. Come on, Neil. You have to do this.

He runs downstairs, inhales, opens the door.

‘Have you got Abi?’ Ava’s face is a mask of total terror.

It is a mirror.

Forty-Two

Ava

Lorraine Stephens and Sharon Farnham are on the doorstep. Farnham cocks her head briefly towards next door. Matt reaches for my hand.

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