Keep My Secrets by Elena Wilkes (management books to read .txt) 📕

they’d done. Frankie shrank into a tight ball, crouching painfully, her chest pressed against her thighs, her breath aching in her restricted lungs, every inch of her body flinching as the splintering bushes shook around her. She couldn’t stay there, that was a fact. A panic gripped her: if she made a run for it she’d be spotted for sure. There was a whole swathe of open lawn to cover. She was sunk.

A pop and crunch of tyres and the pummelling of the bushes paused. She took a glance up. A load of emergency vehicles had squealed up to the kerb; their circling blue and red lights illuminated the driveway.

A dark figure paused by the gates, its shadow wavering and elongating through the spooling lights. A policeman. So close. One look down and he’d have her. She was done for.

‘Frankie,’ said a low voice.

She almost fainted with relief: Martin.

‘Move towards me now. I mean now.’

She scrambled out of her hiding place quickly pushing her way along the privet and through the hole to where his legs were blocking the view. He was still wearing his rucksack. Arm aloft, he had his hand cupped to his eyes as though mesmerised by all the activity. She went to stand, seeing that his jacket had swung open, giving her the perfect cover. He looked like a student out for an evening stroll. He ignored her completely, gazing away and up at the house and then around at the police cars as though he was a curious bystander. She was just about to say something, when his arm slipped around her shoulders as though she had been next to him the whole time.

A policeman’s radio twittered just a couple of feet away, but she didn’t dare look round.

‘Which direction have you just come from, son?’

Martin pointed away down the road. ‘We were just walking from that way. A load of cop cars whizzed past me and we wondered what was going on.’

‘Did you happen to see anyone running along this road, or acting strangely in any way?’

She was concentrating hard at staring into Martin’s neck. She could see the pulse of nerves in his throat as he turned his head to gesture up and down the street.

‘No,’ he frowned. ‘I haven’t seen anyone. We were only walking this way ’cos we missed the bus and there’s a cut-through up there back into the centre of Chester.’

‘Is that where you live?’

‘Yeah. We’re both students at Cheshire College.’

The copper turned his attention to Frankie. He opened his mouth but the driver in one of the police cars called out to him and he was forced to turn away. He nodded back at them.

‘Thank you for your time, son. You pair just need to be on your way.’

She almost giggled as the nerves flooded through her.

‘No problem.’ Martin lifted a hand in salute.

They started to walk awkwardly up the road. Behind them she heard the slamming of car doors and radios clamouring as the police cars began to pull away. She found she’d gone from trembling to a full-bodied shake. Martin still had his arm around her, and her hand inched its way around his waist, her fingers clutching at his jumper, too scared to let go. She felt like dropping to her knees right there on the pavement, and giving in to total hysteria.

‘You okay?’

She nodded. She wasn’t sure her legs would take her any further. Neither of them dared to speak and then she realised Martin was shaking too. She glanced at him.

‘How about you?’

‘Jesus,’ he breathed. He was almost laughing. ‘Jesus, Frankie! How the hell did we get out of there alive?’ He shook his head. ‘Did any of that really happen?’

‘Did that woman see your face?’ The thought suddenly struck her. A tremor of real fear jolted her back to reality. It had gone from just some mad stunt to something far more real.

‘Nah. Definitely not. A hundred per cent… She was a feisty old bird though, wasn’t she?’ They turned down an alleyway. He was chuckling properly now. ‘Fuck, can you imagine what she was like when she was younger? It’s a good job I legged it, if she’d smacked me with that stick she’d have probably caved my head in.’ He grinned round at her, the tension easing and lifting as a sudden wash of adrenaline gushed through her.

They’d done it. They’d really done it. They had. The two of them together.

She felt closer to him than ever. Pulling his arm close around her and turning her face, she nuzzled into the wooliness of his jumper, wanting to blur the lines between them, to meld herself to him. She wanted him more than she’d ever wanted anyone or anything before.

‘It’s here.’ He pulled away from her, breaking the spell. They were halfway along an alley. Martin dropped the rucksack from his shoulder and hoisted himself up on the wall to peer over.

‘What is?’

‘Where we’re delivering.’

She looked at him, wide-eyed. ‘We’re going in there?’

‘Don’t worry. This old chap never locks his back door. He says if someone wanted to break in and steal stuff they’d be sadly disappointed, and if they broke in and murdered him it would be a blessing.’

‘That’s sad.’

‘Yeah, and d’you know what’s really the saddest thing of all?’ The anger came off him in waves.

‘That this poor old bugger lives only round the corner from that lot.’ He thumbed over his shoulder. ‘They have more than they know what to do with, and he has nothing. How can that be right?’ He bent to lift a broken bit of fence panel. ‘Here you go, we can squeeze through here.’

She took half a step forward and then stopped. ‘I can’t, Martin. I just can’t.’

‘Yeah you can. Don’t be scared. You’ve done the scary bit.’

‘Really, I can’t. Not after…’ She gestured weakly. ‘Seriously. Seriously. It was too much. Please don’t ask me.’

He stood coolly watching her for a few moments, not saying anything.

‘You’re not going to do this again?’

The disappointment