Chapter One
Haze
“The wheels on the bus go round and round, round and round.”
“I’m telling you this is crazy.” Fox shook his head.
“We have to do this.”
He gripped the steering wheel. “It’s just a poo.”
“It’s a poonami. Look at him!”
Fox turned round and glanced at our four-month-old son, who was strapped into his car seat and staring at us wide-eyed. A telltale brown stain darkened the whole front of his white Baby-gro. If it was like that at the front, I shuddered to think how annihilated the back was going to be.
“He seems fine with it.”
“He is now, but how long for? What if he kicks off when we’re right in the middle of it?”
“There must be a spare diaper in there?” Fox gestured to the black holdall by my feet.
I rifled through it. A large knife, duct tape, a blowtorch, three screwdrivers of varying sizes, a roll of bin bags.
“It’s only an hour round trip; I didn’t think he’d need one.” I briefly considered fashioning something together out of a bin bag and duct tape.
“This is your fault for trying to multitask.” Fox put on an annoyingly good English accent. “He loves the car. He’ll settle in the car.”
“He was screaming when we dropped Bibi at Jenny’s. I couldn’t ask her to look after him like that.”
“I think she, of anyone, would’ve understood.”
“I can be in and out of there in five minutes. Eight, tops.”
Fox sighed and looked around the empty forecourt. “Okay. Do it. I’ll try and fix it tomorrow.”
I paused with my hand on the car door handle. “Tomorrow? Shouldn’t you fix it tonight?”
“As it is, we’ll be lucky to be in bed by 2 a.m. And we’ll get maybe an hour and a half before he kicks off again. You seriously—”
“I just thought if you were being so paranoid, you’d want to fix it as soon as possible.”
Fox rubbed his right eye. “I do. I just…I don’t think I can. I’m so tired I can barely see straight.”
I took a breath. “We always knew this was going to be tough…”
“…But it’s worth it.” Fox finished what had been our mantra for the last few months.
He reached over and squeezed my hand. I squeezed back and got out of the car.
I caught a glimpse of myself in the wing mirror and winced.
My hair was piled up on my head in a knotty mum bun and I had panda eyes from where my mascara had smudged.
I’d pulled on Fox’s old hoodie as we were leaving the house, and could now see it had a large spit-up stain on the right shoulder.
I unstrapped Reggie from his car seat while breathing only through my mouth and held him in my outstretched arms as I walked briskly toward the petrol station shop.
Fox
It was going to be fine. I was overreacting. It was a small detour. The chances of anyone noticing us, anyone even interacting with us, were tiny. A one percent chance.
I looked out as a white car pulled into the forecourt.
I blinked several times. I was getting myself so worked up I was clearly hallucinating, because that car looked like it had blue and yellow checks along the side of it.
And blue lights on top. I blinked again.
The word “POLICE” was printed across the hood. It was there. Definitely.
Okay, calm. Think calm thoughts.
I tried to ignore my rising heart rate. We were just a normal couple. Out for a drive at midnight. With a baby.
The police car parked right next to us. Would a normal man with nothing to hide turn and look at it?
My mind wasn’t working properly. I just kept staring straight ahead.
Out of the corner of my eye, I saw two police officers get out of the car.
I gripped the steering wheel. Was I about to get a knock on the window? What could they know?
They hovered. I could feel them standing there looking at me. I leaned over and twiddled with the radio. When I sat back upright, both men were walking toward the petrol station shop.
Haze’s mobile was still in the car. It didn’t matter. She would see them soon enough.