Free The Girl by the Thames by Peter Boland Page B

that got in her way. She swore and flung insults at Gem who was lying on the ground trying to stop blood from spilling out of his nose. She looked around and saw the faces of the other gang members. Some were laughing but others looked at Lena with a new respect. They could all deal out their fair share of violence, but never with so much fury.
    Duff now turned to face her:
    “Okay, that’s enough. Calm the fuck down, Lena. You did it, okay. You kicked Gem’s ass. Now you can have your little friend in the gang, all right. But only if you chill.”
    Tanya, she had forgotten all about getting Tanya into the gang. It had been the whole point of the fight. Her body relaxed slightly and Seb loosened his grip. “If I let go, you gonna be cool?” Seb asked.
    “I’ll be cool,” Lena said breathlessly.
    Duff handed her the bottle of whisky and Lena took a large slug. The hot liquor made her gasp even more and she felt a warm glow in her stomach. She smiled and took another mouthful. Vicks and Liz crowded round her, slapping their hands on her back.
    “Hell, Lena, can you teach us how to fight like that?” Vicks said.
    “You better teach Gem as well while you’re at it,” said Si. His comment was met with laughter. They all turned to look at Gem, but he had gone.

Chapter 8
    A torturous morse code of electronic bleeps tapped away at Tanya’s sleepy head. Whatever idiot had invented the alarm clock, she now wished him dead.
    A clumsy arm poked out from the duvet and fished around for the off button. It took a few hammer blows before the irritating pinging ceased, although she could still feel it dancing around inside her skull.
    She turned and corkscrewed the duvet around her, letting sleep take her once more. That creamy, snoozy feeling was hard to resist, until another alarm went off. This time it was her head. Her conscience would not let her to go back to sleep. Then Tanya remembered.
    She had a plan. But it would only work if she got out of bed early. It had popped into her head last night. A simple but genius strategy that left her feeling quite pleased with herself. She didn’t want to get too smug, but hopefully it would result in her getting through the barricade and past the police until she was right next to the whale. But the whole thing would be a complete waste of time if she didn’t get up. She looked over at the clock. It was just after five am.
    An early start was essential if Part 1 of her plan was going to work; people’s alertness was at its lowest early in the morning. It was the best time to catch them off guard. They were either asleep or wanted to be asleep, especially those miserable council workers and police who had the early morning shift guarding the whale. There would be less of them too. Just a skeleton crew probably, there to stop early-morning nutjobs from trying to get close to the whale. Did that mean she was a nutjob? Probably. But Tanya felt she was justified in wanting to get close to the humpback. After all, she’d seen it first, which gave her more reason than most to be near it.
    Tanya threw her legs out of bed and got dressed. Enthusiasm for her plan gave her a little boost. She wasn’t hungry yet and went straight to Part 2.
    She walked down the corridor to her dad’s room. She would have tiptoed but that wasn’t necessary. The alcoholic cloud hanging in his room told her he’d be out of it at least until Jeremy Kyle started.
    Her dad had no wardrobe, just different piles of clothes, each with varying needs of detergent. Tanya kicked her way through the jumbled heap on the floor until something flashed in the dingy light. It was his old hi-vis jacket. He hadn’t worn it since he’d been released from work due to ill health. Of course, the only thing he suffered from was laziness. One day he’d decided he was bored of sweeping roads and made up some bullshit story about stress. Tanya wondered how anyone could believe a road sweeper suffered from stress, but they bought