3. Hayley
3
HAYLEY
Four weeks later
I look up with a smile when I hear the door open five minutes before closing time at the café, because Maxim often visits then. He says it’s to check up on how things are going, but we end up talking about anything and everything—books, movies, food—and not work.
“Hi!…” It’s not Maxim and my heart drops with disappointment.
Five young men walk in, wearing slim-fit suits with skinny ties. Clean shaven.
Definitely not the sexy, older, chunky vibe that I adore in my bear-of-a-boss.
“We close in a few minutes, and there are no pastries left,” I say apologetically from my place behind the counter.
They keep walking, expressions set.
It’s only then that I glance around and notice there are no other customers. My pulse spikes uncomfortably. This could be trouble.
“I can do drinks, but they’ll have to be take-away.” I’ve already cleaned up the coffee machine, but these men look like the type you don’t say no to.
They stop before me, and the one at the front with black hair, looks me up and down with a sneer.
“I don’t want coffee,” he says in a cut-glass posh accent. “Where’s your sister?”
“What?” I squawk.
“Where,” he leans onto the wooden counter, “is your thieving little sister?”
The blood drains out of my face.
“Payton? She’s at uni,” I babble. Probably she’s at home now.
He’s shaking his head even before I’ve made the statement. Out of the corner of my eye I notice that the other four men are wandering around. They close the blinds and flick the door sign to “closed”, and flip the lock.
“Hey, you can’t do that,” I protest.
“Yes, I can.” He bares his teeth in an approximation of a smile. “Don’t you know who my father is?”
I go still. Because no, I don’t know who his father is, but I suspect I don’t want to.
“I’m going to call the police.” Or my boss. He’s intimidating, or he would be if he weren’t so sweet and cuddly like a bear. He has lots of tattoos. That’s scary, right? “I suggest you leave now.”
As I reach for the phone, there’s the rustle of fabric and the click of metal.
“I wouldn’t do that if I were you,” the man opposite me says calmly.
The rest of them all have guns drawn.
Shiiiitttt.
They are pointing them at me.
I’m shaking as I lower my arm. My stomach roils, and every cell in my body is slamming in random, panicked directions.
“Who are you?” I stammer out.
The guy narrows his blue eyes. “You don’t know?”
Then it’s obvious. “Ivan.”
“Ding-ding! Slow but she got there.”
My sister’s boyfriend.
Oh my god. This morning she wanted to talk to me, but I was late for work, and I said we’d speak later.
“Your sister owes me a lot of money.”
“What? No.” I stare, incredulous.
Ivan’s goons have lowered their weapons now that I’ve stepped away from the phone, but I still don’t have a chance of escaping.
“She took things from me, and I need them back.”
“Things like what?” I bristle, because my sister isn’t a thief.
Ivan shrugs. “Necklaces, clothes?—”
“She said they were gifts.” I told her he’d want something in return. I knew it.
“They were presents for my girlfriend if she behaved like my girlfriend,” he spits. “But if she wants to be a little prick-tease, then no. She pays up. Or gives them back.”
“If you’re as rich as you said?—”
“I need the money, okay,” he snarls. “And I don’t like being jerked around.”
“Dude, just tell her that you owe Camden money and don’t want to tell your dad,” one of his friends mutters.
“Where’s Payton?” Ivan demands. “And my money for the gifts—stuff I gave that whore.”
“I haven’t got anything for you.” I use the firm voice that I use with Payton when she’s being whiney. But my whole body is trembling, and not in a good sexy way like when Maxim laughs at my crap jokes. Terror is such an insubstantial word compared to the sensation. “And neither has Payton.”
I’m sure my sister was being honest with me, but I’m also really hoping she still has all the presents so she can return them.
“Fine. Give me what’s in the till.” He makes an impatient gesture with his hand.
I should. Money is replaceable.
But I think of my boss. He wears a sharp suit, but this café isn’t profitable, and I don’t think many of the Lazy Bean cafés are. He’s tattooed and gruff, like he fought his way up in life, and why should this stupid kid take his money?
“No.” It’s not mine, it’s my boss’, and it’s what pays my wages.
In short, it’s not Ivan’s.
He sneers. “Give me the fucking money or I’ll blow your head off.”
Oh god, I’m going to vomit.
“It’s really not that much.” This might be foolish, but seriously? Ivan gave my sister that stuff as presents, and now this is just straight-up theft, and that’s not cool.
“Prefer to pay another way, would you?” He moves forwards, flicking the countertop open, and I back away. I shouldn’t have said that. What was I thinking? I’m loyal to my boss, but Ivan is serious. “What do you think, lads?” he tosses this comment over his shoulder. “Is she pretty enough to use? Maybe with a bag over her?—”
He’s blasted to the side, and a scream is torn from my throat as the sound and shock smash through me too.
Red. Blood. His head has a hole and his eyes are staring, glazed.
Blood is sprayed over the wall, and me, and he falls as more gunshots explode in the room.
I drop to the floor and scuttle into the little nook beside the fridge, my heart slamming into my neck.
Curling into a ball, as far from the noise as I can get, given there isn’t much space, I screw my eyes shut as the shots continue in irregular bursts, with shouts in Russian from Ivan’s friends.
I slap my hand over my mouth to keep a sob from rising up as my chest heaves with fear so potent it has taken over my whole body.
Then there’s silence.
The rustle of fabric, and a groan.
I open my eyes, and swallow, pressing my fingers tighter onto my lips.
Another shot makes me flinch.
“You touched what’s mine,” says a deep, harsh voice. “You die.”
My brain can’t process what that means over the slow thud of a man’s steps. Deliberate. Measured.
Getting closer.
And nearer again.
I shrink even further back to the wall and press my eyelids together. Every muscle in my body is tensed in the effort to make myself smaller. As though that will help.
I’m suddenly aware of the wet stickiness of the blood I’m covered with. It’s soaking through my clothes and to my skin. Cloying and with the copper stink of death that’s joined by the acrid tang from the guns.
The footsteps stop and even as I know I should look or try to run or fight, my body is trapped in the freeze part of fear. I’m about to die, and I can’t find the courage to look at whoever’s going to kill me.
A man exhales, and there’s another soft movement of clothing.
“Hayley.”
I can’t process the word, terror pulsing in me.
“Hayley.” A familiar, calm, low voice makes my fear ebb away. “It’s me.”
Maxim.
I peel my eyelids open and see my boss knelt before me, his grey eyes gentle.
“It’s safe. You’re safe.”
He has a gun in his hand. Behind him is a sea of blood.