Ash

I take my phone out of my pocket. ‘Joe still hasn’t answered my bloody text,’ I say.

Rabbit makes a noise, like he’s sucking his lip. ‘Why not?’

I make a face at Rabbit. ‘How am I s’posed to know? What d’you think I am? Psychic?’

Rabbit tuts, but he doesn’t say anything. He goes over to the window and peers out through the cracks. Then he takes his mobile out of his pocket. He looks at it and shakes his head.

‘Come on, Joe . . .’ I mutter under my breath. ‘Come on.’

Rabbit walks back towards me. It’s almost pitch black in here now, but I can guess what his expression is. Worried and scared, like mine. Why won’t Joe just let us know he’s OK? I mean, it could be something as simple as his battery died, cos he’s crap for that. Nearly as bad as me. Always forgets to charge his phone. And he’s always saying he can’t get a signal.

Rabbit looks at his phone. ‘I think we should phone the cops,’ he says. ‘Joe might be in danger.’

I stare back at him.

‘Forget about getting in trouble for the money and the gun and whatever. Joe could be in danger right now and there’s fuck all we can do to help him. We need the police.’

I sigh. I’m scared. I’m fucked. I’m going to prison. And Joe needs us. ‘Give it another minute,’ I say. ‘He’ll probably come in through that door any second.’

Rabbit sighs and starts pacing around the room.

I put my elbows on my knees and my head in my hands and try and think. Only I can’t think straight – there’s too much going on in my head. Around me, I can hear Rabbit pacing, I can feel the air moving as he walks around the room, sighing and kicking at the floor, frustrated and angry and scared. And I still can’t work out what it is I’m trying to think.

Rabbit stops pacing. ‘Fuck it,’ he says. ‘I’m gonna do it. I’m gonna phone the cops.’

I sit up and look at him. I want to tell him not to, that he’ll land us all in the shit. But I can’t. So I just sit there and watch as he taps 999 into his phone and then looks back at me. He presses Dial and holds the phone to his ear.

As he’s waiting for an answer, my phone starts vibrating. I take it out of my pocket and look at the display. It’s Joe.

I wave my hand at Rabbit and point to my phone. ‘Rabbit!’ I shout. ‘Hang up! It’s Joe!’

Rabbit stares back at me, the look of shock on his face lit up by his phone’s display. He presses Cancel on his phone and slowly lowers his arm.

I press Answer and hold my phone to my ear. ‘Joe! Where are you, man? Why didn’t you answer my text?’

There’s no answer at the other end, just background noise.

‘Joe?’

‘Hello?’ It’s not Joe’s voice. It’s gruffer, deeper. It’s the voice I spoke to the other day, the one that I told where to look for the bag. They must have found Joe’s phone. Shit.

‘Where’s Joe?’

There’s no answer right away, just more background noise. Car doors shutting, mumbled voices, a moan. ‘He’s right here,’ the voice says.

‘What have you done with him?’

There’s more noise in the background, another moan. It sounds like Joe, like he’s in pain or something. I look across the room at Rabbit. He’s just staring back at me.

‘Now it’s time for you to listen to me,’ the voice says. ‘It’s time to stop fucking about. Time to stop playing your stupid little games. Someone’s already been hurt. And if I don’t get the rest of my money and my skunk back soon, someone might just die. Do you understand?’

I take a deep breath. ‘What do you mean, someone’s already been hurt?’

‘Your friend. Joe.’

‘What have you done to him? Is he all right?’

‘He’s alive. He’ll survive. As long as I get what’s mine.’

‘Let me speak to him,’ I say. ‘Please.’

There’s just background noise at the other end of the phone again. Two muffled voices, not Joe’s, though. The gruff voice comes back on. ‘All right,’ he says. ‘You got ten seconds.’

More background noise.

‘Ash?’ says Joe. He sounds distant. Terrified. Like he’s crying.

‘Joe,’ I say, ‘are you all right? What have they done to you?’

Joe doesn’t answer right away. He breathes shallow breaths, like he’s in pain. ‘They shot me.’

‘What? They shot you? Where?’

‘My foot,’ he says. ‘Listen, Ash. Do what they say, please. Whatever they say –’

And then there’s a clunk and Joe’s voice is gone.

‘Joe?’

‘You’ve had your chance to listen to your boyfriend,’ says the voice. ‘Now it’s time for you to listen to me. If you want to see him again, you better do exactly what I say.’

‘OK. What do you want us to do?’

Rabbit sits down on a box, still staring at me. He cups his face in his hands.

‘First thing, kid,’ the voice says. ‘No cops. If you even think about calling the cops, your friend, little Joe, dies. Do you understand me?’

‘OK. No police.’

‘Good. Now, when you gave me my bag back, there was nearly three grand and a big bag of skunk missing. I want them back.’

‘Right,’ I say. ‘Where d’you want us to bring it?’

There’s no answer. I can’t hear anything at the other end. Not even Joe moaning. The guy must have his hand over the phone or something. ‘Right,’ he says. ‘I’ll give you half an hour to go and find the rest of my money. And then you deliver it to me at nine thirty p.m. There’s an industrial estate in Fayrewood. I want you to go right to the end of it. There’s an empty unit. Number twelve. I’ll be parked outside it in your friend’s shitty brown car. You bring the money in a shopping bag and I’ll give you your friend back.’

‘OK. We’ll be there.’

‘You better be,’ the voice says. ‘And you better have every penny of my money. Your friend’s life depends on it.’

And then the phone goes dead.

I put my phone back in my pocket. Rabbit stares at me, waiting for me to say something. How do I tell him what I’ve just heard?

‘What is it? Is Joe all right?’

‘No, they’ve got him. He’s shot.’

Rabbit looks at me, wordless, shocked. He runs his hand through his hair. ‘Let’s call the police.’ He takes his phone back out of his pocket.

I shake my head. ‘Put your phone away,’ I say. ‘They said they’d kill him if we call the cops.’

Rabbit slowly puts his phone in his pocket. ‘What do we do, then?’

I shrug. I feel useless. I feel like crying. ‘They want the money. All of it.’

‘We gave them the money already, though,’ Rabbit says. ‘Didn’t we?’

I shake my head. ‘Not exactly.’

‘What the fuck?’

I take a deep breath. ‘Me and Joe spent some of it,’ I say.

Rabbit kind of stamps his foot and turns round on the spot, like he can’t even look at me. After a second he turns back. ‘How much?’

‘Nearly a grand,’ I say. ‘Plus the money I gave my mum.’

‘But . . . you said there was five hundred in the bag?’

‘I lied.’

‘Jesus,’ Rabbit says. ‘I don’t believe this. So how short are we?’

I shrug. ‘Nearly three grand.’

‘For fuck’s sake. What do we do?’

I shake my head, say nothing and think. ‘We’ll have to bluff them,’ I say. ‘Get together what we can and meet them. We’ll take the gun, just in case. What else can we do?’

Rabbit doesn’t answer. He just stands there, terrified, and nods his head.