The click of the lock has me stiffening, and I take a step back, my palms sweating as the door slowly creaks open.
There before me is my mum. Five-foot nothing with the same shade of dark hair as me, her strands long, limp and lifeless.
As she stares up at me, her pale skin flushes a little, and her brown eyes fill with tears.
Shit… are they for me, or because she knows Monty died?
“Hey, Mum,” I rasp, emotion thick in my throat.
“Asher,” she sobs, falling to her knees, her hands cupping together in front of her chest. “I’m so sorry. I tried, Asher. I really did… but Monty, he… it was the drugs. I couldn’t stop. Ican’tstop.”
A strangled cry rips from her lungs, and I fall to my knees too, reaching out and pulling her to my chest.
“I know, Mum. I know.” Fuck, now I’m crying too.
“I didn’t know how to escape him.” Her cries are muffled against my chest as she grips my shirt like it’s her fucking lifeline. “I don’t know how to escape the drugs, Asher. They have a hold on me.”
Pulling back, I cup my mum’s face, staring into her eyes and seeing the pain and conflict she’s suffering.
She’s not just saying words she thinks I want to hear. She’s telling the truth.
“But you want to get off them, right?” I ask, and her face contorts with pain, even as she nods.
“I have tried, I swear… but the sickness. It feels like it’s going to kill me.”
“Let me help you,” I say, brushing her hair back as I speak. “I’m not talking about the other times we’ve tried, Mum. No more cold turkey and needing to lock you away. I’m talking about a top facility that will help you wean off them safely. You’ll get all the help you need, and I swear, you won’t be tempted again.”
Even as I say those words, I don’t know how true that is.
The only thing I’ve ever been addicted to is Lily, and there’s nothing on this Earth that could ever stop me craving her.
Fucking nothing.
“We don’t have that sort of money,” she sniffs, even as her eyes brighten at the prospect.
She’s right, we don’t have that sort of money. But Lily does, and she’s insisting on paying.
If it were just about me, I’d say hell no, but this is my mum. I’ll happily take charity or even work it off until my dying day if it means she can get the help she needs.
“It’s already paid for, Mum. All you have to do is agree, and come with me. Leave this shit hole town, and this shitty fucking life, and come and start over somewhere else.”
Her eyes widen, and she pulls back, sniffing.
“Where? In London?”
I shake my head. “Not in this country.”
She frowns. “I don’t have a passport.”
“Do you trust me, Mum?” I ask, and she nods quickly. “Then just say you’ll leave with me. Say you’ll come. I can’t tell you where to yet, but I promise you’ll love where we are going. We can start over. You, me, Ronan, Jude and… Lily.”
“They’re coming too?” she asks, and when I nod, she frowns. “But Asher, I’ve seen the news. The police are looking for Lily.” She leans closer like she’s about to tell me a secret. “She’s the Crimson Angel.”
“You can’t believe everything you see on the news.” I chuckle, hating that I need to lie to my mum about this, but she’s better off not knowing. “Someone has a grudge against Lily, so they’ve dobbed her in for something that is absolutely ridiculous. Even the police haven’t found any evidence that Lily is the Crimson Angel when they searched her house. Her name has been run through the mud because of hearsay, and nothing more. But it has destroyed the life she built here with her sons, so they are leaving, and we all want you to come with us.”
I shift back, jutting my thumb over my shoulder to the car parked at the curb, and my mum’s gaze follows, spotting Lily in the car.
“Oh, of course. You’re right. Lily wouldn’t hurt a fly. That woman is a saint.”
