Read Online Saving Sophia by Fleur Hitchcock - Free Book Online

outside.
    “What was her name? Before he made her change it?”
    “Isadora.”
    “Isadora what?”
    “Oh. Fonseca.”
    “Fonseca?” I say. “But yours is Formosa.”
    “Yes – they’re different. I’m named after my father – he was a Spanish sea captain. Died in a tsunami. Unless he’s still alive on a desert island somewhere— What’s that noise? Outside?”
    Something else crunches outside the boat – either that or the same lobster’s found another crab – or do crabs eat lobsters? Or do cockroaches eat both?
    We sit stock still. I listen intently until it feels like my ears are going to burst.
    It sounds like two lobsters now. Really big ones.
    “Heloooooooo! Girls!”
    And someone pulls the boat off from over our heads.

The uninvited guest
    It’s Ned. And I can’t work out if I’m glad or furious. While I’m still thinking about it, he snuggles down under the side of the boat and starts talking.
    “Need to hide from the helicopters – have they been this far along the coast?” He shines his torch in my eyes.
    “Ned! Torch!” I squeal.
    “Oh – sorry. But did you see the crash? I sank the Wesson woman with one blow – she’s totally rubbish at steering – but the noise was spectacular, and I did think I might possibly have drownedher, but the course leader dived in to get her out, although she was already out, so they were both wet by then – and,” Ned coughs, “really cross. Anyway, the motorboat rescued her, Miss Sackbutt told me off which was like being told off by a bathmat, and it took them all that time to work out that you two had gone, and only I had seen which direction you went in.”
    “But how did you know we wanted to escape?” asks Sophia. “Sorry,
I
wanted to escape.”
    “I didn’t. It was a complete accident. I was watching a cormorant landing on a buoy, and I hit Wesson. She’s not very lovely. She is here because of you, Sophia, isn’t she?”
    “Of course she is!” I snap, now feeling that my heroic stance is being eroded by the chivalrous actions of my unchivalrous brother. “So why are you here?”
    “I didn’t think you’d want to be on your own for ever. I mean, it’s not possible to be out here with only a wetsuit for very long. You can’t exactly buy anything, or ask for anything, or even hide, and at some point, your skin’ll fall off.”
    “What?” asks Sophia.
    “He’s probably right,” I say, reluctantly. “Awetsuit is like wearing a wet rubber glove. After a while, things get fetid.”
    “Eeeew,” says Sophia.
    “I knew it,” cheers Ned. “I knew she’d be an ‘Eeeew’ girl. Just like you.”
    “She’s not,” I say. “She lived in a flat full of rats.”
    “Oh, I heard that bit. Do you believe it?” Ned asks me as though Sophia’s not there, and starts pulling something out of his bag.
    “I do,” I say, reaching out my hand to grasp Sophia’s wrist in a gesture of solidarity.
    “Hmmm,” says Ned, chucking something at me.
    “What’s this?” I ask.
    “Clothes,” says Ned. “Out of the lost property box. And what about the bit about her mum being a singer?”
    “But she is,” says Sophia.
    I wriggle to reach the zip of the wetsuit. “What you don’t know is that Sophia thinks that Pinhead – Pinehead – wants to keep her away from her mum, so that he can steal her mum’s fortune.” I say it firmly, unpeeling the warm rubber suit and reaching for what appears to be a T-shirt.
    “Really?” says Ned. “Sounds like something out of one of your books, Lottie.”
    I thump him, and drag on some tracksuit bottoms.
    “But we don’t know she hasn’t made it all up, all the sea captain bit, the gun running, and the names,” says Ned.
    “What about Miss Wesson, then?” I say.
    “She might be exactly what Miss Sackbutt said, just someone hired by the school for extra security.”
    “But it’s all true…” mutters Sophia in the dark, her voice quiet but with a hint of a sob. She’s rustling. Pulling