The footsteps came closer, stopped on the landing below, then moved into one of the bedrooms, then out, then to another.
She thought of climbing down the ladder, but her legs were shaking so much she thought she might fall. She thought next of pulling the ladder up and shutting the trapdoor, then calling the police, but before she could do this, Bowyer sprang down to the landing and ran, tail high, off down the stairs.
‘Stupid cat,’ she hissed, clenching her fists.
She was about to try and pull up the ladder as quietly as she could when she heard Bowyer make the awful, strangulated sound cats make when they’ve had their tails trodden on.
‘Fuck off!’ a male voice roared.
Lawrence Harville.
She froze for a moment, then made her way down the ladder and on to the upper landing, aiming for complete silence, holding her breath until she had achieved it.
What was he doing here? And how did he get in?
His tread was back, and on the stairs. She had to confront him now. She ran to the top of the staircase.
‘What the hell do you think you’re doing?’ she demanded, her fingers wrapped around the handle of the knife in her pocket.
He was disconcerted only for the merest flicker of a second, then his face relaxed into a laconic smirk.
‘Just checking over what I might need to do to the place when it’s mine again,’ he said.
‘You’re trespassing. Get out.’
‘What are you going to do, call the police?’ he asked politely. ‘I’m not sure you’d make what they call a credible witness, now. Not after what you’ve been charged with.’
‘A crime’s a crime, whoever reports it, and you’re committing one. Get out.’
‘Oh, I don’t think so,’ he said, the smile still in evidence. ‘Come down, Jenna. Let’s talk. I’d rather keep things amicable. There’s no need for all this shouting.’
‘I have nothing to say to you except to tell you to give yourself up.’
‘I beg your pardon? Give myself up? What on earth are you talking about?’ There was distinct menace in his tone now, the smile withering at the edges.
‘You’re behind all this. The drugs, Jason’s imprisonment. You set him up. Somehow you’ve got Mia and her friends eating out of your hand, but you can’t keep it up forever, Lawrence.’
‘What utter rubbish,’ he said, his face contorted with anger. ‘He fed you all this, did he? Your jailbird lover?’
‘No, I worked it all out for myself.’
‘Well, better get back to La-La-land, my dear, because you don’t seem to understand the real world. But I can teach you all about it, if you want. Come down.’
‘I’m going to call the police.’
He made a sudden move up the stairs and she tried to pull the knife out but her skinny jeans were so tight she couldn’t wrestle it out of her pocket quickly enough.
He took advantage of her impotent struggling to take hold of her elbow and drag her, yelling and kicking, down the stairs and into the half-decorated master bedroom.
‘Sit down,’ he snarled, pushing her on to the bed. He seemed to think she’d been reaching for her phone and hadn’t bothered to take the knife off her. She fidgeted with it in her pocket, trying to ease it free of its confinement without Lawrence guessing what it was.
‘Why couldn’t you have just been nice to me, Jenna?’ he asked, standing over her. ‘I gave you so many chances, but you kept your distance, every time. I was kind to you
but you threw it in my face. We could have been so good together. We still could.’
She laughed with disbelief.
‘You can’t be serious. I’d rather shag a whole pit full of snakes.’