‘Exactly.’ Georgie rolled her eyes and then smiled because, well, just because he was her gorgeous on-the-brink-of-becoming-a-nightmare pre-teen – she could see it now – but she adored him.
‘Okay, cool. I like cats.’ He put his coat back on. ‘Are we going now?’
‘Yep. Let’s go.’ She’d just have to be surreptitious and get him to play with the cats while she searched.
Forty minutes later they were inside the house, having successfully negotiated the Ring alarm.
Georgie looked around the hall appraisingly and then began to open doors. Where would Raf keep the envelope? Kitchen drawer? Bedroom? No. Study, if he had one?
‘Why are there video cameras everywhere?’ Max asked from behind her.
‘Oh, ha ha ha,’ Georgie said sarcastically, as she poked her head into a sitting room and spotted a bookcase with drawers in it. Maybe it would be in there.
‘Why is that funny?’ he asked.
Oh yes. Max didn’t knowthat video cameras everywhere would be her worst nightmare.
Which meant…Fuuuuuuck.
‘Are there actually?’ she said, whipping her head back out of the sitting room.
‘Yes, look.’ He pointed towards lots of little, white-boxed cameras in ceiling corners.
‘Oh.’ Georgie had seen a panic button inside the first door she’d opened, a walk-in cupboard near the front door. ‘This is Raf’s aunt’s house. She’s quite elderly and has recently had to move into a nursing home. Maybe her relatives had the cameras installed for her safety in case she had a fall. One of my friends at work did that for his elderly father.’
Solucky that Max had mentioned it. It wasn’t like Raf wouldwatch the videos – presumably – but at the same time, what if he did? She’d have to find out somehow whether there was any chance of that before she searched properly.
So frustrating.
The envelope had for a while been on a different continent, but now it was in the samehouseas her and she couldn’t look for it.
You could barely get a more classic case of so near and yet so far.
While she grappled with cat food – the tin was quite difficult to open – she thought through her options.
Maybe she could disable the video system.
No, she could not possibly do that.
Maybe she could… Well, her mind was blank.
‘Mum, would you like some help with that?’
She looked down. She’d been holding the tin and basically doing nothing with it for ages. ‘I think I’m okay, thank you.’ She gave the ring pull a yank and it came open.
Fifteen minutes later they were back in the car, and Georgie could barely sit still at the wheel, she was so annoyed.
The journey home was also very annoying. What waswrongwith other road users? Why couldn’t they drive remotely competently?
‘Mum, are you okay?’ Max asked, as she pulled into a parking space about three houses along from their flat and beeped at the idiotbehind her who apparently could not understand that a left indicator and reverse lights obviouslymeant that she had been about to park.
‘No, I am not.’ She beeped again. ‘Why can’t other people drive properly?’
‘Do you hate cats?’
‘No?’ She beeped for a third time.
‘You’ve been a bit angry ever since we were in Raf’s house.’
