Page 17 of Good Girl, Bad Blood

Outside, she stopped in the middle of the car park and looked up into the sky, clouds hiding the stars from her, hoarding them for themselves. It had just started to rain, cold droplets that stung as they fell into her open eyes. She stood there a while, watching the endless nothing of the sky, trying to listen to what her gut was telling her. She closed her eyes to hear it better.What do I do? Tell me what to do.

She started to shiver and climbed into her car, wringing the rain from her hair. The sky had given her no answers. But there was someone who might; someone who knew her better than she knew herself. She pulled out her phone and dialled.

‘Ravi?’

‘Hello, trouble.’ The smile was obvious in his voice. ‘Have you been sleeping? You sound strange.’

She told him; told him everything. Asked for help because he was the only one she knew how to ask.

‘I can’t tell you what decision to make,’ he said.

‘But, could you?’

‘No, I can’t make that decision for you. Only you know, only you can know,’ he said. ‘But what I do know is that whatever you decide will be the right thing. That’s just how you are. And whatever you choose, you know I’ll be here, right behind you. Always. OK?’

‘OK.’

And as she said goodbye, she realized the decision was already made. Maybe it had always been made, maybe she’d never really had a choice, and she’d just been waiting for someone to tell her that that was OK.

It was OK.

She searched for Connor’s name and clicked the green button, her heart dragging its way to her throat.

He picked up on the second ring.

‘I’ll do it,’ she said.

Seven

The Reynoldses’ house on Cedar Way had always looked like a face. The white front door and the wide windows either side were the house’s toothy smile. The mark where the bricks were discoloured, that was its nose. And the two squared windows upstairs were its eyes, staring down at you, sleeping when the curtains were closed at night.

The face usually looked happy. But as she stared at it now, it felt incomplete, like the house itself knew something inside was wrong.

Pip knocked, her heavy rucksack digging into one shoulder.

‘You’re here already?’ Connor said when he opened the door, moving aside to let her in.

‘Yep, stopped by home to pick up my equipment and came straight here. Every second counts with something like this.’

Pip paused to slip her shoes off, almost over-balancing when her bag shifted. ‘Oh, and if my mum asks, you fed me dinner, OK?’

Pip hadn’t told her parents yet. She knew she’d have to, later. Their families were close, ever since Connor first asked Pip round to play in year four. And her mum had seen a lot of Jamie recently; he’d been working at her estate agency the last couple of months. But even so, Pip knew it would be a battle. Her mum would remind her how dangerously obsessed she got last time – as if she needed reminding – and tell her she should be studying instead. There just wasn’t time for that argument now. The first seventy-two hours were crucial when someone went missing, and they’d already lost twenty-three of those.

‘Pip?’ Connor’s mum, Joanna, had appeared in the hallway. Her fair hair was piled on top of her head and she looked somehow older in just one day.

‘Hi, Joanna.’ That was the rule, always had been: Joanna, never Mrs Reynolds.

‘Pip, thank you for . . . for . . .’ she said, trying on a smile that didn’t quite fit. ‘Connor and I had no idea what to do and we just knew you were the person to go to. Connor says you had no luck trying again with the police?’

‘No, I’m sorry,’ Pip said, following Joanna into the kitchen. ‘I tried, but they won’t budge.’

‘They don’t believe us,’ Joanna said, opening one of the top cupboards. It wasn’t a question. ‘Tea?’ But that was.

‘No, thank you.’ Pip dropped her bag on to the kitchen table. She rarely drank it any more, not since fireworks night last year when Becca Bell slipped Andie’s remaining Rohypnol pills into her tea. ‘Shall we get started in here?’ she said, hovering beside a chair.

‘Yes,’ Joanna said, losing her hands in the folds of her oversized jumper. ‘Best do it in here.’

Pip settled into a chair, Connor taking the one beside her as she unzipped her bag and pulled out her computer, the two USB microphones and pop filters, the folder, a pen, and her bulky headphones. Joanna finally sat down, though she couldn’t seem to sit still, shifting every few seconds and changing the positions of her arms.