Suzanne Wright - From Rags

“What’s wrong?” It was the third time Connor had asked her yet still he got no response. Rising from the bed he approached her and seized her gaze. “Who are bastards and why are they bastards?”

She exhaled slowly, hoping to calm herself. “Basically Ollie doesn’t want me going back to my apartment until he’s seen me. He said he’s picking me up from the airport. Something’s wrong, I could tell by his voice, but he won’t tell me. Conveniently, his, Richie and Tony’s phones are currently unavailable .”

He wanted to tell her it was probably nothing but the fact that no one was willing to tell her anything until they were face-to-face with her didn’t sound good. Before he could say another word she was dragging out her suitcase and slinging her belongings inside. He tried to calm her down, as did Anna, but their efforts were futile. Connor wasn’t surprised. He suspected that Jaxx would be fine if she knew what had happened. Sure she’d be swearing and cursing all over the place but she would be alright. It was that she didn’t know what was wrong that had her like this; she couldn’t deal with it because she had no idea what she was supposed to have to deal with. The not knowing was cracking her up and leaving her the space to imagine all kinds of things.

As such, neither he nor Anna nor Warren had been able to offer her any words that would reassure her. Her uptight, nervous mood stayed with her which brought her problems while going through airport security. Connor was thankful that the guards were more amused than offended during the brief body search when she told them to get their grubby hands off her or they’d each lose a bollock. Her mood also earned her anxious looks from other passengers. If they hadn’t recognised her as a celebrity they might have mistaken her for a suicide bomber or something.

When they finally reached the end of the terminal at Heathrow airport Connor half-expected her to launch herself at Ollie and throttle him going by the murderous expression she was wearing. Clearly Ollie was just as worried because he immediately raised his hands in a placatory gesture. It didn’t help him.

“You bastard,” she hissed when she neared him.

“Shhhh, let’s go somewhere private,” urged Ollie.

“Oh not a sodding chance,” she whispered abrasively. “Either you tell me right now what’s been going on or we’ll be testing how well you can balance on one bloody leg because I’ll have snapped the other one.”

He sighed. “Someone broke into your place last night, trashed it and scrawled words all over the walls in corn syrup – obviously hoping it would look like blood, which it did.”

Anna gasped. Warren said ‘You’re joking’. Connor let loose a string of curses. Jaxxon just stared at Ollie.

Ollie saw the question in Jaxxon’s eyes. “Mostly ‘Die Bitch’.”

Why Anna and Ollie thought they could talk her out of this, Jaxxon had absolutely no idea. Connor hadn’t even tried; he knew that she was the type of person who didn’t shrink away from the bad stuff but faced it and then took it on the chin. That was how she got passed it.

Ollie made one last ditch effort to reach Jaxxon. “Luv, I promise I’ll tell you every single detail, I won’t leave anything out. You don’t need to do this.” He didn’t want her to; there was a big difference between knowing someone had invaded and wrecked your own personal space and seeing that defacement for yourself. Even though he had been prepared for the scene by Lily – who had let herself into Jaxxon’s apartment to leave her some milk and bread and other little bits for when she got back the next morning – the mess had knocked him for six. Hell, it had enraged him and it wasn’t even his apartment. She hadn’t yet spoken another word since he revealed what had happened. A swearing, pissed off Jaxxon he could deal with. But this hard, mute, unreachable version of her he didn’t know how to handle.

Her focus still on confronting this, Jaxxon held her hand out to Ollie for the key of the new lock he had fitted on the door. When he gave it to her with a sigh she unlocked it and gave it a hard shove, making it swing open. The smell hit her first. Cracked eggs and stale milk and other such crap – once contents of her fridge now decorating her carpet. She might have gagged if she hadn’t been prepared for it. Plenty of times she had got back to her old flat to be greeted by foul odours; sometimes it was the smell of the blood of whoever broke inside, cutting themselves on the door or window in the process. Sometimes the sick buggers would even leave her a present by using the middle of her living room carpet as a toilet. So the smells she could overlook. Being no stranger to damaged belongings, she could even overlook the smashed vases and lamps and kitchen ware, could overlook the strewn of clothes that seemed to cover the floor of every room. Could overlook the overturned couch and mattress and could shrug at the rolls of toilet paper that were scattered everywhere like garlands. It was the words smeared repeatedly all over her walls that snagged her attention:

‘Bitch’, ‘Slag’, ‘Slut’, ‘Die Bitch’.

“How do you know it’s not blood?” Warren asked Ollie as he put a gentle, comforting hand on Anna’s shoulder. Warren thought she was more unsettled than even Jaxxon who looked more curious than anything else. Oh she was enraged, there was no denying that. But there was no fear there to be seen on her face.

“Don’t forget I have plenty of scientists and lab technicians working for me. It was easy enough to get them to test it.”

“Why didn’t Lily phone the police?” asked Anna. “You said in the car that the police haven’t seen this yet and that’s why the papers haven’t got hold of it.”

Ollie sighed. “I asked her not to. I don’t think we should get the police involved.”

“ What? How can you say that? Look around you. Whoever did this was sick.”

“And cowardly,” muttered Jaxxon.

Anna double-blinked. “Cowardly?”

Jaxxon turned to her. “Did they have the bottle to come and say any of this to my face? No. Did they leave a signature? No. There’s nothing big and bad about breaking into someone’s place, making a mess and then running off so it doesn’t exactly strike fear into my heart. Same as with the letter.”

“Letter?” said Connor, Anna and Ollie.

“Last Sunday someone stuck an envelope under my window-wiper. Inside was a piece of paper that said ‘Die Bitch’.” And in her opinion, it was too much of a confidence for it not to be the same person who did this to her apartment.

“ What ?” demanded Connor, Anna and Ollie.

“Will you all stop talking at the same time, it’s freaky.”

“You got a threatening letter and didn’t think to say anything?” Connor wanted to throttle her. “Where is it?”

“I wouldn’t exactly call it ‘threatening’. Besides, it was just a little note. I binned it straight away. Come on, celebs must get things like that happening all the time.”

“Indeed they do,” confirmed Ollie with a sigh. “So we can assume they also did this.”

Warren nodded. “And that she has a stalker.”

Connor frowned, skeptical. “A stalker who doesn’t make themselves known until she buggers off on holiday?”

“Maybe he missed her.”

“I know stalkers are, normally, stealthy but they do like for their existence to be acknowledged by who they’re stalking. I’m pretty sure Jaxx would have picked up on someone following her around.” The twist of her lips and the way she dropped her eyes bothered him. “Jaxx?”

She scratched her head. “A couple of times I did get this feeling like I was being watched.”