Page 179 of Good Girl, Bad Blood

‘But everyone is –’

‘I said I’m fine,’ Pip said, but it wasn’t her saying it, not really. She sighed, looked across at him. ‘I’m sorry. I don’t mean to snap. It’s . . .’

‘I know,’ Ravi said, closing his hand over hers, sliding his fingers in between hers in that perfect way they slotted together. They still fit. ‘It will get better, I promise.’ He pulled her in closer. ‘And I’m here, whenever you need me.’

She didn’t deserve him. Not even one little bit. ‘I love you,’ she said, looking into his dark brown eyes, filling herself with them, pushing everything else out.

‘I love you too.’

Pip shuffled, leaning over to rest her head on Ravi’s shoulder as they watched the others. Everyone had now encircled Josh as he tried his best to teach them all how to floss, straight jerking arms and locking hips everywhere.

‘Oh god, Jamie, you’re so embarrassing,’ Connor giggled, as his brother somehow managed to hit himself in the groin, bending double. Nat and Cara clutched each other, falling to the grass with laughter.

‘Look at me, I can do it!’ Pip’s dad was saying, because of course he was. Even Arthur Reynolds was trying, still at the grill, thinking nobody could see him.

Pip laughed, watching how ridiculous they all looked, the sound a small croak in her throat. And it was OK, to be out here on the sidelines, with Ravi. Separate. A gap between everyone and here. A barricade around her. She would join them, when she was ready. But for now, she just wanted to sit, far back enough that she could see them all in one go.

It was evening. Her family had eaten too much at the Reynoldses’ house and were dozing downstairs. Pip’s room was dark, her face underlit by the ghostly white light of her laptop. She sat at her desk, staring at the screen. Studying for her exams, that’s what she’d told her parents. Because she lies now.

She finished typing in the search bar and pressed enter.

Most recent sightings of Charlie and Flora Green.

They’d been spotted nine days ago, security footage of them withdrawing money from an ATM in Portsmouth. The police had verified that one, she’d seen it on the news. But here – Pip clicked – someone had commented on an article posted to Facebook, claiming they’d seen the couple yesterday at a petrol station in Dover, driving a new car: a red Nissan Juke.

Pip ripped the top sheet from her pad of paper, screwed it up and threw it behind her. She hunched over, checking back to the screen as she scribbled the details down on a fresh page. Returned to her search.

‘We’re the same, you and me. You know it deep down,’ Charlie’s voice intruded, speaking inside her head. And the scariest thing was, Pip didn’t know if he was wrong. She couldn’t say how they were different. She just knew they were. It was a feeling beyond words. Or maybe, just maybe, that feeling was only hope.

She stayed there, clicking through for hours, jumping from article to article, comment to comment. And it was with her too, of course. It always was.

The gun.

It was here now, beating within her chest, knocking against her ribs. Aiming with her eyes. It was in nightmares, and crashing pans, and heavy breaths, and dropped pencils, and thunderstorms, and closing doors, and too loud, and too quiet, and alone and not, and the ruffle of pages, and the tapping of keys and every click and every creak.

The gun was always there.

It lived inside her now.