by Beth Moran
Throw in a singing lesson from Hester, a custom-made outfit from Rosa, a technology masterclass from Uzma, and a set of children’s bobble hats, hand-knitted by Millie, and we were well on our way to reaching our target.
Eek. My turn next. Whatever the lot sold for had to cover the cost of the four-course meal I would cater, so it needed to be a decent bid or someone (me) would be out of pocket.
Hester did another grand introduction, nudging beyond embellishment, past exaggeration, and into plain fabrication a couple of times, but I guess it was all in a good cause. She finished off by mentioning my outstandingly awesome organizational skills, as demonstrated by planning the gala.
“Who’ll give me one hundred pounds for a fully catered dinner party for six, to start us off?”
An HCC committee member at the back raised her hand.
“One hundred and twenty!” called out another one.
And we were off.
A couple of minutes later, someone upped the bid to two hundred and fifty pounds if I made it for eight people and threw in party favours.
“Anyone else?” Hester barked.
There was a brief silence.
“I’ll give one thousand pounds if she organizes my daughter’s eighteenth birthday party.” Eddie, Perry’s partner, waved so we could see him.
Hester looked at me, eyebrows raised. “Faith?”
I sidled up to the microphone. “Um, will that include the cost of the party?”
Eddie shook his head. “No. Expenses are extra. The grand is for you.”
“Okay.” I nodded at Hester and stepped back, trying to appear nonchalant.
“What do you say, then? Any more? Who can top that?”
Nobody would top that. Eddie was Perry’s partner. Perry had probably offered to give him the money.
“One and a half if she can sort out my parents’ wedding anniversary without bloodshed,” a man on another table called out.
“My fiancé says he’ll give two if she can plan my wedding without sending him bankrupt,” a young woman in the corner joined in.
We were off again.
Hester had her gavel poised, on the second “going”, about to say “gone”, when a raspy voice called out, “Ten thousand.”
Everybody sucked in a deep breath. I knew this because when I saw who spoke, staring at me while raising his hand in a salute, I couldn’t find an ounce of oxygen left for me.
Without even bothering to ask what it was for, Hester slammed her gavel onto the wooden block. “Sold to the man at the back for ten thousand pounds!”
The crowd broke out into uproar.
I couldn’t hear any of it. I felt as though I wore a space helmet.
Hester had sold me for ten thousand pounds to the man who murdered my mother, ruined my life, and nearly destroyed my brother.
My brother. I clutched my chest, willing it to start working again, frantically searching the crowd with my eyes as the applause went on.
Where was Sam?
Chapter Twenty-three
I left the stage as quickly as I could without appearing conspicuous. Hester began calling everyone’s attention back for the final bid, and I took another moment to scan for Sam. Or Kane, who had vanished in the excitement.
Slipping along the outside of the room, I reached Perry’s table.
“Perry. Have you seen Sam or April?”
He swivelled slightly in his seat to look at me. My heart sank at his drooping eyelids and sloppy smile. “No. I’m talking to Eddie and Jones about your legendary cooking skills.”
“Right, well –”
“Say hello, Faith,” he said, the words spilling out on a wave of alcohol fumes.
“Pardon?”
“Say hello to Eddie and Jones.”
I gave them a tight smile. “Hi. Thanks for coming. But Perry, I really need to talk to you about Sam.”
He groaned, shaking his head. “I’m talking to Eddie and Jones at the moment. Sam’s better now. April’s looking after him.” He paused, slowing his speech down as though worn out. “Let it go, Faith, for one blessed night, can’t you?”
“Please. I need to speak to you for two minutes.” I put my hand on his arm, trying to suppress my panic.
“No!” He shook it off, clumsily. “Just for once let him take care of himself. He’s back five minutes and straight away retaken the number one spot in Faith’s affections. What about me? What about my needs and affections? I’m not interested in talking about your nutjob brother tonight.”
Eddie gripped Perry’s arm. “Steady on, man.” He looked at me in apology. “Ignore him. He’s a horrible drunk. He’ll feel wretched in the morning.”
I nodded, unable to speak, and left them, the sounds of the auction buzzing in the background as I hurried round to my own table near the far end of the hall. My eyes still hunting, pointlessly, in every direction.
Dylan stepped out from an alcove as I moved past, taking hold of my arm.
“That was him.” His smooth skin had turned white.
“I can’t find Sam.” My voice sounded hoarse.
“He left, about ten minutes ago.”
“By himself?”
“I don’t know.”
I turned to the two tables taken up by choir members, but couldn’t see April. The final bid had been sold, and the guests rose to their feet, applauding Hester as she thanked everybody for their generosity.
Dylan loosened his grip on my arm, sliding his hand down to squeeze my hand, briefly, before letting go. He led us through the crowd as he searched for April, pausing every now and then to ask somebody if they’d seen her, or the man who made the big bid.
By the time we reached the door, Marilyn had hustled round to join us.
“What’s happening?” she asked. “Is it Sam?”
“Possibly,” Dylan said, ushering us into the ballroom foyer. “Have you seen April?”
Marilyn looked at me. “When I nipped to the loo after your moment of glory she was talking with the guy who made the bid out here.”
Sensing my legs crumple, Dylan braced me with his arm. “Did you see what happened next? Where either of them went?”
Marilyn’s eyes were like saucers. She put one trembling hand up to her face. “They left out the front door. I thought she must know him. Who is he? What’s happened? Is April messing about with that old bloke? They looked pretty grim, to be honest.”
Gasping, I clutched at Dylan as if I was drowning. “Call the police.”
He’d already dialled the first two nines by the time I hit the floor.
As soon as I knew police cars with lights flashing and sirens wailing were speeding to Sam’s flat, I dragged myself up and stumbled outside, where the gusting downpour hit me like a slap.
Dylan came right behind me.
“Where’s your truck?”
“In the other car park. But Faith, I’ve had three beers. I can’t drive. Especially in this weather.”
I whipped around, grabbed the lapels of his jacket. “How long is it going to take the police to get to Houghton? You could get me there in six minutes. Less, if you break the speed limit.”
He shook his head, his eyes pleading with me. “No, Faith. What about Perry?”
“Perry’s been drinking a lot more than you. I don’t have time to explain to anyone else. Please, Dylan. I am begging you. Everyone else’s come in taxis. Put your moral principles to one side for six minutes. Drive me to Sam’s.”
He closed his eyes for a second, before shaking his head briefly. Then, pulling away, reached into his pocket. I breathed a whoosh of relief.
“No. I’m sorry.”
What?
“Here.” He threw something at me. Automatically I reached up my hand and caught it. His keys.
“You drive.”
“Do you want me to tell Perry what’s happening?” Marilyn had managed to gather something of the situation from hearing Dylan’s 999 call.
I paused for a tiny moment. Flashed bac
k to the ballroom. “Right now, I really don’t care.”
I ran to the truck. Clambered in. Dylan grabbed the magnetic learner plates out of the glove compartment and stuck them in the windows.
“Take it slowly now. If you reverse back in a straight line you can turn around by the trees.”
I looked at him, overwhelmed with panic. “I can’t. I can’t do this.”
He smiled. “Yeah you can. Remember that turning by Little Farm? It’s just like that. You could do it with your eyes closed.”
I shook my head, my hands shaking so hard I could barely grip the steering wheel.
Dylan kept on talking, his voice calm and steady. “You can do this, Faith. You can do this for Sam. Take a deep breath, blow out the fear or whatever it is Hester taught you. Breathe in.”
I let out a trembly breath, sucked in some courage, some strength, whatever the heck it was I needed to get this truck to my brother.
“Okay?” Dylan pulled on his seatbelt.
“Okay.” I let out a weak laugh. “Do you mind if I sing? It kind of helps.”
“As long as you don’t mind if I pray. That definitely helps.”
So, slowly at first, oh so carefully, I backed the truck out and swung it around. Picking up speed as we headed down the drive, I decided to ditch the singing and joined Dylan in praying instead.
When you think your brother’s life is at stake, a two-mile drive through a rainstorm is nothing, however inexperienced a driver you are. What you do when you reach him is another thing altogether. When I came to a juddering stop outside Sam’s flat, there were no police cars outside. The lights were on in the windows above our heads.
Dylan and I exchanged glances. I knew he wanted me to stay in the truck, or at the very least to stay behind him. He knew better than to tell me that. I did feel a moment’s reassurance that there were worse people I could be sprinting up the shabby staircase with than a Northern ex-gang member with God on his side.
As we rounded the top of the stairwell we could hear it. Thuds, scuffles, a deep rasping voice dripping with menace. My brother’s garbled cry. I burst in through the open door. Sam flailed against one wall, Kane’s vengeful hands around his throat.
Screaming, I leaped towards him. Strong arms pushed me aside. Dylan threw me onto the sofa as he moved in front of me. He called out. Kane tightened his grip. Sam’s face turned a hideous purple. His eyes bulged as his legs kicked and bucked against the wall. It must have been seconds – less than a second – before Dylan picked up a plant pot – a recent addition from April’s garden centre job – and smashed it into the back of Kane’s head. Kane dropped like a marionette with snapped strings. Sam slid to the floor behind him. I scrambled off the sofa and fell to his side.
That was how the police found us, a few minutes later.
Sam, choking and sobbing, cradled in my arms. Dylan with April, trying to assess the damage to her unconscious body, sprawled out by the fireplace.
Kane, motionless, a pool of blood as black as his heart creeping across the carpet. After all these years, all the phone calls, the middle of the night emergency visits, the job losses, the shopping, the cleaning, and the dropping everything to be there for Sam: after all this, I hadn’t been there when he really needed me. I hadn’t saved my brother.
My debt remained unpaid.
After a few hours and numerous tests, the doctors discharged Sam from hospital. Bruised, hoarse, battered, there was no physical damage time wouldn’t heal. A nurse brought me to his bay to help gather his things together – a ripped shirt, a box of painkillers, the loose change from his pockets. I took his hand, leading him out towards the exit, but he stopped a few paces down the corridor.
“April?”
“She’s been taken for a scan. They’ll keep her in tonight, at least.”
“I want to see her.” He turned back towards the direction we had come.
“We can’t see her now. The doctors are doing tests. We can come back first thing in the morning and see her then.”
He looked at me, and my insides withered at the dead light in his eyes. “I can’t leave her.”
“You’re no good to her hanging around here, Sam. The best thing you can do for April is go home, clean up, get some sleep, and visit her in the morning when she’s woken up.”
“I won’t leave her alone.”
Letting out a long sigh, I began tugging him in the direction of the waiting room.
“Look, Dylan’s down the hall. He can stay with April until we get back. And they’re trying to contact her mum, so she’ll be here soon, too.”
“She hates her mum. And she barely knows Dylan. He won’t protect her from Kane. He doesn’t get it.”
“Doesn’t get what? Kane is in another hospital under police guard. We don’t need protecting from Kane any more.”
Sam laughed, shaking his head. It sent chills through my bones.
We reached the waiting room, where Dylan sat in one corner, nursing a cup of brown sludge.
After another five minutes’ weary discussion, revealing the wreckage of Sam’s emotional state, we agreed a compromise. Dylan would take Sam back to his house. I would stay with April overnight, protecting her from both her mum and Kane.
Sam made me swear to watch April, to take care of her. He muttered something about how April would be better off without him, that he was the problem. I remembered those words from the day he had packed my bag for London. However, too exhausted to understand what they meant, now I hugged my brother and told him goodnight.
Why did I decide to trust someone else with my brother’s welfare at his weakest, most vulnerable moment?
I may keep asking myself that question until the day I die.
The cavalry arrived at nine the next day. I un-crunched my aching muscles, tried to wipe the sleep from my eyes, and accepted the freshly ground coffee, steaming doughnut, and warm embrace from Mags, Melody, and Rowan with gratitude that brought fresh tears to my eyes.
I had forbidden Marilyn from coming to the hospital, vowing to ditch her as my matron of honour if she left her husband’s side the day after his return.
I filled them in on the latest news, i.e. nothing. No one had managed to get hold of April’s mum, which may have been for the best. April remained in a stable but critical condition, accompanied by long words and medical jargon my brain had no capacity to comprehend at that moment.
“Come on, darling,” Melody clucked. “I’m taking you home.”
“Can you drop me off at Dylan’s instead? Sam’s there.”
“Of course. No problem.”
Only there was a problem. Sam was not there.
After banging on the door for longer than my nerves could stand, a rumpled, dishevelled Dylan let us in.
“Sorry. I must have dozed off. We sat up most of the night, but Sam went to bed around five.”
“You dozed off?” My heart started hammering. “You weren’t watching him?”
“Only for an hour or so. He was sleeping. I checked on him first.”
I pushed past him, through into the tiny living room. Whirling out again, I confronted Dylan in the kitchen.
“Where is he?”
“Upstairs, in the spare room. Calm down, Faith. It’s okay.”
“No.” My voice was loud, angry. “It is not okay.”
I raced up the stairs, banging all four doors open until I located what had to be the spare room.
My howl rattled the window frames. Dylan found me on my knees in the doorway. He said nothing, but I heard him searching the house, opening the front door, and no doubt doing the same in the garden, the car park, the side alleyway.
I remained on the floor, bent double as the numbness set in, creeping over my body like a cloud across the sun.
It was too late. Searching was pointless. Dylan had fallen asleep, and now my brother, my family, my heart, had gone.
The next week or so passed in a haze. I clung to the numbness for dear life. I answered questions, sig
ned official statements, gave out information, went through the motions. Gwynne came to tell me how Kane had managed to keep travelling to Nottinghamshire undetected. Stolen cars, old contacts, forged ID. None of it mattered. None of it could change anything. None of it could penetrate the grey.
Perry moved in, bringing flowers and fruit and more films to watch, as if any of that could make things better. He even took a few days off work, before fetching his laptop and setting up an office in my kitchen. I kept my new phone switched on, at the authorities’ request, in case Sam got in touch. It made no difference to me. I knew there would be no call.
After two days Perry told Dylan to stop leaving messages and sending texts. When he called round, I listened from the bedroom as Perry politely told him to leave me be. I felt nothing. All-encompassing grey nothing.
Cards came through the door, more flowers were dropped off. And food – pasta bakes and casseroles, cakes and steaming pies. Perry ate what he wanted, the rest I calmly scraped into the bin.
Larissa and Milton called round. Again, I stayed in bed, listening detachedly as the voices rose to penetrate the ceiling.
She’s a liar, Peregrine.
How can you trust her?
All this time, and not a word…
He’s an addict. Do you really want to take that on?
No wonder she…
I brushed off the flicker of curiosity at whether Perry would stay, and sank back into the grey.
After a week, a soft-spoken doctor with sharp creases between her eyebrows came to my bedroom, perching on the empty side of the bed. She asked me more questions, most of which I forgot as soon as I answered them. I laughed when I saw the familiar name of the pills she prescribed, startling myself with the bitter cackle.
Eleven days in, I lay alone in bed, Perry having nipped to the office for a meeting. As I stared at the ceiling, embracing the grey, somebody knocked on the door.
A minute later, I heard the sound of the lock unclicking and the door opening as the somebody entered my house. I tugged the duvet up over my head and tried to ignore them.
There was a louder knock. My bedroom door. I had a second to regret not wedging a chair under the handle before the door swung open, footsteps crossed to my bed, and came to a stop beside my head.