The Forevers by Chris Whitaker

Author:Chris Whitaker
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781471409608
Publisher: Bonnier Publishing Fiction
Published: 2021-06-17T16:04:09.617000+00:00

26

She found the collar caught on the side gate, the lead still attached.

In the back garden Stella petted the dog.

Mae slipped the collar over its head.

‘What’s going on?’ Stella said.

‘I’m taking the dog back.’

Stella shook her head, the tears filling her eyes. She tried to take Mae’s hand.

‘Please,’ she said.

‘It’s not ours, Stella.’

‘No, Mae. Please let me keep her. There’s not long, they don’t even miss her.’

Mae said nothing.

‘I put up posters,’ Stella said, desperately. ‘Mrs Baxter took me out after the party and we put up posters. I did what you said, but no one has come for her.’

Their grandmother stood in the doorway. ‘There’s not long, Margaret.’

‘You want to pay to feed it?’ Mae fired back. She pulled on the lead. The dog got up but tried to pull back towards Stella.

‘I hate you,’ Stella said. ‘You’re mean and everyone knows it and that’s why no one asked you to the Final and that’s why Abi moved away.’

Their grandmother leaned down and held on to Stella as she sobbed.

Mae walked in silence, the dog pulling back, her muscles burned, the last days had taken a toll.

The collar gave an address on Parade Hill, at the top of Ocean.

She stopped as a truck rolled through the gates of the Prince house.

She saw Hugo directing it, met his eye and he waved her over. She tied the dog to the gate.

‘You all right?’ he said.

She nodded.

‘Can’t believe you saved her like that.’

‘Neither can I,’ Mae said.

She followed him down the side of the house. Past the glass garage that housed the rare Ferrari, and the swimming pool, lit from beneath, the blue so heavenly Mae fought an urge to dive straight in, sink to the bottom and wait out the next weeks.

The hole was cavernous now. Hugo lifted a barrier and stepped onto the metal plinth, motioned and she stood beside him.

He pressed a green button and they gripped the rail tightly as the lift groaned and creaked. It took them down, past packed earth, dense rock torn by mechanical hands. Lights had been punched into the stone and shone out eerily.

It stopped far below and Mae craned her neck to see sunlight.

The bunker.

Steel like a vault.

A heavy door was propped open. Metal walls, secondary power from generators as tall as Hugo. They walked through the entranceway and it opened out to a sprawl of harried workmen, electricians with clipboards, an architect with measuring tape.

‘Looks expensive,’ Mae said.

‘I heard my dad talking about trying to offload the chalet in St Moritz.’

‘Jesus, no,’ Mae said, a hand to her mouth.

Ahead they came to a small group. Hugo walked over to his father, who stood with other men but dismissed them when he saw his son.

‘You’ve been with Hunter this morning? You weren’t home,’ Jon Prince said.

‘Gym.’

His father nodded at that, then glanced over at Mae. ‘You just bringing girls down here, Hugo? Remember what I said.’ He gripped Hugo’s arm and squeezed it so hard she saw Hugo flinch. And then Jon Prince seemed to remember they weren’t alone.

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