DEATHLOOP by G. Brailey Read Free Book Online

in Hull.
    She used to ask Zack why he liked her, and all he would say was that she was odd and he liked odd. The pneumatic cleavage type of woman was not for him, which was just as well thought Susan, as she had nothing in that department at all.
    Zack used to drop into the organic juice bar where Susan worked just about every day. She was usually covered in fruit pulp when he turned up, early afternoon, asking for his pick-me-up, carrot juice, with ginseng and ginger was his favourite. He was always friendly, always polite, and always gave her a tip, very few people did that. Susan didn’t think much about him really, apart from acknowledging the fact that he was way out of her league, but one day when she was sweeping up, sweaty, sticky, with strawberry bits in her hair and ginger smeared across her cheek he came in and asked if she fancied a drink.
    Susan didn’t get it. “What kind of drink?” she said.
    “Any drink you like,” said Zack, “you’re the boss.”
    Susan presumed he wanted information, possibly the low down on the lease of the building which was up for sale, so she went along after work expecting nothing. She realised quite early on that it was a date, and thought she had blown it, she looked an absolute mess.
    Back at her rented studio flat in Stoke Newington, showered and spruced, she apologized, and kept on apologizing, until Zack told her to put a sock in it, it was no big deal. But to Susan everything about Zack was a big deal. He wore suits and worked in the city, and had a flash high rise apartment and a bank account in Nassau, and he was exquisite looking. What on earth did he see in her? He told Susan that he had always been attracted to arty girls, creative girls, oh and he loved her eyes too.
    “They’re too close together,” she said.
    “Technically,” said Zack, “but as your mouth is too big and your nose is too long - it kind of works.”
    Zack had done so much for Susan’s self-esteem, but now she wished she had never met him, because she’d become hooked. He was an addiction, and for her drug to be snatched away like this was the cruellest cut of all. She had heard that expression somewhere and now she knew what it meant. There was not one part of Susan that did not ache. The emotional hurt was one thing, the physical hurt was something else and totally unexpected. It had caused her to keel over twice that day and Zack Fortune had been entirely responsible. He must get off on this, she decided, scooping someone up from the gutter, making them believe that anything is possible then dropping them back down again from a great height.
    Susan opened the boot of her car and reached inside. Her father’s antiquated old jack lay there, solid, heavy, like it meant business, she struggled to lift it out with one hand, but closed the boot back down again and set off.
    Zack and Clarissa were still alone, still talking, heads together, so they did not see Susan cross the street and stand right up against the smoky grey window. But they did hear the smash as she slammed the jack against the plate glass, once, twice, three times, causing a sudden frosting to spread out, forming a network of small white lines, like veins on a leaf, right across the window until it was opaque, and then, with one more smash, a section of glass collapsed inwards as confused diners fled.
    Zack grabbed Clarissa and half carried, half dragged her back, but it was not an easy manoeuvre to extricate her from the heavy chair, the table. A couple of people, slow off the mark looked like they’d been caught in a snow storm. As it was, Clarissa’s hair managed to trap a fair selection of little glass daggers making her look as though she’d broken her halo.
    It took some time for people to grasp what had happened. Waiters stood rooted to the spot, not quite sure what to do.
    “Call the police. Has anyone called the police?”
    “Was it a car?”
    “It was a woman.”
    “Did she fall?”
    “A woman?”
    “She