Inferno (Page 13)

‘She’s been behind us the whole way.’

‘Huh.’ Millie flicked an indicator at the last minute and turned up a side street. The Mercedes followed. ‘You know what? I think you’re right. There’s something up with this chick. Let’s see if we can lose her.’

‘Mil, don’t do anyth—’

Millie slammed on the brakes and turned on to another side street with a deafening squeal. I was thrown, shrieking, against the side of the car. She crushed the accelerator and we sped down the street, taking a last-minute turn on to another residential row of houses and zigzagging around the neighbourhood.

After twenty minutes of what Millie called ‘stealth driving’ around Cedar Hill, we doubled back and pulled up outside my house. I got out, feeling a passing urge to kiss the pavement.

‘Told ya we’d lose Lego-head!’ She was cackling to herself. She didn’t really feel threatened. Suspicious maybe, but only mildly, and I could tell the chase was for my benefit. She offered me a brace-filled grin as she pulled away. ‘See ya tomorrow for phase two of our rehabilitation plan!’

My mother greeted me at the door. ‘How was it?’ Her tone was anxious but her expression was going for enthusiasm. ‘Was it fun? Did you have fun?’

I felt a sudden urge to hug her, but I stifled it. I didn’t want to freak her out. ‘It was good,’ I said. ‘I had fun.’ I kept the memory of the black Mercedes wiped from my expression.

She smiled, a whisper of relief in her response. ‘I’m so glad, sweetheart.’

I wondered how long she had been watching the driveway, waiting for me to come home. ‘What did you get up to?’ I asked. ‘Did you see the girls?’

She waved her hand around as I shut the door behind us. ‘I didn’t get around to it,’ she said airily. ‘I did some gardening instead. Watched some TV. Did you eat?’

‘Popcorn. A mountain of it.’

She laughed, ruffling my hair. ‘Well, you’re definitely back to your old self!’

I kept the threads of panic bound up in my throat. ‘Yup, I’m feeling much better.’

She rested her hand on my shoulder and I touched my head against hers. She smelt of lavender and peppermint. We went into the kitchen, both of us walking carefully on eggshells.

That night I lay awake in bed imagining a car rumbling down my street, every hour, like clockwork.

CHAPTER SEVEN

THE SHADOW IN THE GARDEN

I was lost in a thick dreaming fog when Nic’s voice floated into my consciousness.

‘Sophie?’

The sound perforated the vision, filling up the endless space around me.

‘Are you here?’

The Nic in my nightmare wasn’t speaking to me. He was standing, like he always did, over the dying figure of my uncle, as blood coated the floor beneath them. I was across the blackness, leaning over Luca, with my hands pressed tight against his torso. He looked the same as he always did, as I had come to remember him even in my waking moments – paper-white and utterly still. I knew every shadow on his face, the quirk of his lips, the length of his lashes. I stared at him every night in this dream while his blood lapped around my hands. When I tried to call out, the sound always vanished into a puff of nothingness. And Nic? Nic never spoke to me. He wasn’t speaking now, either. He wasn’t even facing me.

‘Sophie? I’m sorry, I know it’s late.’

But still, that voice, so insistent, so familiar … Where was it coming from?

‘Sophie?’

I sat up in bed, half expecting Nic to burst out of my closet. I grabbed my phone and flung open my curtains, peering into the garden. Below me, Nic was lit up by the sensor light above the kitchen window. He was waiting for me with all the innocence of someone who didn’t know any better. But Nic did know better, and being in my garden at 1.12 a.m. meant he was way out of bounds.

My window was already open. ‘Nic?’

I was still groggy with sleep, halfway between incredulity and reality, and my heart and my head were doing a thousand flip-flops a minute.

He raised his hands, palms facing outwards. ‘I know,’ he said. ‘I’m breaking all the rules.’

‘The only rule,’ I hissed back, conscious not to speak too loudly and wake my mother. Since she hadn’t shooed him out of the garden already, she wasn’t downstairs.

‘Come down?’ he said, his eyebrows lifting.

‘What’s happened?’ I asked, the dregs of sleep leaving me. ‘Has someone been hurt?’ A sea of possibilities rushed through my mind.

‘No,’ he said, lowering his voice to a less audible whisper. ‘It’s nothing like that. No one is hurt.’

I could almost hear the yet in the pause that followed.

‘Oh.’ I hadn’t realized how hard my heart had been thumping until it dulled again. ‘Then what is it? What’s going on?’

His smile was tight. ‘Can you just come down, please? I’m starting to feel self-conscious.’

I knew I shouldn’t. That was a no-brainer. But it’s hard to avoid something when it’s right in front of you …

‘Stop weighing it up, Sophie. Just come down, I have to talk to you.’

His expression, steeped in moonlight, held a level of anxiety I hadn’t come to associate with Nic. He was rattled. Something had happened.

‘Fine,’ I conceded, curiosity and something else – something mutinous – pushing me from the window. ‘But only to see that you’re all right.’