I smiled at her and said, “Can you sayC-ole?”
“Ole,” she chirped proudly, making me laugh.
“All right, close enough,” I said, ruffling her hair.
I took her into the lounge to escape another Oakley-related conversation with Mia. Leona wriggled in my arms, waving her doll around, almost smacking me in the face with it.
The number of bruises this girl had given me…
“Maybe you could actually fix it, David?” Mum said dryly, hitting her laptop, as if that would magically make it work.
“It’s not that simple, Jenna,” Dad countered, matching her tone.
“Oh, how hard can it be? Just call the Internet people.”
I laughed. Mum turned and glared. Leona giggled along, too,even though she had no idea what she was laughing at. Mum had no clue when it came to anything technical.
She still emailed for almost everything, I got calls rather than texts, and she thought online shopping was killing the high street. It was but we still all did it.
Hell would freeze over before she got an Amazon account. Mia had deliveries from them most days, nearly all of it for Leona.
“It’s the router, Jenna, not the entire Internet,” Dad said, shaking his head. He walked off to his study where the router was, ready for another attempt to make the thing work before he’d admit defeat and call an engineer out.
As I held Leona over the sofa, she started laughing and squealing immediately, knowing what I was about to do.
“Ready?” I said slowly, making her squeal louder.
I dropped her on the cushions, and she screamed like she was being murdered. Kids were so easy to amuse. All you had to do was chuck them around a bit and give them endless snacks. In that order.
Leona had been with Chris the Dick all morning, so she was on a sugar high. All it took was for her to smile at him and he would give her whatever she wanted—usually sweets. At least Chris the Dick had stuck around. He’d surprised everyone there. As much as I hated to admit it, he was a good dad.
I still wouldn’t piss on him if he was on fire, though.
Grabbing my mail from the side table, I escaped to my room. Having Leona around was great, but she had too much energy.
I flopped down on the bed and ripped the first envelope open.Please have something decent in here.
The estate agent had sent me a few new houses. I’d seen about six already, but they were shitholes. Refurbishment, I could handle, but I didn’t want to do anything structural. Thelast one stunk so strongly of old smoke and wasted potential, it had made me gag.
If those were all I could afford, I might be here longer than I hoped.
I ripped open the envelope and shuffled through the latest printouts. Two out of the five were okay, and I would make an appointment to view them. The rest, I threw in the bin.
House-hunting was something I was meant to do with Oakley. When we had been together, I’d thought about stuff like that. We were sixteen and seventeen, so it was only “one day” kind of thoughts, but it’d been there. Our future was wide open, but I was confident that we’d share it.
Now, I would be living alone.
She had been on my mind more than usual lately. The trial would be starting next month, so I knew it was that. I hoped those scumbags would get life and rot in prison until they died.
When we first got the court date, I didn’t want to go. I didn’t want to hear the details. I’d given a full statement of what had happened the day Oakley called me and confessed, and it was going to be read out loud in court.
Now, though, I wanted to be there. I needed to watch them go down, and I wanted to see her again. It would only be on a screen, but it would still be better than looking at old photos. I would get to hear her voice.
“Hey,” Chelsea said, letting herself into my room.
I startled and placed my hand over my thudding heart.
“Cole, it’s almost eight!” she said, throwing her hands in the air.
