Page 75 of The Best Friend
I don’t find anything she says funny any more. ‘You needed to get me over here?What do you mean? Why didn’t you just call me?’
‘No, that wouldn’t have worked. I couldn’t risk my call being traced.’
A chill sweeps through my body. What’s she talking about? ‘Call Marianna!’ I cry, hearing the shrillness in my voice. ‘Get her to bring Joe home, right now.’
‘Oh, they’ll be in the movie theatre already. Her cell will be switched off. You’re not allowed to have your phone on once the movie starts. Or are you one of those selfish types who keeps it switched on? It’s very annoying, you know. You’ll be in the middle of a tense scene, and then someone’s phone starts ringing. Takes you right out of the moment.’
‘What the hell are you on about? Try her phone,’ I demand. ‘Call the cinema and tell them it’s an emergency.’
‘No,’ she says, her eyes glinting.
‘Fine. Then tell me which cinema, and I’ll go and collect him.’
‘No.’ She smirks and laughs, and I can tell there’s something really wrong with her. Something rotten.
‘Okay,’ I say, my voice trembling. ‘Then I’ll go and find him myself. And if he’s not at the cinema, I’ll call the police and tell them you abducted my son.’
‘No,’ she says softly as she turns towards me with the knife in her hand. Tomato juice drips from the blade onto the white marble floor.
Surely she wouldn’t try to… But I remember Mike’s blank eyes, the blood everywhere, and I know without a doubt that she killed him. I glance to my right and see the bifold doors are closed tight. Probably locked, I can’t get out that way. I’ll have to go back through the front door. The same way I came in. I turn and run, fumbling with the front door, shoving it open. I head straight for my car, her laughter chasing me out onto the floodlit driveway.
Too late, I realise my keys are with my bag on her hall table. I swear under my breath. Darcy’s footsteps are close behind me. I can’t turn back now. Instead, I swerve and make a run for it, racing around the side of the house, my heart battering my ribcage. A security light flashes on.
‘I can see-ee you!’ she calls, enjoying my blatant fear.
The freezing night air takes my breath and chills my tears of terror. I make my way down the side path, past the white-rendered wall of her house, tall, dark pine trees on the other side, her steady footfalls behind me. I have no idea if this path leads anywhere, or if I will find myself at a dead-end, with a wall in front of me and a mad woman brandishing a knife behind me.
Luckily, it’s not a dead-end. The path leads to the decking area behind the house. Through the closed bifold doors, I glimpse the half-lit kitchen. There’s no time to look behind me. I have to find a way out of here. The wooden deck is slippery, a thin film of ice forming on its surface. I skid and slide across it, stumbling down the wooden steps and almost falling head first onto the grass below, the place where Tyler and Joe played their game of football all those weeks ago when I first got caught up in Darcy’s web.
‘You can run, but I’m gonna get you, Louisa,’ she calls out from behind me.
The icy, brittle grass crunches underfoot as I race towards the gate, set into the white wall that leads onto the beach. Security lights click on, illuminating my progress, like moving spotlights on the star of the show. I crash into the wooden gate at the end of the garden, pushing and pulling at it in desperation. It won’t budge.
‘Don’t strain yourself,’ Darcy calls out, amusement in her voice. ‘It’s locked!’
I’m unfit. Un-athletic. Weak. And my knee is shot to pieces. But somehow I scramble up and over the high gate, tearing my nails in the process. I guess fear of death is a powerful motivator. I land on the hard sand with a thump, pausing for only a few seconds before struggling to my feet and limping away across the sand dunes.
She’s behind me. I hear her laughter, her fragmented taunts whipped away by the wind. As I stumble across the dark sand, I picture the knife in Darcy’s hand. The sharp edge of the steel, the glint of the blade. Again, I remember the sight of Mike’s body covered in blood. Will that be me soon? Lifeless and bloody? My knee feels torn and ragged, the pain a throbbing precursor to what is about to come. It hurts so much, I don’t know how I’m even still running. Will it hurt to die? To be stabbed in the chest? Or will the shock blot out the pain?
The swish of the waves merges with the thump of my heart. It’s never beaten so loud before. Like a war drum, a death knell in my throat. I daren’t look round. What if she’s there, right behind me, ready to tackle me to the ground? She may be slim, but she’s tall, strong, sinewy. She could beat me in a fight, I’m sure of it. Especially armed with a knife. In my mind, I see Darcy’s mocking face. The glint of steel in her hand. Will she catch me any second and stab me in the back?
I have to run faster. My breath comes in wheezing gasps, my lungs bursting, thighs burning. The cold wind stinging my cheeks, boots thudding unsteadily across the hard sand. To my right, the rolling sea. To my left, the millionaire mansions in the distance shimmering as fear blurs my vision.
A shape looms up ahead. It’s a man walking towards me.
‘Help!’ I cry, my voice half-strangled.
The man stops. Comes into focus, the three-quarter moon throwing his face into relief.Thank God. Thank God. It’s Max. He must have ignored my request for him to stop following me. Sobbing with relief, I stagger straight into his arms and he gathers me into the safety of his solid body.
‘She’s coming!’ I pant. ‘Darcy. She’s got a knife. We need to get out of here. Have you got a car?’
I try to step back out of his arms, but he’s still cradling me.
‘Max, didn’t you hear me? She’s got a knife. Let’s go. We need to run.’
His grip tightens. I try to lever my body away from him but it’s like being held by warm stone. He’s unmoving. Through my panic, I’m trying to make sense of it. Does he want to confront her? Another, more distressing thought cuts through. I push my hands against his chest, twist my body back, then kick him in the shins, but still he doesn’t move.
‘Shh,’ he says, his soft voice merging with the crash of the waves. ‘Don’t struggle. You’ll only hurt yourself.’
