Free Worse than Death (Anna Southwood Mysteries) by Jean Bedford Page B

worse, I thought, and stifled a nervous urge to giggle. I withdrew a hand and took a puff of the cigarette. He regarded me steadily; he was a man experienced in lies and truth, and I thought he was beginning to look puzzled.
    “Who?” I said when I thought my voice would be steady enough. “Which friends?”
    Jack put coffee on the table. “Let’s cut the shit,” he said to Birkett. “Rough her up a bit — she’ll soon stop playing games.” I recognised the look in his eyes then — he wanted to hurt me. He was looking forward to it.
    “No,” Birkett said, spooning sugar into his cup. “She just might be straight. It doesn’t matter, anyway.” He looked at me thoughtfully. “She still serves the purpose as far as that smart-arse little journo’s concerned.”
    “Lorna?” My voice came out squeaky. “What’s she got to do with it? What are you going to do to her?”
    “She’s a nosy little bitch,” he said, then stopped himself. “No. If you really don’t know what’s going down we might make a different deal of this. You’re better off not knowing, believe it.” He put out a huge hand towards Jack’s disappointed movement. “No. Don’t want to risk murder if we don’t have to.” His voice was offhand and I realised he’d just changed his mind about killing me as casually as if he’d altered his lunch order at a restaurant. I stared at him with horror.
    “We’ll just keep you here for a while,” he said, thinking aloud. “A few days. Enough to scare the shit out of your friends.”
    “But she can identify us all,” Jack said angrily. His face was red, thwarted, like a kid denied this promised treat.
    “She’d never make it stick,” Birkett said. “The alibis are already in place. It’s only her word, and we’ll have witnesses to the contrary. Too bloody many, in fact. Why’d you have to get those two in on it?” He gestured out the window to where the two men leant on the veranda railing looking pissed off. “I thought you said you could manage it yourself.”
    Robinson looked uncomfortable. “Shit, they’re okay. As long as they get paid.”
    “They’d better be.” He got up and called to the others through the kitchen window. They came in, not looking in my direction. They must still have thought I was going to be disposed of.
    “Change of plans, boys,” Birkett said. “Just mind her for a few days.”
    They shrugged and nodded. They didn’t care either way. But Sandy had spoken up for me, I thought, grasping at straws.
    “I’ll ring,” Birkett said. “We’ll come back for you. Come on.” He took Jack’s arm firmly and they walked out, Jack shooting one last, appraising glare at me. I shuddered at what he was still promising if he had the chance.
    “Shit,” I said when they had gone, and burst into tears of relief. Sandy and Balaclava were starting to seem like old friends compared to those two.
    “Hey, wait on!” Sandy had gone to the door and shouted after them. “What about the money? We get paid the usual way?”
    “No.” Birkett’s voice came back sharp and startled. “I’m dealing with it myself. It’s all arranged — don’t worry.”
    Sandy and Balaclava exchanged a look of surprise and something like disgust, but they wouldn’t say anything in front of me. Sandy went to the cupboards and opened them, then looked in the fridge.
    “Well, it’s well-stocked,” he said cheerfully. “We won’t starve. Even fags in the cupboard there. Cards, too. Play patience?”
    I shook my head.
    “There’s books in the other room,” he said. “You can have a couple if you like, then we might lock you in your room for a while.”
    They let me go to the bathroom again, Balaclava standing guard this time outside the half-open door, and Sandy brought a small pile of paperbacks up the stairs to a back bedroom. He saw me looking at the fly-screen on the window and shook a finger at me.
    “Don’t even think of it,” he said. “We’ll be right down