Page 44 of The Lottery Win
‘No, they were. I liked John and Andrea. They seemed just anordinary couple. A bit flash with all the fancy cars and the high-end barbecueequipment, that kind of thing, but nice all the same. But when they’d beenliving in the cottage about six months or so, it all went badly wrong forthem.’
‘Really?’
Hamish nods. ‘I couldn’t work it out at first. I used to getthe feeling when I drove past the cottage that they’d been in the gardenseconds earlier and dived inside when they heard a car coming.’
‘How weird.’
‘I know. It was. Very weird. Of course, we found out whatwas going on in the end.’
‘You did?’
He nods. ‘Village gossip. The pair had obviously been livingbeyond their means. They had all this fancy stuff – parcels deliveredpractically every day – but it turned out a lot of it was bought on tick andthey’d got into a real financial mess. So they ended up being in hock to a loanshark and then not having the readies to pay off the debt. Apparently, they puteverything in storage and left at the dead of night for Spain.’
I stare at him, feeling like my insides are clamped in avice. ‘Loan shark? They borrowed from a loan shark?’
He nods. ‘That’s the rumour that’s going round. Of course, Ididn’t hear it from the horse’s mouth, so to speak.’ He shrugs sadly. ‘Mainlybecause I never got to speak to them much aftershearrived on thescene.’
‘She?’
‘Yes. Miss Loan Shark herself, I guess. Blonde woman. Slim.Attractive. If you passed her in the street, you’d never imagine she was thatevil. But I was chatting to John the day she pulled up in her swanky car,wearing her posh sunglasses and dressed to the nines, and I saw the fear in hiseyes when she was talking to him. They went inside and after that, I never sawJohn again. He and Andrea vanished the following week, lock, stock and barrel.The word around here is that the woman’s a ruthless moneylender who preys onthe likes of John and Andrea.’ He shakes his head in disgust. ‘Once she’s gother claws into you, you basically become her property and you’re trapped.’
‘So John and Andrea felt they had to leave the UK in orderto escape her?’ I whisper.
Hamish nods. ‘Of course, that won’t be the end of it for anasty piece of work like her. It’s been almost a month since John and Andrealeft in a hurry, and I’ve no idea if she knows yet that they’ve actually fledthe country. I suppose she’ll find out when she doesn’t get her monthlypayment.’ He frowns. ‘It’s probably best you know all of this. Then if shecomes calling, looking for John and Andrea, you’ll know who she is and you cansay you’ve just moved in and you know nothing about the previous tenants.’
I look at him in mounting horror, feeling the colour drainfrom my face.
April will likely come here, looking for John and Andrea?
‘You’ve got nothing at all to be scared of.’ He pats my armreassuringly. ‘Don’t worry. You’ll be fine. It’s notyouwho owes thatlowlife money.’
I swallow hard. ‘Er... no.’
He talks on, changing the subject and telling me how theyphoned up the authorities to find out about his wife’s disability payment, onlyto find that it was now called something different but that she’d still bereceiving it.
I fix on a smile. ‘That’s great. I’m so pleased,’ I murmur,hearing vaguely the words ‘Personal Independence Payment. PIP for short,’ whilemy mind is actually somewhere else altogether... wonderingwhat the hell I’ll do if April knocks on my door. It’s probably more a questionofwhenshe knocks on the door. Because knowing her as I do, there’s noway on earth she’s going to let John and Andrea escape from her grasp without afight...
Hamish leaves soon after and I watch his Land Rover until itdisappears from view, then I hurry into the cottage and lock the door behindme.
I’ve never felt so alone in my whole life.
I thought that moving here, I’d be escaping April’sclutches. But it turns out I’ve been living here on borrowed time. I’m luckyshe hasn’t already knocked on the cottage door, looking for John and Andrea,and finding another of her victims instead!
She’ll be here soon, though, determined to extract her poundof flesh. From me, if not John and Andrea. I know she will.
I thought I’d found a lovely safe haven in Rose QuartzCottage. But thanks to a cruel twist of fate, I’m back to living in fear again...
CHAPTERTHIRTY
Knowing that April could turn up at the door of RoseQuartz Cottage at any time of the day or night has changed everything for me.
I’m determined to be brave if I’m forced to confront her,but that doesn’t mean I’m not scared. I wish I could say I was unaffected byher bullying tactics, but that would be a lie. Making people fear her isApril’s trademark and she’s an expert at it.
Hamish’s revelations about John and Andrea have left me in aconstant state of dread. And over the following week, I feel like a prisoner inmy own home, creeping around in the semi-dark because I have to keep the blindsdrawn to make it seem as if no one lives here. Every time I hear a noiseoutside, my heart is in my mouth as I dart to the window and peer out, thinkingit must be April coming to demand money from the previous tenants.
I’ve started to slightly resent John and Andrea. They arethe cause of my current misery, after all.
They’re probably sunning themselves on a Spanish beach rightnow, having escaped the trauma back home, while I’m left here having to copewith the fall-out from their chaotic financial affairs! It doesn’t seem fair.
