All Fall Down: A gripping psychological thriller with a twist that will take your breath away (22 page)

F
rom the living room
, it sounded as though the ceiling had caved in. They heard the colossal crash, along with a bellowing cry of rage that could only have come from Gabriel.

Rob, who’d been steeling himself to cope with his daughter’s cries, had no idea what to make of this outburst. Among the followers, there was similar confusion. Ilsa gave a disgusted sigh, while Milo rolled his eyes. Lara had her back to them, hiding her reaction, and Kyle, who’d been ogling her body, turned away to hide a smirk.

‘He’s a madman, you know that,’ Rob said. ‘This is your chance to stop him.’

Kyle went to respond but Ilsa snapped, ‘Say nothing.’

From upstairs, they heard Gabriel shout, ‘Do it!’

‘Please,’ Wendy groaned. ‘We’re begging you. Don’t let him hurt her.’

‘Impossible,’ Milo said, and Ilsa added, ‘The Leader does what he pleases.’

‘Four against one, but you’re scared of him,’ Evan muttered, and for this he received a vicious, swiping kick from Kyle.

Then came more shouting from overhead. This time it wasn’t just Gabriel. The family shared grim smiles at the sound of Georgia’s voice; they knew that stroppy tone very well indeed. Rob felt a rush of pride that she was arguing back, though it was tinged with fear that she might push Gabriel too far.

Ilsa murmured to Lara: ‘We should get some rest, continue this tomorrow.’

‘I’ll stop when Gabriel wants to stop,’ Lara said coldly. ‘If you can’t handle it, maybe
you
should get some rest.’

Ilsa looked furious. Conscious of the family listening, she leaned closer and hissed what sounded like: ‘This is not going to plan.’

‘Don’t worry,’ Lara gloated. ‘She’ll be screaming her head off soon enough.’

But instead, there was only an ominous silence. After a couple of minutes, Lara made a huffing sound and marched out. Milo went to follow but Kyle grabbed his arm. ‘Let me go with her.’

When they were gone, Rob caught Ilsa’s eye and said, ‘You’re a lot smarter than your friends. I think you could bring this to an end, right now, if you wanted.’

Ilsa met his gaze, her expression merely cool, rather than hostile, and said, ‘It is not in my hands.’

F
or all his
size and power, and the way he bossed everyone around, Gabriel had just reacted like a toddler, throwing the toys out of his pram.

Afterwards, he seemed exhausted by it. He sat on the floor beside the bed, took half a dozen deep breaths, and then snarled at her: ‘Bitch.’

‘Wanker.’

‘This is a privilege, to spend time with me.’

‘Fuck off, is it? You’re a pig.’

Suddenly they were raging at each other, but it was more like an argument between siblings, neither of them moving, neither of them putting their words into action. Georgia had a good excuse – she was tied up – but Gabriel’s reluctance was harder to understand.

Except that he looked like shit.

‘I hope you’ve got Ebola,’ she taunted. ‘You’re gonna die with blood coming out of your eyes.’

It all stopped when they heard footsteps on the stairs. Gabriel climbed to his feet, jabbed a finger at her and said, ‘You shut up now.’

She wasn’t completely sure what he meant by that until Lara entered the room. She examined Georgia carefully, and can’t have missed the fact that her underwear was still in place. ‘Did you do it?’

He only made a noise – ‘Mmm’ – that could have meant anything.

‘Was she good?’

‘Not really.’

Lara pulled a face, like pretend disappointment; Georgia thought she looked secretly pleased. ‘Is it my turn now?’

‘No. I’m not done with her yet.’

Lara gently pulled Gabriel away from the bed and embraced him, burying her head in his stomach. ‘What’s wrong, Leader?’

Before he said anything, one of the others came in. It was Kyle, who reminded Georgia of a really snide boy at school – the type that caused trouble but always managed to blame someone else.

‘Everything okay?’ he asked.

Gabriel seemed to be in a daze, so Lara said, ‘We don’t need you here.’

Kyle ignored her, coming up to the bed and studying Georgia with a mixture of curiosity and lust.

‘If you want the family to suffer, they have to hear her screaming.’

Lara let go of Gabriel, and waited for him to respond. He looked as though he didn’t much care any more, but finally nodded.

‘I can make her scream,’ Lara said. ‘It’ll be a pleasure.’

From the way Kyle grinned, Georgia could see that he and Lara – even if they didn’t like each other much – were a bigger threat to her than Gabriel. The tricks she’d used on him weren’t going to work with these two.

But she couldn’t make things worse for Mum and Dad, or the twins. That mattered to her more than anything.

Kyle ran his greasy fingers across her stomach. ‘How much this hurts depends on you.’

‘I won’t do it.’

‘You will. You’ll howl with pain.’

‘No –
ahhh
.’ She let out a whispered groan as Lara grabbed her hair and pulled so savagely that a clump of it came out at the roots. It was agony. Georgia bit her lip until she realised she was drawing blood, then opened her mouth and gasped for air.

But she hadn’t screamed.

Lara wiped the hair from her hands and spat in Georgia’s face. Then she raked Georgia’s thigh with her fingernails, drawing blood in several places. Across the bed, Kyle made a noise in his throat; hungry, and desperate.

‘I want to have her now.’

‘No. Gabriel said not yet.’ Lara looked to him for confirmation, but Gabriel had wandered towards the doorway, and wasn’t listening.

‘I can touch her, though.’ Without waiting for an answer, Kyle thrust his hand between her legs. Georgia tried to make her muscles go rigid. She couldn’t help but express the shock and pain, but kept it to a low-pitched whine that wouldn’t travel far.

‘
Scream
, you little bitch!’ Lara went for Georgia’s mouth, just as she’d done earlier, but she wasn’t paying enough attention – Georgia whipped her head forward and managed to catch Lara’s forefinger between her teeth, biting down hard until she felt solid bone.

Now it was Lara who let out an earsplitting cry, falling back as blood spurted from the wound. Georgia braced herself for retaliation but Lara just ran out of the room, bawling her eyes out.

Pathetic
, Georgia thought, then became aware that Kyle was staring at her in horror. She tasted the coppery flavour on her tongue, touched her lips together and realised there was blood all round her mouth.

Georgia the Savage.

After some crashing in the bathroom, Lara returned with her finger wrapped in a tissue. ‘Can’t find disinfectant,’ she said, weeping in a self-pitying way.

‘Probably downstairs,’ Kyle said.

Cradling her hand, Lara whined, ‘She hurt me, Gabriel. We have to make her pay.’

‘I know.’

‘I want to be the one. When it’s time.’

He grunted. ‘All right.’

‘It was going to be Milo,’ Kyle reminded them.

Gabriel shrugged. ‘Let’s go down, do something else.’

‘But what about her punishment?’ Lara insisted.

‘Yeah, we’ll force her to listen instead.’

It took Lara a second to get his meaning. Then her eyes lit up. ‘The twins?’ she asked excitedly.

Gabriel nodded.

R
ob could get
nothing else out of Ilsa. As they waited to see what would happen next, the boys shifted closer to their mum and dad. Rob murmured something about Georgia’s strength, and Wendy knew he was encouraging them all to think positively. But it wasn’t enough to drown out the voice in her head, warning her to prepare for the end.

A screech of pain seemed to confirm her worst fears, but even as Wendy reacted she caught a frown from Rob and understood why he looked confused.

‘That’s not Georgia,’ Evan whispered, and Josh said, ‘It’s the overbred hippy chick.’

Sure enough, Milo muttered something to Ilsa, who merely shrugged, as if nothing more could surprise her tonight. From upstairs there were creaks and thumps, but no other raised voices. They could only wait, and hope; Rob and Josh immobile, Wendy and Evan rocking slightly, unconsciously working some of the tension from their bodies.

Then came a heavy tread on the stairs. Gabriel entered the room, still pale and bleary-eyed but a little more alert than earlier. Lara was with him, red-faced and gripping her forefinger, which was swathed in tissues.

‘Where’s your medical kit?’ she demanded. ‘Your
animal
of a daughter bit me.’

Good
, Wendy thought. But all she said was, ‘Look in the kitchen.’

‘You’d better not have hurt her,’ Rob said, and Wendy threw in another plea for the girl to be brought back down.

Gabriel shook his head. ‘I’ve not finished with her yet.’

Wendy kept her face impassive, but inside she was rejoicing that he’d confirmed one thing, at least.

She was alive. Whatever else had happened, Georgia was alive.

They heard sounds from the kitchen, and a minute later Kyle came in with a tray of drinks. ‘Black coffee,’ he told Gabriel. ‘This’ll help.’

Gabriel drank gratefully, and directed Milo and Ilsa to move the sofas to the far sides of the room, depositing Wendy on one and Rob on the other. Milo had the gun now, and he sat next to Rob. Ilsa stood between Wendy and the twins, who remained on the floor.

Once Lara had returned, her finger crudely bandaged, Gabriel gave the order to proceed. Kyle took out a vicious, narrow-bladed knife and knelt down behind Josh. As he cut the plastic ties, Josh groaned with relief and threw out his arms, causing Kyle to dodge back.

‘Stay still,’ Gabriel warned, as Kyle moved round and released Evan. But any thoughts of resistance ended when Milo jammed the gun into Rob’s side. ‘It’ll take a fraction of a second to pull the trigger,’ Gabriel added. ‘Remember that.’

Sighing, Wendy asked, ‘What do you want from us now?’

Gabriel glanced at Lara, content for her to reply on his behalf.

‘Entertainment,’ Lara said, with a gleeful smile. ‘Your boys are going to fight.’

W
hat they required was
an old-fashioned boxing match. A bare knuckle fight.

The twins were permitted to stand up and restore the circulation to their arms and legs. Gabriel, Lara and Kyle formed a loose perimeter at one end of the room, armed with knives.

‘A proper contest,’ Gabriel instructed them. ‘With real aggression.’

‘Impossible,’ said Rob. ‘They don’t hate each other.’

‘Neither do most boxers. It’s a question of incentives.’ Gabriel smiled at the twins. ‘To start with, how about. . . the loser gets his arm broken?’

Evan and Josh turned to Rob, plaintively appealing to their dad for answers in a way that neither of them had done for years. It shamed him to the core that he had nothing to offer, no advice to give. Whatever they did, it would mean punishment and pain.

‘Do it!’ Gabriel snapped.

With weary disdain, Josh removed the rings from his nose and ears and dropped them on the floor. Then he stuck out his chin and said, ‘You first.’

‘Wait!’ Lara cried, and Rob let out a sigh. Had they only been bluffing?

Then she said: ‘Take off your shirts.’

Reluctantly, they obeyed. As their audience settled down to watch, Rob felt Milo relax slightly; maybe, if his concentration wavered, Rob might get a chance to disarm him.

Evan finally swung a well-telegraphed punch, which Josh didn’t bother to parry. It caught him in the chest and he took a step back, not badly hurt but exaggerating.

‘Harder than that.’ Gabriel drained his mug of coffee and perched on the sofa, close to Wendy.

Josh went next, a slow one-two to the stomach which Evan instinctively tried to block, responding with a little flurry of his own. Both of them were still flat-footed, breathing normally, and Rob could see it wasn’t going to impress Gabriel or Lara.

‘It’s nearly half three in the morning,’ he said. ‘Why don’t we all just get some sleep?’

For a moment it looked as though Gabriel had some sympathy for the idea. Ilsa certainly did – she was yawning constantly, sipping at her coffee as if it were the only thing keeping her awake – but Lara glared at him. ‘They’re going to fight.’

‘It’s okay, Dad,’ Evan muttered. He and Josh exchanged a few more blows, and Rob saw the guilt, the silent apologies when one of them caught the other a little too forcefully.

‘They’re just playing,’ Kyle complained, and Gabriel agreed.

‘Raise the stakes,’ he said.

‘We’re fighting, aren’t we?’ Evan paused to rub his sore knuckles. Josh had a faint abrasion on his cheek, and his eyes were watering from a blow to the nose.

‘It’s not enough.’ Lara darted past them, grabbed Wendy around the neck and put the knife to her cheek. Pressing till the skin turned white beneath the blade, she marked a slow trail down to Wendy’s jaw, not quite drawing blood but close to it. . . so close.

The twins watched in horror, and Gabriel gave a nod of approval.

‘A proper fight,’ he said. ‘It’s either your blood – or hers.’

N
ow it was
Georgia’s turn to be eaten up with fear. Instead of celebrating the fact that she’d been left alone, her imagination was tormenting her with all kinds of ideas about what might be happening to her brothers.

Anything suggested by Lara had to be bad. With the exception of Gabriel, maybe, she thought that Lara was probably the nastiest of them – an evil witch, hiding behind the blonde hair and the blue eyes. Georgia hoped the bite wound went septic.

But there were other things to think about. She’d survived Gabriel’s first attempt to rape her. Next time she might not be so lucky. And being left alone was really important. It meant she had the best chance of any of them to escape.

‘Oh yeah,’ she muttered to herself. ‘Easy peasy. . .’

She stared at the ceiling and tried to think about it rationally. The handcuffs were too strong to snap or pull apart, and she’d tried yanking her hands out of them and couldn’t do it. Was she brave enough to break some bones, if that was the only option?

No. Not yet, anyway.

So, what else? How far could she move? The cuffs fed through the gap between the mattress and the headboard, and were connected to the bedframe. Georgia couldn’t move more than a few inches to one side or the other. She couldn’t move down the bed, and she couldn’t sit up. Hopeless.

Not quite.

‘I can go up.’ She said it out loud, wanting the idea to sound more positive than it felt inside her head.

Digging her heels into the mattress, she lifted her body and pushed backwards until her head was almost touching the headboard. That was metal, like the frame, but with leather padding on the front. Georgia rested, thinking hard, trying to imagine this was a puzzle. Like something from one of those maths lessons she’d hated so much.

She lifted her head and pushed again until she was beginning to sit up. It was painful, tipping her head forward, but now her arms were bent at the elbows, her hands level with her shoulders, and the handcuff chains were loose enough to allow for some movement.

Ignoring the burning pain in her neck, she wriggled on to her right side so at least she could see what she was doing. The cuff on her left hand was now pulled taut, but it meant she could push her right hand beneath the headboard. By twisting her wrist until it hurt, her fingertips were just able to brush against the frame.

The muscles in her neck and arms were screaming; to ease them she brought her hand up and gripped the bottom of the headboard, taking some of the weight off her upper back. But it wasn’t enough: gasping, she withdrew her hand, wriggled down and lay flat, having to accept that it was useless. She was at totally the wrong angle to reach the bedframe – and even if she could get hold of it, what good would that do?

One of her fingers was still throbbing; she looked and saw a trickle of blood. Must have caught it on a rough edge at the back of the headboard.
Great
.

It was a silly, niggling pain. Couldn’t clean it or dress it, couldn’t do anything about it – and wouldn’t it be bloody typical if
she
was the one that got blood poisoning, not Lara?

This worry occupied her for a minute or two, until another thought slowly wormed its way in. Caught it on what?

She took a few deep breaths, lifted and pushed, turned on her side and stuck her hand through the gap. This time the angle of her wrists made it easier to go up rather than down. Cautiously she patted her fingers against the back of the headboard until she found what had cut her finger.

It wasn’t a rough edge. It was something on one of the upright metal posts that fixed the headboard to the frame. A screw, by the feel of it, protruding slightly from the post.

The pain in her back was burning again, but she lived with it for a few more seconds. Pressed her fingers against the screw until she could visualise it, then pushed a little more. . .

And it moved.