Decay (Heart of Stone Book 13)

by Sidebottom, D H

  I frowned at him when I sat on the edge of the bed and pulled on my boots. “You mean like a date?”

  “Yeah.” He nodded hesitantly in case I hadn’t understood the word yes.

  “Why bother going out when we can just fuck instead? It’s much more fun.”

  I noticed his face tense but he shrugged. “Maybe I just want to spend time with you.”

  I hated this. I always hated it. Sighing, I snatched up my jacket. “I don’t really do social, Kris.”

  Without giving him a chance to start begging and embarrassing both of us I escaped the confines of his apartment and pulled out my phone when it rang right on cue.

  “Hey, baby.”

  I smiled as I jogged down the stairs, my heart rate pinching higher. “You have what I need, Mack?”

  “That I do, Miss Fox.”

  I waited.

  “Name’s Jim Carver.”

  My teeth sank into my bottom lip with the name. “You’re a gent, Mack. Someone will be around within thirty minutes. One and half, yeah?”

  He chuckled. “You see this is why I love working with you, Katie. You’re always prompt.”

  “Likewise. Thanks, Mack.”

  “Anything for you, baby.”

  I chuckled and ended the call. Reaching in to the compartment at the back of my glovebox, I unwrapped the velvet cloth and slowly ran my finger across the edge of the blade, the blood it left in its wake wetting my appetite. And then I went to play with Mr Carver.

  Ava

  I stared at him. Everything I wanted to say to him had gone through my head on repeat over the last three hours, but now he sat opposite me, his face full of dejection and acceptance, the words just died in my throat.

  The pain on his face broke every single part of me. His eyes were dull, his skin pale and blotchy and his whole body appeared to radiate defeat.

  “I’m…” I squeezed my eyes closed, hating the weakness in my voice.

  “You’re what, Mum? Going to turn back time?”

  I flinched at the vehemence in George’s tone, the way he spat each word at me as though I had physically put him in the God awful place. The blue of the prison attire mocked me with the calm colour and the loose comfortable material. I couldn’t help but picture myself in it.

  Every wall that surrounded us in the small room appeared to slowly be closing in, stealing every breath that came from me. “George.”

  He shook his head slowly and turned away, focussing his gaze on a damp patch in the corner of the wall. “You can’t do anything. I deserve to be here. Just go.”

  Anger surged and I reached across the table for him. The guard situated in the room with us stepped forward and shook his head. “No touching,” he barked.

  Gritting my teeth, I forced myself to retreat and gripped the edge of the table just for something to physically touch if I couldn’t touch my own son. Every passing second was chewing up a part of my soul. I knew that doing life in here would eventually take away the very parts of me that made me.

  Swallowing back the fear and cursing my helplessness I blew out a strengthening breath. “I need to know who you owed money to, George.”

  He slid his gaze to me and for a second the guilt and pain on his face choked me but in a moment it was gone, more anger and hatred seeping from him. Leaning over the table, his face so close to mine that I could feel my child’s breath on my face once again, he lowered his voice. “You can’t help. Don’t even try to. Just accept what I did, walk out of that door and forget about me.”

  Anger finally winning, I glared at him. “Where the hell is your fight? How can you sit back and accept this? I know you, George, there is no way you would ever hurt Debora or Becca.”

  He shook his head and then stood up, his chair scraping on the tiled floor and making me wince with the squeal. “You don’t know me; I don’t think you ever did. Look at the fucking evidence, Mother. LOOK AT IT! I have my own child’s blood on my hands.”

  “They’re going to pay for this, George, they will,” I promised, ignoring his guilt.

  He closed his eyes, turning his face away from mine. “Yes,” he whispered, a chill in his voice making me shiver. “They will. They will.”

  Without even saying goodbye he nodded to the guard and walked back through the door, never once looking back at me.

  ♡

  Mason slipped his arms around me as I stared out of the window from where I’d been sat for the last four hours, just staring into space and giving in to the hopelessness of the situation.

  “Hey,” he whispered softly.

  Turning instantly, I reached up for him. Knowing me inside out, he drew me into him and lifted me from the chair, carrying me back into the bedroom.

  Standing me on my feet he unbuttoned my blouse, his eyes secured on my own and forcing strength and love into me like only my husband could.

  He was so sad and I couldn’t hold back the single tear that slid from the corner of my eye. Mutely, Mason leaned into me and kissed the tear before it abandoned me as his fingers slipped the material from my shoulders.

  Doing the same with my skirt, he pushed it from my hips and then cupped my bottom. My legs instinctively wrapped around his waist as his mouth found mine and he kissed me like only he could. His warm breath bled into me and curled around the chill that had descended within me since I had visited George.

  Bunching the material of his t-shirt in my hands I yanked it over his head, needing to feel the closeness of his skin on my own. He moaned into my mouth when I raked his back with my nails.

  Softly he laid me down on the bed, his mouth moving down my throat and tasting the tears that had freed themselves. “Don’t cry, baby,” he whispered against my skin. “Please don’t cry.”

  I hated the sob that tore from me and disobeyed him, mocking his plea as he slowly entered me. In my desolation I hadn’t even been aware that he’d stripped from his trousers.

  Every part of me calmed with my husband’s love, my body surrendering to the only person that could ever give me the peace it sought for. Our joining pacified my soul and gave my heart another reason to keep beating.

  “I love you, Ava,” he breathed into my neck as he kissed his way over my skin to my ear. His body moved over mine slowly as he made love to me, his idolisation and adoration forcing their way into the cold fibres of me, heating my insides and my heart once again.

  My man knew what I needed. He was in sync with every single one of my emotions and needs. He knew when I needed control, when I needed to be controlled and when I craved for tenderness.

  Each drive into me took me higher and higher until I couldn’t do anything but concentrate solely on Mason and beg for paradise. My body hummed in need, my skin electrified and sensitive to each of his gentle touches.

  Once again, knowing exactly what I needed, he sank his teeth into my neck and he thrust into me with a forceful urgency. His moans fuelled my orgasm, his laboured breathing showing me how much pleasure he took from me. For over twenty years not once had we never enjoyed the touch of each other. It never diminished over time and I knew it never would. Throughout the journey of our hard lives, this, the love and sex between us was the only thing that could take away the pain from what life forced on us both every day.

  “Ava!” he roared out when he came with as much force as which took me to heaven with him. “Baby.” The contradicting cry and then the soft choked whisper once again brought my tears to the forefront.

  I clung to Mason, needing to make a memory that would help me survive the horror of what was to come. I could admit to myself that I was scared, but never to Mason. Never to him.

  “I love you,” I choked out against him when he wrapped me up and held me tight. “I’m so sorry, Mason. I’m so sorry.”

  He growled quietly. “Don’t be sorry, Ava. You know I will never allow you to leave me.”

  I nodded against him, not having the energy to argue with him. The hope in me had disappeared and acceptance had now moved i
n. I was going to prison. It was simple. And not even Mason could fix this.

  Katie

  “How much did he owe you?”

  Jim Carver just smirked at me. “It has been paid.”

  Anger surged through me, tightening and sending shocks through every part of me. I hadn’t just inherited my mother’s looks, I had also gotten my father’s chilling wrath, and right then I was struggling to keep myself calm. I never reacted to their taunting but this was personal. This was my brother’s life.

  “I wouldn’t try me, Carver. All I need is a simple sentence and then we can make this a lot quicker. How much did George owe you?”

  Jarred and Mark stood silently watching me. They could feel the ice start to trickle into the air around us, the spread of white fury start to fog around us.

  Taking out my blade I ran it across my tongue, needing to release some of the pent up rage that was starting to crush me from the inside. Carver stared at me like he thought I was insane. I knew I was.

  “Start talking, I’m struggling.”

  He gawped at my words. “Struggling?”

  “Mmm,” I murmured as I trailed the blade along my skin and breathed out a sigh of relief. “I’m starting to grow angry.”

  He rolled his eyes. I knew he thought I was just a little woman. They all thought it. When I forced the tip of my blade through his eyeball his scream told me he’d finally worked out I wasn’t the little girl he thought I was.

  Jarred, as was usual with him, chuckled. Mark recoiled with disgust.

  Carver’s scream, the piercing squeal, finally made me smile. Dragging the blade out of him I tapped it to his other eye. He shuffled backwards into the chair he was tied to, fleeing from the danger. The sight of the blood pouring from his eye calmed the storm a little but then the sight of Debora and my niece in my mind’s eye once again forced the fury back to the front. They hadn’t deserved to die like that. They were innocent in all of this.

  “You do know if I choose not to kill you that you’ll go down the line instead.” I leaned towards him. “And we both know what they do to child killers in there!”

  When I forced the blade though his other eye his scream burst excited little bubbles to pop in my blood. My breathing was calming and I took a huge breath, using the moment of peace to refuel my lungs.

  Carver was screaming too much to get any words out so I allowed him a little time for his body to accommodate the pain and turned to Mark when I noticed the paleness to his skin. Throwing him a tenner, I smiled at him. “You wanna go fetch us some coffee ready for the clean-up?”

  He smiled and nodded. “Usual?”

  “Yeah. In fact, I’m hungry, grab me a muffin too, please.”

  When Carver whimpered I turned back to him. “Well?”

  The press of my knife inside his ear must have finally triggered his memory because his confession bled from him in a wave of eagerness. “Okay. Fifty K. He owed me fifty grand!”

  Anger floored my heartbeat and I sucked air through my teeth to steady the surge of savagery. “And you thought my niece and sister-in-law’s lives were only worth fifty thousand?”

  He swallowed his own blood when the force of my punch caused him to swallow two of his own teeth.

  “You murdered and raped Debora. You suffocated my one-year-old niece just because he owed you fifty grand? FIFTY FUCKING GRAND?”

  The heel of my boot punctured his right lung when I forced it through his chest.

  Jarred hesitantly touched my arm. “Katie, you need his confession. Go easy.”

  Every part of me was vibrating with the need for revenge. Bloodlust gave me a hunger for carnage and I had to slide my knife over my own palm to stop myself from slicing across this fucking monster’s throat.

  Fifty thousand pounds. A heroin debt of fifty thousand pounds had taken my families lives and murdered them all.

  But then the three words that Carver managed to get out ended my control and I tore the motherfucker’s limbs from him with my bare hands.

  “She was fun.”

  I’d played right into my enemy’s hands. He knew he wouldn’t survive prison, and his mockery gave him what he wanted. Death.

  And now I had killed any chance of getting my brother out of hell.

  Mason

  Ava ended the call. I knew from the look on her face that Katie’s news was both good and bad. I couldn’t keep up with the furious beat of my heart, its powerful thud making me lightheaded.

  Her eyes slowly reached mine. “Jim Carver.”

  I swallowed slowly and gave her a soft nod. “I’m sorry. I should never have doubted him.”

  She sniffed, her body stiff as she nodded, accepting my apology. “Katie killed him.”

  I closed my eyes as disappointment flowed over me. That would mean… that would mean we had no way of proving George’s innocence. And now we had to rely on Robert Delaney.

  As if on cue, my heartbeat actually stopped when a heavy knock at the door secured mine and my wife’s eyes in a knowing gaze. I was struggling to force the tears of despair back as I followed her silently through the house.

  Robert stood with a sombre gaze as he stepped into the house.

  “I should have believed you,” he said honestly. “I didn’t. And I should have.”

  His frankness caused hope to curdle in my belly.

  Ava simply nodded.

  Robert continued. “One of George’s neighbours saw a man matching the description of a known dealer enter your son’s property on numerous occasions. The night of Debora and Becca’s murders he also saw him leave.”

  “How come this has only just come to light?” I asked through the nausea that was threatening to overpower me.

  Delaney swallowed. “That I can’t disclose.” Anger heated my blood but he shook his head. “And it is of no concern now. I have filed for George’s imminent release.”

  The choked sound that left Ava had me quickly reaching out to catch her when her legs gave way.

  “Of course it matters,” I barked as I held Ava up with an arm around her waist.

  Delaney scoffed. “It still doesn’t change the fact that your son owed a debt that cost Debora and Becca their lives!”

  Ava lowered her face, hiding her pain and shame from him.

  “My family have suffered enough!”

  Ava pulled out of my arms and turned to me. Lifting her hand, her soft smile poured pain through my very pores. Her wet eyes found mine and I hated that my knees buckled. “I love you,” she whispered before she gently reached up and pressed her lips to mine, her warmth and heartbreak forcing my veins to constrict.

  Rearing back, I framed her face with my hands. “It’ll be okay, baby. Robert knows it wasn’t George. It’s okay now.”

  She physically flinched. “That wasn’t the deal, Mason.”

  I shook my head at her. “Even Robert isn’t that cruel.”

  Leaving me, Ava walked over to her handbag and pulled out two large brown envelopes then handed them to Delaney. “Everything is there.”

  I turned my eyes to Delaney as he took the evidence against him from Ava.

  And then my whole world fell apart when he stepped towards Ava. My arms were pulled behind my back by two coppers I hadn’t even seen in the room as they held me back from my wife.

  They couldn’t hold me though when the words that left Robert’s mouth caused my wrath to burst free.

  “Ava Fox, I am arresting you for the murder of Dean Stewart…”

  More of his men stormed into the room, each taking a piece of me when my sanity snapped and I tried to kill them all.

  “…You have the right to remain silent…”

  “You bastard!”

  More men tried to take hold of me, six of them struggling to hold me back. Delaney had come prepared for my wrath.

  “…anything you do or say may be used against you in a court of law…”

  Ava looked at me through the depths of her tears, my fight for her destroying her soul. “I
’m so sorry Mason. I made a deal. I love you. Let me go. I love you, baby.”

  My life ended when Delaney placed his cuffs around Ava’s wrists and led her silently from the house.

  My wife was going down for life.

  And there wasn’t a damn thing I could do to stop it.

  One

  Mason

  I sat at the cheap plastic table and stared around the room at the others, my fingernails digging into the nasty veneer coating and making my teeth clench at the horrific sensation – yet I still couldn’t stop gouging at it in a needy desperation.

  Most in here were in the same situation as me, not all, but most. We all held that something recognisable. Something deep down only other partners of those locked behind the same four walls shared.

  My patience was waning, my eyes fixing on the door nestled into the back wall as I waited for it to open and settle the ache inside me that had grown into a frenzy I was struggling to contain. My soul could feel the closeness of her, my heart dancing an excited rhythm while my spirit wanted to run and never come back.

  The scraping of chairs ricocheted around my head when the door finally opened. My heart didn’t want to beat anymore, not until my eyes landed on her.

  When she emerged, the overwhelming sensation that I had been fighting with shifted into pure, undiluted anger.

  I stood quickly, too quickly, and had to grip hold of the edge of the table to steady the shake in my legs.

  Her hair was pulled back into a ponytail from her face – revealing a huge purple bruise and stitches in her top lip.

  She winced when she approached me, catching the rage that was bubbling under the surface. “Hey.” Her voice was quiet, her eyes assessing me. She gulped and slid into the chair on the other side of the table.

  I couldn’t move, my body in lockdown as I stared at the state of her. “Who did this?” My voice was a squeak through the clench of my teeth.

  “Sit down, Mason. You’re showing me up.”