Page 22 of The Payback Plan

Paige glanced at the hamster who seemed to be cowering in the far corner of his cage. It was such a sweet consideration Paige almost let out anawww. But then she remembered.

Jilted,Paige. Jilted.Get a grip.

She struck a few more screechy chords as Oliver disappeared down the stairs with the cage, stifling a laugh as she heard the door close. Oh,thiswas going to be so much fun.

Picking up the phone on her lap, she read the text he’d stabbed out.

Listen here, you tosser. There is a particular place in hell for bots. You’re blocked!

Paige did laugh then. Because she had plenty more SIM cards and the means to buy more. She could do this for the next two months.

Returning to the violin, she set up her phone on the table in front of her and scrolled to video. Tapping record, she filmed herself playing a particularly slow and torturous (for the benefit of her downstairs audience) rendition of ‘Three Blind Mice’.

Given it was one of the foundation pieces when learning the violin, the song was pure muscle memory for Paige although it had been many years since she’d played it so heinously. She remembered how proud she’d been when she’d conquered it. How her parents had winced-clapped heartily and her sister had threatened to decapitate her Ken doll if she ever heard it again.

Stopping the video, she did a quick edit, zooming in and cropping until it was just the instrument, then she attached it to a message and sent it to her co-conspirators.

Just Desserts WhatsApp Group. 17.45GMT.

Paige

Guess who decided to take up violin?

Sienna

Holy crap. That’s awful. I love it.

Paige

Sadly, Oliver is not a fan. Bwahahahahahahahaha

Sienna

Poor baby

Astrid

Oh the pain!

Bella

God, I wish I could have seen his face.

Paige

There was wincing

Bella

No one does resting wince face like Olly

Paige

There wasn’t much resting about it.

Astrid

You’re hitting this out of the park, sister.