But then it dawned on him.

  He turned around. “Who’s getting into our…”

  When he saw the woman with the dark hair climbing into his car, every muscle in his body tensed up.

  An instant, gut-wrenching reaction.

  The cheeky bitch.

  Nobody took what was his.

  Nobody threatened his children. Because that’s what this was, if indirectly. Threatening his children.

  Nobody got away with that.

  Daniel let go of Kayla’s hand.

  “But I’m not finished yet, Daddy,” she said.

  “You finish off yourself,” he said, cracking his knuckles. “Daddy needs to speak to someone.”

  TWENTY-ONE

  LILY

  DAY ONE: 12:40 P.M

  Lily held her breath as she made her way towards the vacant car.

  The sun beamed down with ferocious intensity at this stage. She might’ve been enjoying it earlier, in a weird sort of way. She certainly wasn’t anymore. Ever since Terrance had fallen… the weather had gone from warm to imposing. Suffocatingly so.

  She felt tired. She felt sick. She was riddled with anxiety.

  And she felt completely fucking awful about what she was about to do.

  She could see movement in all the cars stacked up on the road ahead of her. She knew people would witness her doing what she was doing. And she was ashamed about what she was going to do, sure, as Beast ran alongside her. She didn’t want people judging her. She knew they’d jump to conclusions about her. But she had her reasons for doing this. Fear. Panic. And she certainly wasn’t going to be the only one doing something like this.

  Did that make it right? No. Not at all.

  But, again, what the fuck else was she supposed to do?

  And besides. It wasn’t as simple as doing this for herself. It wasn’t just a selfish act.

  There was a reason she was doing this.

  She was doing what she was doing for her son.

  It was in the most desperate of situations that you realised just how far you were willing to go for those you cared dearly about.

  Turned out, Lily would do something truly awful if it meant securing Alex’s safety.

  She got to the car, heart racing. Inside, she could see all sorts of stuff stacked up on the back seat. Protein bars and shakes. Bottles of water. Even torches, and things like that. Stuff that was going to come in handy. Stuff that was going to keep her alive.

  She took a quick cursory glance over her shoulder at the road surrounding, just to check nobody was looking. Her vision was blurred and muddled, distorted by the weight of what she was actually doing.

  But that had to be a good thing. The fact that she couldn’t see anyone in her immediate surroundings meant that the car had to be mostly clear.

  She held her breath, her heart racing. She had to make the most of this. She had to just act.

  No more time for thinking about it.

  No more time for mulling it over.

  For weighing up the morals and ethics of what she was going to do.

  It was time to act.

  “Get in, Beast.”

  Beast glanced around at her, like he too was surprised about what she was doing. The only time he ever usually got in cars was when he was going to the vets. Fortunately, he actually quite enjoyed his trips to the vets. If he didn’t, this whole ordeal might be a real challenge. He did look confused, though. Probably confused at where this car had come from at all. Lily didn’t own a car anymore herself. Way too nervous for that.

  But she remembered how to drive, of course. She could hold herself together long enough to do what she had to do.

  At least she hoped that was the case, anyway.

  “Beast, quick. Come on!”

  Beast hopped into the passenger seat with no further ado. She slammed the door shut, and the sound of it echoed down the long, crammed road. She looked ahead. How the hell was she going to get out of this mess? And where the hell was she going to go? Shit. She hadn’t thought this through. She hadn’t thought this through one bit.

  But there was no use worrying about it. She was in too deep at this point. Just one step at a time. One step at a time…

  She rushed around to the driver’s side and opened the door. She climbed in, and she slid in her seatbelt and then she slammed the door shut. She reached for the key. Took a few seconds to question whether she really wanted to do this; whether she was capable of committing such an act.

  But she detached herself from the fact that she was stealing from somebody. She saw it simply as taking something that was going to help her get to her son and help them survive.

  She took a few long, deep breaths, and swallowed a lump in her throat.

  Then she started up the car.

  She reached for the gearstick only to realise it was automatic. Shit. She knew automatics were supposed to be easier, but she’d never driven one, so that threw a bit of a spanner in the works.

  She tensed her grip around the gear stick to ease her shaking hands.

  She slipped the car into reverse.

  Then, she started to back away.

  She wasn’t sure what caused it. But something happened. Perhaps it was how out of sync she was with driving. Perhaps it was simply a case of her being so nervous that this wasn’t a piece of cake, for sure.

  But she did something that she knew was going to get her in deep, deep shit.

  The car slammed right into the front of the car behind.

  She froze. And in that moment of disbelief, a naive part of her hoped that she’d get away with this. That she’d be okay, somehow.

  But then she heard the ramming blast of the horn, and the shouts.

  And she knew she was in the shit.

  She was in deep, deep shit.

  She felt her face heating up. Her chest tightened. Breathing grew trickier. Her whole body felt like it was seizing up. Now more than ever, she needed to get away from here.

  She couldn’t afford to stick around anymore.

  She put the car into drive and started to swing around.

  To get out of here.

  Get the hell away from here.

  But then something else happened.

  She didn’t hit the car in front, thank god.

  But she did hit something.

  She hadn’t seen the bicycle running up the outside lane.

  Not until the front of her car flew into it and knocked it down.

  She froze again. Covered her mouth with her hands. Her entire body was shaking. Beast was barking. This wasn’t just going badly. This couldn’t be going any worse.

  People were outside their cars, some of them shouting at her. There was a man lying on the ground in front of her, his bicycle crumpled. She couldn’t move. She couldn’t think. She couldn’t anything.

  “What the fuck?” he shouted. “What the fuck are you doing?”

  In that moment, Lily felt it all building up. The anxiety. The desire to just disappear into a hole in the ground.

  She couldn’t stay here.

  She had to leave.

  Now.

  Right now.

  She cleared her throat, tried to calm herself as much as possible. Because that’s all she could do. Keep herself composed. Getting stressed out wasn’t going to get her out of this situation.

  She put the car back into reverse and eased back steadily despite all the cries and the uproar from behind her.

  Then she saw the opening at her side, and she felt a glimmer of hope. She was getting away. Whether it was right or wrong, she had an opening and she had an opportunity to get out of here, and she was going to take it.

  She took a deep breath and smiled at Beast.

  “We’re going to be okay,” she said.

  And then she started to turn.

  But then she stopped.

  She stopped because there was someone opposite her.

  A man.

  Two children.

  All of them standing right in front of the car.

  The man stared into her eyes with intense focus. He looked mad. Very mad.

  And it only dawned on Lily then who this man was.

  He tightened his fists. The muscles in his jaw tensed.

  “Get the hell out of my car,” he said. “Right this second.”

  TWENTY-TWO

  BETHANY

  DAY ONE: 11:30 A.M

  “This doesn’t have to be messy now, kids. You simply do as I say, and there doesn’t have to be any more trouble. You drop that fucking stuff there. You drop it and you turn around and you leave. Understand? You leave. And if you do that… we’ll be good. Everything’ll be all good.”

  Bethany’s heart pounded as she stared across the darkened shop at the shop assistant, Gavin. He was holding a long, shiny knife. Fuck. A knife. This wasn’t real. This couldn’t be happening. This surely couldn’t be happening.

  And as much as she wanted to convince herself that he wouldn’t use it, she couldn’t help but feel from the look in his eyes that he was deadly serious.

  This was a man willing to do serious damage to protect his store.

  Protect his supplies.

  This was a man none of them wanted to mess with.

  She was standing alongside Dan, Olly and Susan now. All of them had been lined up in a row. And even though it was only this shop assistant that was standing opposite her, she felt like more eyes were watching her, burning into her. The man’s steely gaze sent shivers up her spine and made her hairs stand on end right the way up her arms.

  “Are you dumb or what?” the shop assistant said, stepping closer to her and the group. Less diplomatic now. More aggressive. Which definitely wasn’t the direction things needed to go. “Drop the stuff and get the hell out of here.”

  And Bethany knew there was only one option here. They couldn’t fight. This man was unhinged. He was acting irrationally. Nothing good came from escalating this situation. The nutter was just waiting for an opportunity to kick off.

  But then, something else happened.

  “That’s not going to happen,” Dan said.

  When Dan said those words, Bethany’s stomach sank. She tasted vomit at the back of her throat almost immediately, nausea crippling her insides, a classic symptom of her nervousness. Of course, she wanted to hold her ground. They’d put a lot of effort into gathering the supplies they’d found, and it’d be a shame to just give up on them all because of some nutter. It didn’t feel right. At all.

  But at the same time… this guy clearly was a nutter. So they could do far better than to mess with him.

  But Dan had to be Dan, didn’t he?

  He just had to stand up to him like that.

  Put himself in danger.

  Put them all in danger.

  The shop keeper narrowed his eyes, which had thick bags underneath. “What did you just say, kid?”

  And that was Dan’s chance. His chance to swallow some pride. To back down. To step away from this situation. To deescalate.

  But again, Bethany knew Dan.

  And based on all she knew about Dan… that wasn’t his style.

  Sure enough, right on cue, the worst happened.

  “I’m not a kid,” Dan said, trying to stand tall and look confident. “And I said we’re not going to drop the stuff. Now we’ll pay you for them. We’ll even give some of the stuff back if we have to. But… but there’s plenty here for all of us, pal. So please. Don’t be selfish. See things from our perspective. We need a hand here.”

  Bethany tried to get a read on this shop assistant’s reaction. He still didn’t look best pleased or impressed by Dan’s olive branch. It was a gamble, that was for sure, and one that Bethany wasn’t sure was going to pay off. But then, Dan did have a way with words, sometimes. He’d tried his best to calm matters. A last throw of the dice. That’s what it was. That’s what it had to be. If he stood his ground, they needed to back the fuck down. No good could come of this.

  The man lowered his knife. And for a moment, Bethany really believed Dan had struck a chord in him and got through to him somehow. Even though it seemed unlikely. Seemed more likely to her that Dan’s words had wound him up even more. Patronised him.

  Just when she was experiencing some hope, the man shook his head and sighed. “I really, really don’t want to have to hurt you guys. You’re good kids. I’ve got no doubt about that. Bit cheeky coming in here when the shop’s clearly closed up, but hey, I can allow that.”

  He lifted his knife and started stepping towards the group.

  “But what I can’t allow is you guys to walk away with that stuff. It doesn’t belong to you. You wouldn’t have stolen a few hours ago before this shit started, so you won’t start stealing now.”

  He stepped so close to them that he was just inches away. Bethany could smell the mouthwash on the guy’s breath. It did nothing to mask the rot underneath it. The decay.

  “I’m sorry. I really am. But it’s everyone for themselves now. And this village… this village needs its supplies. We can’t be sharing with outsiders like you. And you’ll find somewhere else. We’re in the Lakes. There’s no shortage of village shops. But you aren’t stealing from mine. Let me make that clear. This is my village. And you aren’t stealing from us. From our people. If this is as bad as it looks like it’s gonna be… then we need all the supplies we’ve got.”

  Bethany’s mouth was dry. She was under no illusions now, as she gripped loosely onto her bag of stuff. They had to take the loss and get out of here. The shop assistant had made himself perfectly clear. This was no time for messing around. Just needed Dan to realise that.

  “Come on, Dan,” Olly said.

  “Listen to your mate,” the shop assistant said. “He has a bit of sense.”

  Susan cleared her throat too. “Dan, seriously. He isn’t gonna cave. Let’s not get ourselves into trouble here.”

  The shop assistant put his hands by his side. And as Bethany looked at Dan, she worried. Because she knew what Dan was like. She knew how stubborn he was. How headstrong he was. And how damn competitive he was.

  Dan wasn’t the kind of guy who accepted defeat, and that worried her.

  But he did something remarkable.

  He lowered his bag of supplies to the floor.

  Bethany followed. Then Olly. And then Susan did, too, and before they knew it, they all had their bags lowered and were standing without holding anything at all.

  The shop assistant’s eyes lit up. He smiled. “Good. That’s more like it. Now I think you should back up and⁠—”

  “What gives you any more right to this stuff than us?” Dan said.

  Shit. This was it. This was the clanger that Bethany had been fearing.

  The shop assistant’s smile dropped. “What?”

  “You work here, sure. You probably get paid a pittance to go spend on your miserable existence. But that doesn’t mean you have any more of a right to this stuff than we do.”

  Dan grabbed a frying pan from the shelf beside him. It was almost comical. But damn. It was a pretty big frying pan.

  “So if we walk away, so too should you. Because you’re stealing just as much as we are. Aren’t you?”

  The shop assistant was quiet. Just for a moment, Bethany saw his cheeks flushing and his eyelids quivering, like he was embarrassed and nervous.

  But that moment passed in an instant.

  And so too did this man’s apparent uncertainty.

  He stepped up towards Dan.

  “You just made a real, real bad choice,” he said.

  Then he pulled back his knife and swung it at the group.

  Bethany didn’t see if it hit anyone. She didn’t feel anything, so she could only assume that she hadn’t been touched by the blade.

  But she did the only thing she could do in a situation like this. The only thing any kid could do in a situation like this.

  She turned away.

  And, leaving behind all the supplies they’d spent so long gathering and worked so hard for, she ran.

  TWENTY-THREE

  BETHANY

  DAY ONE: 12:00 P.M

  You didn’t have to be a genius to realise that Dan was annoyed.

  The fact he emerged from the shop at all was a relief to Bethany. Especially with that nutter of a shop assistant waving a knife anywhere and everywhere. He wasn’t a thug. He was just afraid. Afraid, and nervous, and a bit crazy. A dangerous combo, though. Especially when someone wanted to prove themselves.

  When she’d first rushed out of there, she’d been closely flanked by Susan and Olly—both of whom were also out of their supplies. But Dan hadn’t emerged. Which worried her. It worried all of them, as they watched from behind a vacant car at the other side of this village road.

  But just when hope was running out, just as the nerves were hitting peak intensity, Dan had emerged from the shop.

  He wasn’t stabbed.

  He had a little cut on his forearm.

  The only supplies he had were some antiseptic cream, which it seemed like the shop assistant must’ve given him to make sure that wound wouldn’t get too nasty. A weird kind of peace offering. There’d obviously been a scuffle. Shit had obviously kicked off. But it’d settled. It must’ve done.

  Tensions were high. They’d reached breaking point.

  And then they’d settled, all over again.

  Dan didn’t seem too keen on talking about it. Going into it.

  Bethany had seen the look in Dan’s eyes as he’d marched across the road, though. He didn’t like losing in any way. It made him feel like a failure, no doubt about that. She didn’t know where this deep-rooted desire to win came from. A lot of people were competitive, but with Dan it went beyond that. There must be something in his past that drove this. She wondered what it was. Whether there was a catalysing moment.

  But right now, the past was irrelevant.

  Dan raised his arms as he approached. “What the hell was that?”

  “What the hell was that?” Olly said, a rare moment of him standing up to Dan. Bethany was surprised to see it. But, again, it was good seeing this side of Olly. “Mate, you nearly got us killed in there.”