The Puppet Master Page 3

  As he rounded the corner, he heard taunting laughter. In the distance, he saw a young lad, track-suited up on a push bike, flanked by two other similarly track-suited lads. The three youths were bearing down on Billie. Even from this distance he could see she was shaking and terrified. There was no way around the boys, and they looked like all their Christmases had come at once. For a moment, Adam felt a flicker of delight that she was going to get what was coming to her. But then one of the goons stepped forward and roughly grabbed her by the arms. He saw the lad holding her throw her to the floor, her body slammed to the ground. Before he knew what he was doing, he was running towards them. He yelled out, hoping to scare them off. At the same time, the one on the bike was about to run her over with his wheel. He knew he wasn’t going to get to her in time and in a moment of crazed desperation Adam took off his shoe and threw it towards the boy, hoping to distract him. It didn’t work. He raced over to her. It turns out hoping for someone to suffer and seeing it occur so violently were not the same.

  Billie

  “Can you get up?” he asked. She wasn’t sure. Her body throbbed with pain. She carefully eased herself up to a sitting position. He was sitting on his knees, his dark blue jeans covered in dirt from the path. It looked like he was wearing the same clothes as last time she saw him.

  “Are you hurt? Should I call an ambulance? I saw that idiot drive over you on his bike.”

  “I don’t know… everything hurts.” She moved and tried to get up, after a few seconds her legs gave away and she fell. Strong hands caught her around her waist, gently lowering her back down to the floor.

  “Woah. Slow down.”

  “I’m fine. I just want to go home.”

  “Okay, that’s fine. Just let me help you.”

  “No!” she shouted at him. She was in shock and hurt, but even that didn’t stop her from realising that it would be a terrible mistake for him to help her home. What was he even doing here? Of all the people to be in this park and helping her. It was too much of a coincidence. “I don’t need your help. I will be okay. Thank you. You’ve done enough.”

  His pale green eyes stared earnestly into hers. “I won’t hurt you,” he said. The sincerity was evident in his eyes, but she must have still looked dubious as he continued, “You need to call the police. We should do it here. But you might be more comfortable doing that from home. If you don’t want me to help you back, then I will call the police myself, and they can take you. Either way, you can’t be alone. I’m sure those yobs are long gone, but it’s not worth the risk.”

  His tone was stubborn and forceful as he spoke. She would not call the police. She didn’t trust them and speaking with them would unlock a door to memories that were scarier than the thought of this strange man taking her home. She just needed to get home and convince him that she was okay. Then she could shut the world out again.

  “Don’t call the police yet. I just want to go home.”

  “Will you let me help you?”

  “Yes.” It was the hardest word she’d ever said. Letting someone into her home. It was a terrifying prospect.

  She must have been freezing as she could feel the warmth from his body as he wrapped his arms around her and gently brought her to her feet. He went to carry her, but she drew the line there. Instead, she hobbled next to him. She winced as she felt her jeans rubbing against the myriad of scratches she must have around her legs and waist. The man had his arm underneath her shoulders, and she had her arm on his, using him for support. She could feel the muscles rippling in his arm. She blushed at the intimacy. It had been a long time since she had last voluntarily touched a man – touched anyone for that matter. He was so careful with her, his attentive gaze caught every wince that signalled she needed to stop to catch her breath. She was lucky that he had shown up to help her really as she would have taken hours to get home alone. However, she still needed to find out if this was the world’s biggest coincidence or not. She had a feeling that it was not. She was letting him help her, but she didn’t know the first thing about him.

  “I don’t know your name,” she said.

  “Adam.” He didn’t look like an Adam. “Am I allowed to know yours? I don’t think you’re in a state to run off this time.” He smiled at the blush on her face as she recalled her pathetic attempt to do a runner when he had asked her name.

  “Sorry about that. My name’s Billie,” she admitted reluctantly.

  “Hmm… I prefer crazy non-phone lady, but I’m sure there will be lots of people with that name, so you’re right, Billie is better.” She chuckled at his attempt at humour. He said the strangest things. She noted that he had dropped the word ‘beautiful’ like he had said last time. He must be very perceptive to realise that was what had made her leave. She didn’t know how that made her feel. She was about to ask him what he was doing in the park, but his bright red sock with footballs on caught her attention.

  “Where is your shoe?” she said. He looked down at his feet and sighed.

  “Oh yeah, I threw it at those chavs. I thought it would scare them away. But I have lousy aim and it went straight into the lake.” He didn’t look remotely abashed to be walking around with one shoe, or that he had tried to throw it at someone, he merely smiled at her. She bit down the laughter that was trying to escape. He stopped at a crossroads and was waiting patiently for her to tell him which way to go. She cringed when the grubby white block of flats came into view. She wanted to tell him that it looked better on the inside, but he would see soon enough. She had to lean on him heavily on the way up the steps to her flat. She was shivering badly from the cold, the side of her body that pressed against him tried desperately to leech his heat, but it wasn’t enough. Now that the shock was wearing off she was becoming more aware of her injuries. She had her hand beneath her dark blue raincoat and under her plain white T-shirt, holding onto her side, though it did nothing to ease the pain.

  She finally motioned for them to stop at her door. A brass number ten was the only feature of the scuffed dark green door. She gasped when she realised that she didn’t have her bags. As if reading her mind, Adam passed her the handbag he had been holding on his wrist. She could see the white bag of books as well. How had she not noticed before? It was odd to have someone helping her, looking out for her. The whole day had been awful, weird, and strange. She wanted tomorrow to start already.

  She swayed a bit as she rummaged in her handbag and his arm moved from her shoulder to around her waist to hold her up. Her heart thumped like trampling elephants in her ears at the feel of his hand on her waist. She was so scared of him, but she also felt safe with him. How dangerous could a man with one shoe be? Maybe when she’d been thrown to the floor, she’d hit her head and her common sense had been knocked out. She found her keys and opened the door, and they both walked into the flat. Although Billie was relieved that she was a relatively tidy person, she still felt embarrassed as he took in the studio flat. Her whole world was this room. Her safety net. She had never let anyone in this space before – except Mrs Kaye, but then she never asked for permission. It rankled that Adam was here. Adam. He really didn’t look like an Adam.

  Her cat looked around from his position, swinging like George of the Jungle from her curtains; deciding he’d greet them, he abseiled down with his claws. She cringed as he gauged new holes into the cream curtains. When Adam didn’t comment on the fact her entire house was in one room apart from the bathroom, she moved over to the bed. She thought about the armchair, but she was so exhausted from the tumult of emotions she had just gone through that she couldn’t resist it.

  “Have you got a medical kit?”

  “I don’t think I need one.” She lay down on the bed and closed her eyes. “I just need to sleep. I feel like I’ve been hit by a bus.”

  Adam went red and fidgeted but eventually voiced what it was he wanted to say.

  “We need to be one hundred per cent sure. I don’t want to have wasted a perfectly good shoe.” She didn’t ha
ve the strength to argue and maybe, after all this time, she wanted to be looked after. He took her silence as an agreement, and moved over to her. He knelt down beside the bed. She didn’t stop him as he slowly lifted her top until he got to the huge red mark that the bike wheel had left on her side, it was already beginning to swell and bruise. There were a few cuts where the wheel had twisted her skin and a small amount of blood still seeped from the cuts. There was a fury burning in his eyes that warmed her heart. He barely knew her, but he had shown more care for her than any of her family had. She could feel her emotional barriers, wilting under his compassion. She knew more than anyone that men could make you feel like the centre of their universe and then throw you away once they had gotten what they needed from you. The logical part of her brain was insisting that this was Adam’s agenda, and he was no different, but at that moment she was couldn’t believe it.

  “I don’t think you have broken anything.” He got up to go the bathroom and came back with a wet flannel to clean up the blood. He gently washed her side with a tenderness that she had never experienced in her life. Once finished he lowered her top and sat back on his knees. “Can I get you some painkillers or something?”

  “I can’t have any.” He shot her a concerned look and she added, “I’ll be okay.”

  “Why can’t you? Allergies?” Relieved that he answered for her, she agreed and then lay back on the bed. Trying not to show the pain she was feeling. She knew that she would need to clean up her legs too, but there was no way that she was doing that in front of him.

  Adam brought his phone out of his pocket and passed it to her. “You need to call the police.” She couldn’t face sitting up so she reached out to take the phone but she had no intention of using it. While she weighed up what she could say to convince him, she couldn’t help but notice how the locks of unruly blonde hair that had fallen onto his forehead augmented his handsome features. Why did someone like him even care what happened to someone like her? She was a nobody. Maybe it wasn’t even about her. Maybe he was just one of those good people that she had read about but had yet to meet. Maybe she was reading too much into things. She just needed to get him out of here, and then her life could go back to normal.

  “I don’t want to call the police. Nothing happened, you stopped it. I can’t even remember what they looked like. There is nothing that they would be able to do. I just need to be more careful and sensible in future. Thank you for all your help, but I just need to rest now.” She closed her eyes, praying he would take the hint. She tried to regulate her breathing so it looked like she was going to sleep. There was no noise or movement from Adam. It was so hard to breathe normally when she knew he was watching her. But she wasn’t brave enough to ask him to leave again. She didn’t want to anger or upset him, not when he had been so kind. She wanted to turn over on her side and face the wall, but the pain her side was only getting worse, and she knew that would just aggravate it.

  After an age, she heard Adam get to his feet. She felt his breath before his lips brushed across her forehead. The gesture both warmed her and terrified her. She heard the front door close. She released her breath.

  Now that he had left she got undressed and assessed the damage, just a few scrapes and bruises on her legs too. If she ever needed proof that the world was dangerous and that keeping her limited routine was the only way to stay safe, then it was written all over her body. She focussed on cleaning up her legs with some antiseptic and not on how much she felt his absence. Reminding herself that although she was grateful to Adam for helping her, she still hadn’t asked him what he was doing in the park in the first place. She needed to make sure she didn’t see him again. After all, it was her first meeting with him that had set off this disastrous chain of events. A small voice whispered that she’d seen her body in worse states than this, though.

  Diary Entry

  My fury at her has intensified. I can barely contain it when I am near her. When I’m not near her, her image is woven in everything I look at. She is causing me to lose control. I can’t have it. My need to cause her pain escalated when I saw the spring in her step as she walked from a bookshop. The evil in me reared at the sight of her. She is a liar! She needs to pay! Before I knew what I was doing, I headed over to three teenagers, their sneering jeers at me changed when they caught sight of the money I had in my hand. I followed stealthily behind them and watched with pleasure as the bitch was stopped by them. They were enjoying it so much I wondered if they’d have done it for free. I breathed in the intoxicating sight of her fear. I watched with pleasure as her face paled and her body began to tremble. That’s more like it. I wished it could be me doing it, but it was too soon for that. I wasn’t done making her suffer, yet. When she saw me, I’d make sure it was the last thing she saw. As one of the kids pushed her towards the floor, I turned and walked away. Oh look at that, there’s a spring in my step now.

  Chapter Three

  Adam

  Adam stood outside the door of Billie’s flat. He stared at the number ten intently; as if it could tell him all he needed to know. Maybe it was just male hormones that had kicked in and forced him to protect Billie. What happened today felt like a dream. He was sure if it had been any other vulnerable girl he would have felt the same fury. When he’d got to her, she was on the ground weak and broken and it was horrible to see. It made it hard to believe that she was capable of the destruction he knew she had caused. Picking her up off the floor, he was furious with those kids for taking advantage of a defenceless girl, but he was also angry with her for ruining his straightforward plan. He was worried that he actually might end up caring for her. Once he was helping her home, it was so hard to remember who she was. He didn’t want to admit it, but she intrigued him. How could someone so evil come across so meek and mild? But even more than that, underneath that shy girl was a strength that surprised him. She had barely even cried, and she didn’t want his sympathy. Nothing he’d seen from her matched what he knew.

  He rubbed at his temple; the confusion was giving him a headache. He had gone to the phone shop after he had settled Billie in and bought a phone. It was nothing special, but it was a way for him to keep in touch with her. He just needed to concentrate on getting her story. In his head, he told himself that he needed to capitalise on her vulnerability before she had time to recover her mental defences towards him. Nothing like a knight in shining armour to weaken your resistance, after all. He placed the phone down in front of the door. He had clumsily wrapped it in some brown paper left over from a delivery. He walked away from the door repeating over and over again: she’s a home-wrecker, a liar, and evil. Do not be fooled!

  Billie

  Billie dragged herself out of bed, groaning at the pain coming from her side that was a map of cuts and bruises. She took longer than usual to get ready for work. Dragging her black uniform polo top over her head and easing into her plain black trousers.

  After the agony of bending over to put on her shoes on she hurried to make up the time she had to get ready for work. It was only a fifteen-minute walk, but she knew she would feel every second of it. She opened the door to leave and tripped, almost landing head first. She caught herself from falling and let out a grunt of agony. She turned to look at what had tried to kill her and saw that there was a box wrapped in brown paper. She stopped for a moment, foolishly considering whether it was a bomb. It was more likely than anything else because she never received any post apart from bills. No one knew where she lived. She crept towards the parcel slowly; irrational fear was making her heart pound in her ears as if she was standing next to a marching band. She picked it up and checked that it was in fact for her. It could have been put there by accident. But she was the only Billie in the building, and she could see her name scrawled on the brown paper. She wanted to just throw it away, as nothing good was going to be in it. But her common sense was overpowered by her curiosity. She tore off the paper and found the box with a smartphone inside. The screen was lit up inside the box
, it had already been opened. Still curious she opened the box and pulled out the phone. It was on the message screen. It read: Billie, don’t freak out, please have this phone – it was my old one. Just keep it on you for emergencies, or when you decide to go walking in the park. Adam.

  She didn’t know what to think, once again she was torn, her fear told her to toss the phone away, move house and start over somewhere else, safe away from people. But a small part of her wanted to smile at how caring this gesture was, he didn’t know her, but he cared about her safety. But she had been given presents and gifts and had fallen for the ‘I care about you’ line before, and it had nearly cost her life. So she went back inside and put the phone under her bed in a shoe box. She would throw it out later as she was now late for work.

  Nearly eight hours later, Billie was hunched up at her desk in the insanely overcrowded call centre. Her phone was wedged up under one elbow, and the computer mouse was under the other. This meant it took a certain amount of gymnastic skill to answer the phone and use the computer. They were too cheap to upgrade to headsets. Not that the phone ever rang that often. She stared into space, pretending that instead of working this menial job, she was a famous singer, letting all her emotions out through song and losing herself in the music and screams of her fans. She jumped when the phone rang, momentarily confused when it wasn’t her agent. In the cramped space, she took the customer’s order for what she thought was a boiler and then slumped back in her broken black chair that only had one armrest. She tried to remind herself that she was free and safe, and this boring, menial job was all part of keeping it that way.

  It was hard because when she escaped to university, she was convinced that she would have the world at her feet, but she was ruled by her fear. He had sworn he would find her. She had thought about leaving the country, but it was too scary a thought to seriously entertain. So, here she was selling boilers and other things she couldn’t remember because it was the only way she knew how to stay safe. After all, everything bad that had happened to her was her fault. Except her rather round physique – that was entirely the fault of whoever created chocolate. This was her lot in life, and compared to what her life had been, she knew she should be grateful. She shuddered, forced those thoughts back into the box they belonged in – using her ever ready compartmentalising skills.