She walked fast along the street, casting nervous looks over her shoulder. Kaitlin hadn’t slept a wink all night, half expecting ‘Jack’ to round on her at any moment. Had he smelt her deceit, sensed what she was planning? If so, he was keeping it to himself. He hadn’t appeared to notice when she’d slipped out of the squat this morning.
She was making straight for the Lamb and Flag on Argyle Street. It was a grim old man’s pub in Holloway, with very cheap beer and extremely flexible opening hours. You could get a pint there any time of day or night, though if you visited after midnight, you had to serve yourself – the corpulent Latvian who owned the joint was usually found slumbering under the bar in the small hours.
But Kaitlin wasn’t after a drink and walked swiftly past the bar towards the toilets. The handful of serious alcoholics who were enjoying their breakfast pint barely looked up. They were used to the flotsam and jetsam of London washing up here to use the loos or shoot up in the tiny beer garden. Kaitlin was glad of their lack of interest, but still checked behind her as she came to a halt by the payphone. Nobody had followed her, so pulling a pound from her pocket she fed it into the machine. Payphones were relics of a different time, but this archaic, ramshackle pub still possessed one and Kaitlin was glad it did.
This was it then. Decision time. What she did in the next few seconds could make or break her life. Again she cast a look over her shoulder, but satisfied she was alone, she began to dial.