Chapter 21 #2
“Just a break-in. Normally, during a break-in they take things rather than destroying them all. Looks like whoever it was, was searching for something.”
“They ruined the worm farm and I can’t find any of the worms. I could try and find some of them, I guess.” Bea’s voice was filled with sadness, and he knew that it would be a trigger for his oldest brother, because he didn’t like their sisters to feel anything except happy.
Nothing else was acceptable to him.
“Don’t worry,” Ronan told their sister gently. That voice was reserved for just her or Fiadh. “We’ll get some more worms.”
“And you’ll make sure whoever did this to them pays,” Bea said.
And Ronan’s voice hardened. “Oh, yes, I’ll make sure whoever did this pays.” He glanced over at Harvey. “You had Bea coming to your house when you weren’t here?”
“She was feeding the worms. It was only once every three or four days.”
“This person could have still been here when she arrived. She could have been harmed.”
“I’m fine, Ro,” Bea told him, glancing up at him with a smile. “Just upset about the worms and all the mess. Poor Harvey. They destroyed all of his stuff. I mean, most of it was ugly, but still, it was his stuff, and they had no right to mess it all up like this.”
Why did everyone keep saying that his stuff was ugly? His house hadn’t looked that bad, had it? Well, he guessed he’d never taken a lot of notice. Most of the furniture had just come with the house and then he’d added bits and pieces.
“It’s eclectic,” he muttered.
“Sure it is.” Bea gave him a pitying look.
Jesus. It wasn’t like he lived in a dump. Most of the stuff in here was expensive.
“Right, here is what is going to happen, Paddy will go over the security footage and find out anything he can about who did this,” Ronan commanded. His arm was still around Bea’s shoulders as she leaned into him. “I will get someone to come sort through this shit and take care of it.”
Right, it might be a mess, but he wasn’t certain that he liked it being called ‘shit’. He glared at his brother who simply stared back at him. Ronan turned to Bea. “Are you all right? Do you need to take the day off work to recover?”
Jesus, he’d once been on his death bed with food poisoning, and his brother had made him work. He shared a look with Paddy who just shook his head and shrugged.
Ronan had always been like this. And, truthfully, if he wasn’t this protective over their sisters then Harvey and Paddy likely would be.
“Oh no! I’m going to be late!” Bea glanced at her watch. “I have to go!”
“I’m going to have Mick drive you,” Ronan said smoothly as he turned her toward the door.
“But I have my car here.”
“Give me your keys and I’ll make sure it gets to your work so you can drive it home, but I don’t want you driving while you’re upset.” His voice was soft and caring.
Bea nodded. “You’re so right. You always take such good care of me, Ro.”
“And I always will. Let me walk you out and talk to Mick about driving you safely to work and then I’ll come back and sort this out for Harvey.”
Harvey rolled his eyes as they both turned away. Then he sighed as he stared around at the mess.
“I’ll take a look at the camera footage,” Paddy said. “You think this could be related to Lily?”
“Maybe? I guess it’s possible that someone came here looking for her. But would her mother or Doctor Wallace really do this?”
“Why didn’t the alarm go off?” Ronan asked as he stepped into the room.
Harvey sighed. “I turned it off before I left. Bea can never remember the code and constantly sets it off.” Bea was brilliant in some ways and kind of hopeless in others. Remembering security codes was a challenge for her.
Yet solving complex mathematical equations was easy.
“I don’t like that Bea was caught up in this.” Ronan sent him a look.
And he thought that Harvey did? And she wasn’t exactly caught up in it. Thank God.
“From now on, you won’t use her to take care of your house when you swan off to do other things.”
Harvey clenched his teeth. “I wasn’t swanning off to do other things. You know what’s going on, Ronan.”
“I know that your little sister walked into a crime scene this morning. That guy could have still been here.”
“Well, you might need to have a chat with her about the dangers of walking into a place that has been clearly broken into. She saw that the lock was broken, the door was slightly ajar, and instead of leaving like she should have, she walked straight on in. And the reason she did that is because she has no idea of the dangers of the world, because you coddle them, Ronan. You make them think they’re always protected and nothing bad will happen. ”
The look Ronan shot him could have frozen the balls off a polar bear. But Harvey figured one of the reasons that he looked like that was because he was fully aware that Harvey was speaking the truth.
“Nothing bad will happen to them,” Ronan said. “I will protect them both.”
“Right. Well, shall we get on with dealing with this?” Paddy said, obviously trying to defuse the situation. “Hey, look at the bright side, Harvey. At least now you’ll be able to buy some better stuff for your house.”
“Did my house really look that bad before?” Harvey asked.
“Yes,” both of them replied.
Well, hell.