Free The Make by Jessie Keane

touched the hair, her hand shaking violently. ‘No. I mean yes. They cut his hair, they had to, but George never wears his hair this long anyway. And look.’ Suze pulled a jiffy bag out of a drawer and tipped out the contents. More hair. And it was the same.
    ‘Was there a note with this?’ asked Gracie, feeling sick.
    ‘Yeah. Here.’
    Gracie took the note Suze handed her. It said ‘ Doyle scum. No cops .’
    Gracie stiffened. ‘You haven’t. Have you? Told the police?’
    Suze shook her head. ‘I was too frightened to.’
    ‘I guess this is Harry’s then,’ said Gracie.
    ‘He wears it long, like that,’ said Suze.
    Gracie stared dumbly at the hair. George had been a mouthy little pain in the arse through most of his childhood, but Harry had never been any trouble. Gracie didn’t like to think of someone hacking Harry’s hair off like this. She didn’t like it at all. It spoke of a spiteful need to inflict visible damage.
    Her mother was still fingering the hair. Gracie set her bag down on the floor, looking around her. The same old place. She hadn’t been happy here. Mum and Dad ranting and raving at each other, Harry and George sitting on the stairs in a state of terror and tears, her trying to reassure them . . .
    Bad, old memories that she didn’t want to look at all over again. She didn’t even want to be here. But she was.
    ‘They still living here, with you?’ she asked.
    Her mother looked up. ‘What?’
    ‘George and Harry? They live here?’
    ‘Nah, they moved out when Claude moved in. About a year ago.’
    ‘Who’s Claude?’ asked Gracie.
    ‘I am,’ said a masculine voice.
    A man had just appeared in the kitchen doorway. He was tall with a beer gut, a receding hairline and blue eyes magnified by hugely thick rimless glasses. He looked in his fifties, and he had a smarmy smile on his face that put Gracie’s hackles up straight away.
    ‘This . . .’ Her mother looked at her with less than friendly eyes. ‘. . . This is my daughter Gracie, Claude.’
    ‘The famous missing daughter!’ Claude came forward, holding out a hand in greeting. ‘Well, I never.’
    ‘Hi,’ said Gracie, pulling back when he tried to kiss her cheek.
    Claude noted it straight away. He turned a smile on her mother. ‘She’s a bit frosty, Suze,’ he said jokily.
    ‘You don’t know the half of it,’ said her mother sourly. Gracie saw her mother’s eyes snap to his hand, which was still holding hers. His grip felt soft and damp and Gracie pulled her hand away.
    ‘Bad business about your brother being in hospital,’ he said, twisting his face into an appropriate expression of sympathy.
    Gracie could see why George and Harry had moved out. She’d taken against Claude on sight and she was willing to bet he’d driven them away.
    ‘Yeah, it’s bad all right.’ Gracie turned her attention to her mother. ‘What’s the latest on that? Is George any better?’
    Suze shook her head. ‘Just the same.’
    ‘And what’s this?’ Claude was crossing the kitchen and was now prodding at the hair. ‘What on earth . . .? Is this another lot of hair?’
    ‘Yeah. Some was posted to me, too,’ said Gracie, not really wanting to discuss any of this with him. ‘It’s got to be Harry’s.’
    ‘Well, it’s got to be some sort of joke , don’t you think?’ asked Claude.
    ‘A joke ?’ shot back Suze. ‘Well it ain’t very funny, is it?’
    ‘Yeah, but you know what these youngsters are like. One of their mates larking about, and maybe him and Harry thought it’d be a laugh.’
    Gracie looked coldly at Claude. The man was an idiot. And clearly he didn’t know Harry at all. She could only dredge her memory, but what she did remember told her that Harry would never go in for a sick, demented prank like this.
    Gracie wondered for a moment about showing her mother the note she’d got, but decided against it. Her mother could wail and shout for England, and Suze throwing a fit all over the bloody kitchen