Fatal Witness (Detective Erika Foster #7) (86)

The soft padding sound came again, and in the dim light she saw something small flex and leap down from the kitchen counter, and land on the floorboards with a soft thud. The light shining in through the hall caught George’s eyes with a glint of green in the darkness.

Erika felt relief that it wasn’t an intruder and she smiled.

‘What are you doing, you little shit? It’s three in the morning,’ she whispered.

George gave a loud miaow, and then batted at the floor with his paws before leaping back up onto the counter. Erika heard a squeak and a rustle and then there was a loud crash and a tinkle of glass. It was a mouse, that little monkey had brought in a mouse, she thought. She loved George, but the thought of a half-dead mouse, or a very much alive mouse, vanishing into the floorboards gave her the shivers.

She hurried down the hall towards the kitchen and was about to switch on the light when she felt the broken glass under her feet. It was too late to stop and she blundered into the pile of broken shards, feeling an agonising pain as a piece sank into the bottom of her right foot.

Erika cried out and stepped back, but stood on another piece. She found the light and switched it on. George was on the counter in a goose-stepping frenzy, clubbing at a mouse with his paws, sending more of the takeaway chip papers and a mug clattering to the floor. There was a creaking sound from upstairs and then Igor’s footsteps thudded across the floor above.

‘Erika!’ he shouted. ‘Are you okay?’

George leapt on the mouse, disembowelling it with his claw, and at the same time flinging it up in the air. Blood spattered over the window and Erika, uncharacteristically for her, screamed. Igor came crashing downstairs, and emerged around the bannister running stark naked towards her. He had his phone torch lit.

‘What is it? Are you okay?’ he said.

‘Stop! Careful! There’s a broken beer bottle on the floor!’ said Erika, trying to limp out of the pool of green shards. George had now finished with the dead mouse and he jumped down and looked up at them both, giving a miaow, as if to say, what are you both looking at?

Igor shone his torch down on the floor, and Erika saw the blood, a rather large amount of it, amongst the shards of glass and pooling under her foot. He put out his hand.

‘Come on, let’s get you out of this, I’ll clean up the glass,’ he said.

Erika turned and hopped out from the shards of broken green glass with her cut foot off the ground. ‘Watch out for George, he could cut his paws,’ she said, leaning on Igor’s arm and looking back.

‘He’s okay. He’s a smart pussy,’ said Igor, as George leapt clean over the glass and padded along the hallway after them. The pain in Erika’s foot was searing, but she laughed.

‘What?’ said Igor.

‘Sorry. I’m being immature.’

‘Are you laughing because I said pussy?’

‘I don’t know anyone who calls a cat that, apart from an old lady,’ she said as he helped her hop down the hallway.

‘I’m glad you find me funny,’ he said with a smile.

‘And you, running with no clothes on,’ said Erika, laughing even more. She limped to the stairs and Igor helped her to sit on the bottom step. He stared at her, looking at her dissolving into hysterics with a curious look on his face, which made her laugh even more. ‘It’s tough when a woman laughs at you when you’re naked,’ he said.

‘I’m not laughing at you… It’s just a funny situation.’

George and Igor waited patiently as she laughed some more, and then she saw her foot. There was a nasty curved slash on the bottom of her instep, about four inches in length, which gaped wetly with blood. Now she could see it, she stopped laughing and the pain was even worse. She gripped his arm.

‘That’s a nasty cut,’ he said, crouching down and examining it. ‘You should really go to hospital.’

‘No. Please, no hospital. It’s fine. I’ll bandage it up.’

‘Erika. It’s the bottom of your foot. There are big arteries there, and it’s a deep cut. We should get it checked out. I’ll take you. I should just put some clothes on first.’

Erika looked down at the yawning cut on the underside of her foot. The pool of blood was growing on the floor. Igor reappeared a moment later, dressed and carrying her clothes.

‘You really want to take me to the hospital?’ she asked.

‘Of course,’ he said. As he helped Erika on with her trousers, she felt so comfortable with him, like suddenly she wasn’t alone in the world anymore.

It was a scary thought to have, and she pushed it out of her mind.





57





Peterson arrived, bleary-eyed, at Lewisham Row the next morning. It was very cold, and even at 8am the day seemed to be struggling to get light, a blue twilight hue hung in the foggy air.

He hadn’t slept well, and as he grabbed his bag and the hot sausage rolls he’d bought from Greggs on his way in to work, he wanted nothing more than to go back to his comfy new bed with Fran. As he hurried across the car park towards the main entrance, a huge Argos delivery lorry pulled up to the barrier, and then came rumbling through. Next to the Argos logo on the side of the lorry was a huge garish photo of a smiling Father Christmas with his thumbs up.

It came to a stop at the main entrance, and a fit-looking young bloke with a beard climbed down from the cab and ran around to the passenger side. He opened the door, and Peterson was surprised to see Erika sitting in the passenger seat. The man half lifted her down, and she stepped gingerly onto the tarmac. Her right foot was bandaged, inside an ill-fitting flip-flop. The guy reached up into the cab and took out a pair of metal crutches, handing them to Erika.