Jane Renshaw - Watch Over Me

‘I’m lightin’ it,’ goes Jed.

We’re in a KFC on the way back to our bit. I’m on the low-cal ginger and a chicken wrap – fucking diet. The boys have both got Big Daddy Box Meals and Jed’s got a Zinger and fries.

I’m in his face. ‘You light it and what’s there for them to fucking sell? A burned-out fucking ruin?’

‘Aye Da,’ says Travis. He’s got a plaster on his hand and he keeps rubbing his finger on it. Getting bit by a wee lassie? He’s no a happy bunny.

‘You’re back planning , aye?’ goes Jed.

‘Aye, so shut it.’

Ryan gets up for another Coke. He’s in his Armani and among all the wee neds he sticks out like a Rolex on a scabby dug. Folk look at him as he walks by. All the wee hairies going Gies a slice o’ that .

When he gets back, I says, ‘Right yous, listen up.’

‘Is it a belter, aye?’ goes Jed.

‘Shut it. This is what we do, right? We don’t do nothing .’

‘Here we go.’ And Jed puts on the daft voice that he thinks is him talking posh: ‘Why – am – I – not – surprised?’

‘We wait till that wee house goes for sale. We make like we’re maybe gonnae buy it. We get the Home Report sent us, to an email address Connor will set up that’s no traceable. We get them thinking we’re that interested in buying. But we’ve a shitload of questions and the estate agent cannae answer them so we’re like that: Gonnae gie us the seller’s details so we can ask them about the septic tank .’

I lean back and pick a bit chicken out the wrap.

‘But Maw,’ goes Ryan. ‘Even their best pals havenae a fucking clue where they’re at. Are the bastards gonnae give the estate agent their details so they can get them scammed out them? That’s no happening. They’ll have done it all through their fucking brief.’

‘Aye, it’s a long shot, son. But in the meantime we check out they places, eh? Perth. Torridon. Fucking Amalfi, wherever the fuck that is. Fucking Australia if we have to.’ I bite the chicken. ‘First up, Torridon. Teuchterland Central – they’d think they’re safe enough there, eh? But we dinnae go in all confrontational. Me and Mandy’ll hire a shite wee car, one of they new Fiats maybe, and go and book in a B&B. We’re there because our pal Pippa Morrison telt us all about it and we thought it sounded right bonnie, and where are the Morrisons living at now so we can go and say hello to Pippa’s folks?’

Travis is eating with his gob open, and when he goes ‘Fucking belter!’ a bit chip falls out onto his Rangers top and then it drops on the table right next Ryan’s Coke.

‘Jesus,’ goes Ryan. ‘Get that out my fucking space. Fucking chimp.’

‘What?’ goes Travis.

Ryan gets a serviette and, all delicate like, picks up the bit chip, and Travis makes to get up out his chair but Ryan grabs him by the tit and shoves the chip up his neb, and Travis is ‘Ah fuck, ah fuck!’ and tipping back in his chair. The chair cannae take it, Travis is a big lad, eh, and a leg breaks under him and he’s couped out it on the floor.

Jed’s pissing himself.

‘Quit it!’ I yell. ‘God’s sakes!’

Travis gets another chair and Ryan goes, ‘We’re gonnae need our ain place for Bekki till we get Spain sorted. Flat’s fine aye, but we’re shitting money up the wall there renting. And Bekki might like a garden, eh? She’s been living out in that wee cottage with a garden and nature and that, how’s she gonnae like being stuck in a fucking flat in fucking Nedland? Naw. I’ll buy us a wee house with a garden, a wee newbuild someplace nice. Bearsden maybe. Plenty trees and that. I’ll put it through the holding company so there’s no any paper trail.’

Shannon-Rose is Ryan’s twin, eh, and her wee lassie means the fucking world to him.

‘But can you stretch to it, son, with Spain an’ all?’

‘Aye Maw, nae worries. Can sell it on after, eh?’

‘That’s barry then, son. Barry.’

Ryan’s eyeballing me.

‘Barry,’ I goes.

‘What?’

‘Nothing.’

‘You’re thinking we’re no gonnae need heehaw for Bekki, and we’re no gonnae need to fuck off to Spain. You’re thinking we’re no gonnae get Bekki back?’

Ryan’s got my brains right enough. ‘I’m no gonnae lie, son, I’m getting a bad feeling about this bint Ruth. A bad fucking feeling.’

‘Aye?’

‘Why’s she never telt Pammie nothing about her childhood?’

Jed, Ryan and Travis gowp at me. The Three Fucking Stooges. ‘They’re best pals, aye? See each other every fucking day for five fucking years?’

Not a dickie bird.

‘She’s a fucking woman .’

Nada.

‘Every fucking woman on the planet tells her best pal about when she was wee. Every fucking woman. This Ruth bint’s a clever bitch, I’m thinking. Maybe she’s had it at the back of her heid that maybe we’ll find them, that maybe they’ll have to disappear, and she’s got an ace up her sleeve – she’s got somewhere to run to, somewhere she lived when she was wee, and she’s no giving away nothing about it to any fucker, not even her best pal Pammie. I’ll bet a million fucking pounds she’s no even from Australia.’

‘No bastard can stay off the radar these days,’ goes Ryan. ‘Dinnae you worry, Maw. We’ll find them. Torridon and they places, aye we’ll check them out, but if the bastards arenae there, we get looking into Ruth Morrison and where she was at before she was married. There’ll be records, digital footprints. We’ll get Connor on it. Get the wee fucker earning his keep, aye?’

I bite another bit wrap and take a swally ginger and say ‘Aye son,’ but I’ve still got that bad feeling.

There’s something no right about that bint Ruth.

There’s just something no right.

And she’s got Bekki.

‘Could it have been slugs?’ said Beckie, squatting on the path to poke at one of the holes that marked where the tulips had been.

Flora kept her voice light. ‘Would have to be very hungry slugs.’

Did Beckie do it? Did she sneak out here last night, when they thought she was upstairs asleep, and rip out all the tulips? To punish Flora for losing it at her yesterday? But then she’d have to somehow dispose of them. Maybe under the hedge?

Flora couldn’t accuse her, not without evidence. She mustn’t overreact. At least, she mustn’t overreact any more than she already had done. She mustn’t start blaming Beckie for everything.

This was probably just random bored kids intent on some easy vandalism. They always locked the gates at night, but the small one at the end of the path from the front door to the pavement was only three feet high. Easy enough to climb over.

And Mia had been staying next door with Ailish and Iain last night. Flora wouldn’t put it past that girl to sneak out in the small hours for some ‘fun’ making all the tulips mysteriously disappear.

She looked up, over the hedge that divided the front gardens, to the first-floor windows of Ailish and Iain’s house. Maybe Mia’s bedroom was at the front. If so, the tulips would have been in full view if she’d been looking around deciding on her next ‘project’, as Ailish called her niece’s schemes.

‘Is it time now ?’ said Beckie. She’d been looking forward to this damn barbeque for weeks. A barbeque in early May, for God’s sake – Flora had been hoping for rain, but of course it was a lovely sunny day, perfect for an outdoor party. The thought that Mia was just next door was driving Beckie nuts – every minute they remained apart was a minute wasted, apparently.

When Flora had suggested to Neil that there might be a link between Beckie’s behaviour at school and her friendship with Mia, he’d laughed.