Dennis threw Wendy against the wall. The impact rattled her bones and snapped her head back.
“Please,” Leo whispered.
Dennis seized the abandoned bread knife from the kitchen counter. Leo closed his eyes. Buried his face in Lila’s sweet-scented hair. A dull thud rattled his skull, then another, and another, like the kicks and punches he’d heard so many times before.
But this wasn’t like the other times. Wendy’s gasp was different, stuttered and strangled. Empty. Hopeless. The phone line buzzed and crackled. Leo counted three heartbeats before the operator took a breath.
“Hello? Are you still on the line? Which service do you require? Do you need assistance?”
Leo opened his eyes. Blood oozed across the tiled kitchen floor.
Wendy’s blood.
Mum’s blood.
Dennis was by the stove, bending down with an unlit cigarette in his mouth. A nearby tea towel caught alight. He shoved it aside into the stack of newspapers ready for recycling. They ignited. Leo watched the flames begin their dance, and clutched the phone tighter. “Come quickly. My dad just killed my mum and set the house on fire.”
Charlie de Sousa made himself comfortable on the bottom of the stairs. The third step up was the best one. The bottom two creaked like crazy, and though he wouldn’t get in real trouble for eavesdropping on his parents, he didn’t want to interrupt their discussion before they got to the juicy bit.
“It’s a risk, Kate,” Reg said. Charlie could almost see him running his hands through his unruly mop of white hair. “Taking one traumatised child is a challenge in itself, but two? I don’t know. Do we even have room?”
“Of course we have room.” Charlie heard Kate get up and pace around, like she always did when she was annoyed. “The boy can go in the study. We’ll just have to move the computer downstairs.”
“It’s not ideal.”
“‘Ideal’? For God’s sake, Reg. Nothing ever is. If it was, these kids wouldn’t need us in the first place.”
Silence. Charlie strained his ears and wondered if the conversation was continuing in sign language. Kate was hard of hearing, and could read lips and speak, but she and Reg often continued conversations in sign language if they didn’t want the rest of the house to eavesdrop. Charlie considered creeping to the door and taking a peek, but Regalwayscaught him when he did that. The bloke had ninja senses.
Someone in the dining room sighed; Charlie couldn’t tell who. Then Kate spoke again. “Look, I know it’s a big ask, but these kids have been through the mill. They need a safe place to heal, and we can give them that. Iknowwe can.”
“What about the family we already have?” Reg countered. “It says here that both kids have medical issues from that fire, and the boy was in trouble at school before that . . . fighting and drinking. Truancy. Is it really fair to bring that into our home?”
“We can help them,” Kate said. “And we should ask the others before we make a decision. It’s how we do things in this house.”
Reg’s dry laugh told Charlie that Kate had got her way. He tensed, ready to flee upstairs, but the dining room door opened before he could move. Reg fixed him with a stare that said he’d known Charlie was there all along. “Go fetch your sister. I’m going to call Andy. Family meeting as soon as we’re all here.”
Charlie scrambled upstairs. He found Fliss in her room, headphones on, watching some vampire crap while she talked to her mates on Facebook. She didn’t acknowledge him, even when he blocked her view, but that wasn’t unusual. Charlie had joined the Poulton family when he’d been barely two. Fliss had been six, and the only child in Reg and Kate’s full time care back then. She’d never quite forgiven Charlie for encroaching on her territory, and that suited Charlie fine. Fliss was a stuck-up bitch, and shealwaysused all the hot water.
He unplugged her headphones.
She hissed and punched his arm. “What the hell are you doing?”
“Dad wants us. Family meeting.”
“What for?”
Charlie shrugged. He wasn’t about to share his stolen knowledge with Fliss. Stuff that. He’d enjoy her being the last to know. “Just come downstairs, yeah?”
He left without waiting for her response. Kate would deal with Fliss if she didn’t show.
Charlie drifted downstairs and took his place at the dining room table. Kate appeared and set a big bowl of her special houmous in the middle of the table, a sure sign that the discussion might get heavy. In this house, nothing soothed frayed nerves better than Kate’s home cooking.
She ruffled Charlie’s hair. “Okay, chicken?”
Charlie scowled and fixed his too-long dark hair, but he didn’t mean it. He enjoyed Kate’s motherly affection far more than he cared to let on. “Did Dad get hold of Andy?”
“He’s on his way. Have you done your homework?”
