Justice for the Damned by Ben Cheetham Page A

‘So who do you need me to buy off this time?’
    ‘It’s not like that. I made a bad investment.’
    Edward started to feed his mother the same lie he’d fed Philippa, but she cut him off with a humourless, biting laugh. ‘Who am I, Edward?’
    He ran his tongue across his quivering bottom lip. ‘You’re Mummy.’
    ‘And what does Mummy know?’
    ‘Everything. Mummy knows everything.’
    ‘That’s right. Now start again from the beginning, and this time tell me the truth.’
    ‘I… I can’t. Not on the phone.’
    ‘Then I’ll just have to come up there.’
    ‘No! It’s not safe for you to come here.’
    ‘All the more reason for me to do so. If you’re in some kind of danger, Edward, my place is there with you.’
    ‘Please—’
    ‘No more arguments. I’ve got one or two work things to take care of, but I should be with you by this evening. And for God’s sake, pull yourself together, Edward. No more crying. Remember who you are. You’re better than them. They have no right to judge you.’
    ‘Yes, Mummy. Sorry. Thank you, Mummy.’
    The line went dead. Edward glanced at the mahogany clock, a familiar mixture of dread and delight vying with each other in his heart as he calculated the hours until his mother’s arrival. Sniffing back his tears, he flung the phone onto a sofa and strode from the room. With the wolfhound padding after him, he climbed two flights of stairs to a cavernous attic, cluttered with boxes and antique furniture. At the rear of the attic, sunlight slanted through a round window, illuminating a galaxy of dust particles. He took a nail out of a chest of drawers by the window. Dropping to his haunches, he pushed it into a hole in a floorboard. He pulled the floorboard loose, reached into the cavity beneath and withdrew a little black book. He flicked through it until he found the page he was looking for. It was discoloured by a brownish-red stain, but not sufficiently to obscure the writing thereon. The dog peered over his shoulder, sniffing at the book.
    ‘Smells good, doesn’t it, Conall? There’s no other smell quite like it.’ Edward ran his finger down the page. ‘You see those names? They think they’re safe. But if I go down, I’m taking them with me. Every last fucking one of them.’

11
    Reece sat in his car, staring at the semi-detached house he’d grown up in. It was looking a little the worse for wear these days – the garden was overgrown; the window frames needed a new coat of paint; bricks showed through in places where the pebbledash cladding had flaked off. Sighing deeply, he got out of the car and approached the front door. He tried the handle. The door wasn’t locked. As he stepped into the hallway, a musty smell of old cigarette smoke, fried food and body odour assaulted his nostrils. Unopened mail was strewn on the doormat. Through an open door at the end of the hallway, a pile of pots was visible in the kitchen sink. Since finding out about his illness, his dad had all but given up on household chores. It wasn’t that he didn’t have the energy for them, he’d simply ceased to care about the upkeep of the house. Not that he’d ever had much interest in it. That had been his wife’s domain.
    ‘Dad,’ called Reece, gathering up the mail and making his way to a living room that showed signs of a woman’s touch in its matching floral wallpaper, carpet and three-piece suite – signs that were being steadily blotted out by food, drink and cigarette stains. The room was stiflingly warm. Heat pumped from a gas fire. The dusty mantelpiece above it was cluttered with photos, some of them in frames, others merely propped against the wall, all of the same woman. She was well-built, verging on stocky, with the same good-looking angular features, moody brown eyes and dark hair as Reece. There were more photos of her balanced on top of a television. As always, it struck Reece as ironic that his dad surrounded himself with pictures of his late wife,