Flo puffed out an angry breath.
‘But we still take from boxes,’ Sonny went on.
‘Boxes?’ Flo asked.
‘Them boxes and jars and things. Like yours,’ he said pointing out of the window into the front garden.
‘You mean honesty boxes?’
Sonny nodded again.
‘We do that on Sundays. That’s the best day, Dad says. The jars are sometimes full of coins. If they’re not, he gets me to take the eggs or other things. He told me to take some sprouts once even though I don’t like them.’
Flo gasped at this new revelation from her great-nephew. ‘But you know that’s wrong, don’t you? People like me put out a little bit of garden produce for a few pence. We do that in good faith that our trust won’t be abused. The honesty box is sacred, Sonny. Sacred!’
Bryony rested a hand on Flo’s. She could see that the boy was looking frightened.
‘I’ve got my neighbour stealing eggs from the hedge and my own nephew and great-nephew stealing from my house!’
‘It’s going to stop,’ Bryony assured her. ‘Now that we know what’s happening.’
‘Yes,’ Flo said, nodding. ‘It’s going to stop.’
They all took a minute to calm down and process what had been said.
‘What are you going to do, Flo?’ Bryony asked at last.
She shook her head, looking completely dazed. ‘I can’t ring the police, can I? I can’t report my own nephew.’
‘Well, you could. He is stealing from you and using a minor to do his dirty work,’ Bryony pointed out.
Flo rested her head in her hands. ‘I can’t,’ she whispered. ‘I just can’t. He’s my nephew.’
‘Then we’ll think of something else.’
‘He’ll be mad,’ Sonny said.
‘What’s that?’ Flo asked, looking up.
‘When I’m not there today.’
‘He’s right,’ Bryony said. ‘He’ll be expecting Sonny at school.’
‘I’ll ring him,’ Flo said, on her feet in an instant. ‘I’ll tell him Sonny couldn’t come to school today. He won’t suspect anything.’
They watched as Flo crossed the room, picking up the phone from a side table and dialling the number.
‘Mitch?’ she said a moment later, her voice light and friendly. She really was a very good actress, Bryony decided. ‘Sonny’s off school today. Tummy bug. No. No. He should be back in tomorrow. Yes, tomorrow. No, I’m quite sure. I think he just needs extra rest today. Toodle pip.’
She hung up.
‘What did he say?’ Bryony asked.
‘Not a lot. Didn’t even send Sonny his love.’ Flo walked across to her nephew and bent to kiss his forehead.
‘Do you think he’ll be waiting for you tomorrow, Sonny?’ Bryony asked.
Sonny shrugged. ‘I guess.’
‘He seemed to want my assurance that Sonny would be back at school then,’ Flo said.
‘Does he come every day?’ Bryony asked Sonny.
‘No. Not every day.’
‘How many times have you done this for him?’
‘I’ve lost count,’ he said honestly.
Flo bent down and delved into Sonny’s school bag, bringing out the pink piggy bank which she placed on the coffee table and then the print of the Labrador. The two silver candlesticks and the bronze figurine were next and she took them to the mantelpiece with shaking hands. Bryony’s heart ached for her.
‘Did you really think I wouldn’t miss them?’ she asked Sonny.
Sonny’s eyes filled with tears again.
‘He was just doing what his father told him to,’ Bryony reminded her.
‘I know,’ Flo agreed. ‘Did he ask you to get particular things?’
Sonny nodded.
‘You know, now I come to think of it, the time before last when he was here, he was having a good nose around. Eyeing my things up. He was doing a secret inventory, wasn’t he? Then he decided to plant Sonny here to take them all.’
‘He took pictures,’ Sonny said. ‘On his phone.’
‘Of my things?’
‘Yes. He showed me. Told me where things were.’
Flo’s mouth was a perfect O-shape of shock. ‘And here I was thinking I was just getting a bit forgetful with where things were.’
Just then something seemed to catch Flo’s eye and she crossed the room.
Bryony tried to see what she was doing and grimaced as Flo handed something to her.
‘What is it?’ she asked.
‘A cheap ornament I bought from the back of one of those catalogues that fall out of magazines.’
Bryony turned the colourful figurine of Betty Boop over in her hands.
‘What are you planning to do with it?’
‘Put it in Sonny’s bag,’ Flo said. ‘That’ll teach Mitch a lesson, won’t it?’
‘I don’t know,’ Bryony said honestly. ‘It’ll probably just make him mad.’
‘Yes, but wouldn’t you love to see his face when he takes it out of the bag? Serve him right, the no-good rascal!’
‘I’m not sure. I think we should probably put the candlesticks back in.’
Flo gasped. ‘They were my aunt’s,’ she said.
‘And we’ll get them back before anything happens to them,’ Bryony said. ‘Here, I’ll take a photo of them on the mantelpiece and then we’ll have proof that they’re from here.’
‘I can’t believe this is happening,’ Flo said, shaking her head. ‘It’s like CSI Castle Clare around here.’
‘I’m so sorry this has happened to you,’ Bryony said.
‘I’m sorry too,’ Sonny suddenly piped up from his chair. ‘Am I in trouble?’ His big eyes were swimming with tears once again and Flo bent down to hug him.
‘You’re not in trouble, darling, but I do wish you’d told me what was going on. Your dad was wrong to put you in that position. He should never have asked you to do something like that. It was selfish and stupid of him.’
Bryony watched as Flo and Sonny embraced. It was a moving scene and Bryony felt the threat of tears herself as she watched them.
Finally, Flo broke away and mopped her eyes again.
‘Right, what’s next?’ she asked.
Bryony took a deep breath. ‘I suppose we have to ask ourselves what we want from this. Do we want to catch him red-handed with your candlesticks? Do we want the police involved?’
‘I don’t want to go to prison!’ Sonny suddenly cried.
‘You’re not going to prison,’ Flo assured him. ‘Nobody’s going to prison.’
‘But it might be a good idea to catch him on camera all the same,’ Bryony said. ‘If you don’t want to hand the photos over to anyone, you can at least let him know that you’ve got them. That’ll surely stop him from stealing from you again.’
‘How would this photo business work exactly?’ Flo asked.
‘We could go to the school at lunchtime and wait for him. There’s a line of trees the other side of the playing fields. There’ll be plenty of coverage for us whilst we wait for the drop.’
‘The drop?’ Flo cried. ‘I feel like I’m in the middle of a nasty crime film. One of those that you catch late in the evening by accident and that give you nightmares.’
‘He might see you,’ Sonny said, his face anxious.
‘Yes, what if he sees us?’ Flo asked.
‘We’ll just have to make sure that he doesn’t,’ Bryony said. ‘He doesn’t know me, anyway.’
‘And I could wear a disguise!’ Flo cried.
‘Can I wear a disguise?’ Sonny asked.
‘No, silly! You don’t need one,’ Flo told him. ‘You’ll just wear your school uniform and go about things as you’d normally do. We don’t want your dad to suspect anything, do we?’
‘Are you going to arrest him?’
‘No, we’re just going to watch,’ Flo said.
Sonny seemed to take all this in and Bryony and Flo went over their plan, deciding to get to
the school ahead of the lunchtime break in order to get into position.
‘Okay, I think we’ve covered everything, haven’t we? We’re all ready for tomorrow?’ Bryony asked.
‘You bet,’ Flo said. ‘I want my cake knife back!’
Bryony drove into Castle Clare and relieved Polly from her duties in the bookshop. She didn’t tell her sister exactly what was going on because she thought it best to keep the whole secret mission quiet for the time being.
By the time she got home later that day, she felt absolutely exhausted. She kicked off her boots and made herself some tea and then flopped onto the sofa, closing her eyes for a moment. What a day it had been. Bryony wondered what would have happened if she hadn’t opened Sonny’s bag and found all of Flo’s things inside it. How long would Mitch have gone on stealing from his aunt? Would he have emptied her entire house? Did he really think he could have got away with it?
The more Bryony thought about it, the more her heart ached for her new friend. How could somebody in your own family deceive you like that? Mitch Lohman must be a unique kind of person to do that to his own aunt. A part of her wanted to ring the police right now and report him, but what good would that do? This was Flo’s call and Bryony had to support her friend and the decisions she made about how she wanted to handle things.
Getting up, she went upstairs and switched her computer on. The chaos of the day had meant that she hadn’t had time to check in at Country Catches, but she did now and found a message from Ben.
What a day I’ve had, he began. I made it all the way to class and realised I’d forgotten the worksheets I’d spent all night preparing! I had to totally wing it. I don’t think anyone noticed.
Bryony bit back a smile because she could imagine Ben improvising. Growing up, he’d always been good at getting himself out of trouble.
PS: I’d really love to meet up and talk to you. B x
She sighed. He wasn’t going to give up, was he? Well, she’d just have to go on ignoring his request and talk to him about something else.
It was then that something strange happened. Before Bryony could stop herself, she found she was telling Ben her entire day. It was so easy, she thought, to fall into the old routine with him.
So you think you’ve had a hectic day, do you? she began. You should have had my day! I dropped Flo’s great-nephew at school this morning and, when I went to pick up his bag, I thought it was a bit on the heavy side so I took a look inside it and you’ll never guess what I found in there: a pair of silver candlesticks and other things from Flo’s home. I think I was in shock for a moment because he’s such a shy little boy. I just couldn’t wrap my head around it. And then I realised I had to tell Flo and she’s one of the sweetest people ever. I knew it was going to break her heart.
Bryony went on to tell him about Flo’s reaction and how Sonny had been stealing for his father. She hadn’t meant to write so much to Ben and she cursed herself as soon as she’d hit the send button. But she had to admit that she’d felt safe telling him about the whole Flo, Sonny and Mitch story. She’d always felt safe with Ben. She’d been able to tell him anything and that had been one of the things she’d missed so much when he’d gone. He’d taken away such an important part of her daily routine. Not only had she lost her boyfriend, but she’d lost her best friend too – the friend she’d call not only if something out of the ordinary happened, but if something completely ordinary occurred like running out of bread when all she wanted in the world was a slice of toast with seedless raspberry jam. Or that time when she’d got hiccups and couldn’t answer the shop phone without cracking up. He’d run right round to hold the fort for her until the hiccups had gone.
When Ben had left, she’d felt utterly bereft. Of course, she had a great big family she could have shared all the silly moments of her day with, but it wasn’t the same. Everybody had that one person in their life they were connected to in that very special way and, for Bryony, it had been Ben.
She swallowed hard as a thousand memories came swimming to the surface. She couldn’t allow herself to become engulfed and she certainly couldn’t allow herself to fall back into that easy relationship with him, however much it seemed natural to her and however much she craved it. That wasn’t part of her plan, she told herself. And so she shut her computer down before she was tempted to write anything else. She had a big day tomorrow.
Chapter Fourteen
Bryony wasn’t the only one with a big day ahead; Ben had one too only he didn’t realise it when he woke up.
His head was still spinning from the message he’d received from Bryony. He was thrilled that she was confiding in him, but it baffled him that she didn’t want to meet up with him. Still, he didn’t want to push things. If writing was her preferred medium and she was comfortable with talking to him that way then he wasn’t going to push things.
Of course, he’d replied as soon as he’d got her message.
I can’t believe what you just told me! I hope Flo’s alright and you too. I can just imagine the shock. Mitch sounds like a modern day Fagin, using Sonny for his own gains. Are you okay? Let me know if you want to talk. B x
It was a strange time with the women in his life and communication, he thought. Aria had sent him a text after their disastrous day in London and it was full of remorse and apology, ending with the words, I need your help. In truth, he was glad to hear from her again.
Of course, he texted back.
They were going to meet up in Cambridge of all places. Apparently Aria had a lead from someone she’d tracked down in a little corner shop in Ruislip. Dario, it seemed, had been working there for a while, but had moved on to Cambridge. Ben, who knew Cambridge well from his days there as a student with Bryony, assured Aria that he’d help. She didn’t have an address and she felt anxious that her limited English would only get her so far. Ben wanted to tell her that her English was better than a lot of English people’s, but he realised that it might be her confidence that let her down and so they arranged a day and a time to meet at the train station.
He hoped this would be it for Aria. She sounded desperate to be back home and to take her brother with her, but what if that wasn’t what he wanted? So far, their time together had only focussed on finding Dario, but what would happen when they did? Was Aria prepared for that? What if Dario didn’t want to be found? What if he was mad with his sister? Ben suspected that part of the reason Aria wanted him with her was in case of trouble – he would provide emotional support as well as back up.
The more he thought about it, the more he realised that Dario might be angry at being found. When Ben had left Castle Clare, the last thing he’d wanted was his family to come chasing after him. He’d said his goodbyes to Georgia and told her to keep safe. He’d needed time and space not just to calm down, but to make sense of what had happened. He would not have appreciated his sister flying across the world to bring him home. Well, maybe Dario felt like that. Ben would have to warn Aria although he was sure she must suspect that.
One of the great regrets of Ben’s life was not telling Bryony about what had happened the summer he’d left. He had a feeling that she’d have been more understanding if he had told her. Perhaps the great rift that had developed between them would never have happened, but he hadn’t been able to. He’d wanted to protect her from the darkness of his life. He didn’t want her tainted with it. Was that wrong? He didn’t think so. Of course, she’d had no idea that he’d been hiding anything. She’d just thought he’d had itchy feet and that his wanderlust was more important than their relationship. Oh, how wrong she was.
Taking a deep breath, he read though the latest message from her again. It seemed strange that they were still using the dating site for their communication instead of swapping email addresses, but it was working well so far.
Hi Bryony, he began. I can’t believe Mitch treats his son and his aunt like that. It sounds like you had quite a day! If you need to talk about it, let me know. I’m just a phone call or a qu
ick drive away.
He gave her his number. Well, he had to try, didn’t he?
I was thinking of you today.
That was an understatement, he thought, because she filled his every waking hour and he was betting that she knew that too.
I found that old book of love poems your Grandpa Joe gave us. Remember? The one with the red rose pressed into its pages at the Robert Burns’ poem? You used to get me to read it to you all the time and we’d try and imagine the person who had placed the rose inside the book.
Ben thought back to it now. How exciting it had been to find that special flower within the pages. Grandpa Joe swore he hadn’t known it was in there. He’d bought the book as part of a job lot from a dealer. And how they’d loved speculating about its history. Had the book belonged to a woman whose lover had given her the rose? Or had it belonged to a romantic man who’d placed a rose within its pages to remind him of the woman he loved? Books were so special, he thought. You never knew what you’d discover within their pages.
Bryony had loved him reading out the Shakespeare sonnets. She’d adored the language. Ben was less keen on it, but he’d loved how languid the rhythm had made Bryony. She’d virtually melted in his arms. Shakespeare was a genius; he knew the true power of iambic pentameter.
Perhaps we could read some of the poems again, he wrote, thinking of the way she’d snuggled in his arms as he’d read to her.
He shook his head. He was being much too forward and so deleted the line.
We used to read so much together, didn’t we? Two bookworms. We never went anywhere without at least a couple of books between us. Remember that awful geography school trip to Wroxham? We were meant to be doing some study on traffic – counting cars coming into town. Anyway, it was really boring and so we made up a load of statistics and sneaked off down the river and read Coot Club. Do you remember?
Ben smiled as he recalled the day together with the line which had inspired them to sneak away. ”They had left all the noise and bustle of Wroxham behind them”. Ben had read that out to Bryony who’d been a little reluctant to just bunk off in case they got caught, but he’d managed to persuade her.
Natural Born Readers (The Book Lovers 3) Page 15