Chapter Thirty
ADAM
There were more cuts on her leg. When I saw her in the shower yesterday, my god was it only yesterday? When I saw her then, she had new cuts on one thigh, but today there were some on both.
“We need to hurry, Adam.”
“Fuck that. When did you do these? Did you do this here?”
She moved her leg out of reach. “Rinse.”
“Julie.”
“Rinse the damn shampoo out of your hair, Adam. It’ll get in your eyes.” I groaned, and awkwardly pushed myself up to stand under the water. While I did that, she was quiet, and when I looked at her again, she was shampooing her own glorious hair.
She moved me so she could rinse, and then she set about washing me in the most cursory way. No lingering, no sweet teasing touches, like I’d wanted. Because I’d fucking mentioned the cuts on her leg.
“Is it because of me?” I asked, feeling a deep sense of dread, as I awaited her answer.
“No. Well… No. It was a lot of things. And no, I did that when I was sent home from work.”
“They’re bleeding.” I said, wanting to fucking fix her. Right now.
She stepped out of the shower and dried off, before she turned off the water, and reached to help me back out. She’s tiny, and she’s having to help me move around. So fucking humiliating.
“I need to patch those up for you, Julie. You can’t leave them bleeding.”
She groaned. “I’ll sort it. Just please, let me get you ready, so we can go and break poor Jeff’s heart. I can’t concentrate on anything else, while that’s waiting to be done.”
Fuck. Jeff.
As soon as I was dry, I crossed the room carefully, and grabbed my phone, moving a little better now the painkillers were in effect, and I was standing up. Going from sitting to standing was the difficult part. I sent Jeff a text, telling him I needed to meet with him in the bar, and that I was leaving straight away.
We were in the car and halfway there, when my phone rang. It was Jeff. He was in pieces.
“He’s dead! My boy is dead… Adam, it was him.”
I groaned, glancing at Julie as she drove. She looked so small behind the wheel of the car. Maybe that was another reason she didn’t normally drive. She wasn’t ridiculously short, but with her small build, she just looked… yeah… tiny…
“Jeff, I’m so fucking sorry. I was hoping to get to you, before the news reached you. So you could hear it from me. We’re about five minutes away.”
“He knows?” Julie whispered, lifting a hand to her mouth. I nodded.
I saw tears welling in her eyes, and no fucking way is she going to cry over that bastard.
“Adam, I need to know what happened. How did my boy end up floating in a fucking river? My god.” He broke down again, and the call ended.
This fucking job. Those fucking Bennetts. I sent Nige a text then, because something awful just occurred to me.
Me: Did you manage to wipe that image from his phone?
Nige: What the fuck? Whose phone?
Me: Jeff Clarke. Get with the program.
Ha! Take that. It felt nice to throw that shit back at him.
Nige: Impossible to do remotely, without some help. My advice is get it from him, and delete it yourself.