‘Don’t you dare touch her again, you bastard,’ he ground out angrily, his arm jerking furiously. From this angle I could see Peter’s chin ratcheted up notch by notch as Daniel’s grip tightened.
Barney was on the floor beside me, ripping at the tape securing me to the chair. I think I passed out because the next thing I heard was the clumping of feet on the stairs. Suddenly the lounge was full of black-soled shoes which was pretty much all Icould see from the floor. Two pairs of feet came to flank Daniel’s brogues, relieving him of his burden and rescuing Peter from imminent strangulation.
Then Daniel’s denim-clad knees dropped in front of me as he elbowed Barney out of the way. ‘Olivia! My God.’
I mmm mphed through the tape. Daniel hesitated before picking at the edges. I screwed up my eyes as he ripped it off, tearing a good strip of skin off my cheek. Being able to breathe through my mouth again was such a welcome relief though that I forgave him the brutal exfoliation.
Having been brave for so long, I should have been able to have hung on a bit longer but as the tape was ripped off, my bravado collapsed like a tent in a force-nine gale. Tears poured down my face mingling with the snot from my liberated nose.
Totally ignoring the slime trail of salty tears and unmentionables coursing down my face, Daniel scooped me, chair and all, from the floor and laid his cheek against mine as he righted me. His eyes were drawn with horrified fascination to my throbbing cheekbone, which I could feel had swollen to Elephant Man proportions. Vaguely I was aware of helping hands ripping at the tape binding my arms to the wooden chair back.
Released at last, my shoulders were screaming having been pinned back in such an unnatural position for so long and I slumped forward in relief. Daniel grabbed my hands rubbing them between his. I looked up completely defeated, whispered, ‘Thank you,’ and laid my forehead on his shoulder. ‘How did you know?’
‘Tell you later,’ he muttered into my hair.
Around us I could hear the tinny sound of police radios, deep voices all talking at once. Daniel and I were in a private oasis, two alone in the midst of all the activity. My fingers, the pins and needles flooding them, wiggled their way to intertwine withhis. My eyes were closed and I stayed there shutting everything out, absorbing the strength and warmth of Daniel’s presence, his steady breath in my ear, the firm grip of his fingers and the warm flesh under my forehead. I didn’t need anything else.
* * *
PC Cartwright materialised. ‘Can you tell us what happened?’ she growled in her smoke-laden voice.
I tried to lick my lips and winced, they were so dry despite the excess of saliva that had revoltingly collected in my mouth.
Daniel flicked her a distinct, ‘Leave her alone,’ look before piping up, ‘She needs water.’ At a slight nod from Cartwright, another WPC darted away and was back in seconds with a glass.
I sipped gratefully. Across the way, Emily was sitting on the sofa, her head in her hands. Peter was being held forcibly by two constables who wouldn’t have seemed out of place on the back row of a rugby pitch. He looked unperturbed gazing choirboy like at the ceiling.
I thought police procedure would take forever but they were amazingly quick and incredibly sympathetic. I heard Peter being read his rights and arrested before he was escorted down the stairs.
‘We’ll need you to make a full statement,’ Cartwright said to me, her face softening to granite. ‘But we’ll wait for the paramedic to get here.’
‘Can’t it wait until tomorrow?’ asked Daniel, indicating my bruised face.
Cartwright pursed her lips. ‘Sorry, we need witness statements from all of you.’
Emily stood. ‘Why don’t I give you mine now? Olivia needs to...’
The words go home were left unsaid. I was already at home, after all, but there was no way I wanted to stay.
I smiled weakly at Emily. ‘Thanks.’
Cartwright turned to me. ‘A uniformed officer will stay with you and accompany you to hospital. I really think you should go.’
She raked my face with an experienced eye. ‘That cheek looks a bit of a mess, although believe it or not you got off lightly.’
Got off lightly, who was she kidding? I dreaded to think what someone who hadn’t looked like. My face felt as if it was on fire and my head hurt if I so much as blinked. On top of that I felt so limp and defeated. All I wanted was simply to sign on the dotted line and say, ‘I hereby hand over my body — somebody please take charge of me’.
The paramedic, a vision in bilious green, arrived looking more like a kindly leprechaun than a hero of the emergency services. His twinkly avuncular manner belied a core of steel and before long I had agreed to go to the hospital with him. By this time, statements had been taken from Emily, Barney and Daniel and they were all free to go.
Before I left Emily came over. ‘Clothes and now men. You always did like my cast-offs.’ She smiled wryly to show that she was joking. Daniel melted away disappearing into my bedroom. ‘Sorry, Olivia. I always knew you liked him.’ She sighed heavily. ‘I should have given him back earlier.’ That was as close to an apology as I was ever going to get. ‘Take care of yourself. I won’t come back here.’ She laughed tonelessly.
She directed a quick look at Daniel, who’d emerged from my room with a bag in his hands into which he was stuffing a pair of my jeans. ‘Bye then. Are you coming, Barney?’ She gave him a flirty smile. Typical, he was so her type.
He grinned back. ‘Well done. Bloody brave of you to brave the lion’s den. Back to my place?’
‘Please, that would be nice.’
She turned to Daniel. ‘Bye, Daniel.’
