Someone Who Isn't Me by Danuta Kot (romance novel chinese novels .TXT) 📕

things first. She needed to bring in some wood and kindling to start the fire, but the outside door that led into the storage shed was locked and none of the keys Oliver had given her worked. Someone was taking security seriously, because the door was held with a heavy-duty anchor and hasp, and a secure padlock. It was a good job Oliver had shown her how to access it from the inside, or right now she’d be setting off to Hull to buy fuel and the biggest electric fire her funds would run to.

She shut Milo in the kitchen over his loud protests, then scrambled through the cupboard under the stairs to access the fuel store – she’d phone tomorrow to get that key or the padlock changed. Still, there was plenty of wood. Not as much as she’d first thought – the yellow bags were mostly compost, but there were a couple of bags of fuel and an open bag of what looked like coal. Presumably no one policed the smokeless fuel laws on Sunk Island either, unless Catherine Ford was a fanatic.

Curiosity made her lift up the sheet of hardboard on the floor, and she found a trapdoor underneath it. She tugged at the handle that lay flush against a recess in the timbers, but it wouldn’t budge. Well, she wasn’t likely to need access.

She took buckets of coal and kindling through to the front room, then she grabbed Milo, carried him upstairs and put him in the bath. While he struggled and splashed, she shampooed and rinsed him, then set him free. He hopped out of the bath and shook his wet coat all over her while she tried to dry him. ‘Serves you right for rolling in whatever you rolled in,’ she told him.

Kay, sopping wet, had a quick shower herself then put on her old tracksuit, which she tended to wear more and more often these days. She decided she couldn’t be bothered to blow-dry her hair. It was so short, what difference would it make? Maybe Poppy could make it look better, when they met. If she turned up. Kay frowned, her concern about Poppy replacing the lingering unease her conversation with Catherine Ford had left.

This wasn’t the time to think about that either. It was time to get the fire lit.

Coal was easy to get burning, and it smelled good. Putting her eco-reservations to one side, Kay went back to the fuel store and refilled one bucket with coal, another with wood and kindling. Warming the place up was her first priority, then she’d make up her bed, get something on the stove and settle down for an evening with a good book, a glass of wine and some food.

After a day of travel, work and then sorting out her things, she would sleep well tonight. A horde of boy racers could ride their bikes through her bedroom and she probably wouldn’t stir. Despite Catherine Ford’s ominous warnings, Kay felt unwarrantedly cheerful as she got to work.

Chapter 12

Bridlington

Curwen lived in one of the old houses overlooking the bay. It was in the converted upper-storey of one of the huge Victorian terraces close to the sea that mostly housed hotels and B & Bs. Property was cheap in Bridlington, even property with a view like this.

The high windows faced east. On summer mornings, he sat there sometimes lingering over a cup of coffee, watching the sun rise over the North Sea. He was sitting there now, a bottle of beer in front of him, oblivious to the lights twinkling out at sea.

He was remembering.

Andy bit into his sandwich, catching a trickle of egg yolk with his finger and licking it clean. It was late, he’d been in the Smokehouse all evening and had texted Curwen, sounding excited, to say he had something useful. Curwen suggested he came to the flat and Andy had arrived with egg and bacon muffins for both of them from the van along the front.

‘I needed that,’ Andy said. ‘I get the munchies by closing time. I can’t be in that pub all evening and not drink. I got away with a half tonight.’ He patted his belly and said, ‘Once this is done, I’m spending a week in the gym.’

Curwen grinned. ‘I might join you. OK, what have you got for me?’

‘This.’ Andy put a couple of small baggies on the table, next to his phone, which he’d dumped there earlier before they stared eating.

Curwen felt his eyebrows shoot up. Slowly, he opened the first one. It contained what looked like a herbal mix. Curwen would have said cannabis, but the rich, resinous smell wasn’t there. He sniffed it. Nothing. ‘Spice?’ he said.

‘Yeah.’

‘OK.’ He started opening the other baggie.

‘Careful,’ Andy warned. ‘That stuff is fucking potent. Too much and you’ll go crazy. I mean it.’

He got a whiff of an unpleasant smell like – he struggled for an analogy and came up with stale piss, masked by something sweet and chemical. He gagged. ‘Shit. What the fuck is that?’

Andy grinned. ‘Shit just about sums it up. This is the new stuff, the stuff we’ve been having all the trouble with. It’s alpha-PVP.’ He rattled off the information he had. ‘Street names are “bath salts”, “cosmic wave”. It’s like spice, only it starts from a different drug – cathinodes, you know, from khat. It’s very close to the flakka they had all the trouble with in the States. It more or less vanished over there – too dangerous even for junkies. It’s just too easy to OD, but someone pimped it a bit, and now it’s back, it’s badder and it’s here. I’d rather have spice on our streets than this stuff.’

‘Where did you get these?’

‘You know I’ve been putting word out in the pub – my people want access to the big stuff that’s coming in, we can move it on faster, make it worth your while, no names no pack-drill and all