Chapter 64
Sixty-Four
Brian
He sat in a hospital bed, in a stupid gaping gown as nurses came and went, but at least he had his own room.
He didn’t like that there was a PC out there but PC Smith had been nice enough.
He’d even gone and bought Brian an energy drink and a Mars bar, which he was more than grateful of.
He’d asked about Aunt Claudia but no one had told him anything.
Someone knocked at the door and came in. ‘Tabby,’ he said as his little sis ran over and sat on his bed.
‘I thought…’ She swallowed and stifled her sobs. ‘I thought we were going to die. When you wrenched me over in that chair, I saw the floor and waited for us to go up in flames.’
He was grateful that the universe had been on his side. The candle had narrowly missed him but they had taken a hard thud to the floor after rocking back and forth to get further away from it ‘Everything’s okay. We got through it and we’re going to be fine.’
He kept thinking about Edwin’s threats and he wished he hadn’t eaten chocolate because he felt nauseated now.
He stared at the cardboard bowl that the nurse had left on the bedside table.
No, he wasn’t going to be sick because everything was okay.
The police had to have found Aunt Claudia and they had to have stopped OpenMeSmiler from whatever had been planned next.
He shivered as he thought of all the message chats he’d had with Cody.
Cody was never real but he missed him so much.
He’d seemed real. Brian clenched the sheet, angry at how gullible he’d been.
Tabitha lay on the bed next to him and hugged him. ‘Come here. Love you, dipshit.’
‘Love you, dumbass. If you ever use the internet again, I’ll kill you myself. It won’t take some psycho to do it.’
There was another knock at the door. Tabitha sat up and the DI walked in. He couldn’t remember her name but she’d questioned him and Curtis at his house. It had all been a blur but he was sure she’d been there at the unit, when he and Tabitha were on the floor.
‘Brian, Tabitha. I’m DI Harte. Do you remember me, Brian?’
A man followed.
‘This is DS Driscoll,’ DI Harte said.
Her eyes seemed puffy. There was a bruise on her chin and scratches on the back of her hands.
Her coat looked like she’d been dragged through a hedge with its slightly torn sleeves and her hair had half come out of an elastic band that she’d been using to keep it up.
She looked how he felt. He cleared his throat of the cloying sugary chocolate that still coated it.
‘Can we see Aunt Claudia? Is she in this hospital or is she at the police station?’
The DI’s head tilted and the DS stayed by the door and looked down. They didn’t have to say anything. Brian already knew but she started speaking in a gentle voice. ‘I’m really sorry to inform you that your aunt died a short while back. Is there anyone we can call for you?’
He shook his head. His aunt was all they had.
Tabitha lay back down next to him and sobbed into his chest. Aunt Claudia had taken them in when they had nowhere to go.
She’d been kind, loved them almost like she was a big sister rather than a mother.
She’d done everything for them and now she was gone, just like their parents were.
He held Tabitha tightly and cried with her, knowing that at eighteen, it was his turn to step up.
He’d done things he wasn’t proud of recently but now it was time to change all that.
He was never going to be parted from Tabitha or let her go into care.
He had a job. It was time to grow up. Whatever happened, he was never going to go down any form of dark path again, ever.