Beneath the Moon and the Stars (17 page)

She knew she had just handed herself to Casey on a plate. It was down to him now whether he would serve her up to the police and the waiting press.

He stood up. ‘We normally have our own people for such things, but… We have limited budgets, we don’t have access to the really cool stuff that MI6 have, and I expect Warner Brothers and their associates have an even bigger budget than they do. It would be good to pass on this evidence to someone skilled enough to handle it. I imagine I can trust Alex to pass on any details that he finds?’

‘Absolutely.’

He nodded and fished his phone out of his pocket, then walked into the lounge. ‘Hello it’s DI Fallowfield. You know the CCTV footage of the Plasticine Diamond case, from Menton Hall. I need you….’ His voice faded as he moved to the front of the house and Joy realised her heart was thundering against her chest. She quickly made the tea, having to do something with her hands. Alex to the rescue once again.

He had done so much for her, not only putting his life on hold to raise her, but financially supporting her for the first few months when she had returned to the UK and was trying to make a name for herself as a chainsaw artist. Where other parents might have encouraged their child to get a job somewhere, anywhere just to get some money, Alex had been fierce that she had a rare talent and that her career would take off just as long as she kept working at it. Eventually she’d gotten a few commissions, in her life previous to The Dark Shadow, and it was enough that she could move out of Alex’s home and rent a place with bad plumbing and several dubious damp patches. It was here that she had lived on a diet of porridge and baked beans on toast, and where she was determined that after everything Alex had done for her, she would not be reliant on him again. He had his own life and it was time enough that he started to live it.

She couldn’t go back to wondering where her next meal was coming from, or rely on Alex to put her up again.

But yet here she was, relying on him to get her out of this bind, pulling him in to the lies and the deceit, now she’d be asking him to lie to the police for her.

Casey came back in and he smiled at her when he saw her worried face.

‘I’ve just spoken to Alex, he’ll be more than happy to have a look at the footage for me.’

She frowned slightly, confused. ‘You spoke to Alex?’

‘Yes, you gave me his number, remember, so we could chat about being gay and my inappropriate crush on my best friend.’

‘Of course, but I didn’t know you had spoken.’

‘We actually met for coffee yesterday; he really is a lovely bloke.’

She beamed. ‘He is… did you…’

He must have seen her innuendo. ‘No, no, no. Definitely not my type. I mean funny, kind, fiercely loyal to you, but I’m not remotely attracted to him. He’s way too thin for my liking. In comparison to Finn, Alex is like a blade of grass. Alex pretty much said the same about me, that if this was your attempt at setting the two of us up, then it hadn’t worked, he likes them big too, men that is.’

She smirked. ‘I didn’t think the two of you would suddenly leap into bed with each other just because you’re both single and gay, I was just hoping that you could become friends.’

‘Well we’ve certainly done that. We’re definitely going to meet up again, probably after the wedding or the honeymoon. Anyway…’ he fixed her with a serious look. ‘He says he’ll take care of the CCTV for you, I mean for me.’

‘Thank you.’

‘And perhaps, if you know this Dark Shadow man, you’ll tell him to keep his head down for a while.’

She nodded.

‘And that’s the last time I’ll speak of it, I promise.’

She knew it would be too. She knew she could trust him completely. She stepped forward and hugged him. He jolted in surprise as she rested her head on his chest and then he hugged her back, holding her tight in his arms. She felt a tightening in her throat as she held him and she smiled as she pulled away.

‘Damn it Casey, why do you have to be gay?’

He laughed as he kissed her fondly on the head, picked up his mug of tea and walked into the lounge. ‘What did you want to talk to me about anyway?’

She cast her mind back to her previous problems, grabbed her mug and followed him.

‘Finn.’

‘Oh yes?’ He threw himself down next to Darcy who was sprawled out upside down on the sofa, with her tongue hanging out of her face. He rubbed her belly absently which earned him a half-hearted wag of the tail. Joy sat down on the big comfy chair opposite him.

‘It’s just that… there’s a code, between friends.’ How could she put this? ‘When me and my friends would go out, if one of us called dibs on a guy the rest of us would stay well clear. Normally we all went for very different types anyway but occasionally we would overlap. I remember once I fancied this guy Steve for months, though he was blatantly not interested in me. Anyway as the months went on, Libby started to notice him too and when he asked her out, she came to ask me if it was ok.’

‘And was it?’ Casey asked with a smirk, clearly knowing where this conversation was going.

‘Yes,’ she said, honestly.

Casey took a big breath. ‘You’re asking me if it’s ok if you go after Finn?’

‘Yes. I won’t do anything with him if you’re not happy with it. You’ve been in love with the man for fifteen years, it would be a bit mean of me to…’ She sighed. ‘I think I’m falling for him.’

He took a big swig of his tea and swallowed it thoughtfully. ‘Does he feel the same way?’

‘I don’t know. He likes me, I know that much. I think it could be something more. He’s still hurting over Pippa and I don’t think he’s ready for a relationship yet.’

He shifted uncomfortably. ‘I’m going to tell him.’

‘What? That I’m falling for him, that’s hardly fair.’

‘No, that I love him.’

She had no words, though she was aware that her mouth was flapping open like a fish.

‘I have to know Joy. I know deep down that he doesn’t see me that way, that he’s not gay, but I have to know for sure. I have to hear it from him. Maybe then I can finally move on.’

‘You’re going to tell him you’re gay, that you love him and have been in love with him for fifteen years?’

Casey nodded. ‘I know it’s stupid, but I have to.’

‘But what if… what if he’s homophobic?’

‘Finn? No way, he may be a moody sod, but he’s not that.’

Her heart ached for him. He was not going to get out of this what he wanted and he knew that. But maybe this would be the first stage in him coming out, in finally being brave enough to accept who he was.

‘When are you going to do it?’

‘Friday. I’m having a sort of mini stag do, just me and him. I don’t want a big fuss and if Zach had his way there’d be strippers and lap dancers. Me and Finn are just going to have a few drinks, maybe play on the Wii. I’m going to tell him then.’

She moved to sit next to him, taking his hand, but she couldn’t find any words to offer hope when she knew it was hopeless. She could only hope that Finn was kind about it.

‘After that Joy, after I’ve told him and been spectacularly rejected, you can have him. I want him to be happy and I know he won’t find that with me so if he can find it with you then I’ll be happy with that. Just give me till then.’

She nodded, almost hoping that Finn would suddenly turn out to be gay, and Casey at least would get his ‘happy ever after’.

*

Joy was busy making a maquette, a mini model from plasticine as she planned out her next carving. Many ideas and plans were formed in her head, but it wasn’t until she made a model of it could she see the limbs and detail in scale. She liked to make a scale model of the tree first based on photos from her recces. Then she experimented with what she could achieve from the canvas she had been given. Sometimes branches would become part of the design, sometimes she would chop them all off and work with a plain round canvas. She often wished that trees would grow square instead of round, it would make her job an awful lot easier.

The backdoor was open and the late afternoon sun was spilling across the kitchen floor. She heard Darcy bark and looked out to see what she was doing. Her heart dropped when she realised Darcy wasn’t in the garden. She ran out and saw her with a girl of about seven years old in Finn’s back garden. Her hair was a white blonde curtain over her face and she was busy painting Darcy’s claws with pink sparkly nail varnish. Joy smiled and let herself through the connecting gate which Casey might have left open earlier.

‘You know, you should probably practice your skills on someone who isn’t likely to lick it off.’

The girl jumped and Joy saw the smile that had been on her face quickly fall off.

‘Is this your dog?’

For someone so young, Joy was surprised to see such an angry expression on her face.

‘Yes, her name is Darcy.’

‘Do you have Billy then as Uncle Finn has your dog?’

‘No, Billy’s not next door, I think Darcy just wandered through the open gate.’

The girl looked back at Darcy. ‘She’s a Newfoundland isn’t she? My granddad had one, Boris he was called.’

‘Your granddad or the dog?’

The girl smiled again. ‘The dog, Granddad was Frank.’

Joy noted the ‘was’ and the sudden sadness that had entered the girl’s eyes.

‘I’m Joy by the way.’

The girl shook her hand so hard that Joy’s whole arm was almost yanked out the socket.

‘I’m Lily.’

‘So, Lily, why don’t you practice your makeover skills on me instead, and then you can tell me all about your granddad and Boris.’

‘I don’t like to talk about it.’

‘Ok, I’d like purple nail varnish please.’ Joy sat down and laid her hands on the table, knowing there’d be more to come.

Lily dived into her bag and pulled out a bottle of bright purple nail varnish. ‘Well that’s what Mummy says when people talk about him, she tells them “I don’t like to talk about it” and then they stop.’

Joy nodded as Lily stuck her tongue out and carefully applied the nail varnish to her thumb nail. ‘And would you like to talk about it?’

‘I miss him.’

‘I bet you do.’

‘He died two weeks ago and the funeral is today. I’m not allowed to go.’

Children and death were such tricky subjects. There was a fine line between trying to shield your child from death and allowing them to grieve properly. When her parents had died, no one had spoken to her about it, apart from Alex. Everyone thought she was too young, or that mentioning it would upset her even more. Talking about it helped but no one was prepared to take that risk.

‘Tell me about Frank, what was he like?’

*

Finn put the phone down and went out towards the garden. Lily loved pizza; maybe that would cheer her up. She’d been so sad for the last two weeks and nothing seemed to make her smile for very long, if at all. He didn’t agree with his sister’s decision to not let Lily come to the funeral, but it meant he got to spend time with Lily and that was always a good thing in his book.

He stepped outside and froze.

Joy was holding Lily on her lap, her arms around her to stop Lily toppling off as Joy struggled against her. Joy’s lips had already been painted red, she had pink glittery eye shadow, deep red blusher in little cute round circles on her cheeks and Lily was desperately attempting to put ribbons in Joy’s hair. Joy was moving her head out of Lily’s reach, but Lily had her pinned down, giggling uncontrollably, she quickly attached the ribbon before Joy could move away. Then she added a pair of huge plastic orange clip-on earrings and the outfit was complete. Joy slumped in defeat.

‘Now would you like purple nail varnish or red on your toes?’ Lily asked, rummaging in her makeup bag.

‘Red I suppose,’ Joy grumbled, looking at the ribbon in her hair. ‘It will go with my ribbon.’

Finn snorted with amusement and Joy turned to look at him. Suddenly he felt a huge lump in his throat. Every time he thought he had successfully pushed her away, she did something to pull herself closer. She looked adorable.

‘I caught this reprobate putting nail varnish on Darcy and the next thing I know I’m being made over like some kind of Barbie princess.’

‘What’s a rebro-bate?’ Lily had found some glitter gel and was applying it to Joy’s cheeks.

‘It means troublemaker,’ Finn said. He finally tore his eyes from Joy and glanced around the garden. The back gate leading to the road was open and his heart leapt.

‘Where’s Billy?’

Joy and Lily looked blank and he quickly ducked back inside and called him. Billy didn’t appear. He raced upstairs. Billy normally came when he was called, but it wasn’t completely unheard of for him to be in a very deep sleep. There was no sign of him upstairs either. He ran back downstairs and back out into the garden. He couldn’t have gone far.

‘Lily get your shoes on, we need to look for Billy.’

Joy stood up, her eyes underneath all the makeup were alert and concerned. ‘He’s missing?’

Finn gestured helplessly to the open gate as Lily ran past him into the house.

‘Look,’ said Joy, ‘she can stay with me, you’ll probably cover more ground without her.’

He shook his head. He couldn’t leave his niece with a complete stranger. Besides he was supposed to be cheering her up.

‘I can’t, she’s had a rough few weeks, she’s barely spoken – ’

‘I know, her granddad died, she told me all about it. And him, he sounds like quite the character. I’m presuming as you’ve not said anything that he wasn’t your dad?’

‘My brother in-law’s. She told you? She hasn’t wanted to talk about it at all.’ His sister had been quite adamant not to mention it in front of Lily.

‘It turns out she did.’

Finn felt angry at this. Lily had known Joy for all of five seconds.

Joy must have seen his face. ‘Sorry, I didn’t mean to tread on any toes. Maybe she felt more comfortable because she didn’t know me. Regardless, you can shout at me when you get back, you need to look for Billy. Give me your number and I’ll call you if he comes home. They normally do once they’re hungry.’

Joy was right, he would be quicker looking for Billy without Lily.

Lily came running out with her pink spotted wellies on. ‘I’m ready, do you think Billy’s ok?’