Later, we sit in Ronan's room holding take away hot chocolate and cake from the Hatter. Chickpea is balancing on my shoulder, ruffling her yellowy-brown feathers and nibbling my ear. I wince lightly.

"So, this is your house." Hannah comments. "It's a good thing your parents are out."

"Are you two going to tell us the story or not?" Rose asks. She reaches down and scratches Felix between the ears.

"Story?" says Ronan blankly, glancing at me. I shrug, then comprehension dawns on me as Rose gestures to Ronan's arm. He follows her gaze. "Oh."

"Yeah, Emma knows everything-"
"I know about as much as you two-"
"-so we should get to know as well."
"I'll tell you exactly what I told Emma; I have old enemies."

Rose looks mad as she finishes her hot chocolate. "You can do better than that Ronan, this isn't just an old school friend's fight. This is something the police should be investigating."

Before either Hannah or I can speak Ronan whips a small blade out of his pillow and presses it against Rose's throat. "If the police find out anything, you die. Do not thinking I'm bluffing, I'm a wanted man."

"There, now we know some things." Hannah sounds triumphant. "Emma pass me your phone."

"Emma, don't pass her your phone." Ronan says instantly. The colour drains from his face as he puts the knife away.

"I'm not giving either of you my phone." I retort, opening up Google. With barely moving fingers I type in Ronan Caninamara.

No results found. Google tells me urgently. I pause for a second, then put in Ronan Tang.

"No." Ronan's voice is barely more than a whimper, and he makes a strangled sound as if everything is falling apart around him. "Please. Don't."

"It's four- melon-farming -thirty!" shrieks Rose, looking at Ronan's clock. We all leap to our feet and scrabble to ins our things. "We should have been home an hour ago!"

Chickpea chirps next to my ear as I pass her quickly to Ronan. He looks stunned. "Guys, wait-"

But the three of us are running now, out the door, past a bewildered looking Tara as she walks up the driveway, down the street and onto the main road. We part our separate ways and I run as fast as possible towards my house. I can see mum sitting in the yard with a pair of garden shears. I fling myself at the front door.

"Sorry I'm late, I got caught up in schoolwork." I gabble. My phone dings urgently in my pocket, again and again, but I ignore it. Mum slowly lowers the shears and stands up.

"Emma." She says calmly. "It's quarter past two. Why aren't you in school?"

I freeze and very slowly pull my phone out of my pocket. There's the same text from Ronan, a thousand times. MY CLOCK IS FAST DO NOT GO HOME.

Mum looks at me, waiting for an answer. Unable to come up with one, I smile and race into my room. "Emma you're grounded!" She yells furiously, but I've already slammed the door. Grounded, I text into a group chat.

My mum's used to it, I'm fine Hannah says.
I can't see you three psychos for a week. Rose complains.
I think Tara might put me back in foster care. says Ronan. Why didn't you idiots read your texts??
We were kind of busy trying not to be late home. I can almost feel the sarcasm in Hannah's writing.
Well I should go. Things to do. I leave the chat abruptly and open back onto te Internet.

The words are still there, exactly as I left them when we escaped from the Caninamara's. There are four searches for Ronan Tang

"Yes, tell me the searches." I whisper, and click on an article. It's a page out of an old newspaper. People have left their own opinions underneath it.
Tang deserves to rot in hell, there's no excuse for what he did.
I just wish I knew why he would do that.
Personally I think he lost his mind, or was drunk.

I shudder and start reading the article.

Ronan Tang: The Missing Murderer
Ronan Tang has been missing now for two years. The young boy was just thirteen when he heard of a family heirloom worth, to him at least, more than his actual family. Though it has been years since the incident, police are still searching and are as baffled as ever.
"I don't know what came over him." Says police chief Wilkerson. "From what we could get from his friends and teachers at school, Tang found out about a priceless object within the family and wanted it for himself. His mother was found in her bedroom with lover David Moreover, both had been shot and stabbed five times to the stomach area."

"Oh my god." I cover my mouth with one hand. Someone knocks on the door, and Alex pokes his was in.

"What are you doing?"

"Homework, go away." I snap, slamming the door. My brother's laughter echoes as he runs down the hall. My phone beeps then, and I glance down to see a message from the murderer himself.

You didn't think I thought you'd forgotten about me being wanted? I know you're reading that old article, and I want you to know that everything there is a lie.

I don't answer, and exit out of the site. A priceless family heirloom? It has to be the thing the gangsters were looking for in the house. I put Google back up and type Tang family heirloom.

The newspaper comes up again and I scroll past it. There's a funeral site with an entire page dedicated to Kara Tang and David Moreover. Nothing about any object that Ronan would kill for. I start flicking through sites and chatrooms and videos as if in a dream. Ronan texts me again and I open it.

Please.

I stare blankly at my phone for about five seconds. Then in one swift movement, I toss it on my desk and fling myself face first on the bed.