Seconds passed and then Richard replied. ‘Understood. You’ll follow us back?’
‘Yes.’
The convoy left. The lights still flaring. She prayed they wouldn’t try anything clever. An ambush or a roadblock. That they would trust what she had said and let her keep her promise.
‘OK,’ she told Stone. ‘Let’s try that again.’
He nodded curtly. ‘I need your gun.’
He hesitated for a moment then passed it to her. It was heavy She wrapped it and put it safely away. Then, her muscles throbbing with tension, she used the ice-scraper to clear the remaining glass from the windscreen, pushing it onto the bonnet.
She felt a surge of self-pity. She wanted to be home and safe and warm, not here with some lunatic who would shoot her as soon as look at her. Just do the job, she told herself. Get on with it. She had to stay strong, and practical and level-headed.
Her limbs juddering, she started the car. Haltingly she drove, concentrating fiercely and shivering in cold rain that spattered on her face. Other drivers slowed, seeing the damage. Twice she stalled, cursing as she fired the ignition again, her fingers feeling swollen and clumsy
Stone said nothing. Did nothing.
They were all waiting outside the station: Richard, Butchers, DCs and loads of uniforms. She’d no doubt there were marksmen somewhere but at least they’d had the wits to keep them out of view.
‘I’m going to get out first and then I want you to get out slowly,’ Janine told Stone.
‘I need to cuff you,’ she said, when he complied. ‘They won’t let us in unless you’re in restraints.’
He looked at her, still distrustful. Then he relented, held out his hands. She put on the flexicuffs, clumsily, hampered by the way her own hands were still quivering.
At that point a number of uniformed officers walked forward to escort Lee Stone into the building. Richard approached Janine. He studied her for a long moment, unsmiling, his eyes guileless. She matched his stare. Then he gave a tiny smile, closed his eyes in relief. ‘Where’s the gun?’
‘Glove compartment, in the nappy sack.’
Richard began to speak, no doubt about to make a quip.
‘Don’t,’ she said. She wasn’t ready yet. She needed to get into the building and find somewhere to collapse.
As soon as Stone had been taken away, Janine fled to the toilets. She sat down in one of the stalls and put her head in her hands. The shaking grew stronger; it felt as though there was a boulder in her throat, lead in her belly. She could smell the stink of cordite on her clothes, and her own fear. A wave of rage sluiced through her, impotent, blazing rage. She balled her fists and banged at her own knees, cursing repeatedly. Slagging off Stone, the job, the world that had placed her in such danger.
She finally allowed herself to think about her kids, about them waiting for her at home. And then of Ann-Marie’s home: the little girl would never come in the door again, never giggle at the telly or complain about her food or sing. It was that that undid her. She cried noisily and messily until she felt cleansed.
When she came out to wash her face, her nose was swollen and red, her face puffy. She splashed cold water over it repeatedly then patted it dry and brushed her hair.
She saw the custody sergeant and promised him a full written statement for the morning. ‘I really need to get home now, Geoff,’ she croaked.
‘You go. No problem.’
Richard was in the incident room. She leaned on the door frame and gave him a wave.
‘Hey,’ he said softly, ‘nice one.’
She bit her lip, keeping control. ‘I’m off. If you need me…’
‘I know where you are, he said.
‘How’d you find us?’ the thought struck her.
‘We’d an all points alert out. An unmarked patrol saw you leaving Royle Green Road. They called in your location when you went into the fields.’
‘Who’s doing the interview?’
‘I am.’
She gave him a summary of what Stone had told her.
‘Think he’s telling the truth?’
She exhaled noisily, shaking her head. ‘Ask me tomorrow.’
Chapter Twenty-One
Pete didn’t say a word when she walked in. Just hugged her, held her close. Even that hurt, made her bloody eyes water. Thoughts of how many years that hug had been hers alone, well – hers and the kids. Pre-Tina. His body so familiar. She knew him so well but then maybe she hadn’t known him at all. Certainly not well enough to realise he was being unfaithful. She pulled away.
Pete poured her a generous brandy, handed it to her.
She took a mouthful, the taste reminding her of Christmas. She savoured the warmth in her mouth before letting it slide down her throat.
‘The kids?’
‘Just think you’re working late.’
She nodded, relieved that she wouldn’t have to reassure them. Deal with their own fear as well as her own.
‘How did he get in the car?’ Pete asked.
She exhaled. ‘He’s a professional car thief, among other things. He could get into anything.’
Pete shook his head, his tongue balled into the corner of his mouth. ‘Pete, I’m all right.’
He nodded ruefully. ‘I want to know what happened, all of it.’
She told him. It helped to recount it, to go over each memory: the moment in the car park when she’d felt the chill of metal on her neck, the visceral threat of Stone’s violence, the horrendously loud retort of the gun going off and a split-second when she thought he had shot her; that she’d die in the car, on wasteland; that she wouldn’t hold Charlotte again or see Michael or the others, that they’d have to grow up without her; the panic of the posse arriving, just as she thought she had defused the situation; Stone’s explosion of rage and her frantic attempts to stop Richard and the others, to save herself. Then the worst part really, when she knew that she had survived it, when she was no longer acting purely on instinct and the need to hold it all together, when she could finally let go and release all the emotions, the bright anger that made her teeth ache, the bowel-churning terror that scuttled across her skin and through her veins, the sorrow at what she had endured and the huge need to be comforted, to be loved and cherished. To be safe and to celebrate life in all its precious fragility.
Now and again Pete interrupted but only to clarify events for himself. Mostly he just listened, nodding when she sought reassurance, echoing her sense of shock when things had been most critical. When she had finished he hugged her again. ‘I’ve never been so scared,’ he admitted.
‘Well, I’m here now.’ She drew back. ‘In one piece, more or less. He was wound up that tight, Pete, I should have taken more time to calm him down.’
‘Christ, Janine, you’re not blaming yourself?’
‘No, just figuring out what I’d do different.’
‘Next time?’ His face grew pale, a sign of anger.
‘No! Possibly! But he wasn’t there trying to hurt me – he was giving himself up.’
‘I don’t want there to be a next time,’ Pete said. ‘I couldn’t bear it.’ He squeezed her hand.
‘Me neither,’ she tried to smile. It was late, she was spent. Battered physically and emotionally. Janine took another swig. ‘You’d better go.’
‘Yeah?’ His voice suddenly softer. His eyes were burning into hers. He wasn’t just asking about this evening.
There was a pause. Janine’s stomach flipped over. It would be so easy to just give in, to feel his arms around her. The familiar smell of him, the feel of his lips, the shorthand of communication that they’d built over all the years. But when she tried to imagine Pete actually coming back, back in the house, back in her bed, she couldn’t. He’d hurt her, so very deeply, the last year had been the hardest in her life. Any love she had for him now was tainted by that.