Something Hidden (2 page)

There was a smash of glass as another broke into a case on the far side of the store with the butt of his gun. He reached in, yanking out necklaces, bracelets and handfuls of other shiny things,
before dropping them into a different Tesco bag. Every little really was helping.

Owen could feel Wendy’s hand reaching for him again, thumping into his arm, silently asking why he wasn’t staring at the floor as they’d been told. He didn’t know: he
wasn’t a hero and definitely wasn’t going to try something stupid, he simply felt an urge to watch.

He glanced over the front counter towards a trembling Sampson, who was resting on the workbench behind to keep himself upright. The owner kept peering down towards the bench and then back up at
the man filling the bag in front of him. For a moment, Owen’s eyes met Sampson’s and then the shop owner turned away again. Owen couldn’t read him but then he’d never stared
into the face of someone who had a gun pointing at them before.

The third raider clumped back to the front door and gazed outside. ‘We’ve gotta go.’

Definitely Scouse. One of Owen’s mates at uni was an Everton fan and said ‘go’ in the exact same extended way, as if there was a succession of ‘O’s, instead of just
the one. Usually he said ‘we’ve gotta go’ when Everton were losing at home to Liverpool again.

Crash!

Another cabinet on the far side was caved in, with the supermarket bag getting a final top-up of jewels.

‘Come on.’

The bell clinked again as the door was heaved open and then three sets of boots boomed towards the exit. Owen pushed his face into the carpet, suddenly aware of how fast his heart was going.
One-two-three-four-five-six-seven-eight. How many seconds had passed?

There was another screech of tyres, the beeping of car horns, an excited chatter of voices from the street, and a final tinkle from the bell as the door closed itself.

For a moment, there was silence, before it was broken by Sampson’s quivering voice. ‘I think you can get up now.’

Owen struggled to his knees, reaching for Wendy and helping her up until they were both standing. Her eyes were wide, taking in the carnage around them as she gripped his arm and continued to
shake. He took a small step forward, crystals of glass crunching under his feet.

‘Are you both okay?’ Sampson asked. He had pushed himself up from the workbench, inspecting a cut on his wrist from where some of the shards had flown off at an angle. The floor was
a mass of splintered wood and shattered glass, with two glittering rings and a necklace lying among the debris close to the door. Owen glanced at the clock: 11.49 – just two minutes had
passed since he’d been standing with his fiancée ready to choose an engagement ring and now everything had changed.

‘I think so,’ Owen whispered.

The shop owner plucked something from his wound and dropped it on the floor as his gaze continued to flit between his workbench and the shop front, before finally settling on Owen. His tone was
flat, emotionless, eyes unblinking.

‘I should probably call the police.’

Andrew Hunter jammed his hands deep in his pockets, ducked his head down and bustled towards his office in a not-quite-running, not-quite-walking kind of way. The chilled wind
bristled through his mousy definitely-not-ginger, definitely-not-thinning hair.

Seriously, what was the point of February? Somebody had obviously made the decision to ram Valentine’s Day in there to give couples something to do but, apart from that, why bother?
November was shite – everyone knew that. It got dark early, it was always cold, if you lived in Manchester – which he did – it would spend most of the time pissing down, but at
least Christmas was around the corner. There’d be lights threaded through the city centre and a general sense of optimism as everyone looked forward to that golden week between Christmas and
New Year, in which they could go on a seven-day drinkathon and not care about work. January was rubbish but at least it was a new year, with shops flogging anything they could on the cheap,
something different on the telly and the memories of Christmas. But February? It was just there: a waste of everyone’s time. Plus
this
February was colder than usual – which was
saying something for the ice-ridden north of England. Quite frankly, February could sod off. Bring on the spring, with bouncing baby bunnies, early blooming daffodils, and . . . okay, it rained a
lot in spring too – but at least it was a degree or two warmer.

Frost clung to the shadows along the cobbled alley as Andrew hurried from his parking space to the office. It was only a few hundred metres but more than enough in this weather. A biting breeze
sizzled around the tightly packed buildings, whistling into the minuscule gap between Andrew’s shirt and coat and sending a new wave of shivers bristling through him.

Brrr.

Bloody February.

As he reached the corner and turned onto the street that housed his office, Andrew glanced up, spotting the hazy shape on the steps ahead. At first he thought it was a crumpled bin bag but then
the outline moved, sending a thin spiral of breath into the atmosphere. It was a girl or a young woman, somebody small, with arms wrapped around her spindly legs, which were tucked into her chest.
She was wearing a purple bobble hat, with long, dark hair peeping out at the bottom. All elbows and knees and seriously underfed.

Another breath disappeared into the ether as Andrew reached the front of his office, towering over the shrunken figure.

‘Are you all right?’ he asked.

She peered up at him through sleep-deprived half-closed eyes, her voice a harsh croak in the cold. There was a politeness to her tone that wasn’t forced. ‘Are you Mr
Hunter?’

‘Yeah, I, er . . . it’s Andrew.’

Andrew stepped backwards as the girl clambered to her feet. She was young: twenty-one at the most but probably not even that. She was wearing a thin jacket and shivering uncontrollably under the
northern onslaught. After stepping around her, Andrew unlocked the door and held it open, offering a thin smile as he turned off the alarm system. The girl was brushing grit from the back of her
trousers, stretching her legs and suppressing a yawn. Her skin was white, almost grey. How long had she been outside? It had been below freezing the previous night and it looked as if she’d
slept on the street.

She tried to smile but her jaw clicked and she winced as she wrapped her arms around herself. When she spoke, her teeth chattered. ‘You investigate stuff, don’t you?’

Andrew nodded towards the stairs beyond her. ‘Let’s get you upstairs first – the heating’s on up there and you look, er . . .’

He didn’t finish the sentence.

The office wasn’t quite cosy but it was certainly warmer than the hallway. As Andrew fussed around putting the kettle on, the girl sat next to the radiator, splaying her fingers wide and
taking deep breaths. Andrew wondered if she’d say anything else but she seemed happy to enjoy the temperature. He fished a pint of milk from the back of the mini-fridge and straightened the
pile of cardboard folders next to his computer, before crossing to the other desk and taking a packet of Jammie Dodgers from the bottom drawer. He pulled apart the wrapper and passed the packet to
the girl, offering a ‘go on’ as she asked silently if he was really giving them to her.

She ate slowly, nibbling at the layers and devouring one crumb by crumb, not allowing anything to fall.

‘You can have another,’ Andrew said. ‘They’re Jenny’s . . . my assistant’s. She’s got packets and packets of the things in her drawer. I don’t
know how she eats so much.’

The girl nodded eagerly, eyes darting towards the open packet next to the radiator and taking a second biscuit as the kettle clicked off.

‘Do you want a tea?’ Andrew asked. ‘Coffee?’

‘Tea.’

‘Milk? Sugar?’

‘Just milk.’

Andrew made three identical teas – no sugar, don’t go mental with the milk – plopping one on Jenny’s unoccupied desk; resting one on the radiator next to the girl; and
wheeling his chair over so that he was sitting next to her, before looping his fingers through the third.
This
is how you got through Mondays in February.

The girl smiled properly, holding the mug underneath her bottom lip and sucking on the warm fumes. ‘I’m Fiona.’

‘You look cold.’

She shrugged and took a sip of the tea. She wasn’t looking at Andrew, more gazing through him. ‘I saw your name in the paper the other month and got your office number from the
operator.’

‘Are you . . . homeless?’

Fiona shook her head. ‘I can just about pay my rent but that doesn’t include bills, so I don’t put the heating on. You know what it’s like with British Gas.’

It wasn’t just Andrew who knew – everyone did. In a public popularity poll, energy companies were ranked below the Nazis, Piers Morgan, and that bloke who answers his phone in a
cinema.

‘I’ve been saving,’ she added.

‘For what?’

She wriggled on the seat, thrusting a hand into her back pocket and pulling out a wad of crumpled five- and ten-pound notes, before dropping them on Andrew’s lap. He put his tea on the
floor and then picked up the money, flattening the notes between his fingers until he’d counted the sixty quid, and placing them on the radiator.

‘I’m not going to take your money, Fiona.’

‘But I need your help.’

‘What do you need?’

Fiona opened her mouth to answer but the door rattled open. A bristle of chilled air followed and then Jenny came in, complete with a Morrison’s bag for life. Her black ponytail swung from
side to side as she closed the door, spinning on the spot, dimple on show.

‘You’ll never guess what this guy said to me on the bus . . . oh . . .’

Her brown eyes locked on Fiona, instantly examining the scene: freezing cold girl, sixty quid, mugs of tea, Jammie Dodgers.

She held up the bag, offering it to the other girl: ‘I’ve got some choccie biscuits if you want – and some mini rolls. I’m Jenny, by the way.’

Andrew gave her a barely there nod to indicate all was well as Fiona held up her half-nibbled biscuit. ‘I’m okay.’

Jenny motioned towards the door but Andrew shook his head, nodding at her chair. Plenty of room at the inn.

‘What is it you need?’ Andrew tried again.

Fiona stared into the tan-coloured tea. ‘Everyone’s saying my dad did something that he didn’t. They all hate him, so everyone hates me. People spit at me in the street. I used
to live in Oldham but my old landlord threw me out, so I’m living in this horrible place where I can’t afford the heating. I had a job in this office but no one wanted to work with me
– they wouldn’t even talk to me. I thought that if I came to the city centre, there’d be more places to hide, more people, that they wouldn’t know me.’ She stopped,
breathing and sniffling, then adding: ‘But there’s always someone . . .’

She stopped for another bite of the biscuit. Her sentences had come out so quickly that Andrew needed a few moments to take it all in. Before he could ask any follow-up questions, she was off
again.

‘I had to use a fake name to get the new flat just in case – and then I gave my neighbours a different name, not that we talk to each other anyway. Then my CV’s all over the
place. I can’t use my actual name, which means none of my exams are going to show up if they check – plus I can’t ask for a reference. I just . . .’ She stopped again,
exhaling heavily and blinking rapidly. ‘I’m not sure what to do.’

Andrew met Jenny’s eyes across the room but she shrugged in answer to the silent question. She didn’t know who Fiona was either.

‘Who’s your father, Fiona?’

The girl shook her head, sloshing a drip of tea over the top of the mug onto her finger. She winced but didn’t put it down. ‘You don’t understand – it wasn’t him. I
know how it looks . . . I know what everyone says happened but he wasn’t like that. He was just a bit sad – anyone would be if they’d been through what he had.’

Fiona tried to drink from the mug but her hand was shaking so much that she spilled the tea across her chin. She gasped, rattling the chair backwards and dropping the almost-finished biscuit.
She scrambled forward to make amends but Andrew already had a cloth in his hand. He took the tea from her, placing it on the table next to them and briefly rested a reassuring hand on her knee. It
crossed his mind – as always – that this was rather creepy, but then Andrew always thought that. Accidentally glance at a girl on a bus: creepy. Give a homeless person who just happens
to be female some change: creepy. Offer a girl directions when she’s clearly lost: creepy. Ask a crying woman outside a club if she’s all right: creepy. Sometimes – or a lot of
times in his case – a man could try to be nice to a woman without there being any more to it than that.

Andrew tried to make eye contact but Fiona was doing all she could to avoid looking directly at him. She had found a spot on the wall behind him instead.

‘You don’t have to tell us anything you don’t want to,’ Andrew said, ‘but if you want help, we’re going to need to know.’

Fiona nodded pitifully, one arm hugging herself, the other dabbing at her chin.

‘I’m sorry, it’s just . . . my dad was Luke Methodist.’

Ishan Chopra was bored. There was no getting away from it: mathematics was really dull. It was one of those degree subjects he’d thought his parents would like him to
take, something he didn’t find too hard, a subject which would hopefully help him find fortune, if not fame. That might all be true but it was as interesting as watching paint dry, or staring
at grass growing. The people were nice, but still . . .

He gazed down at the lecture amphitheatre from the back row as the screen flipped from one PowerPoint slide to the next. He would download the notes from the uni portal later and might get
around to reading them at some point before the end-of-semester exams. There really was no reason to turn up, except to meet the attendance criteria.