Cut Adrift


 
 
 
 PRAISE FOR THE JEN SHAW SERIES
 ‘An original mystery… A promising debut’ – Sunday Times on On The Edge (A Best Crime Novel of October 2021)
 ‘This amazing debut novel from Jane Jesmond will give you all the thrills you’ve been looking for and keep you gripped from the get-go… We feel as though we have walked into the dark and stormy moors where this story takes place’ – Female First
 ‘A surprising story filled with twists and turns’ – Living North
 ‘A gripping premise, a well-executed plot and an evocative Cornish setting’ – NB Magazine
 ‘The thriller world has gained a compelling and seriously talented voice’ – Hannah Mary McKinnon 
 ‘Gritty, gripping, knotty, intense – this is going to be HUGE’ – Fiona Erskine, author of the Chemical Detective series
 ‘A beautifully atmospheric story that grips you from the start! Jesmond cleverly weaves a tale of intrigue and suspense – a talented new crime fiction writer. One to watch!’ – Louise Mumford, author of Sleepless
 ‘A high octane, no-holds-barred thriller. I couldn’t turn the pages fast enough!’ – Barbara Copperthwaite, author of The Girl in the Missing Poster
 ‘It literally had me on the edge from the word go. Tense, taut and thrilling’ – Lisa Hall, author of The Woman in the Woods
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 For Nikki 
 With all my love
 
 
 Prologue
 A Beach in Northern Libya
 Rania pushed a corner of the rug hiding her aside so she could watch the streetlights flash past through the car window above her. Uncle Eso drove faster now they’d left the stretch of road between Tripoli and Sabratha behind and were heading to Zuwara. She’d pull it back over her head if Uncle slowed down. 
 Aya, her younger sister, curled up in the other footwell, whined a complaint and wriggled until their mother stretched round from the passenger seat to pat the little girl and tell her to hush.
 Rania felt a moment of irritation. Aya should be used to travelling like this by now. They moved every week or so from one of Mama’s friends’ homes to another and every time they were crammed into a footwell or squashed in the boot. Anyway, Aya, at six years old, was half Rania’s size so she had nothing to complain about. Rania’s legs and body had suddenly elongated over the last few months and, although Uncle Eso had done his best, cutting away the underneath of the rear seat to make more room for them both, Rania was cramped and hot. Her legs ached from keeping still and her skin was scratchy with the ever-present sand on the rubber mat that crept into every fold of her body. She shifted. The comfort of a change of position was good even if it never lasted for long. Except now her phone, shoved in her pocket, dug into her narrow hips. 
 For a moment she considered pulling it out, then stopped herself. What would be the point? Her mother had removed the sim card the night everything changed. She couldn’t message her friends or play Fortnite or do anything except listen to the music she’d already downloaded. 
 Maybe she should do that. Because she could feel tears prickling behind her eyes as sharp as the sand that had worked its way up the cuffs of her blouse and into the crease of her elbow. When you couldn’t move or make a noise, crying was tricky. She hated it when her nose ran over her face and onto whichever part of her body she was lying on. Thinking about the night everything changed always made her cry but she couldn’t stop the memory unrolling. 
 She and Aya had been staying with her grandparents, while her parents were away on one of their trips. Mama had returned early and unexpectedly – and alone – with her arm in plaster and a look Rania had never seen before. Empty and distant, as though someone had peeled the skin off her face and stuck it on a robot.
 Rania’s nose filled and her mouth trembled. She’d have to listen to music and let the beat clean everything out of her head. But Uncle Eso barked as soon as she twisted round to get her phone, so she had no choice but to lie there and remember. 
 ‘We’re leaving,’ Mama had said, when Rania and Aya hurtled out of Jidda’s kitchen at the sound of her voice. ‘No! Don’t hug me. My arm is broken. Rania, go to your bedroom and take Aya. You must pack a few things together. Just clothes. Only as much as you can fit in your backpacks. And quickly.’
 ‘Nahla –’ Jidda protested.
 ‘Go, Rania.’
 Something about Mama’s tone made her do exactly as she was told. 
 When she started back downstairs, Mama and Jidda were talking in urgent whispers in the kitchen. She stopped to listen.
 ‘Leave the girls here,’ Jidda was saying. ‘Your father and I will look after them. You know that.’
 ‘No. They must come with me.’
 ‘But their schooling, Nahla? Their friends?’
 ‘No. They’re not safe. They will be pawns in a game you don’t understand.’ Her mother’s frantic tone frightened Rania. Mama’s voice was normally soft and gentle even when her actual words were tough and uncompromising. 
 ‘This will pass,’ her grandmother went on. ‘If you lie low, people will forget.’
 ‘They are not going to forget.’
 ‘I told you no good would come of messing with politics. But you would only listen to Ibrahim. See where it has brought you. You are a woman on her own. Rania is twelve and Aya is six. What kind of life are you taking them into? They will be safer with us. Your father is not without influence here in Tripoli.’
 ‘I say again, Umi, you don’t understand. They aren’t safe.’
 Rania’s brain tried to make sense of