Hit Back Harder by Andy Maslen

Author:Andy Maslen [Maslen, Andy]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: thriller, suspense
Publisher: Calibre
Published: 2016-12-31T23:00:00+00:00

35

Regrouping

OUTSIDE, THE STREET was still quiet. Stella looked down at the knotted black bags of debris beside the dustbin.

“Just chuck them inside,” Other Stella said.

“You’re joking, right? I didn’t just spend an hour cleaning up in there to leave all this where her cleaner or a dogwalker dropping off a poo bag could find them. I passed a parade of shops near the station; there were a couple of takeaways. They have industrial bins over there, probably get a daily collection. I’ll put it all inside one of them.”

She looked down for a final hygiene check. No blood. Wait, some blood. On her right boot, she saw three narrow, elongated teardrops moving from her toe towards her ankle. She bent and wiped them off with a paper tissue, which she crumpled and dropped down a drain outside the house. She bunched the loose plastic at the top of the two bin bags in her fist and walked away.

A white-haired woman walking a fluffy black-and-tan spaniel stopped in front of her.

“Are you all right, dear? Only you look a little lost,” she said in a nasal voice.

Stella looked up. The woman had a pale-pink vertical scar cutting through her top lip.

“What? Oh, sorry. No, I’m fine. I thought I’d lost my phone.”

“Never mind, dear. Worse things happen at sea. Oh, and by the way?”

“What?” Stella asked, desperate to get away.

“I think you have lovely eyes. Remember that, next time someone stares.” Then she looked down at her dog. “Come on, Dudley. We’ll let this lady be on her way.”

Once the elderly woman had toddled off down the road with her dog, Stella pulled out Fieldsend’s phone from her pocket. She entered the code and tapped the Contacts icon, then H.

Sure enough, after a single swipe, Charlie Howarth’s name slid onto the screen. She decided to save the business of texting until she was back in her room at the hotel, a Holiday Inn Express outside London where she had checked in once again under the name Jennifer Stadden.

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