Paternoster Read Free Page B

him as he heaved ceramic pots and paving slabs from the back of the van, recording every move. He wasn’t the sort of scumbag that used to be her prey – the pimps, drug dealers, gun runners and general forgers of misery – that was over now. Now it was insurance frauds and cheating husbands. Eden sighed. You can’t go back, she reminded herself. Jackie’s dead, remember? But the weight of Jackie’s ghost pressed on her shoulders.
    A woman with a toddler turned the corner ahead of her, their voices high on the fresh February air. The little girl had on a red duffel coat and pink shoes, and was clutching her mother’s hand, chattering.
    ‘That’s right, Molly,’ the woman said.
    Molly. Eden’s head snapped round. Molly. Her heart clenched. The girl was too young to be her, and she had blond hair. She’d always imagined Molly with dark hair, but the name snagged her, and familiar grief started to simmer deep in her mind.
    She shrank back as the woman and child drew level. Her eyes met the girl’s; she smiled, and Molly smiled back.
    It happened in an instant. A cry of ‘pussy cat!’, a flash of a red coat, brakes squealing. ‘Molly!’
    Then Eden was across the road, her arms snatching up the girl, and the two of them landed heavily on the pavement.
    Eden sat up, wincing. ‘You all right, sweetheart?’
    ‘I’ve bumped my head!’ Molly cried.
    ‘Let me see. Oh dear, you have got a bump. I’m sorry, sweetie.’
    ‘There was a cat,’ Molly said, tears brimming in her eyes. Eden glanced round. An ugly orange cat perched on a wall nearby, licking its tail.
    ‘Molly! Are you hurt?’ Molly’s mother ran across the road and gathered her into her arms. She stroked the blond locks back from her head, examining the bump. She turned to Eden, ‘Are you OK? How did you … thank God … thank you.’
    Eden scrambled to her feet, testing herself for injuries. Luckily the camera was on a neck strap and had been shielded by her body as she landed. She unwound it from her neck and inspected it, relieved to find it wasn’t broken. She couldn’t afford a new camera. The car was due its MOT soon and she was already praying it would pass, knowing in her heart it wouldn’t.
    The driver of the car and Chris Wilde hurried across.
    ‘She all right?’ the driver asked. ‘I nearly died when she ran out like that.’ He turned to Eden. ‘Where the hell did you come from?’
    ‘She was hiding,’ Molly said. ‘She’s taking photos.’
    Chris Wilde rounded on her. ‘What are you doing here?’
    ‘I’m a private detective,’ she said, trying to remain calm. ‘I’m collecting evidence for a client.’
    ‘What sort of evidence?’
    ‘It’s confidential.’
    ‘We’ll see about that.’ Wilde snatched the camera from her hands and flicked through the photos she’d taken. Shit, she was outed now. The camera had days’ worth of evidence.
    Chris Wilde’s face blossomed red. ‘They’re all of me,’ he said. ‘Hundreds of photos of me.’
    ‘Give it back.’
    ‘That’s my house, and my van,’ he said. Furious, he barked, ‘What the fuck are you up to?’
    ‘Give it back. I won’t tell you again.’ Each word was a rattle of bullets.
    He snorted in her face and held the camera above his head. ‘I could smash this right now.’
    Eden took a step back and sized him up. He had four inches and maybe five stone in weight on her. Then again, she had twenty years on him, and she ran six miles three times a week. Wilde was still sweating and puffing from the effort of unloading his van.
    In one movement she leapt and grabbed his wrist, twisting and ducking as she brought his arm round and high up behind his back, his hand bent backwards. She bent it back an inch further, feeling the tension flex. One tap on his elbow and his arm would snap.
    Wilde screamed, ‘Let go of me, bitch!’
    She prised the camera from his hand and let him go. He stumbled back, rubbing his arm. ‘Fucking lunatic.’
    She looked down at