Chapter 56
‘The only other people with keys to our house are the two we just left,’ Jason said as he switched off the car engine.
Sabri had yet to move. She was staring, rather stupidly, at the open front door of their house.
‘Slide over as soon as I’m out,’ Jason told her in a low voice. ‘Keep the doors locked. Don’t let the kids move. Anything happens, reverse the hell out of here and call the police.’
Sabri watched the door of her house inch open further in the wind as something cold clamped around her heart. She said, ‘You can’t go in there.’
‘We could have left it unlocked,’ Jason countered. ‘We left in a rush. It’s probably fine.’
This was bad. This was the start of her life falling apart. Somehow, she knew it.
‘Nobody move,’ Jason announced, in a deceptively cheerful voice, as he opened the car door. ‘We may have left something at Grandma’s. We might have to go back.’
Maddy gave a heavy sigh, but her eyes remained on her phone. Neither of the other two appeared to have heard their father.
‘Where is it?’ Jason’s voice was so low Sabri barely heard it.
She let her hand slip under her jacket to the side of her breast, feeling the small, round coin sewn into her bra.
‘It’s safe,’ she said. ‘I promise you, it’s perfectly safe. Jason, don’t go in.’
He frowned and closed the car door, before mouthing, ‘Lock it!’ at her.
Sabri did what she was told but stayed in the passenger seat. There was no way she was driving away and leaving Jason. She opened the phone app and let her eyes dart down to the ‘9’ digit as her husband approached the front door. She held her breath as he stepped inside.
‘Mum, what’s going on? What’s Dad doing?’
Great. Her eldest chose that moment to re-engage with the world.
‘Just checking something. We’re staying here for a minute.’
‘Why are we—’
‘Maddy, be quiet!’
Bethany looked up at her tone and nudged her brother. Darren took his headphones off. Any second now, they’d be out of the car, and she couldn’t stop all three of them. She braced herself to leap into the driver’s seat, to get her precious children away from the house that wasn’t their own anymore.
Oh, thank God, Jason was back. He left the house, talking to someone on the phone. Sabri jumped out of the car. He shook his head, gesturing that she stay where she was, but the kids were hot on her tail.