Panic Button (2 page)

Jo winked at Dawn, putting a brave face on things. Her mother smiled back at her, eyes filled with love for her daughter and granddaughter. Jo watched them waving goodbye to her as her limo drove off down the street and turned the corner.

Dawn watched the limo disappear around the corner and looked down at her granddaughter. She had stopped waving and was already playing with the little pink mobile phone. Sophie was such a whiz with technology; it was beyond Dawn how her thumbs could press all those tiny buttons so fast. Only eight, but so sophisticated already. She would become a young woman in the blink of an eye, just as Jo had. It gave Dawn a swell of pride to know how far her daughter had come in such a short space of time. Theirs had been a rocky road, but now Jo was back from the brink. The change in her had had a knock on effect on Sophie too, for the better. The little girl who walked alongside Dawn now was a far cry from the sullen Sophie she’d known when Jo was in the midst of all her problems. For a while, Nanny had to function as mother to Sophie as well as to her own daughter. After much effort and strain, Jo was behaving like the best mum she could be to Sophie - meaning Dawn could enjoy being Nanny again. All their troubles were behind them now and they were a happy family again, Dawn felt sure of that.

They stepped through the front door and up the stairs, heading for the kitchen.

“Okay then missy, what about you and I do a bit of baking?”

Sophie grinned. “Fairy cakes?”

“If that’s what you want, love.”

“With extra butter cream?”

“Of course,” Dawn chuckled, smiling down at her granddaughter.

Sophie was playing with the phone, her little fingers conjuring electronic noises from the pink plastic casing.

“Nanny will save some so you can lick the mixing bowl though...”

As they passed the wall mirror, Dawn’s voice trailed off. She froze. A man was standing just a few feet behind her, his features hidden by a black balaclava. A grotesque grin was stitched across the
woollen
mouth. The man’s real lips, just visible through the jagged slit, tightened as he raised his gloved hand and pointed the heavy barrel of a silenced pistol straight at her.

Dawn felt her stomach lurch at the sight of the intruder in their home. A sick feeling crept over and into her body, as she stood there gripped by uncertainty about what to do next. Should she surrender to this man, ask him what he wanted? Or scream and lash out, knock the weapon from his hands?

She heard the phone’s casing crack open on the hard floor tiles as Sophie dropped it.

Sophie. Dawn’s lips formed a warning, but no sound would come.

The man raised the gun to Dawn’s head. She blinked, incredulous.

As she was thrown backwards, a crimson spray of bloody matter spattered across the kitchen wall.

Sophie screamed - her shrill little cry cut off by the leather-gloved hand.

Jo looked up as a jet plane screeched overhead. It had been so long since she’d gone to an airport she’d forgotten how noisy they were. The last time was her friend Jules’ hen party, and what a wild time that had been.
We were all slaughtered before we even got on the plane
, Jo remembered, feeling suddenly much older than her twenty-nine years. It had been a just over three years since she’d flown anywhere. She felt like a different person now.

The driver took Jo’s luggage from the boot and
placed
it at her feet. “Here
y’are
Miss.”

“Thanks.”

The limo driver climbed back inside and drove away. She looked down at her suitcase. It had taken forever to convince Sophie that Mummy didn’t need to take any of her dollies with her to New York. Not even Cowgirl Barbie who, according to her daughter, “Came from America and would like to go visit.”

The deep guilt she had felt for taking time off from parenting, and from her job at the call centre, had taken a while to wear off. Dawn had encouraged her to go, saying the change of scene would do her good - and how often did opportunities like a free VIP flight come up anyway? “You owe it to yourself, especially after all your hard work, after all you’ve been through,” Dawn had said, “It’ll be fun, just what you need right now.” Jo prayed she was right.

As she walked to Departures, Jo found herself fighting the urge to call her daughter, or to text and tell her she’d arrived at the airport. She stopped still in her tracks and pulled her mobile phone from her pocket, checking the little screen. No messages. Better to let Dawn get on with things, she’d only be reminding Sophie of her absence if she kept sending texts, and she hadn’t even checked in yet. She smiled, thinking about how Dawn must be spoiling Sophie to death already. Jo allowed herself a quick All2gthr.com status update before putting her phone away:

NY HERE I COME!’

She wished she could have told her sister
Maddie
about the prize flight. She’d sent her an excited email of course, but it had bounced back unread.
Maddie
simply didn’t ‘do’ the Internet - a source of much frustration for Jo, especially as her sibling had taken off on a backpacking trip around the globe. Well, Jo was the globetrotter now.

She refreshed the screen, beaming as several online friends within her social network expressed their approval at her status update. To her delight, a couple of her workmates had noticed.
They must be so jealous
, thought Jo, placing the phone back in her pocket. She stepped through the revolving doors, with a spring in her stride and luggage trailing behind her, into the bright lights and noise of the Departures hall.

The airport concourse was alive with activity. Crowds of people darted this way and that, rushing to catch their flights.
Tannoy
announcements echoed in Jo’s ears, telling
Mr
So-and-so and
Mrs
Such-and-such to go to their gates immediately as their flights were now boarding. Jo’s eyes lingered on a happy family, lining up at their check-in desk, kids decked out in their brightest summer holiday togs. With a pang, she saw the dad lift his daughter high into the air. The little girl giggled as he kissed and tickled her.

Jo didn’t miss Sophie’s dad, he was ancient history, but the sight of the happy family unit still made her feel melancholy. The mum caught Jo staring and frowned at her, looking her up and down. Jo turned away, embarrassed, and walked over to an information screen. She scanned the lines of info. There it was - ‘
Deppart
Airlines Flight D-665, All2gethr.com private charter’. Jo saw that check-in for the private charter flight was up on the second floor. She headed for the elevators; glad to be distancing
herself
from the happy laughter of the holidaying family ringing in her ears.

“Hi, Jo isn’t it?”

The soft, mellow voice startled her from her thoughts. She felt a little surprised to be
recognised
.

“Yeah... Who are you?”

“Max...”

The young man standing in front of her winked. He was in his mid-twenties, a little unkempt and wearing a floppy
woollen
hat.

“Max
Nichols
... Another winner?”

“Oh, right!”

Thanks to All2gethr, nobody was a stranger anymore; everyone was a ‘friend’, even if you’d never actually met them before. Jo smiled at Max, pleasantly surprised by his looks. His profile hadn’t included a picture when she’d followed the link from the winners’ email to check him out. Now she could put a face to the name.

Max gestured at her luggage. “Want a hand?”

“Thanks.”

They walked towards the elevators, Max with her suitcase, efficient as a bell-boy.

“So is anyone from All2gethr here?”

“Nope, nobody, all a bit weird. The other winners are here though, thought I’d keep an eye out for you.’

“That’s... very kind.”

“Here we go.” He pressed the call button and the elevator doors slid open with a
ding
.

Jo followed him inside the mirrored lift. He pushed the button for the second floor and grinned at her as the doors closed and the lift lurched upwards. Jo stole a glance at his reflection in the mirror as the lift halted and the doors swished open. Yeah, he was cute, in that doe-eyed student kind of way.

, she thought, smiling to herself.

They stepped out into a hospitality lounge, Jo’s eyes doing a one-eighty around the brightly lit room. A huge flat screen monitor took centre stage, displaying the familiar all2gethr.com logo, a blue spinning globe with an alligator wrapped around it. The creature was all bright green skin, mischievous orange eyes with black slits at their
centres
, and gleaming white teeth. Beneath the monitor sat a table stocked with champagne on ice and crystal flute glasses that gleamed under the bright lights. Plush designer seating and tall vases filled with white lilies flanked the table.

The occupants of the seats, a stocky guy and a blonde girl, stood up as Jo and Max approached them. They looked relieved at Jo’s arrival, a welcome distraction from an impasse in their strangers’ conversation.

Max beamed at them. “Hey guys, looks like we’ve got a full team - this is Jo.”

The stocky man stepped forward first, extending his hand in greeting, “Dave.”

He was in his late twenties and looked like a sportsman who had let
himself
go to seed a bit, with wide shoulders and the beginnings of a beer belly. His fair hair was thinning toward the back and he had grown his fringe a little long to compensate. The comb-over was held in place by a pair of Elvis-style aviator sunglasses. His stripy shirt was straight out of a lads’ magazine fashion column, his slight paunch spilling over the top of his jeans belt.

“Hello, I’m Gwen.” The blonde reached Jo first, leaving Dave momentarily stranded. She kissed Jo on each cheek, her lips glossy with pink lipstick. She smelled of something earthy, which Jo couldn’t quite place for a moment - sandalwood. The scent was in keeping with Gwen’s bohemian, ‘hippy chick’ wardrobe. She looked a good few years younger than Dave and dressed accordingly. She had a long silken scarf wrapped around her neck and her wrists jangled with dozens of bangles and charm bracelets.

“Nice to meet you,” Jo said.

“And you,” Dave echoed.

Dave had a winning smile and friendly, twinkling eyes. He still had his hand outstretched, and Jo reached out to shake it. He had one hell of a grip, squashing her fingers as he lunged in for an air kiss. His aftershave smelled musky and expensive.

“Can I have that back now?”

Dave looked confused.

“My hand?”

“Oh!” He chuckled,
apologising
profusely as he let go of her hand. Dave was genuinely pleased that Jo was along for the ride. She seemed like his kind of person, down-to-earth, unpretentious. He’d been doing his best to have a laugh with Gwen but was struggling a little with her hippy chick
demeanour
. Max seemed a bit on the quiet side to him, definitely not the sporting type. Jo looked like she could pull a pint or two, Dave thought, unconsciously eyeing the table filled with champagne and glasses.