Page 101 of This Reckless Home

He chuckles. “I’ve been waiting for your call for a long time, Miss. Blossom.” I lick my lips. “Your mother and I were close friends before the end, I knew her well and she knew this day would come.”

Chills race up my spine, like fingers from the grave tracing up the skin. “My mother knew? How?”

He sighs. “She knew your father, knew that he would make things difficult. Frankly, I’m impressed and surprised I’ve not heard from you sooner.” My chest twinges, but the wound my father left is lessened by the fact he watched them take my guys away, and if I’m correct, he orchestrated the whole thing. “But then again, she always said you were going to be remarkable.”

Loss hits me all at once, stealing my ability to speak. I didn’t get much time with my mother, not enough of it anyway. And the fact that she protected me even after her death reminds me of what I would have had if she’d not died at all.

“Now, how about I tell you what I have, then you can tell me what predicament you’re in and together we can find the best way forward?”

“Y-yes please,” I reply, pulse thudding in my ears.

And he tells me. He tells me about the years my mother spent while married to my father quietly gathering documentation, evidence of his emotional and financial abuse, his corruption to make sure that whatever venture he invested in thrived, no matter the cost. Then before her death, she charged Ralph to keep gathering. He’s got records of when my father contested my mother’s will, his attempts to try and take the money she left for me, his daughter.

It all shows Wilson Devonshire’s character in a damning light, and lends credibility to my belief that these charges against my guys are false and were concocted by him.

It also shows that my mother knew what my father was like, lived with him, stayed with him — probably for me — and prepared for when she wouldn’t be here to defend me. All without telling me.

“Why didn’t she tell me herself?” I ask once he’s finished, and I hear his exhale over the line.

“Because she didn’t want you living in fear of it, of what he was like and the depths he would go to in order to get his own way.”

Even in death she protected me.

My chest aches, my throat and lungs sore with the loss of her.

“Now tell me, what has Wilson done to have you calling me first thing on a Sunday morning?”

So I explain everything that happened from the moment my father interrupted our family breakfast, the threat, then later last night, the police raid and the guys being taken away. I tell him how Steel was struck even when he wasn’t resisting arrest. How the officers were rough and manhandled them. How I caught the word thug aimed at Nox, who for once said nothing. How I’ve not been able to speak to them or get any information from the county jail. How I saw my father’s car at the end of the driveway when the dust from the police cruisers had barely settled.

“This has your father’s handwriting all over it,” Ralph says, his tone unsurprised but frustrated. “I will send over all the documentation I have, but I cannot help your boys, I’m an estate lawyer.” My heart sinks like a lead balloon in my chest. “However, I know someone. A bright young spark of a criminal defence lawyer who does pro bono work and has had success going up against corrupt systems before. There is no connection to Wilson. He can be trusted. I’ll make the call myself, get him to contact your boys directly so they can accept him if they choose.”

I want to insist that I’ll pay whatever the cost, that I’ll make sure they accept him. But then I think of my guys, and the fact that although it’s my family which has done this to them, they need to feel like they have agency. That they are in charge of their own fate.

“That would be wonderful, thank you, Mr Symes.”

“Please, call me Ralph,” he says kindly. “And it’s no trouble. Bad men shouldn’t be allowed to get away with things like this. It’ll be my absolute pleasure to see Wilson Devonshire brought to his knees. And with the documentation, the evidence I have, your mother built the weapon to do just that. She just hoped you’d never need it.”

“It can be used against him legally?”

“Absolutely. There is a history of abuse and corruption, and there may even be a thread tying him more directly to what happened last night, but your testimony regarding his threat from earlier in the day, and then the fact his car was on the drive at the time of arrest.” He pauses. “Do you have proof of that? CCTV of his car?”

“Yes! And my guards would have recorded letting him in, they have a log for visitors,” I say, that lead balloon lightening slightly.

“Then, with your permission, I will share the documents with my lawyer friend, as well as tell him to get in touch with you for your statement and the evidence of your father being present last night.”

“Anything you or the lawyer needs. If it helps them get out, I’ll do anything.” My throat feels tight, but no longer with just desperation and hopelessness. “I can’t tell you how grateful I am, Ralph.”

“As I said, it’s been a long time coming. My guy will be in touch soon. Don’t lose hope Miss. Blossom. There is a way out of this.”

We say our goodbyes and then hang up. I just sit there, with this new, fragile hope that feels like a seedling just poking out of the ground and could be crushed so easily by a careless foot.

“NO REST FOR THE WICKED” BY KLERGY

STEELE

I’m woken from a shitty night’s sleep by my door being swung open, a guard walking in, cuffs already in hand.

“Up Vaughn. You have a meeting with your duty lawyer.” The words are almost bored sounding, and I rise to my feet, fucking aching from this hard as fuck bed, holding my wrists out for the cuffs to go on.