31

Brannon woke stiff and aching on the floor beside the bed. Skye was stirring, rubbing her eyes. Anxiety had him firmly in its grip: he’d slept too long. He was losing it. Someone needed to be in control and that someone was him. He sat up, rubbed his head, tried to think positively.

The pancakes had been a success. That had been good. He had wanted everything to be perfect for Skye, and he’d managed to stick to that. No rules, no tellings-off. He’d let her toss the pancakes herself, and he’d cheered when she succeeded, laughed and cuddled her when she’d failed. The dog hovered around their legs hoping for dropped catches. When one fell, she scuffled after it and gulped it down. Mrs Greedy, Skye said, and he’d suddenly remembered all the names Georgie had used to steer their daughter in the right direction. Mrs Lazy, Mrs Sleepy-head, Mrs Once-You’ve-Done-Your-Shoes-Up-You-Can-Have-a-Treat. The memory was like an oncoming truck that seemed to leave no room to swerve sideways. He’d opened Lizzie Griffiths’ kitchen cupboards and tried to veer away from it, staring at her jars of Marmite and peanut butter for inspiration. It wasn’t his fault! Gradually the cupboard came into focus. Maple syrup; there was an unopened bottle of maple syrup. He reached out, held it up like manna. ‘Look what I’ve found!’ Skye poured with her child’s hand. The pancakes were swimming in lakes of sweetness.

Then they’d cuddled up with the dog on the sofa, watching Ice Age for the thousandth time. Georgina had put it in the bag she’d packed for Skye when she was going to leave. He was indulging her. He’d never liked the film – the soft-hearted, boring mammoth, the dumb sloth, Sid. His mind drifted. Skye was protecting him from the monsters, holding his hand. When he woke to the credits, she was asleep in his arms. He’d snuggled up to her, smelling her child’s head. At two in the morning, he’d woken her and taken her out through the back garden into the darkness of the park. It’s a magical holiday, he’d told her. Remember you must be a good girl, though, and he’d caught her eye and checked she knew what he meant – that behind the perfect day together was also the warrior who had to keep the family safe, the knife in his jeans, the dog by his side.

‘Do you like the park at night?’ he’d asked. ‘All to ourselves.’ And she’d said yes.

He’d pushed her on the roundabout, held her in his arms as they slid together down the slide. He’d pushed her on the swing for as long as she wanted. Her little hands clutched the metal chains and she closed her eyes as he swung her high into the starless orange sky. She’d sung, ‘Lavender’s blue, dilly, dilly, lavender’s green, when I am king, dilly, dilly, you shall be queen.’ But when she’d run to the edge of the playground, he’d had to call her name. She’d stopped dead as if it was Grandmother’s Footsteps and turned and seen he’d got the dog by the collar, the knife to its neck.

When they got back to the flat, the birds were beginning to sing and she was dropping in his arms. He tucked her up and kissed her cheek until she told him to stop. He stroked her forehead as she fell asleep. It was only then that the beetles had really come crawling. Scuttling under his skin and behind his eyes. The recriminations. The injustice of it all. He’d created that beautiful family and others had destroyed it. He thought of the film he’d watched with Skye: that stupid woolly mammoth in the cave seeing the picture of his wife and child, murdered by the humans. The sloth narrating, ‘Oh, and he’s got a family. He’s happy. Look, he’s playing with his kid.’ It made him furious: the lies, the false sentimentality of it all. He wouldn’t have forgiven. He’d have killed, destroyed. He didn’t want to be that soft mammoth with the vacant expression and the slow speech. He wanted to be the wordless, pitiless bronze statue, lifting Jason’s boat and tipping the Argonauts into the sea.

At six in the morning, he’d checked the app and seen that Lizzie Griffiths’ car was still stationary, 150 miles away up the M6. What if she was on holiday, gone for days? Weeks even. His options were narrowing, the dark clouds rolling in, the deadline approaching. He needed to think straight while he still could, before it overwhelmed him. That trip to the park. Weakness! And he couldn’t trust Skye, not really. He saw how she looked at him sometimes. No, he couldn’t risk that kind of thing again! If he was caught, it would be catastrophic. They would grab Skye, and him. He wouldn’t be able to save her – she might even run to them. And once they’d got him, he could see it all: the cramped seat in the cage in the Serco van, and him shut in there like a neat little pony in a horsebox. He could see the dock, the court security numpty sitting beside him wearing a blue jumper and a bored expression. He wouldn’t even be able to kill himself in his cell. They’d have people watching to stop him doing that.

He’d seen that stupid appeal by the fat man with the little teeth. You must feel terrified about what is going on and you must be looking for a way to stop it. Those words: it was like Jason in the film creeping up and taking the valve out of bronze Talos’ huge foot. The lifeblood gushed out of the statue’s ankle. It grasped its own neck, fracturing, falling. A terrible sound like grinding gears. We know how much you love your daughter. Those words had to be resisted. They were meant to sap his strength. They were tricks to break up his family. And Skye, Skye, Skye . . . What she didn’t understand was that that would be the worst thing! Without him, she would be on her own. No one to look after her. He couldn’t let that happen, wouldn’t let that happen. He should have left the country with her straight away instead of waiting.

He tried to work out his options. The Volvo had got ringed plates. Perhaps they didn’t even know about it. He’d checked the news reports and there was no word of it. But he knew better than to trust the police. They probably knew about the car. There’d be a description of it for police and customs officers. He hadn’t visited it in days, parked up where he’d left it on a side street. Perhaps they’d already picked it up, or, worse, had left it where it was and were waiting for him to return to it. If they surprised him without Skye, he’d be no more than a cornered animal.

Maybe he could break into someone’s house and take the keys to a different car. But the theft would be reported straight away. There was no way he could change the plates now, not in a way that wouldn’t be almost immediately detected.

He watched the rise and fall of Skye’s breath, the softness of her sleeping face. Time and options were running out. How hard he’d tried for her, harder than he’d ever tried in his life. Those bastards, those bastards. Nobody had ever cared for him.

He wouldn’t abandon Skye and he wouldn’t let her down. She wouldn’t be on her own like he had been. It would be easiest to do it while she was asleep. Would a pillow be the gentlest way? He imagined pressing it down over her soft little face, her struggle, his overwhelming strength. He was crying. He wiped the corners of his eyes. His hands were wet. Georgie had always been the only one for him. The only one. Now here he was, on his own, having to make all the decisions.

Lizzie was his one hope. If only he could get her in the house, he could take her car. She was a cop. Her car wouldn’t be flagged. It might be days before anyone even noticed she was missing. He stared at the app. The car was stationary. The fact of it pounded in his head like a piston engine. She wasn’t coming! He tried to breathe, to think. Perhaps now was the time to take the action he needed to take. No more false starts, no more failed resolutions. He would do what he had to do.

But Skye was waking. She rubbed her eyes and her soft face puckered charmingly. ‘Can we have more pancakes?’

That gave him a lump in his throat. Some pancakes and then what?

‘In a minute, Skye. I just need to look at something.’

He checked the app. At last! The car was moving. The dog had jumped onto the bed and was licking Skye’s face. Skye smiled at him, something desperate in the creases at the edges of her eyes. ‘Please, Dad, can we have more pancakes?’

He checked the phone again. The car was still moving, turning left in the direction of the motorway. He smiled at Skye. ‘Of course we can, Mrs Greedy. There’s still some maple syrup left.’