“What?” Jonny put his only slightly chickeny hands on Charlie’s shoulders. “What do you mean?”
“If it weren’t for us, would you be going out properly?”
“It would be different. If it were just you, we’d maybe be more open about it. But if Sadie knew, she’d be planning a wedding and what dress she was going to wear. And I think if it doesn’t work then she’d be heartbroken.”
“Will you be heartbroken if it doesn’t work?” Charlie’s arms went round his waist. The action was unusual; for the last twelve months, Charlie had flinched at most forms of physical affection from his father or grandparents, so they’d resorted to fist bumps and gentle slaps on the back.
Then Jonny thought about his son’s question. “Yes. I will be. But it’s a big thing being someone’s serious girlfriend and a big thing to decide you’re going to be a step-mum.”
“But then she chooses us, doesn’t she? Rayah’s not stupid and she knows how annoying Sadie can be and how Harry sometimes wets the bed so she knows all our bad things. If she decides that then she’ll have picked us as well as you.” There was both excitement and fright in his voice.
Jonny hugged Charlie to him, feeling long skinny limbs and catching the smell of almost teenaged boy. “You need to shower and you’re right. There is more to it that it just being about me.”
“That isn’t fair though. If you didn’t have us you’d be happier.”
Jonny laughed loudly. “Charlie, you three are my life. Never, ever have I ever not wanted you. even when you’re smelly and cross or that time when Sadie decided to pull poo out of the toilet and use it as brown paint have I ever wished you weren’t here.”
“I wanted to send Sadie back that day. That was gross.” Charlie buried his head into Jonny shoulder.
“I did consider sending her to your grandparents for a few weeks. But I changed my mind later.”
“Maybe you should reconsider.”
Jonny laughed. “You’d seriously like to get rid of her?”
Charlie shook his head against Jonny.
“I didn’t think so.”
He caught sight of the door opening and the small whirlwind blew in, one shoe in her hand.
“Daddy! Harry’s taken my other shoe!”
Charlie looked up at him. “Are you sure about keeping her?”
Jonny looked at him, ignoring the bouncy brat about to run into him. “I question my decision every day for around three seconds. Come on, Sadie, let’s go and check in the orangery for the shoe.”
The station was quiet,that lull in the day where some of the people on shift were grabbing a nap or in the gym or updating paperwork. The last one was really just him, or had been. Jonny had finished what he needed to do, mainly work out next month’s schedule and quality check some of the reports and now he was looking through correspondence from the police around the two fires that were suspected arson, or two of the fires. There had been several that were questionable in terms of how they’d been started, but there was nothing to link them. However, the apartment and the farmhouse had one commonality: remains.
“Jonny, we got one.”
He stood up, the papers forgotten. Technically he wasn’t on duty; he was there for the paperwork today, but giving up on an opportunity to be active and part of his team wasn’t something he was going to pass up on.
“It’s at the school.”
The words froze him. “Which school?”
“Severton Primary. We need to go.”
He followed his colleague out, his body working on muscle memory as he went through the motions, climbing into the engine, pulling on his gear, listening to the information and doing his best to put any thoughts of the kids out of his head.
“There’s no one in the building.”
The words were like holy water.
“What?” Processing them was something else though. “What do you mean?”
“It’s the back of the school that borders on to the grove. All kids are offsite as it’s past home time and the staff were in a meeting on the other side of the building. Everyone’s accounted for.”
