Safe Read online

  SAFE

  An addictive psychological crime thriller filled with shocking twists

  JANE ADAMS

  First published 2020

  Joffe Books, London

  www.joffebooks.com

  © Jane Adams

  This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, organizations, places and events are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or locales is entirely coincidental. The spelling used is British English except where fidelity to the author’s rendering of accent or dialect supersedes this. The right of Jane Adams to be identified as author of this work has been asserted in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.

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  ISBN 978-1-78931-428-1

  CONTENTS

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  Chapter 35

  Chapter 36

  Chapter 37

  Chapter 38

  Chapter 39

  Chapter 40

  Chapter 41

  Chapter 42

  Chapter 43

  Chapter 44

  Chapter 45

  Chapter 46

  Chapter 47

  Chapter 48

  Chapter 49

  Chapter 50

  Chapter 51

  Chapter 52

  Chapter 53

  Chapter 54

  Chapter 55

  Chapter 56

  Chapter 57

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  Chapter 1

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  Blood on her hands, blood on her face, on her clothes. Blood everywhere.

  She hammered on the window, knowing that the window was locked and she couldn’t open it and that there was no one to hear. And anyway, she realized, forcing herself to think clearly, she didn’t want anyone to hear, not really. If they heard then they’d find out what she’d done and she’d be dead too.

  She ran to the door. He’d locked it when he came in but still she tried the handle again. What had he done with the key? He’d taken it, laughing at her, and put it into his pocket before throwing his jacket onto the bed. Was the key in the jacket now? She hoped so. She couldn’t bear the thought that she might have to go over to him, over to his body lying on the floor, blood all over it, blood all over her, and search through his pockets. She imagined doing it and her stomach turned over.

  She leaped over to the bed and searched his jacket. A wallet, car keys, handkerchief, but no key.

  He must have it on him, then. Breathe, you can do this. Just breathe.

  She approached him slowly, reluctantly, scared that he might suddenly wake up. Scared that he might just be playing dead, even though she knew he wasn’t. She poked him with her toe and then asked herself what the hell she was doing and knelt down. They would be back soon and she had to get away. Her father would never forgive this.

  She slid her hand into a trouser pocket. Nothing. She pushed her hand into the other pocket and her fingers felt the hard shape of the key. Relief washed over her and she stumbled to the door, inserted the key and turned it. She pulled the door open and listened. No, the house was still empty. They weren’t back yet. Her head told her she would have heard the cars if her father and his entourage had returned, but her heart was beating so hard and so rapidly she could hardly hear her own thoughts.

  She took a deep breath, steadying herself. She had to be sensible, had to think carefully. If she was going to survive, she had to get away from here. Far away.

  How?

  Car keys, his car keys — they’d been in his jacket. She hadn’t even passed her test yet, never driven an automatic before, and she knew that’s what he drove. But how hard could it be? She had to at least try. She picked up the keys and then saw the wallet lying on the bed. She’d need money. She knew where her father kept a stash downstairs but . . .

  She opened the wallet. Charlie always carried a lot of cash. She shoved the wallet into the pocket of her cardigan and raced down the stairs. She paused outside her father’s study. He kept money and other things there, too, and she knew how to unlock the drawers, where he kept the keys. Did she have time? Retrieving the key from the little box on the sideboard, she fumbled with the lock on the drawer. It opened. She grabbed money and then, on impulse, the gun he always kept beside it, snatched her coat from the peg on her way through the hall and then halted. Could she hear cars?

  Were they coming back?

  Her father always travelled with an entourage. When he’d left, there’d been two more cars and at least a half-dozen men with him.

  Over the sound of the pouring rain, she heard a car horn in the distance.

  Fuck. Was that them?

  Lauren hurtled outside, leaving the front door wide open and the rain falling on the hall carpet.

  Charlie’s car was parked out front and she was desperately grateful that the horseshoe driveway meant she didn’t have to reverse. It would be bad enough making the damn thing go forward.

  When it came to it, driving was easier than she’d expected. She had watched him many times, just like she watched everyone and everything, learning, studying, taking it all in until the time she might need it. Now it paid off as she started the ignition and stamped down on the accelerator.

  At the end of the drive, she looked both ways. Which way were they likely to come back? If they spotted his car—

  Left. No, right. No, left. God, she couldn’t dither like this. What was it her father was always saying? Hesitation gets people killed. She indicated right, even though there was no one to see. Mirror, signal, manoeuvre. Then she took off into the night, certain that they were behind her as she put her foot down and raced away as fast as she could.

  Chapter 2

  Harry had fallen asleep in his chair. He woke to a hammering on the door and the sound of rain pelting against his window. Puzzled and wary, he checked the CCTV camera outside the front door and frowned. What was she doing here?

  She must’ve guessed that he’d look at the camera first because she was staring into the lens. Harry, help me. He could see the words she was mouthing and that there seemed to be something on her face.

  She almost fell against him as he opened the door.

  “Fuck’s sake, Lauren, are you hurt?”

  “It’s not my blood.”

  “Then whose?” Harry assessed the situation. “Does your father know?”

&nb
sp; “I don’t know if they’re back yet. I took off in Charlie’s car, but I thought I heard them coming. Harry, I didn’t know what else to do.”

  “He’ll guess you’d come to me.”

  This had obviously not occurred to her. She looked both contrite and scared.

  “Harry, I’m sorry, I should never—”

  “Bit late for that, girl. Go upstairs, get yourself tidied up. You left some clothes here last time you stayed over. I’ll get some stuff together and we’ll go.” And hope for Chrissake, we’ve got a little bit of a head start, he thought.

  Five minutes later, they were in Harry’s car. He had not bothered to hide the vehicle that she had arrived in, what was the point? Who else would she have run to?

  She looked calmer now she’d washed the blood off her face. Curled in the front seat in jeans and a hooded sweatshirt decorated with a longneck cat, and snuggled beneath a blanket, she looked even more like the child who had climbed onto Uncle Harry’s lap, knowing he always had sweets in his pocket.

  Seventeen now, Harry thought. Still a schoolgirl but as far as her father is concerned, just another disposable asset. She’d told Harry that she’d taken money from her father’s study, admitted to taking the gun and the wallet. Harry had let her hang onto both because it seemed to give her some sense of comfort, but the rest of the cash he’d stowed in the bag that now sat on the back seat.

  “He’ll come after me, won’t he? And now he’ll come after you.”

  “He will. So we’ll have to stay one step ahead, won’t we?” He spoke with far more confidence than he felt. Her father’s organization was massive and he was not a man to be crossed. Harry was one of the few who had managed to retire from the firm, and only because he’d been injured in the line of duty, protecting his boss. Harry still walked with a bad limp because of it. But he knew all too well that any previous favour would count for nothing, not now.

  “How did you kill him?”

  “I shot him. Used his own gun.”

  So she humiliated him as well, Harry thought. Another strike against her, in her father’s eyes.

  “And he was the one your dad wanted you to—”

  “Didn’t want to wait till he got a ring on my finger, did he? Said my dad wouldn’t care.”

  Which is probably true, Harry thought.

  “But I told him I cared. I told him I wasn’t going to—”

  Harry nodded. He could guess the rest. “You took the gun off him?” He was curious about that part.

  “He had it in his jacket pocket. He threw his jacket on the bed. Then he threw me on the bed.”

  “Bad move,” Harry said. So, how were they going to get out of this? Frankly, Harry couldn’t see a way. He had no doubt about the danger she was in. Her father had no regard for anyone who crossed him. No mercy, no forgiveness, even for members of his own family. He’d proved that, hadn’t he? So what could they do?

  As though thinking the same thing, she said, “I could go to the police. They could protect us because I know things. If I threatened to go to the police, he might leave us alone.”

  “As far as your dad is concerned, you knowing things is just another reason to have you killed,” Harry said. “You, girl, need to keep your mouth shut and your head down.” They needed to get as far away as they possibly could from his now ex-employer. But where the hell was far enough? In coming to him, she had signed both their death warrants. It was just a question of when and where they would catch up with them.

  Chapter 3

  Kyle Sykes stood at the doorway to his daughter’s bedroom and surveyed the mess. Charlie Perrin lay on the floor where he’d fallen. A good portion of his face and an even bigger portion of the back of his head was missing. The gun lay in the corner of the room where she had thrown it. It had taken only one shot, and it was evident to Kyle that Charlie Perrin had assumed that a seventeen-year-old girl was no match for him. He had clearly underestimated her. Kyle allowed himself a second or two of grudging admiration. Pity she hadn’t been a boy. But the admiration faded and the anger surged. She had defied him, it was as simple as that. Lauren had known exactly what her father intended for her and giving her to Charlie Perrin was not something he’d decided on a whim. A proper marriage, two families united, and no more interference from the Perrins into Sykes’s affairs because now they would be Perrin affairs, too. The little bint had gone and screwed it up.

  Had she killed one of his lieutenants, just one of his rank and file, Kyle Sykes would have arranged for the body to be dumped in a canal somewhere, but Charlie Perrin was different. He’d have to be taken home to his family and apologies would have to be made, explanations given. Knowing that made Sykes incandescent. Even if he’d been prepared to forgive his child — which he was not — the Perrins certainly wouldn’t be. Gus Perrin was as old school as Sykes himself, as Old Testament in his view of justice.

  Sykes walked back down the stairs and out to his car. It was raining now and he didn’t wait for his driver to catch up but took the wheel himself. Minutes later, he was swinging out onto the road with little regard to any oncoming traffic, two cars pulling in behind him, heading to Harry’s place. The girl would go there, he knew that. Who else would be stupid enough to look after her?

  Harry had served his purpose in the old days and had lived quietly since Sykes had let him go. Harry’s wife had died, Harry himself had been hurt shortly after, defending Kyle — Sykes had to give him that — though he’d not been right in the head since Jean died. Sykes figured he’d had a death wish since then anyway. Helping the kid, that sort of proved it, didn’t it? Well, if Harry wanted to commit suicide, he was going the right way about it.

  Sykes got out of the car, leaving the engine running and the door open. He kicked in the front door, setting off the alarm. It amused him that Harry had stopped to set the alarm before he left. Did he really think the police would care if his place was broken into? No one would give a shit about the old lag that was Harry Prentice. Sykes marched into the house, knowing already that no one would be there.

  He was aware that his men had followed him in, standing back out of the way of the boss’s inevitable fury.

  “Burn it down,” he told them.

  Chapter 4

  “Where are we?” Lauren stretched and looked around. They had pulled into a motorway service station and she wondered how long she’d been asleep.

  “We need food and we need petrol,” Harry told her. He looked exhausted and she realized with a slight shock that it was getting light. Still raining, still grey but obviously after dawn. He must have driven all night.

  “You all right, Harry?” Stupid question, of course he isn’t all right. Neither of us are.

  For a second or two on waking, she had forgotten all about Charlie Perrin. She’d forgotten the noise of the gun, she forgot running out through the rain and getting into Perrin’s car and driving to Harry’s place. Forgot what she’d done and what she’d brought down on both their heads. She could feel the tears start and she wiped her eyes. Now was not the time to cry. And Harry was right, she was hungry, surprisingly so. And she needed the loo, quite desperately, now she actually had time to think about it.

  The car park at the services was still busy with people coming and going, even at this hour of the morning. Lauren pulled her coat tight around her and shivered. She’d been warm in the car, but there was a real chill in the air and that heavy November grey that her mother had always hated wrapped itself around her like damp wool.

  She took her time in the bathroom, checking that she looked at least respectable. She was so glad there had been clean clothes at Harry’s house. When Jean had been alive, she’d stayed most weekends. Harry and Jean had loved her mother and then loved her and they’d had no kids of their own to spoil. Lauren’s father had tolerated this closeness because after all, if you cared about someone, that bred loyalty. Kyle Sykes was fully aware that he could never breed that kind of loyalty. He was quite happy to be feared, but that didn’
t mean he was unable to see the value of emotional attachment when it could be manipulated.

  Harry was waiting for her when she came out of the ladies and he nodded approval that she’d washed her face and combed her hair. He was, she realized, old enough to be her grandfather, and she decided that was what people would see when they looked at the pair of them. It was a game she’d played all her life, deciding what it was that people were going to see when they looked at her and then acting the part. She was surprisingly good at it — or maybe not so surprisingly, considering how she’d been brought up. At school, she was the daughter of a businessman, at home, the child of a crime lord. She rarely saw friends outside of school, but when she did, or when she took part in after-school activities, it was most often Harry who picked her up. Uncle Harry had been accepted as her guardian, even though he’d been a little old for that role. Most families, it seemed, had an honorary Uncle Harry somewhere about.

  They took trays and queued up at self-service. “You hungry?” Harry asked.

  “Absolutely starving. Is that normal?”

  “I think we’re beyond normal, love. But it’s good that you’re hungry. You need fuel to keep going. Me, I think I’m going to have the full English, hash browns and beans, the lot. And maybe some toast and marmalade to follow, and a nice big pot of tea.”

  She laughed. She couldn’t help herself. Harry smiled approval and gave her a hug. A grandfatherly kind of hug.

  Neither of them said much while they were eating. But after, when Lauren pushed aside her plate with a deep sigh and Harry poured her yet more tea, she asked him where they were heading.

  “There’s a cottage on the coast. It’s a holiday let, but I know the owner and where they hide the spare key. There’ll be nobody there, it will be shut at this time of year. It’s really isolated and we stand some chance of defending it. Or at least getting some warning. There’s a clear view all around. It’s as good a place as any.”