“I’m going,” I said adamantly to Broderick, gripping my bow in my left hand. “If they’re after me I deserve to know why.”

“We can send you a memo,” Broderick said, dropping a netted bag of lemons into a canvas backpack along with a few packages of crossbow bolts. “Have you ever been in a real fight? And by that I mean a fight where you didn’t get one of the most important people in your life killed?”

“Excuse me?” I clenched my fist, my face beginning to burn a deep red. “There was NOTHING I could do for Meredith!”

The dust had just about settled by the time I came to my senses. I realised that I was lying on top of Jemma. I felt her groan and move so I knew she was alive.

As my head cleared, I realised that Bathroom door had been blown off its hinges and was lying on top of us. The fact that it was solid had probably saved our lives.

For some strange reason, I remembered cursing the building inspector for insisting on it being a ‘fire door’ because the Central Heating Boiler was in the Bathroom. I moved a bit and didn’t get very far at all. The extra weight of the door would make getting out from under it a lot harder. You win some and lose some.

I chuckled to myself. It is strange what passes through your mind at times like this…

“Angela?” I perked up a bit, turning and placing my hand on the steel tubing that comprised the rail of the wooden bridge. I saw the girl, her jet black hair coursing with the flow of the wind, her wedge heels clipping the uneven planks. She looked just like any other girl really, apart from the paleness and the deep blue eyes.

“I hate school,” I said to Rhea as we walked into the bathroom following the last bell. “It’s worse than I remembered.”

“It’s not that bad,” Rhea rolled her eyes and leaned against one of the sinks, her body toward mine. “Fix your lipstick, it looks terrible.”

Doctor William Heath turns the lights on inside his private medical lab. He glances over towards the glass prison cell he kept his son in. The estrogen rich blood transfusion he gave his son last week was doing its job to his body. He was starting to look more and more like his daughter.

He loved his daughter very much and was devastated when she died in a car accident. His son, on the other hand, was a major disappointment. The boy got into trouble all the time and had been caught stealing.

CHAPTER 82
The next few weeks passed far too quickly, as I rarely experienced them as individual days. The files managed something new, delivering a sensation I had thought burnt out of me by Evans, Cooper, Pig and all the rest: shock.

I found myself reliving Peter Nicol-Clements comments about experiences with the police, “Back then”, and I finally understood what a different world they had inhabited.

Tizzy and her partner stand in the living room of the girl that had been killed. They were informed that the detectives that had been assigned to search the place, didn’t find anything. Tizzy moves from room to room examining each room. Her partner was examining the other rooms. She finally makes her way back to the bedroom where the girl had been found.

Tizzy glances around the room and as she was thinking where she would hide something to keep others from finding whatever it was, she had.
She spots the large collection of shoes Malia Napua collected.

CHAPTER 81
Rhod may have been glad to see me, but he had an odd way of showing it, which consisted of dumping the cat into my lap after I had slumped into the settee, followed by recounting what seemed like a century of playground gossip, largely involving children I had never heard of. Blake was at work, so Dad and Mam had driven boy and beast back to our place, together with a big pot of cawl. My larger boy was home at six, and after we had worked our way through a chip supper (I was willing neither to cook nor let Mam do so), the three of us were alone. Three, plus Fritz, who was snoring. Blake set a video going, something about climbing in North Wales he had picked up on our trip, and left boy and cat to their own devices.

“Welcome to your new home,” Rhea stepped into the house, backward, her arms dramatically outstretched. “It’s not as big as Angela’s house, but it’s home.”

“We…live here alone? Just us?” I looked around, noting that the place WAS much smaller. It was a single story house with aging wood floors, faded walls, and furniture that looked like it came from a thrift store.

“I live here too,” Mellie said, walking into the house and passing by me and tossing her purse on the couch.

Carol slumped forward, trying to remember how to breathe, how to think, how to move.

Her eyes idly watched the drops of blood that were hitting the floor, droplets spraying on her bloodless skin. Her ears twitched a little as her hearing returned, she heard the quiet murmuring of her servants and the howling blizzard outside. A flame hissed and sputtered, sharp, bitter incense made her nose wrinkle in disgust. Her mind cleared a little and she gasped for air.

Just over seven minutes later we were parked in a quiet part of Reading Services near the Motel.

“Ok, out withi it... What’s so important that couldn’t wait until we got back to the office?” asked Jemma slightly impatiently.

“I’ll show you. Give me a moment.”

I flicked through the photos of the documents we had found in Farthing’s safe until I found one in particular.

“Here read this,” I said giving her the phone.

The document was in Spanish.

Jemma struggled for a few minutes before giving me the phone back.

“I’m confused. Your Spanish is better than mine.”

“What it says is that when Mr Farthing went to Portugal a month ago where he met with Daniel Esteban. It goes on to say that he came to a deal with Esteban to get us killed in return for the two million Euros.”

“Hello?” I called out, swiveling my head in the darkness. The hood pressed against my face, my breaths were labored. “Where am I?”

My vision swam and my emotions raged as I was flung from the mirror and my body slammed against an old wooden floor, glass and debris bouncing, dust scattering after years of dormancy. I gasped for air and reached my hand upward toward the massive full-length framed mirror from which I had just been ejected. I scampered to my feet, rushed back toward the mirror, barely managing to keep myself standing. My arm outstretched I ran to it, slamming my hand against the glass. It shattered. The shards fell from the frame and turned to dust as they collided with the floor.

Tammy and several others come walking in looking red as a lobster and exhausted. She watches as Sophie drag her backpack in. Tammy felt sorry for her. She had thrown-up everything in her stomach the first few days they were on the life raft.

“I’m going to kill my uncle Jack when I see him.” Sophie barely makes it to her bunk, before she collapses.

“You signed up for this program.” Dave was taking his bloody torn t-shirt off while wincing.

“Pay attention,” Meredith tapped the old dusty book in front of me with her switch. She hadn’t used it on me lately but she really loved using it as an implement. “Without referring to the book, tell me the name of the Seelie court, in old Fae.”

“’Allo,” I responded, hoping I wasn’t messing it up.

“And the inner sanctum?”

“Alloquandirm,” I said a little uncertainty. The look on her face told me I was wrong.

“Alloquandirum,” She corrected me. “You’ve gotta get that ‘u’ in there.”

“Sorry,” I shrugged. “It’s a lot to learn and-“

Rebekah slowly broke the kiss and my my mind was still looking up at the sky in a stupor. One could have thrown a football at my head and then tackle me to the ground and I wouldn’t have cared a bit.
“Eric!” Molly hissed.

“Do you have a warrant?” Brianna asked the two police officers who were standing just outside the door, one craning his neck to see in.

“No Ma’am, this is a wellness check but we can come back with a warrant if need be, to make sure Mr. Achles is in one piece.”

“And who exactly is asking?” I couldn’t see her face, but I could just imagine her furrowing her brow at them.

“His parents,” One of the officers explained. “From what they said he was at camp Chippenwood-“

“Well that’s interesting,” My sister said. “An eighteen year old boy at summer camp?”