CHAPTER HUNDRED AND FORTY-EIGHT

 MOONA POV

He hovers for a minute before he gets into his car, and I wonder what he’s thinking.

 I wonder if he believes everything Nick said about me. I wonder if he knows now that I wasn’t lying when I said they don’t give a shit about me anymore, and there was no way an apology would make any difference to them now.

 Like it or not, I’ll be on my own in a few days. Welcome to adulthood, Moona. I can hardly wait.

      I watch his car pull away and keep watching the road until he’s long gone. The day is drawing outside and I love the way the birds sing around here.

 I love Nick and Amie’s house, even though I would never say it to their face. I love their dog, Limb, even though I never fuss him when they’re around to see it. I walk him through the fields at the back of the garden but they don’t know that. I always hang his leash up exactly as they left it, and I’ve never been caught yet.

 They’d just think I was up to no good if they did catch me, so it’s our little secret, Limb and mine.

  Brian place looks small and clearly has no garden. There would be no birds singing and no fields to walk in and no Limb, and loving those things is in my blood, being Romany and all, but even so, I’d still consider giving up my dreams of a wagon and the open road if he’d let me stay with him.

 I hear Nick and Amie in the kitchen downstairs loading up the dishwasher. My stomach rumbles, but they don’t offer me anything to eat, and I don’t expect them to.

I missed dinnertime.

  I’ll have to sneak downstairs when they’re in bed and grab something from their pantry. They’ve started hiding stuff from me these past few weeks, but I know Amie keeps some chocolate in her sewing tin.

      They’ve already got a kid lined up to replace me, I heard them on the phone to the agency talking about it. I think he’s called Aaron.

      I hope he’s a better kid for them than I’ve been, and I hope he likes this place as much as I do.

      The thought of leaving here makes me feel more upset than it should. I ball my hands into fists and choke back stupid tears that I don’t deserve.

      I could’ve stayed if I was better.

      I could’ve stayed if they hadn’t seen the bruises on my arms and thought I was into drugs or self-harm, or a load of other things that made them look at me in those ways I hate.

      Pity and fear and disappointment.

      Maybe I wouldn’t have been such a bitch to them then.

      I’m not into drugs and I’m not into self-harm, I’m just sick of telling people that when they never believe me anyway.

I have to wait a long time for Amie and Nick to go to bed, and when they do I find Amie has moved her chocolate stash from the sewing tin.

      There’s a note on the side, scrawled out for me.

  ‘If we don’t deserve enough respect for you to join us for dinner, you don’t deserve to eat our food.’

      She’s left a couple of slices of bread out for me, but I can’t even find the butter. She’s hidden it. She’s hidden everything.

      The tears sting, but I don’t let them fall.

      I’ll be gone before morning, eighteen be fucked.

      And I won’t even be sad.

      I pack up a backpack of my clothes and my few stupid trinkets, and I kiss Limb goodbye before I leave. I have to ditch out of the living room window because the front door is locked, but I’m as quiet as I can be, as quiet as a mouse.

      And then I’m gone. 

•

•

•

CAIN POV

I wait for a text from Brian letting me know he’s done dropping his drunk infatuation back home where she belongs, but it doesn’t come. I despair for the guy and his midlife crisis.

 This thing with Moona Avii, it isn’t like him. Brian is responsible and considered. He plays by more rules than he should in life, certainly more than I do, and if there’s one he should choose to break it’s definitely not this one.

      I’m about to call the crazy sonofabitch when I hear his car pull up outside. He’s had the same car for over a decade, I’d recognise the sound anywhere.

      I’ve already opened the door when he reaches my doorstep. He brushes past me without a word, and I follow him on through to the kitchen to grab the beer we didn’t manage at Sassy’s.

      I hand him a bottle and he slumps himself against my kitchen island.

      “They’re going to throw her onto the streets,” he says, and I sigh.

      “Not. Your. Problem.”

      “I’ve been working with her for over five months,” he tells me, like I don’t know already. “I can’t just turn my back on her, not like that.”

      “So refer her to someone who can help. Again.”

      He takes a swig of beer. “I doubt she’ll co-operate. She doesn’t trust anyone.”

      “You tried. That’s all you can do.”

      “I guess you’re right.”

      He doesn’t believe me, and I know it. It’s written all over his face. In Brian’s sweet deluded mind he’s on a one-man mission to eliminate all youth problems in our poor rural county. He thinks I work hard, but I have nothing on him. I leave my work at the office every evening, he lives his life 24/7. He never forgets those kids in his books, never forgets a face or a sad story.

      For all my sighs and grimacing and talk of cold, hard reality, I admire him for it. My work is based around simple risk analysis, working out the right insurance premiums for the right clients. He is emotional, turbulent. Difficult.

  Yet I’m the one who lives in the big country pad with a Range Rover. Go fucking figure. Society has this shit upside down.

      “You have to let this go, Brian,” I say and the guy practically flinches.

      “I’ll let it go when I know she’s safe.”

      “And if she isn’t safe? If she ends up clearing off back to Gloucester and slumming it on the streets?”

      He shrugs. “Then I’ll keep trying.”

      “You’ll follow her around the back alleys like a stalker? Bring her a hot soup every evening?” I stare at him. “Or smuggle her into your bedroom and hope your neighbours don’t talk?”

      His eyes flash with disgust. “I never would.”

      I can’t help but smirk. “If you say so. That girl’s all woman, Brian. She’s definitely all of eighteen, in spirit as well as in body, give or take a few measly days.”

      “She was my client.”

      “A pretty one, if a little uncouth.”

      I’m underplaying it. For all I’ve heard about Moona Avii over the past few months, the descriptions didn’t do her justice. She’s stunning. Even a grotty bomber jacket and grubby boots can’t hide that. Her eyes are pale and piercing, her nose has a pixie quality about it that matches the rest of her. She’s fey and feral, and totally not the kind of girl either of us old farts should be ogling.

   “She’s beautiful,” Brian says, and his eyes have this worryingly wistful quality about them. “It’ll get her into trouble.”

      “More trouble.”

      He groans. “Raul Elf is a waste of space, we both know it. She’d have ended up in his bed tonight if I hadn’t stepped in.”

      “You don’t know that.” I take another swig of beer. “And Raul Elf is a waste of space, but he was another one whose corner you were fighting a few years back. You don’t always win the fight and you know it. She’s another one, you just gotta let it go.”

  “Raul Elf was different,” he tells me. “Raul still had his family. Raul’s problems weren’t nearly as marked as Moona’s.”

 I’m talking to a brick wall.

Brian’s whole body is tense. His brows are heavy and his shoulders look rigid. I’m never worried about him, not really, because he’s the kind of guy who never does anything crazy. I’m the one who makes the impulsive decisions. I’m the risk taker. But right now, looking at him, I’ve nothing but dread at the prospect of leaving for a conference in Berlin tomorrow.