The last vestige of hope left Belle then. It was no good. Nothing she could say or do was going to stop this. She knelt there in the dirt, the chickens pecking all around her, and felt a weird sense of peace come over her, nearly stifling the panic. Slowly, she put her hands behind her head. She closed her eyes.

Game over.

‘That’s it, Belle. Easy now and we’ll soon be—’

But Ludo never finished his sentence.

132

There was an explosive boom that rocked Belle as she knelt there. She yelled out and her ears rang with the force of it. Half afraid to, she opened her eyes and looked around, craning wildly to see behind her, her hands dropping to her sides. All the chickens had scattered, shrieking.

Maybe that was it, she thought. Maybe I’m dead and I just don’t know it yet.

What she saw was shocking. Slipping and sliding amid the slime from the broken eggs, she staggered to her feet, trembling, shattered, and properly looked.

Ludo was on the ground – or what was left of him. Above his designer shirt with its sharp two-toned collar, above the gold glint of chains at his throat, there was just a red, seeping hole. There was only blood and grey gore in a long slick where Ludo’s head had been. And Jack was standing over him, holding the smoking twelve-bore that his mum kept for foxes.

As Belle stood there watching, starting to shake with reaction, Jack bent and snatched up the pistol from Ludo’s hand. Then he straightened, looking all around.

‘Any more of them?’ he asked her.

Belle shook her head. But Trix’s bark, cut off. She worked some spit into her mouth and said faintly: ‘He usually works in a pair. Nipper. Tall blond—’

Then she was grabbed from behind. She felt cold steel bite against her throat and she was held up, feet barely touching the ground. Nipper. He was right there. His grip threatened to choke her.

His voice said, right by her ear: ‘Drop those fucking guns or I’ll cut her.’

Jack stared at him.

‘I said, do it,’ roared Nipper. Belle flinched and felt the steel press harder into her neck. He’d do it. She knew he would. They’d come here to kill her, to finish the job Harlan started.

Jack dropped the twelve-bore onto the ground with a thud. At the same time he lifted the snub-nosed automatic and calmly shot Nipper in the head.

Nipper collapsed to the earth, dragging Belle with him.