She was tired I had decided and I needed to get her back home.
The cottage Jasmin lived in, was almost unrecognisable to the place my gran and grandad had made their home. It had doubled in size and they had thought hard about its layout. I thought about my home, having Lily back was making my creative juices flow again. I was eager to get back to work on the house, but this time with her input.
I could hear voices as I turned the final corner on the narrow stairs.
It wasn’t a surprise to find not only John in the room, but also Nathan, his brother Alex, and Charlie. I looked around the room taking them all in. I didn’t like the niggling feeling that them all waiting for me produced. The room was immaculate, only them being there made it look flawed and untidy.
It gave me a laugh, as I thought about how that would be making John feel.
That’s good, it’s not only me feeling fucking uncomfortable then.
John was of course sat behind his desk, with Alex in front of him. Alex looked relaxed enough, with his leg bent at the knee and his ankle bone resting on top of his other knee. Nathan was leant against the wall, with his arms crossed over his chest. He was looking down to the floor, where his foot fidgeted and his boot absentmindedly lifted-up the edge of the huge rug on the floor. One of Jasmin’s touches, in a room where the rest of the furniture was definitely John’s taste. Charlie was sat on the cherry-red chesterfield settee that was placed in front of the fireplace. Their heads had snapped around to look at me as I stepped inside.
Alex let out a sigh.
Maybe he wasn’t as fucking relaxed as he looked?
‘Close the door behind you, Jack.’ John spoke first.
I did as I was asked and feeling apprehensive I then leant my back against it.
‘Come and sit down, Jack.’ Alex nodded at the seat next to him.
‘Why don’t you arseholes stop patronising me and tell me what the fuck is going down? I’ll stand, thanks all the same.’
‘Sit down, gobshite,’ Charlie tried again.
I took a step forward and gripped onto the back of the proffered chair with both hands.
‘I’ll sit… you start talking.’ I tipped my chin at John.
‘OK. I have a few things here that you need to know.’ I nodded at John and finally sat down on the chair next to Alex. I swivelled my head around and looked at Alex, Nathan and even Charlie, wordlessly asking him why they needed to know mine and Lily’s business.
‘I’m getting to it, Jack,’ he answered my unspoken thought. I could feel the arsehole in me rising quickly.
‘Spit it the fuck out then.’ I clamped my mouth together and waited.
‘Well you asked me to look into Lily’s circumstances and her family. You also asked me to keep some extra security around here. Correct?’ His hackles were obviously rising at my aggressive tone. ‘Well, I have done, and in both instances there is information you need to be brought up to date with. So, do us the courtesy of keeping your temper to yourself and winding in your fists.’
I looked down at my lap to see my clenched hands poised. I took a deep breath in and forced my hands to relax.
‘Sorry.’ I let out a long slow breath and lifted my open hands in surrender.
‘You’re ok, bro,’ came from Nathan who was still leant against the wall. ‘Most of us have fucking been where you are. Just remember that.’
‘Right,’ John spoke again and my gaze moved from his face to the thin manila file he was tapping his fingertips up and down on. He followed my eyes and lifted his hands, pushing his fingers together and lifting them up to tap his index fingers on his lips as he thought. ‘I’m sure you and Lily have shared some things about your time apart, Jack?’ I don’t think I had ever seen him so hesitant in all the time I had known him.
‘Yeah.’ If the arsehole wanted me to share what she had told me he had another fucking think coming. Brother-in-law or not.
‘The Antonescus and the Vasiles,’ John spoke. I heard Nathan curse under his breath to the side of me, but refused to remove my eyes from John as I willed him to continue and to get to the fucking point.
‘They appear to have one thing in common. Their families have both been struggling for money for a while. That’s where Lily and her family came in. Both families wanted their eldest sons to be married to Lily.’
I started shaking my head and John stopped talking. ‘That makes no fucking sense. Lily has no money. Her family are dead and she has no money! That’s how she ended up with fucking Tony Vasile. She is repaying her father’s debt.’
‘No…’ He shook his head. ‘Her father had no debts. In fact, he was a very forward-thinking man. But you’re right, Lily has no money… Although her offspring are well provided for.’
The room was silent as everyone listened to John and turned their heads between us both as they tried to gauge my reaction.
‘Her offspring?’
‘Child, Jack… and subsequent children.’
‘Child… I’m not fucking getting this. You’re telling me that her father owed them nothing?’ I questioned.
‘Yes, that’s what I’m saying. He owed them nothing.’
‘How the fuck did they end up taking control of her life, then?’
‘They told her that her father owed them money and she believed them. The truth was, there was no other money that she could see. Her parents’ bank account was majorly overdrawn, even their large house had a mortgage on it, a mortgage that was so substantial that the house had no equity left in it at all. That’s why it was auctioned off. The only place there was any money, was in the trust fund Mr. Green had created for his grandchildren. He was convinced his grandchildren would become somebody and the fact they came from an immigrant background was never going to cause them a problem. He was looking to secure his future family line into the English hierarchy.’
I leant over, my head now forward in my hands. ‘So, let me get this fucking straight. She had no debt to repay?’
‘No, there was never a debt. Just a trust fund to gain.’
‘So, why the fuck would they do that to another human being!’ I shouted out, even though I knew the answer.
‘Jack, we know what the fuck they’re capable off, don’t we?’ Nathan pushed into the conversation.
‘Each of the families wanted that trust fund and their sons were sent to retrieve it. Those families didn’t care how… they just wanted control of the money. I have spoken to people who knew that Tony helped Lily’s father set up the fight that broke the two of you up. I also just this morning received all the proof we need, with sworn witness statements… that the Vasiles and the Antonescus plotted together. They paid for the deaths of Lily’s parents. Their car was never involved in an accident, it was a deliberate takeout.’
I stood up quickly, grabbed the edge of John’s desk in front of me and leant forward.
‘THEN. WHY. THE. FUCK. ARE. THEY. STILL. FREE?’
I could feel the palpable tension in the room as everyone poised themselves to intervene. Anger was running with free rein all around my system and try as I fucking might I was grappling with the fact I couldn’t calm it down.
His words had made me out of fucking control, anger flowed around my bloodstream.
‘SIT. DOWN.’ John barked out his order and after a few minutes of staring him out with my nostrils flaring, I sat down heavily. I closed my eyes and rolled my head around feeling the sought after clicks in my neck.
‘Come on, Jack…You know me better than that… It’s more complicated than it seems. Since we put the Antonescus in prison the Vasiles have had free rein over Lily… and her son.’
I heard the words, like I’d previously heard “child.” My brain was on repeat as I pushed one and then the other through it, over and over again.
Son. Child. Son. ‘SON?’
I looked around at them all. My best mate and the men I treated like brothers.
They didn’t look surprised. It seemed they all knew, even Charlie.
>
John pushed on. ‘Before you let the accusations fly, we haven’t known for long, Jack. A couple of days. I hope now you understand why we haven’t had them arrested?’
‘Because of Lily’s child?’ I muttered under my breath, still trying to work out how I felt about the revelation I had heard. I’d never even wanted children. It took me all of two seconds to work out that I didn’t fucking care. I could love him, if he was hers then I could love him too. I would love him as my own.
‘Yes.’ With that one word, he pushed the thin manila folder over the shiny desktop towards me. Without thinking twice, I flicked up the corner and looked at the picture it contained.
I think I had known what I was going to find inside that inconspicuous piece of brown card, even before I had flicked it open.
Inside was an A4 size picture of a small boy. He had blond hair and bright blue eyes. I knew even before my eyes spied the cleft on his chin that he was mine. He looked like every family photograph of my dad and of myself that I had ever seen, when we were roughly the same age.
I spun the folder around in front of me, so the picture was now portrait and not the landscape view I’d previously had. My index finger touched the dip in his chin and then ran over the dimples that had developed as he smiled broadly at me. I think it was then that I felt the first of the tears run down my cheeks.
It’s a strange feeling seeing your child for the first time. Most men get to see them born or almost straight after. I was getting to see mine for the first time as a toddler. I knew nothing about him, other than the fact I loved him instantly, fucking instantly. I would do anything for him and his mum. If I had hated the Vasiles before, I would now happily kill them with my own bare hands. They had snatched away the woman I loved, had her parents killed and stolen precious time away from me and my son.
‘That picture was taken last week in Romania. That is Lily’s little boy, and well… I think you can see why we think he’s yours? He’s two and a half years old according to his passport.’ He looked back down at his paperwork. ‘He was born in…’
‘He would have been born in February 2015,’ I interjected.
‘Yes, and his name is…’
‘His name is Harry.’ Everything was falling into place. Things she had said and words she had used when we’d been talking together.
I had a son.
Lily and I had a child
‘Those bastards have my son! What the fuck are we going to do about it? I want them dead.’ I swiped the back of my hand across my face effectively wiping away the tears that I had shed. Never for one moment did I doubt that the men in the room with me wouldn’t be beside me every step of the fucking way, whatever we decided.
‘We have a plan, Jack… But, for it to stand any chance of working… you have to let Lily go back to the Vasiles.’ My eyes shot up to his, he felt them boring into him, but he carried on regardless. ‘Our plan has been helped along by the fact that Laura has given her a letter from Tony today, his hired gorillas have been sniffing around the village for a couple of days.’
‘Laura?’
‘Come on, mate, you must know she’d do any fucking thing to get back into your bed?’ Charlie interrupted.
I looked over at him, frowning.
John just carried on. ‘We have also been made aware that Tony has brought Harry back earlier than planned. So, we know something is spooking him.’ My head fell into my hands again. ‘I’m sorry, Jack. I know what I’m asking… She can’t find out that you know about Harry and you can’t stop her from leaving. We need them together, so we have a chance to rescue them both.’
‘Everything we are, or own, is at your disposal, Jack.’ Alex, who had been silent up to now let me know in words, what I already knew about the men that were in the room with me. He squeezed my shoulder as I let his words sink in.
I lifted my head back up to meet John’s eyes. ‘Do it… Whatever it takes, John… I’ll do whatever the fuck it takes. I’m not gonna fucking lose her again, nor our son. They need my protection and they’re gonna get it.’
I had sat in the winged armchair in the corner of the kitchen for a while. I was pretending to read the book Jack had given me. But try as I might, as my eyes went over the same few words, I didn’t take in a single one. I closed the leather book and stroked its beautiful cover, running my fingers over and around the solid substantial spine. My life was once again on very shaky ground, stroking the binding of my favourite book gave me a sense of calm and familiarity as I prepared myself to go back. I knew my strength was about to be tested to such an extreme level, that my sanity would very probably unravel in front of my eyes. The feeling of being completely out of my depth and ultimately terrified, started to course through me again.
Our ride home from Jasmin’s had been in virtual silence. It wasn’t the same as the comfortable silence we had found earlier in the day. I had sat there frozen to the leather seat, thinking about Laura and the piece of paper I was secretly holding against my body… and Jack, well I hadn’t a clue what he was thinking. But it felt as though he could see right through me, and he had done so every time he had turned his head to look at me. There was an atmosphere in the enclosed car and it seemed that neither of us knew how to move past it. When finally, Jack placed his hand on my leg, I had jumped and flinched away from him. Although I had instantly grabbed his hand with both of mine and held onto to it tightly, I had never felt more distant from him and I hated it.
I looked up at the kitchen window to check if light was still coming from the adjacent building. It was, I could see the lights from the gym shining out onto the grass. When I was happy that Jack was still where he had told me he was going, I pushed my hand deep inside my clothing. I gripped furiously around the antagonistic envelope, and ripped it out of my clothing and away from my body. I had hated keeping anything that Tony had touched near me, but I had no choice.
My hands were shaking as I tore at the stuck down flap, cursing at the quality of envelope he used and how well it was sealed. I received a papercut for my haste and as I sucked my forefinger into my mouth and tasted the salty flavour, I thought how very poignant it was. I wasn’t even back and he was already causing me to bleed.
My eyes focused on the few words.
You have two days to phone this number.
077683900458
Our son has arrived home early.
It was simple.
It needed no explanation to me. I had to go back to him otherwise Harry would be harmed.
I swallowed down my terror. I knew what I had to do and I would do it. Harry would always be my priority. He and his father were my whole life.
I knew the mobile number off by heart, it was Tony’s. So, I opened the Aga door to throw the envelope and paper into the blue flames. I stood back and watched as the cleansing fire consumed them both. Then after slamming the metal door shut I rushed to the sink to scrub away his filthy words and the blood from my skin.
I needed Jack.
By this time tomorrow, I would be gone from his life, once again.
He would go on. He had another chance at a relationship with Laura. He was going to have his first ever chance to be a dad. I had always known what a fantastic dad he would make. My eyes filled with tears at the thought.
I, on the other hand, was going back to protect our son the only way I knew how.
I needed Jack.
He had helped me remember and now I needed him to help me forget.
Sweat was pouring off my body. The salty fluid had made my eyes red raw as it careered down my forehead and finally found its resting place in amongst the tears I had refused to fucking shed.
As soon as we had arrived home I had declared I was going to the gym to work out, Lily was sitting comfortably in front of the Aga, reading. I wasn’t prepared to do small talk. I knew it was the coward’s way out and I wasn’t fucking proud of the fact I took it.
But what the hell else could I do?
The situation wasn’t somet
hing we could discuss and work out, even if I’d have prayed for a fucking miracle, nothing was going to change the fucking shit fest we now found ourselves in. I wanted to hold her, to tell her everything was going to be okay. I wanted to say, that as her man I would stop it from happening, that she would be safe at our house and the shitty world would just go away. But it would have been a load of fucking crap. She knew and I now knew that she had to return. So, for over an hour I had pushed myself to the fucking limit and beyond, using a coping mechanism I had designed just after she left me the first time.
I needed the anesthetised feeling only the gym could give me.
My issues were fighting to be allowed to come to the surface, but I knew they had no place in the here and now. How the fuck I was going to allow her to go back was fucking beyond me. But, for the first time in my life I had to control the demons that I normally let control me. I had to allow one of the two people I loved more than life itself to step back into danger, before I could finally protect them both.
There was no doubt in my mind that I would protect them both, even if it cost me my life.
I had needed the fucking aggressive workout. John’s plan was whirring around my head. The fact that those bastards had my son was killing me. But not as much as the fucking thought of Tony Vasile getting his hands on Lily. I didn’t know which feeling inside me was more dominant; anger, sadness, the pride of being a dad or the fucking overwhelming love I felt for Lily. Fuck knows what she had gone through to protect our son, and what she was prepared to do now to protect him again.
‘Jack.’
I heard her voice calling to me as I pushed out yet another press-up. Sweat dripped off my face onto the sprung, green flooring underneath me. I shook my head and felt my cold wet hair move. I couldn’t look at her just yet. I needed time to sort myself out.
Standing up, I placed my towel around the back of my neck and held on to it with both hands, ignoring the ache deep inside my triceps. I turned to find her stood just inside the gym, almost as though she was scared to fully cross over into my domain. I still hadn’t answered. I just stood there like a fucking idiot staring at her. She was so beautiful; no other woman had ever affected me the way she did.
Undeniable (Fated series Book 4) Page 26