American library books » Other » Someone Who Isn't Me by Danuta Kot (romance novel chinese novels .TXT) 📕

Read book online «Someone Who Isn't Me by Danuta Kot (romance novel chinese novels .TXT) 📕».   Author   -   Danuta Kot



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just over half an hour, so tonight, she’d try it out.

She filled Spice’s dishes with water and the last of the cat biscuits – she’d have to remember to hit the late-night supermarket on the way back – and let herself out of the flat, locking the door behind her.

There was a small group of kids hanging around on the corner. It was the same ones she’d seen before, except there was no sign of Lewis. After this morning, was he too scared to come out? If he’d talked to the police, and they knew it, he should be scared. She remembered Jade’s unhappy face. Lewis was in trouble.

She didn’t want the kids seeing her leave, didn’t want them to know the flat was empty. She went back along the gennel so she would come out at the other end. In the darkness, her feet stumbled on the uneven surface, but she didn’t dare use her torch in case anyone was watching. She kept looking over her shoulder. The lights from the other houses illuminated patches of ground and made odd shadows on the walls, one stretching in front, one moving up behind her as though someone was following her, making her look round nervously, but there was no one there.

Half of her wanted to turn back, forget about the pub, spend the evening hiding in her flat, but if she wanted to get whoever was after her off her back, then she had to do this. She had to go into the pub and get the information Curwen wanted, the information Andy had been after.

She moved forward, and collided with someone who stepped out of the shadows into her path. A hand grabbed her arm and she jerked it away, twisting, trying to free herself, until the voice penetrated her panic. ‘Listen. You got to listen. Please!’

She already knew who it was as she pulled him into a patch of dim light. Lewis. Her bag had fallen onto the ground in the struggle and he handed it back to her like a peace offering. She pulled it onto her shoulder. ‘What are you doing?’

‘I got to hide. They’re going to get me. Please!’

She looked into his face. It was smeared with dirt. His lip was swollen and she remembered the other lads had hit him. But it wouldn’t just be hitting, would it? They all carried knives. What had Jade said? I think he dobbed some people in, and now they’re after him.

‘What are you doing here? Why aren’t you at home?’

‘I have to tell them! I never told them coppers nothing!’

Just a kid, trying to get himself out of trouble and just getting deeper and deeper into it. And now she had to decide what to do to help him.

‘Listen, can you get home?’

‘They’re waiting for me.’

‘At home?’

He shook his head. ‘Out there.’

‘OK.’ She chewed her lip. She didn’t have Jade’s number to call her. Call the police? Lewis wouldn’t stick around for that. She had to find a way to get him home. ‘Right. Listen. If you go along the gennel that way…’ She pointed him in the direction away from the main road, the direction she’d been heading. ‘You’ll come out in a side street. The bus into town stops on the corner. You’ll see it – there’s one due in ten minutes. I’ll wait with you until we see the bus, then I’ll walk along the road to where they’re waiting. They’ll be looking at me. They won’t see you get on the bus. OK? Then you can go home.’

Lewis wiped his nose on his sleeve. ‘Got no dosh.’

‘Got no…? Never mind.’ Becca dug in her pocket and found her last couple of pound coins. ‘Here. Take these. Ask your mum to pay me back tomorrow, right?’

‘Right.’ Something like a smile twitched on his mouth for a second.

They walked to the end of the gennel and stood in the shadows. Soon, she saw the lights of the bus in the distance along the road. ‘OK, give me a minute, then get to the stop. They can’t see you from here.’

She stepped out onto the main road and walked as fast as she could manage towards the shop, and the corner where she could see the group of kids, waiting. Was she being crazy? Were they here for Lewis, or were they here for her?

Snitch bitch. The crazy thing was, she didn’t know anything to snitch about, but they must think she did.

Closer now, and the kids saw her, recognised her and focused in her direction. She lifted her chin and walked straight towards them, as if she hadn’t seen them, as if they meant nothing, and she saw them hesitate.

Then she heard the sound of the bus. The noise of its engine briefly drowned out any other sounds, then it was past her. She didn’t dare look at it to see if Lewis was on it, but she looked back along the road, and there was no one waiting at the stop, so he must be. Lewis would be safe, for now.

The road was clear. She crossed over, and the kids didn’t try to follow her. Even so, she kept up the brisk pace, trying to ignore the stabbing pain in her side and the way her neck ached. She wasn’t sure how she was going to get through the evening, but she had to get to the pub, get those pictures from the cellar, send them to Curwen. She had to do it for Andy.

Had she done enough for Lewis? Reluctantly, she pulled out her phone. Curwen or Dinah Mason? In the end, she decided on Dinah Mason, but she wasn’t answering. Becca left a message – she told Dinah what had happened and asked her to make sure Lewis had got home safely. There wasn’t much else she could do.

Now she had to think about staying safe herself.

Drugs. Dealers. Users. It was a world you stayed right out of if you had any

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