Every Door Closed

Rated Mature: for readers 18 and over.

Mature · Complete · 17,499 words · 5 chapters

Warnings: Abuse

Tags: psychological thriller, suspense, domestic thriller, edinburgh, scotland, locksmith, dual pov, domestic abuse survivor, single mother, ticking clock

Lindsay Kinnear is the only woman on Edinburgh council's list of approved locksmiths, so she's the one they send when a woman needs a home a man can't get into. Hinge bolts. A viewer. A steel box behind the letterbox so nothing burning can come through. And, by Friday, a safe room.

Shannon Leask has run from Aberdeen to Dundee to a tenement in Gorgie with her six-year-old son, and she is done running. She keeps every door in the flat wedged open, because the man she left used to go round at night and close them.

Lindsay never asks about him. She doesn't need his name to keep him out.

She has five days to finish the room. She has no idea who's been carrying her doors.

Chapters

Chapter 1: Non-Destructive Entry (4,021 words) Monday in Gorgie: hinge bolts, a viewer, a fireproof letterbox, and the rule about doors.
Chapter 2: Keyed Alike (2,924 words) Tuesday: a charming husband in Morningside, a taxi at the school railings, a sound at night.
Chapter 3: No Sign of Forced Entry (3,034 words) Wednesday: Shannon comes home to her flat exactly as she left it, almost.
Chapter 4: Cut to Code (3,552 words) Thursday: Lindsay checks what her key machine remembers, and has dinner at home.
Chapter 5: Working Time (3,968 words) Friday, door day: forty-one kilos of solid core and a tenement stair full of neighbours.

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