TWENTY-ONE
Ellie was almost asleep when a loud noise woke her.
She sat up in bed, her heart beating.
Bang bang bang bang.It was the front door. She looked at her watch: it was just after midnight.
‘What the…?’ Ellie muttered to herself, grabbing her fluffy bathrobe and putting it on as she rushed out into the small hallway at the top of the stairs.
Fee came out of her room, rubbing her eyes. ‘What the hell’s that noise?’ she muttered. ‘Made me jump out of my skin.’
‘It’s the door.’ Ellie flinched as the banging reverberated through the beach house again. They both crept downstairs.
‘Get a frying pan.’ Fee pointed to the kitchen, and picked up a vase from the top of the fireplace.
‘Fee, if someone was going to break in, I doubt they’d knock,’ Ellie whispered, but she ran to the kitchen anyway and picked up a wok.
Fee unlocked the door and swung it open, vase at the ready.
Ellie switched the downstairs light on just as Jamey rushed in.
‘You’ve got to hide me. He’s after me!’ Jamey cried, standing in the middle of the beach house living room, waving her arms. ‘Shut the door! Quick!’
‘What’s going on? Who are you?’ Fee slammed the front door.
‘Jamey, what’s happening?’ Ellie dropped the pan on the sofa and approached Jamey as if a scared animal had just burst into the house. ‘Hey. Calm down. It’s okay.’
‘Darren. Thank God the kids are at my mum’s. Banging on my front door, drunk. I went out the back, but he’d come round the side and I didn’t see him. Caught me by the hair but I got away. Ran down to the beach. I think I dodged him, but I didn’t know where else to go,’ she panted.
Ellie made her sit down, and lifted up her blonde ponytail gently. ‘Ouch. Jamey, he’s pulled out quite a lot of hair.’ Ellie frowned. Jamey’s scalp was bleeding, and Ellie knew that she’d had a lucky escape. Goodness only knew what Darren would have done if Jamey hadn’t got away.
‘I’m calling the police.’ Fee’s tone was grim as she tapped 999 into her phone.
Jamey reached up her hand to the back of her head and looked at the blood on her hand. She started to cry.
‘Oh, Jamey.’ Ellie gave the girl a gentle hug, as Jamey sobbed into her shoulder. ‘I’m so sorry this is happening to you.’
‘He was so sweet to me,’ Jamey sobbed. ‘When we started goin’ out. He always opened doors for me. Bought me presents. Told me I was b… b… beautiful.’ She leaned heavily on Ellie’s shoulder. ‘I’m scared, Ellie. He won’t leave me alone.’
‘Fee’s calling the police,’ Ellie said, calmly. ‘It’s going to be all right.’
‘On hold,’ Fee muttered, walking into the kitchen. ‘Must be a busy night.’
‘Okay. Well, why don’t we make some hot chocolate in the meantime?’ Ellie maintained her calm voice. ‘I think you could do with something sweet for the—’ She was going to sayshock, but there was a crash, and something came flying through the window. Glass splintered everywhere.
‘What the…’ Ellie cowered, instinctively covering Jamey’s body with her own as the jagged rock slid to the edge of the sofa. It was from the beach outside: there were a million like it.
‘Jamey!’ Darren’s voice screamed, outside the house. ‘Come out, you stupid bitch! You’re my wife! You can’t hide from me!’
‘Oh, my God.’ Jamey cowered on the sofa. ‘I thought I lost him.’
Ellie swore, and ran to the door to lock it. She had just slid the chain across and flicked the old iron bolts inside the door when she felt a thud, as Darren hit the door with his full body weight. She screamed.
‘Fee, get Jamey upstairs,’ she shouted. ‘And stay on the line to the police!’
Fee and Jamey ran up the stairs obediently. Ellie whirled around, looking for any other easy entrances to the house. There was a wooden back door that led off the kitchen, but she knew it was locked. However, she could see that the key was in the lock, and there was a glass panel in the door that could mean someone could break the glass and reach down for the key to open it.
Ellie ran to the kitchen, made sure the door was locked and then pulled out the key. She didn’t have any way of securing the glass, but she pulled the heavy pine kitchen table up to the door and wedged it against it as best she could. She couldn’t do anything about the broken window either, but she hoped that Darren wasn’t crazy enough to try climbing in through it, given the jagged glass that remained in the frame.
