Page 71 of The Little Shop of Curiosities, The Music Box Part 2

“From Cordelia’s dreams?”

He nods. “Cordelia had her demon rip him to pieces”—he points to a spot in the centre of the picture, which seems to be the middle of the floor in someone’s living room—“right there. After Ishaan had finished with him, there were pieces of the judge dripping from the ceiling.”

I grimace. That sounds extremely unpleasant, and I hate that Harrison had to witness it in HD. “Ishaan?”

“The demon’s name,” he mutters, turning his attention back to the pictures.

“So this case that Hadley passed to me is actually connected to the Crawshanks family? Do you think he knew?”

Harrison shrugs. “You’d have to ask him.”

“But the fact that she was there and had her demon kill someone with extreme prejudice within its walls makes this place important.”

“It’s not just the killing of the judge,” Harrison says quietly. “Something else happened there. Something my gut tells me is important somehow.”

“What else happened, Prickles?” I stroke his back in an effort to provide comfort. I can only imagine what other horrors he’s seen through that woman’s eyes.

“Ishaan had just eviscerated the judge and Cordelia sent him off to drop the judge’s eyes on Dr Whyte’s pillow as a gift, leaving her alone in that house. Before she left, she found a boy chained to the wall in the cellar.”

“A boy?” My stomach sinks as Harrison nods.

“The judge liked young boys, the younger the better,” he whispers. “Dr Whyte used to have them brought from the workhouses for him. I’m guessing I don’t need to spell out why.”

“Jesus.” I swallow convulsively, a wave of nausea washing over me, a feeling obviously shared by Harrison, judging from his expression.

“The boy Cordelia found was so little, barely five years old. His name was Tobias…” His voice trails off and he looks over to me. “I know Cordelia did some really terrible things, no matter how justified they may or may not have been, but she wasn’t a bad person. Tobias was so broken, and she was so gentle with him.”

“What happened?” I ask gently, still stroking soothing circles on his back.

His eyes grow distant, and he slowly lifts his hands to his chest as if cradling a baby. “I held him, the way I never got to hold my own children before they were taken from me.”

“I?” I repeat sharply.

“What?” He turns to look at me, dropping his hands and staring at me in confusion.

“You said I,” I reply. “You said, ‘I held him, the way I never got to hold my children.’”

He shakes his head, his brow furrowed, then, taking a deep breath, pinches the bridge of his nose and closes his eyes. “When I’m trapped inside the dreams, I see everything through her eyes, feel everything she felt, and it’s happened so many times now. Sometimes it’s hard to separate out which are my thoughts and which are hers.”

I scowl as I watch him. I don’t like the sound of that. “Are you still having the dreams?”

He shakes his head. “Not for a while. It’s like they’re waiting.”

“Waiting for what?” Even more alarms go off in my mind, but I’m careful not let my worries show on my face.

“I don’t know,” Harrison murmurs, glancing back at the pictures.

“What happened to the boy?”

“She healed him, all of his injuries, but more than that, she took his memories.”

“His memories?”

“Not all of them,” he explains. “Just the bad ones. I can’t even begin to describe what it was like for her, the pain and rage she felt from having to relive the awful things that had been done to him, but she did it anyway. She took his horrors, knowing she’d have to carry them with her for the rest of her life. She took them so he wouldn’t have to. So he could have a chance at a normal life.”

I rub my hand over my face. The more I find out about this complex woman, the more I genuinely don’t know what to feel.

“What happened after that?”