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“Have you talked to him?” he asked, failing to disguise his disappointment before the answer even came out of my mouth.
I hadn’t been able to bring myself to stand in the same room as Ossian. Dax had gallantly taken on the task of unlocking the crypt and letting Ossian limp up the stairs. As far as I knew, he’d made a beeline for the labs, and stayed there the few days since, probably licking his wounds and snorting up vats of the ‘botanicals’ he’d spent a small fortune on. “No,” I replied.
Sinclair spun around as fast as his shrunken form could manage. “Fix this, Rupert,” he hissed. “For fuck’s sake. He’s your brother. I don’t care whether you love him or loathe him. Stop behaving like children and run this business. It’s falling apart because of the two of you.”
I held my hands up. “Fine. I’ll talk to him,” I replied, planning to do nothing of the sort. I’d rather dig out my eyeballs and toast them over a fire than make nice with that inhuman piece of shit.
Sinclair’s eyes thinned as he slithered past me to the door. They only left me when the door closed heavily, forming a welcome barrier between us. I walked to the window, adrenalin pumping through my temples. Sinclair had never before left me alone in his office. I wondered why he’d done so now. Either he was losing his faculties more rapidly than I’d first thought – either through whatever health issue he was covering up or the realisation he was teetering on the edge of being caught for peddling an unethically produced drug – or this was a trap.
Whatever his intention, I had no interest in prying.
A few minutes passed then I heard fresh footsteps near and the door opened again. I kept my focus on the oaks lining the drive; I could tell from the softness of breath and the temperature of the room it wasn’t Sinclair.
“Don’t get too used to being in this office,” Hector said, unable to conceal the thread of bitterness in his tone.
“I’ll never get used to it.” I turned around, my hands shoved into my pockets. “How is she?”
Hector stood in the centre of the room, his shoulders braced and chin cocked. “You shouldn’t have left that to Minty.”
I pushed a hand through my hair. “Left what to Minty?”
“Vivian asked us when she could go home.”
My chest thickened. “What did you say?”
“What could I say?” Hector replied. “She asked me when she could go home. What was I supposed to say?”
I took a step towards him, my voice lowered. “What did you say, Hector?”
“I told her… We told her she couldn’t go just yet. We had to explain why.”
I had no capacity to think about how hard that must had been for Minty and Hector. Every single one of my thoughts was with Vivian. “And how did she take it?”
“Not well.” Hector’s eyes widened like this shouldn’t have been a surprise. “She said if she’d known all along that this was going to happen, she would never have come back.”
I felt his words like a blow to the stomach. “She said that?”
Hector glared. “Do you blame her?”
I rubbed a hand over my face and muttered a low curse.
“But that’s not why I’m here,” Hector said, pulling a small cluster of folded papers from inside his jacket. He held them out to me. “This is why I’m here.”
“What are these?” I took the pile from him but didn’t pay them any attention.
“Press reports, Rupert. If you were losing sleep already over the way things are going, this will render you noc-fucking-turnal.”
I glanced down at the papers and sifted through them, taking in the headlines.
London pharmacies blame increased theft on city boy wonder drug.
Metropolitan police officer attacked by junkie in a suit.
Anxiety threaded its way up my spine. Both stories were published by The Guardian – the only newspaper group not in Ossian’s back pocket.
“What is this? How is this connected to us?”
“Isn’t it obvious? People are hooked on Bas.”
