She straightened up, about to close the wardrobe doors when something else caught her eye. A dark green baseball cap with a white tick, balanced on top of the hangers. Yes, that might come in handy too, thank you, Max, she thought, mentally adding it to the list as she grabbed it.

With the grey hoodie, the white trainers and the cap bundled in her arms, she made her way downstairs, stepping in between Max’s deep-sleep breaths. She laid the pile of clothes down beside her rucksack.

One last thing, and then she was out of here. The thing she was most afraid to do.

She reached in and pulled out another resealable sandwich bag.

Pip held her breath, though she didn’t need to. If Max could hear anything, it would be the sound of her heart, throwing itself around her ribs. How long could it keep going at this rate, before it gave up and gave out? She walked up silently behind him, to the other side of the sofa, where his head lay, listening to the sound of his breaths as they rattled his top lip.

Pip edged closer and then crouched down, cursing her ankle as the bone clicked, echoing in the quiet room. She opened up the sandwich bag and held it up beneath Max’s head. With her other gloved hand, she drew her thumb and forefinger close and then gently, slowly, she pushed them through Max’s hair, towards his scalp. There was only so gentle she could be, pulling hairs out of his head, but that’s what she had to do. She couldn’t cut them out; she needed the root and skin cells attached to the hair, carrying his DNA. Carefully, she pinched her finger and thumb together around a small clump of his dark blonde hair.

She jerked her hand back.

Max sniffed. A heavy breath and a stuttering in his chest. But he didn’t move.

Pip could feel her wild heartbeat, even through the backs of her teeth, as she studied the hairs snagged between her fingers. Long, wavy, a few visible bulbs of skin at the root. There weren’t many, but it would have to do. She didn’t want to risk trying again.

She lowered her fingers into the sandwich bag and rubbed them together, the blonde hairs trickling down into the clear bag, almost invisible. A couple still clung to the latex gloves. She wiped those off against the sofa, sealed the bag up and stepped away.

Back in the hall, she packed Max’s hoodie into the large plastic freezer bag, his shoes and his cap into another before stuffing them all into the main body of her rucksack. It was full now, the zip struggling to fasten, but that was OK, she had everything she needed. She tucked the bag with Max’s hair in the front pocket instead, and then hoisted it all up on her shoulders.

She flicked off the light in the living room before she left, unsure why she did. The yellow lights, harsh as they were, wouldn’t be enough to pull Max out of unconsciousness. But she didn’t want to take the chance; he still had to be like this when she got back in a few hours. Pip trusted the pills, as Max had surely done himself countless times in his life, but she didn’t trust anything that much. Not even herself.

Pip scooped up the keys from the floor and walked out, pulling the front door closed behind her. She pressed a button on the fob and the tail lights blinked in Max’s black car, telling her that it was unlocked. She opened the driver’s side door, dropped the keys on the seat, and then shut it again, leaving the car behind her as she walked down the drive and down the street.

She pulled off the latex gloves. They were stuck fast to the sweat on her hands – sweat or Stanley’s blood, it was too dark to tell – and she had to use her teeth to rip them free. The evening air felt cold and too solid on the bare skin of her fingers, as she stuffed the used gloves in her pocket.

Her car was waiting for her just ahead. Waiting for her and the next step of the plan.

Her alibi.

‘Why hello, quelle surprise. What are you doing here, muchacha?’

The smile dropped out of Cara’s face a moment later, as she opened the door fully, the light from the hallway lighting up Pip’s eyes. She could tell. Pip knew she would be able to tell. Not just a friend, more like a sister. Something was off in Pip’s eyes, behind them, this long, horrific day imprinted in them somehow, and of course Cara knew. But she could never know. Not all of it. Just like the others. Ignorance kept them safe from her.

‘What’s wrong?’ Cara said, her voice dropping an octave. ‘What’s happened?’

Pip’s lower lip trembled, but she held it in.

‘I-I, um...’ she started shakily. Torn between needing Cara and needing to keep her safe, safe from her. Between her old, normal life – standing right in front of her, blinking – and whatever was left to her now. ‘I need your help. You don’t have to say yes, you can tell me to go away, but –’

‘Of course,’ Cara cut her off, reaching for her shoulder and guiding her through the door. ‘Come in.’ They paused in the hallway, the look in Cara’s eyes as serious as Pip had ever seen them. ‘What’s happened?’ she asked. ‘Is Ravi OK?’

Pip shook her head, sniffed. ‘Yeah, no, Ravi’s fine. It has nothing to do with him.’

‘Your family?’

‘No, it’s... they’re all OK,’ Pip said. ‘I just, I need to ask you to help me with something, but you can never know why. You can never ask me and I can never tell you.’

The background sounds of a TV cut out, shuffling footsteps drawing their way. Oh fuck, Steph wasn’t here, was she? Nonono. No one else could know about this, just those people, the ones who would have looked for Pip when she disappeared.

It wasn’t Steph. Naomi appeared in the hallway, a hand raised in a small wave.

Pip didn’t think she’d be here, she hadn’t planned on Naomi being here. But it was OK, now she thought about it; Naomi was one of them, intertwined in this same full circle. If Cara was a sister, then Naomi was too. And Pip couldn’t not involve her now; the plan shifted and adapted to take in one more person.

Cara hadn’t seen her sister.

‘What the fuck are you talking about, Pip?’ she said urgently.

‘I just said, I can’t tell you. I can never tell you.’

They were interrupted, not by Naomi, but by a high-pitched, 8-bit ringtone, coming from Pip’s front pocket.

Her eyes widened, and so did Cara’s.

‘Sorry, I have to take this,’ Pip said, reaching for the burner phone to accept the call. She turned her back on Cara and lifted the small phone to her ear.

‘Hey,’ she said.

‘Hey, it’s me,’ said Connor’s voice down the other end.

‘Everything OK?’ Pip asked him, and she could hear Naomi behind her, asking Cara what the fuck was going on.

‘Yes. All good,’ Connor said, slightly breathless. ‘Jamie’s driving us to Wycombe now. The phone is in place, behind that first rock. We didn’t go in the gate, didn’t even look. All good.’

‘Thank you,’ Pip said, her chest releasing slightly. ‘Thank you, Co—’ She almost said his name, stopping herself before it was too late with a glance up at Cara and Naomi. They shouldn’t know who else was involved, that kept them safer. All of them. ‘This is the last time we talk about this. It never happened, understand? Never mention it: not on the phone, not in texts, not even to each other. Never.’

‘I know, bu—’