Rory was getting angry. He was reading the comments that were being added to the bottom of the video and snorting and swearing as he scrolled through them.
‘That bitch,’ he said. ‘People don’t know what she’s like.’ He swiped his hand across the coffee table and sent the paper he’d given me to read flying. ‘She’s got them all bloody fooled.’
I was curled up in the corner of the sofa. My cheek was still throbbing and I was too scared to speak in case I made him angrier. I could feel that my lip was swollen where I’d fallen against the coffee table. I wondered if I would have a bruise. My nose had stopped bleeding but it hurt a lot and I wanted to cry but I didn’t. I wouldn’t give Rory the satisfaction of knowing I was scared.
I kept looking round the room, trying to work out how to somehow get away but there was literally nothing there. There was the sofa, the coffee table and the bookcase and that was it. Nothing that could cause enough of a distraction for me to make a run for it.
Rory was agitated, walking up and down the room, and that made me nervous. Every time he came towards me, I shrank back against the cushions.
‘Bitch,’ he kept muttering. ‘Bitch.’
‘What’s wrong?’ I said, wondering if I would regret asking.
‘People are on her side.’ He waved his phone at me. ‘They’re all taken in by her act.’
Oh god, if things weren’t going his way, he might get angry and hurt me. I was shaking and I put my hands under my bum on the sofa so he wouldn’t see. ‘What are you going to do now?’ An idea struck me. ‘Maybe we should go to the police station.’ I nodded vigorously. ‘That would be the best idea. We should go to the police and tell them everything.’
Rory laughed. It was a horrible sound. ‘Not yet,’ he said. ‘Not yet.’
He looked at his phone again and snorted. Then he scrolled through and dialled a number. I could hear the long beep you got when a number had been disconnected. But Rory spoke anyway. ‘Billie, it’s your dad. Just wanted to let you know you’ll be able to come home very soon. I promise.’
My nose was bleeding again. I put my fingers up to my nostrils and when I took them away they were covered with blood. Like Lady Macbeth, I thought. With blood on her hands.
Another idea struck me and I stared at my fingertips thoughtfully. Rory was still pacing and muttering, eyes on his phone. I put my fingers to my nose again, smearing the blood across my hands. I rubbed them together, spreading it more, then I did it again. The blood was sticky and it felt horrible and I hoped this would work.
I took a deep breath and then I shrieked. ‘Rory, look!’ I wailed. ‘I’m bleeding! I need tissues.’ I held out my bloodied hands to show him. Rory stopped pacing, looking furious. For a second I thought he’d just ignore me but I put my hand on the sofa cushion, leaving a rusty handprint and he growled.
‘Fuck’s sake,’ he hissed. He spun round and marched off to the kitchen, and seeing my chance, I leapt to my feet. I was at the flat door before I knew it, fumbling with the catch on the door, and then I was throwing myself down the stairs, half sliding, half running, and opening the door at the bottom with shaking, clumsy fingers. And then I was outside, charging down the path hearing Rory’s shouts of rage behind me. My heart was pounding and I was crying. I had no idea where I was, but with no time to make a proper decision, I turned towards the leisure centre and ran down the street, my breaths short and panicked.
Then, like a mirage in the desert, I saw Harry Potter coming towards me through the darkness. I rubbed my eyes, thinking I was imagining it. But he was still there, with a witch, and Eva and another woman. And my mum.
‘MUM,’ I wailed. ‘Mum!’ And Callum and Cassie. I ran to them, and fell into Mum’s arms, just as a police car pulled up beside us.
‘It’s okay,’ Mum said, holding me so tightly I almost couldn’t breathe. ‘It’s okay. You’re safe now.’