Someone Who Isn't Me Danuta Kot (best books to read .TXT) 📖

again, scrambling to her feet. She dumped the keys next to his papers, knowing he wouldn’t look.

He pushed his chair away from the table a bit and patted his lap. ‘Tell you what, why don’t you stay here for a bit? Show me what you can do for your raise? It’s quiet, there’s no need for you to go right back out there.’

‘No. It’s getting busy. Toby’ll come through! I could… later. After we close!’

He looked put out. Becca felt her hands clench into fists, then – and the relief flooded through her – there was a tap on the door and Toby stuck his head round. ‘There you are,’ he said to Becca. ‘We’ve got a queue.’

‘I’m just coming.’ She looked at Carl and forced herself to smile again. ‘Later,’ she said.

Back behind the bar, her legs were still shaking. This was her last night at the pub, she knew that. She served drinks, getting the queue down, and suddenly it was quiet again.

‘I’ll just be back in a minute.’ She lifted the hatch and went through, leaving Toby behind the bar before he could protest.

She had to move fast, but everything hurt, slowing her down. She unlocked the cellar door and hobbled down the steps into the dim basement. Bottles gleamed from the shelves but she ignored them and went to the other room, to the cupboard in the wall.

She looked back up the steps. Nothing, and the door had shut behind her. OK.

She unlocked the cupboard door.

They were there, the holdalls, stuffed into a corner. She pulled one out a short way and tugged at the zip. It was jammed, and the more she pulled, the worse it seemed to stick. She felt sweat break out down her back, and forced herself to be calm.

The zip moved a short way. Pulling the fabric tight to keep it straight, she managed to open it a bit more, enough to get her phone inside.

OK.

She fumbled in her pockets and got out her phone, opening the camera. The flash would do it. Squeezing her phone through the gap, she took the picture, seeing the flash light up the inside of the bag. Right! She took several more shots to be on the safe side, pulled the phone out and shoved the bag back into the corner of the cupboard.

Then she heard the heavy tread of footsteps above her.

Carl. She was under the back room where he was working. It sounded as though he was coming towards the bar.

Quick! She took pictures of the holdall and packages from as many angles as she could, one after the other, no time to check, then she stuffed the phone back into her pocket.

She pushed the cupboard door shut, then went back up the steps, her stiffness making her clumsy, making her stumble and almost fall as she caught her shin on the stone riser. The pain made her eyes water. Then she was at the door. No time to mess around. She opened it a crack, slipped round and let it swing slowly shut behind her.

Carl came through the door into the bar area as she stood there, breathing fast.

She heard the slow whisper of the hinge above the door that stopped it slamming. The click as the door closed seemed to echo like a gunshot.

‘You OK, Becca?’ Carl was looking at her, frowning.

‘I’m fine,’ she managed. ‘Just…’ She hoped he’d think her breathlessness was because of what had happened earlier, and breathed more deeply to make her tits stand out. He noticed that and grinned appreciatively.

She felt dirty. ‘I’ll just get on.’

He looked straight at her. ‘I’ll be seeing you later. Toby, go and bring those crates in from the back.’

She ducked behind the bar. She had to talk to Toby. He’d started to say something, I’ll tell you something, though. I heard… but a punter had interrupted him. Carl kept his eyes on her as he wandered over to the games machines and checked the screens. It was like having a fly crawl over her.

‘Toby, what were you going to say, you know, before you served that guy?’

‘When?’

‘You know, about people saying he was dealing.’

‘Oh. Yeah. No, it was just that—’

‘Crates.’ Carl was right by the bar, looking at Toby. ‘OK? Now, not next week.’

Toby gave her an eye roll. ‘Tell you later,’ he said and vanished in the direction of the yard.

Keeping right away from Carl, who had come behind the bar and was checking the shelves, she served drinks and busied herself cleaning the bar and polishing the beer taps. She got the impression that Carl knew exactly how she felt, and was enjoying it, that he’d like making her do things for the extra money even more if he knew she was hating it.

She had to get the keys back to him. Her original plan had been to go into the back again and drop the cellar keys on the floor, as if they’d come off the bunch when they fell off the table. Now, she wasn’t going anywhere near that room. She couldn’t rely on Toby to interrupt them another time.

And the photos. She had to send them, even though her phone might be bugged. Curwen? She’d promised to help him, but he’d lied to her about Andy. Did that make a difference? What else could she do with the pictures? Dinah Mason? Dinah didn’t know all that stuff about the cellar. Curwen did. And Dinah seemed too… too nice.

Curwen was a shit. Sometimes, that was what you needed.

And he knew there was something going on here. It had to be him. He might be a creep, but he wanted to get the people who’d killed Andy. That was good enough for her.

She found his number, and pressed send. OK, the photos were gone. Then she dropped the keys on the floor behind the bar, near where Carl had been standing. It was the best she could do.

She didn’t have any more time to think about