Her Bad Boy (Chapter 15)

How does a girl cope when her twin flame is the definitive bad boy? (18+ Erotica)

Chapter 14 | Chapter 15: The Dark and the Deadly

The rain had stopped its onslaught in the city, but once they had taken the route towards the market town it had started up again, harder and faster this time. Unrelenting, darkening clouds had begun to collude together, cutting off the sunlight, and turning the day murky.

Despite the Land Rover’s heater blasting hot air into the car, and wrapping herself in Kevin’s jacket, the scene outside gave her goosebumps. “I’m not going to ask you to stop, because you’ll only think I’m stalling again. But this weather is getting pretty bad.”

“We’ll be fine.”

“I can hardly see outside for the rain to give you directions. What have you got? Laser vision?”

He sent an irritated glance her way. “What do you want me to do? Stop in the middle of the motorway?”

“You could slow down for starters.”

“Your wish is my command.” He eased his foot from the pedal, until the Land Rover visibly slowed. A car from behind honked its horn, and flashed its headlights. “Anything else I can do for you, while I’m at it?”

She didn’t bother answering. Except for the swish of the windscreen wipers and large drops of rain on the windows blurring their vision, they rode in silence for several minutes. Finally, they reached the junction that headed east to Montrose.

She leaned her head back against the seat, appraising him, studying his taut jaw, the frown lines that pulled at the corners of his mouth. Her pulse picked up. “When will you stop being angry with me?”

“I’m not angry with you.”

“Not much you’re not,” she retorted.

“What?”

“You heard me.”

“Well, if I am can you blame me?”

“Oh, I get it. Teach Daisy a lesson, is that it? Put her on the naughty step.”

He gave her a hard stare. “This isn’t a game.”

“Neither is sulking. It isn’t very manly. Anyone ever told you that?”

“Well, you’re the expert on sulking.” He paused. “And men.”

Anger pinched at her heart. “That was a cheap shot.”

“What can I say? You bring out the best in me.” He tightened his grip on the steering wheel. “Look, we all say things we don’t mean. We all say things we can’t take back. How about we just stay quiet and minimise the damage?”

“How about you grow a pair of balls?” she shouted, her quick temper releasing the knot of frustration inside her. She watched his jaw tighten at her response, and she decided she liked it.

“You must have led your dad a merry dance when you were young.”

“That would be difficult as I never knew him.”

“I’m sorry to hear that. No, strike that. You don’t want my pity, right?”

“Right.”

Blowing a deep breath through pursed lips, he narrowed a troubled gaze on the wet road. “We keep putting our foot into it. Do you think we could stop? At least until we get out of the car?”

She thought about telling him to go to hell, but decided to keep her first response to herself. “I’ll give it a go if you will.”

“It’s a deal.” He gave her arm a gentle squeeze, and his thumb skirted across her wrist. Before she could pull away, it traced the scar that was there.

When he glanced at her this time, his eyes held such sadness that her heart contracted. Returning his hand to the steering wheel, he asked in a softened tone, “Do you want to talk about it?”

After a moment of tense quiet, she said, “What is there to say. I’m still here. It- It was a long time ago.” She shifted in her seat, more shaken by the way he’d looked at her, than anything else. She’d never seen a man look like that before. Not at her. It had touched her more than she could say.

Trying to compose herself, she turned away from him to look out the car window, when her smartphone rang to drag her away from the precipice of the moment. Feeling grateful for the diversion, she dug in her pocket for the phone. It trilled, displaying a number she didn’t recognise. Curious, she swiped her finger across the brightly lit screen. “Hello? Who is it?”

“Daisy? Where... you? ...calling from hospital...”

“Sally?” She watched his pensive expression as she poked a finger in one ear so she could hear over the static on the line.

“When... back? ...have news... Iain...” Sally’s broken words filtered through the bad connection, courtesy of the rain, she assumed. It seemed strange the weather would be the culprit, but what else could be playing havoc with the service? They were near the coastline, and there were no mountains for miles.

“Sally, say that again. What about Iain?” She strained to hear Sally’s response. “No fucking way?” She punched the air, and gave a whoop for joy. “He opened his eyes? What does old man Merry say?”

Kevin gave her a silent thumbs up, and a wink. She winked back. “OK, we’re still on the way to your place. But I’ll be back as soon as I can.” Despite the garbled connection, she managed to relay the basics of the weather situation to Sally. “Yeah, Kevin and I are driving over together... OK, I’ll tell him. Right, see you then.” She keyed off the call and jammed the phone back in her pocket.

“Good news, huh?”

She gave an emphatic nod. “Great news. Suddenly I don’t care that I have to tell Sally what I’ve done. I’m just glad Iain has opened his eyes. At least he is going to be OK, even if I’ve lost a friend.”

“Don’t shout fire ’til you see the smoke. I’m sure she’ll forgive you.”

She shrugged, blinking hard, and wanting to change the subject. “Sally says thanks for the breakfast by the way... but the line was bad. I must have understood her wrong.”

“Why?”

“Tunnock tea cakes and bacon?”

“And what’s wrong with that? I thought women liked chocolate treats?”

“With bacon? For breakfast? Seems I got off lightly having breakfast with you.”

“It’s what I usually eat for breakfast.”

“I can tell you’re not married.”

“I was,” he said in a low voice.

“Was? Divorced?”

“She took her own life.”

She instinctively touched the faint scar mark on her wrist, understanding more clearly the look he’d given her. Turning on her seat to face him, she pulled at her bottom lip for a moment, deciding if she should say anything. Better not to, she thought. There were times words did more harm than good.

“We all have a choice, she made hers. But it’s the people left behind who have to live with it. You think about that, OK?”

She huddled deeper into his jacket. “I did it at a time when my mother had just died. I thought I had no one to leave behind, except Sally, and it would have been one less burden for her.”

He directed the car heater’s slatted vents towards her so that she got the full benefit of the heat. “Your mum made you think you’re a burden?”

“God, no. But being a single mum is still frowned upon in our town. She lost her job when I was born. My mum was housekeeper for the McMasters,” she explained.

“And she never married? Or tell you who your dad was?”

She shook her head, thinking back to her teenage years, and how she was made to feel an outcast by the small-minded conventions of a market town. She remembered how much it hurt having to silently endure the taunts at school, and she hadn’t wanted to inflict that knowledge on her mother. So, she never pestered her about her father. And anyway, if the bastard hadn’t wanted to know her, why she should want to know him?

“She didn’t give you up, though. She must have loved you very much.”

“I think- I think she felt guilty that I didn’t have a father. So, she tried to love me enough for two parents. And she did a good job, I was just a lost cause.” She had grown up loved, but the secret nature of her parentage had made her feel unwanted. There was a difference, and it was one that had festered in her, poisoning her against men.

They were all two-faced bastards, the lot of them, she thought irately. Willing to take notice when they wanted her to spread her legs for them, but acting as though she had the plague around their womenfolk.

“No one is a lost cause. Don’t say that.”

Glancing over her shoulder, she narrowed a curious gaze on him. “You’re a tough guy to figure out.”

“There’s more to you than meets the eye, too.”

She raised her chin. “I’m not as stupid as I look, is that what you mean?”

“You act stupid, but you don’t look stupid.”

“You need to work on your compliments. Have I told you that lately?”

He gave her a big smile. “You’re the most beautiful girl I’ve ever seen. How’s that?”

She hadn’t seen that coming, or maybe she should have done. Placing a finger in her mouth, she pretended to be sick. “Please!”

“I mean it.”

Something in his voice made her stop. “You looking for a pity fuck? Or what?”

Instead of taking offence, his face lit up with amusement. “Or what. I don’t need to go through this hassle to get a woman. Even one as pretty as you. Take my word for it.”

She eyed him surreptitiously, and knew he was right. When a woman looked at him they probably saw every romantic hero they’d ever lusted after. He was tall and muscular, with dark blue eyes, and golden brown hair, straight and well cut, while cast across a strong chin was a light shadow of stubble, roughing out his perfect edges.

But it was his hands that had taken most of her attention. Thick, and strong, and yet with the capacity to be so gentle... It made her knees shiver just thinking about the way his thumb had stroked her wrist. “So, why the compliment?”

He turned the wheel towards the intersecting junction to her town. “You’re very suspicious. You need to be more trusting. Not all men are evil.”

“They have their uses... but I do wonder how you lot run the world, when you don’t have the basic intelligence to put the toilet lid down once you’re done.”

“You never hear us complaining when women don’t leave the lid up, do you?”

She let out a weary sigh, and stared out the window. The fight had gone out of her. The day seemed to get darker, and the rain was refusing to let up. It looked like it was nearly ten in the evening, instead of ten in the morning. “How am I going to direct you in this?”

“My trusty steed might be old, but we do have one or two modern tools.” He indicated for her to open the box department by her knees. “I have a sat-nav in there. Take it out and we’ll punch in your postcode.”

“We could just use my smartphone?”

“My sat-nav is military grade. More reliable.”

Once the gadget had been set up and attached to the dashboard, she told him the address and postcode. Settling back for the last leg of the journey, she asked, “Did you really mean what you said?”

“I’ve said a lot of things. Be specific.”

She squirmed uncomfortably. “About me being beautiful.”

“Yes... but if you’d let me finish before you started throwing up, I was going to add that for someone who has battled with the issues you have, you have a lot more to offer than just your physical appearance.”

“Thanks... Now I sound like a charity case... So, what is it you think I have to offer? Apart from these babies,” she said, cupping her breasts.

He chuckled. “You’re strong despite what you’ve been through. I find that beautiful. It takes a lot of strength for someone to release their anger. But it also takes a lot of support for someone to grow and become a better person.”

“If that’s true then Sally could lead a beauty pageant. She’s always been there for me. Always. She’s forgiven me everything.”

“That’s what friends are for. You need to start returning the favour.”

“Some things are unforgivable though.” She looked at him pointedly when he didn’t come back with a smart response. “What no clever comeback? This is your chance to make me feel guilty yet again, and you’re not taking it?” She stretched up with her hand, barely managing to reach his forehead. “Are you running a fever?”

“I made a deal with you, didn’t I?” He made a zipping motion across his lips, but she absorbed the sudden expression he wore like a physical blow. It twisted at her insides.

“So, what’s that look for?”

He shrugged his large shoulders. “Forget it.”

“No, come on. What gives?”

She regretted pushing him for an answer the minute he asked the question, “Do you have feelings for Stephen?” His brusque manner twisted her up even more. “Well?”

She shook her head, not trusting herself to speak, feeling as though they had gone back to a line they’d broached before Sally’s call. He wouldn’t let the matter drop, however.

“He’s happy with her, even if he won’t admit it. I’ve seen them together, and if they decide this is what they both want, why would you interfere?”

Rallying herself in response, she said, “I thought I recognised the type. He may think it’s what he wants, but in a few years, he’ll get restless. He’ll feel trapped. But Sally isn’t like that. She isn’t like me-”

“She sure isn’t,” he cut in.

She clenched her teeth, shoving down the sour spike of guilt that churned in her stomach as she crouched into his coat. “Or maybe I was just jealous. That he’d take away my only friend.”

Her skin burned with shame. Why had she vented like that? What he must think of her? A sad, lonely bitch no doubt. Wincing at the thought, she felt herself go even redder from her toes up. “You tell me why I did it. You’ll have a better explanation. You always seem to.”

He said nothing for a moment, then said, “It took a lot of guts to tell me that. I don’t know your reasons for doing what you did, but what matters is you know now it was wrong.”

She rolled her shoulders uneasily. “So, you’re not angry with me any more?”

“I never was...”

“Sure, I believe you. Millions wouldn’t. You never make mistakes, I suppose.”

“I’ve made more than enough. But you have a talent for making people crazy.”

“I do rub people up the wrong way,” she admitted. “Maybe that’s why I’m no good at making friends.”

“You know, you don’t have to be lonely and Stephen going out with Sally doesn’t have to mean you’ll lose your friend. He can be a good friend, if you let him.”

“Looks like I ruined any chances of that.” She looked straight ahead into the dark, wet slurry beating outside the car window. “And what about you?”

He checked the sat-nav, and turned the wheel right. “We should be there in a minute. You got the key?”

She fumbled in her pocket. “Yeah... but you didn’t answer my question.”

“Do I need to?”

“No.” Clearing her throat, she leaned back and glanced away.

The sat-nav gave a long beep to signal arrival at the keyed destination. He stopped the car, and looked directly at her. “Get under my jacket, you’re going to be soaked otherwise.”

She looked at him, dressed in just a shirt and jeans. “What about you?”

“I’ll be fine. I’m a big boy.” He peered outside. “But I don’t see the house.”

She gave a small smile. “This is just the driveway. The McMasters mansion is further up that way.” She pointed to her side of the window. “You’ll see its outline as you drive up.”

“What are those wires fences?”

“The new company have already started sectioning off the old mines. They are going to start drilling soon, if the town can’t stop them... It was on the radio.”

“Right, of course.”

As he started the Land Rover up, and they began the long drive up to the mansion, memories of finding Iain injured and unconscious dug at her senses. Had the intruder been there, too?

She tried to divert her intruding thoughts with small talk. “You must have heard of the McMasters? Even in Dundee? Mr. McMasters tried to completely disinherit Sally, but the executors went against the old man’s wishes saying he was crazy or something. They couldn’t save her losing control of his company though...” She fell quiet with an involuntary shiver, failing to stop herself from imagining some psychotic intruder stalking the grounds.

“You all right?” He shone the car’s fog headlights, white beams penetrating the prevalent Stygian gloom, made denser by the absence of street lighting. The bleak clouds hung lower.

Stop scaring yourself you idiot, she thought. “Yeah, just being silly. Damn, it’s as dark as night out there.”

His warm hand wrapped around her arm again. This time she placed her hand on his own, only releasing it when the wrought iron gates of the mansion and its imposing skyline finally came into view. She sat upright. Blue police tape lay torn on the ground. The cordon had been broken.

He responded calmly to her startled expression. “Don’t worry. The storm may have done it.”

Despite his assurances, however, a cold emptiness settled in her chest as he drove slowly through the open gates, stopping at the main entrance a few yards in. With the sound of the engine cut, the muffled rain seemed to beat louder against the metal and glass. “Give me the key. I’ll get out first,” he said. “I’ll come get you after I’ve had a look around.”

She grabbed at his hand. “No way am I staying here on my own. We go out together.”

He didn’t argue with her. He got out and walked over to open the door for her. “Get under that coat,” he said in a raised voice, “and give me your hand.”

She pulled his coat over her head, and reached out to him. He took her hand, and led her out, closing the door behind her. He began to run across the gravelled pathway to take them up to the font door, but she pulled him back.

“Not there. She closed up the main house when her dad died. They live in the old lodge next door.”

“You could have said before we got out the car.”

“You never asked! Come on, we’re getting drenched!” She took his hand and guided him down the gravelled path that led down to the garden grounds, around to a smaller, two storey building that looked like a large cottage. The downpour began to beat and trickle down the confines of the coat.

At the front door, she steadied her hand to put the key in the lock. She turned the key right until it clicked, and pushed the door open. Bounding in, she quickly took off the jacket and shook the excess water off.

“Come in and shut the door, quick! Oh, wow-” She threw a hand to her mouth when she caught a look at Kevin. He was standing in the open door frame, completely sluiced by the rain.

“Don’t you dare laugh...” he warned, stepping in and shutting the door behind him.

“I thought you were a big boy and could handle it?”

“Someone forgot to mention we’d need to take a detour down a garden the size of a football pitch to get here. We could have taken the car.”

“Yeah...” She watched in horror as he started to strip off his wet clothes. “What are you doing?”

“What do you think?”

For the first time she could remember, she felt shy with a man, and tried not to look at him, as he plucked his shirt off like a wet sheath, and undid his belt. He placed one hand against the door, and yanked his jeans off, first one leg, and then the other.

“Could you get me a towel, or do you want me to just run about to dry myself?” He stood there in the cool semi-darkness, wearing only black briefs. There was a Calvin Klein label on the waistband and a bulge below. Her gaze shot up. His bare chest had tight abs, rounded pecs, broad shoulders, and skin with a smattering of curly light brown hair that arrowed down his huge chest and kept on going.

“Towel, right,” she muttered, thinking it wise to get as far away from his perfect proportions as she could get. She switched on the hall’s lights, and made a quick dash for the stairs. As she reached the top, she heard him call out.

“Where’s the heating?”

“Switch is in the kitchen,” she called back.

She tried to get the image of him standing in his briefs out of her mind, as she quickly made her way to the bathroom for a towel. The wet look sure suited him, but she didn’t want him catching pneumonia.

On the second step, something caught her eye. Did Iain’s bedroom door just move? She must be imagining things. She stood there, instinctively wanting to call out to Kevin, but she steadied herself. There was nothing to be frightened of! If she called him, and there was nothing there, she’d never hear the end of it.

The creak came next. A creaking sound behind the bedroom door. Could it be the storm outside?

Her heart pounded in her chest and reverberated in her ears, as she clutched her hands together, breathing hard. She stayed absolutely still, listening out for more sounds.

Now the creaking was coming from behind her.

“What’s taking you so long?”

Turning around, she threw her hands up in the air, and screamed into Kevin’s surprised face. “Oh, you scared the fucking life out of me!”

“What’s wrong?”

She hugged herself. “I don’t know. Nothing. I just thought I heard a sound coming from Iain’s room. I must be imagining things.”

“Well, let's see shall we?” He walked over to the door and turned the handle. He stood her back, and pushed open the door, protectively positioning himself between her and the doorway.

Her breath was unsteady. “See anything?”

“Look for yourself,” he said, making way for her to enter. Hesitant and apprehensive, she peeked in.

The room was empty. Daisy heaved a sigh of relief. Except- Glancing around the room she noticed something that hadn’t been there before, and reaching out for the wall switch, turned on the light. What was that over there? On the far right wall. She blinked twice. Was she seeing things?

With a gasp, she pointed to the writing someone had left there. In large, red letters. As though scribbled in blood.

The dark is coming.

End of Chapter 15 | Read Chapter 16

Yours in love,

Her Bad Boy (Chapter 14)

How does a girl cope when her twin flame is the definitive bad boy? (18+ Erotica)

Chapter 13 | Chapter 14: Sally’s Secrets

“Sally, what just happened? Did I say something wrong?”

Motherhood. Just one more high wall to climb. “No... I’m OK. As OK as I can be.”

He saw much, but for reasons vague to her for the time being she wanted to hide how she felt. How talking about children and motherhood grabbed at her heart. So, she tried to feign some kind of assurance, hoping he wouldn’t see in her eyes the rising fear she was trying so desperately hard to push down. But it was like bile in her throat.

“You sure?” Stephen’s words seemed to stretch and echo inside her mind. “Did I say something wrong?”

“No. It’s just... you know.”

“Of course I do.” But he didn’t look convinced. He was right not to be.

I have so many secrets, Stephen. So many. That I want to tell you. But...

She instinctively knew they both had their share of secrets they needed to tell each other, if whatever they had between them was going to pull them through this time. Because she knew first hand how secrets kept people apart. They built walls between people. They closed in on you, so you felt you couldn’t breathe with the knowledge that you’d bricked yourself in by your own fear.

But secrets shared could also push people apart... and which secret would be the one to do that to them? She worried whether they would survive her secret fears of motherhood, how she would probably never be a mother. Then there was Daisy... And at the top of that list was Iain. Trying to get used to the idea she’d never have children, she’d focused all her motherly instincts on her brother.

She didn’t even want to think about life without Iain, and if anything happened to him now, she didn’t know if she could survive, let alone know whether a relationship with Stephen would. First her mother, then her father, but to watch helplessly as Iain fell into the same chasm of darkness would be too much... For her, Iain’s loss would be the most senseless of all.

Yet he was a responsibility Sally felt she’d no right to ask anyone else to shoulder with her, because it meant denying them a normal family life. Not even Stephen, who despite what he thought of himself, was a natural with kids. She remembered how good he’d been with her brother when she introduced them. He’d been patient and kind, taking a polite interest in Iain’s books, and on his second visit had brought with him a box full of the things. She could see he would make a great father one day, and that was something else she’d no right to deny him.

“Have I upset you, Sally?”

“Upset me? Oh, if you only knew just how much it means to me having you here.”

For many people family was what made the purpose of life good, but her parents had shown her that love was also a powerful force that could tear people apart. You don’t always get to choose who you fall in love with. Who had said that to her? Was it Molly? She wasn’t sure, but it didn’t matter, because if she could choose, she knew what her choice would be. And that was the point, wasn’t it? The thing that separated them from her parents - and his?

But just as you don’t always get to choose who you love, you don’t always get to be with them, either. It was heartbreaking, but true nevertheless. She knew how much it hurt when Stephen left, and it had frightened her to discover just how little power she wielded over her feelings. Initially she’d thought the responsibility Iain had presented might have made him take up with Daisy... but she realised now how wrong she’d been.

This time, though, she needed to be certain which way the wheel turned for them, even if she had no idea where to start looking for the answer. A voice spoke from somewhere inside. Love is the answer. She could almost hear Molly’s voice saying the words. Of course, it had been Molly. You don’t always get to choose who you fall in love with. Or maybe she had made that choice a long time ago.

She felt she knew better than most how real love could take a long time to come around. You never knew where love would strike, so you had to be open to it at all times, and not let it slip away - but how could you know it was the real thing, when you had nothing to compare it to? It seemed cruel. Life was short, but the chance at love seemed even shorter.

In her mind, the search for real love, identified with ideals like passion and truth, had just been stories in the books she’d read. In those pages, it was worth taking a risk in love, to follow your heart, she thought, because there was nothing to lose. In the real world, though, there were huge plot holes you could fall into.

And there was her baby Iain, lying so still in the heart of all her indecision. She wouldn’t be able to think straight until she saw him out of that hospital bed. She was trying her best to put on a strong front, because it was expected of her. It’s what a McMasters would do. But moreover, she knew that screaming and crying wasn’t going to help her brother. Not now.

“Your brother is one tough cookie. He is going to get through this.”

“When I hear you say that, I just about believe it.”

He moved closer to her. “Believe it.”

They stared at each other, and she felt the full force of their magnetism speak. Still undefined between them in any term other than sexual attraction, it had the power to close the space their secrets threatened to push between them. All Stephen had to do was look at her and her doubt would dissolve. She sensed that he was part of something eternal in her, like the stars were to the sky. The imagery brought their heated moments at the fairground to her mind.

She blushed red, tried to look away, but he directed her gaze back to him. He raised a finger to her lips, and his touch gave her a heady thrill, skittering across her skin, as he softly traced a line down the side of her cheek. “We take it slow. OK?”

“How slow?” Her blood clamoured at the knowing edge to his voice. Her brother was lying right next to them, but he could have taken her there and then if he wanted. This was hunger of a different kind. “You know those things we did. You were my first.”

“It showed.” He planted a gentle kiss on her forehead. “So we go as slow as it needs to be. OK?”

Her colour deepened, as his finger traversed further down her body. “OK. I hear you. Slow.”

Cheek to cheek now, his lips barely touched the lobe of her ear as he spoke, but his breath stoked the fires raging below. “You know, there was a time I’d have just fucked you here. But now... you’re a bad influence, Miss. McMasters. You’re a mystery to me...”

“Is that why you chatted me up? You wanted a challenge?” she asked, her voice cut down to whispers. “Is that how you saw me?”

“No, but I bet guys round here peg you down as the spoilt brat of a rich father. Couldn’t be further from the truth. Good thing then I’m not from around here. I just saw you. But it was like you’d put a distance between you and the world... And what did you think of me? A bit of rough to smooth your lonely nights over with? A wild beast to tame?”

“I saw the real you inside.”

“And it didn’t frighten you?”

“No. Like you, I wanted to touch what no one else could...”

“You’re braver than me, then.” He pulled her to him. There was still a conversation going on, but now it was a conversation of body language and facial expressions, and all she could see was the way she was reflected in his eyes.

“Stephen... I-”

Before she could get the words out, they were interrupted by a quiet knocking from behind the door. The swing of mood suddenly reversed, they pulled away as the door opened, and a new duty nurse Sally hadn’t seen before walked noiselessly in. The nurse raised her eyebrows at the scene in front of her with more than a modicum of surprise.

“I’ve just come on my shift and I thought I’d let you know the doctor will be in shortly, Miss. McMasters.”

“Thank you,” Sally said, standing up and brushing herself down. “Does he know I’m here?”

“Yes, he does.” The nurse stared pointedly at Stephen, still seated on the floor. “That is very unhygienic young man, and you really shouldn’t be in here you know. Visiting hours are not until ten, and this is a restricted area for family visits only. Are you family, may I ask?”

Stephen began to make his apologies, but Sally intervened. “He is family,” she said firmly. As she spoke, she caught him glancing at her, and it was a look that scattered her fears far into the shadows. For now, at least, she thought. She couldn’t say for any certainty whether love was a cosmic truth, but staring back into his honey coloured eyes just then, she needed to be blind to doubt what she had seen in them.

What passed between Sally and Stephen went unnoticed by the nurse, who walked over to the bed, and satisfied nothing was amiss on the instrument read-outs, gave a quick shrug of her shoulders. “Well, not much longer, then. Please make sure you’re gone before the doctor arrives.”

“The doctor is our family physician and friend. He won’t be any trouble.”

“Who me or the doctor?” Stephen asked with a grin, jumping to his feet. It was infectious, and the nurse found herself smiling with him. He picked up an unopened tea cake from one of the boxes and presented it to her, as she made her way to the door. “A peace offering.”

She accepted it graciously. “Thank you.”

“I should thank you for being so understanding. Here, let me,” he said, opening the door for her.

“I’m glad chivalry is still alive and well. There’s not many left like you, young man.”

Stephen winked. “What else are we good for?”

“He’s a keeper,” she said to Sally, before taking her leave.

He closed the door behind her, and they were left alone. Eyes darkened with concern, he dropped the joking demeanour she knew had been for the nurse’s benefit. “If your doctor doesn’t come soon, I’ll go looking for him. Isn’t he semi-retired? What’s taking him so long?”

“Now, how on earth do you know that?”

Stephen told her about his conversation with Tony. She said, “That’s just one of his many secret visits. The official line is he’s retiring, but it’s just to give him more spare time to help those really in need. If he isn’t here yet, it’s because there’s someone more in need than us. I’m sure he’ll be here as soon as he can...” Conversely, the doctor’s absence had been one of the thin threads of hope she’d been holding on to, but it sounded as though she were trying to reassure herself more than Stephen. “To be honest, it makes me feel better he hasn’t rushed over. I’m hoping on hope it means he thinks Iain is going to be OK.”

Looking unconvinced, he said, “Whatever the reason, he should be here now.”

“If he thought his condition was really serious he’d have spent the night here himself,” she said, adding as way of explanation, “Dr. Merryweather has been like a father to both of us.”

“I have to say I’m kind of envious of this doctor of yours.” He walked over to her, and took her in his arms. Her heart began to beat in her ears, louder than the torrent of rain raging outside the window. “He must be a very special guy if he can get your eyes to look like that. Should I be jealous?”

“The man’s been happily married for nigh on forty years. I think his wife would have something to say about that, don’t you?” Wanting to keep herself busy, she forced herself out of his embrace. Before I start seeing stars again, she said to her herself, and began picking up the food boxes from the floor, transferring them to a bin in the corner of the room. “And you said yourself Iain is one tough cookie, though I don’t know who he takes after.”

He looked at her. “I do.”

She sensed him staring at her, and deflected his gaze behind a crumpled piece of greasy cardboard. “Oh yeah. Regular Rocky Balboa, that’s me... You hardly ate anything.”

“Neither did you.” He made a move for Molly’s flask, unscrewed the cap and poured himself another pitcher of coffee. Cup in hand, he walked over to the window, and looked out at the rain hammering at the window.

She suddenly sensed one of those walls lift up between them, and she wanted to knock it down. Secrets. Secrets everywhere. By the slant of his neck, she could almost imagine the muscles in his back tightening. He was reliving some time in his past that she was still locked out from.

He took a gulp of his coffee, then raised the pitcher to the framed sunlight. “Is there anything stronger than coffee in this? Makes you feel like you can say anything.”

“If it gets you to talk, I’ll ask Molly to patent her coffee.”

“Ha-ha.”

“I’m serious.” The coffee never seems to run out or go cold, she found herself thinking. Maybe it’s not even the drink, but what the drink is in.

She inspected the flask, wondering not for the first time where she had seen one like it before. It was as mysterious as the owner. It seemed to be some type of super container, and it hadn’t gone unnoticed by her that the coffee always stayed the perfect temperature to drink, tasted delicious, and never ran out. It was the drink that kept on giving, that was for sure.

“It’s better than the vending machine slop she brought me, at any rate. But it sure makes me want to talk.”

“So talk. Tell me about Afghanistan,” she said, clearing away the last of the boxes. Take my mind off my fears. Off the sounds of the beeping and hissing that makes me want to cry. Take my mind off the waiting, even though I want to wait. I want it to take forever for Dr. Merryweather to come through the door. Because I’m afraid of what he might say. Because he may also have stayed away thinking there’s no hope for my brother. Nothing more he could do...

Sally was about to say something, when Stephen spoke up as though he’d heard her plea. “You know the army is the only real family I’ve ever had. My father was married to the army, sometimes I think I joined to try and finally make him see me...”

He hitched his shoulders in a tense little shrug that echoed through her. “But getting recruited was an improvement on home. Shit, the army was my home. No other home, there never was, not much at least. My mother died when I was born, so I never knew her, but her death gave my father the excuse he needed to beat me with it every chance he could get. And he beat me into the man you see now.”

His voice sounded hollow, and his words seemed to hollow out her insides, too. “Problem is, Sally, it’s our family that instructs us, tell us who we are and how we should be. Without that, we find it hard to make sense of ourselves, what we want, what is right. The army did that for me, and then it sent me to war...”

He stopped for a moment, lost in a previous time, and a sudden silence fell, punctuated only by the sound of raindrops. It was a silence loaded with his torment, and as she waited patiently for him to speak, not wanting to obstruct his flow of thoughts, his pain cut into her skin as though it were made of paper.

“You know, it’s funny how developed countries have no horizon... You ever noticed that? Look out of a window here and all you see are things getting in the way. In Afghanistan all you see is the horizon. Over there you feel you should be able to breathe more under all that sky, but it’s not the horizon, just you that’s stuck in a box.” He turned around and his gaze fixed on hers, so serious and earnest that her heart stilled in her chest. “Then you get sent home in one, or walk around in one for the rest of your life.”

“You were strong enough to walk away from it,” she replied with sincerity.

“Strong? I didn’t feel strong, I felt a coward. I’d deserted my family.” He took a slow sip from the pitcher, before saying in a thickened voice, “I’m damaged goods, baby. I left a war behind, only to find out it hasn’t left me. I’m still fighting it, and I don’t want you to get hurt. I’ve killed too many already. There’s a long line of casualties behind me.”

She’d never heard him sound so vulnerable. He doesn’t talk like he’s scared, but that’s what his act is about. It’s just that he’s scared. She never realised that he could be scared. When people grew up they learned not to show when they were scared, and she guessed Stephen’s military training helped him to do that more than most. But everyone got scared at one time or another.

That’s where he is right now, he’s scared he’s not going to be do right by you. By anyone. She didn’t know where that piece of wisdom had come from suddenly, but the realisation that he was scared moved her. She imagined him as a young boy, with no mother, and a strict father, and her heart went out to him.

It was as though she had in that instant discovered how his peripatetic military childhood had helped to shape him. He had no idea of family, and neither, if she were honest, had she. The failings of their parents, their insecurities... there was a lot that was similar about them, she thought. She knew exactly what family life did to you and there was no need to empathise. As he stood there, she became him. She was him.

He said, “You never believed that bullshit line I fed you about leaving to fight for world peace, did you?”

“I thought you were making fun of me.”

“I thought it would be what a woman would want to hear.”

“All a woman ever wants to hear is the truth, Stephen. You have such a way with the ladies, I’m surprised you don’t know that. You don’t need to impress me, or frighten me off with lies.”

“I’ve never wanted to lie to you, but are you so sure the truth is something a woman shouldn’t be protected from? The truth isn’t pretty. Especially ones in Afghanistan. You don’t want to know about that, and it’s a subject I’ve no business talking about with anyone.”

“You can’t leave it all blocked inside. You have to talk to someone about what happened to you out there. About how you feel. I want you to know, when you’re ready, you can tell me. I won’t judge you.”

He turned around and looked at her again, and his eyes were the darkest she had ever seen them. Deep, unfathomable, unreadable. Another brick in the wall. “No one can judge me as harshly as I judge myself,” he said. “Things happen in war. You do what you have to do. Then you live with it.”

“You don’t have to live with it alone.”

“Sometimes alone is better, it narrows the risk down to one. The truth is I’m a fuck up, Sally. I make a mess of things.” he said.

“Whatever you think you’ve done, or how bad it was, I won’t believe there wasn’t a good reason.”

His eyes lightened a shade. “You so sure of that? So sure I’m not a monster?”

I couldn’t love a monster. “Open up to me. That’s all I’ve ever wanted you to do.”

“That’s all, she says... before I met you I didn’t- I don’t do feelings. Opening up gets you killed where I come from.”

“And not opening up can kill you, too, inside. Don’t keep it all bottled up. Talk to someone. If not me, then Kevin. Or anyone. I would rather it was me... I know I’m not a great substitute for someone who was there, but I can listen.”

“I’ll make you this promise. If- No, when we get through this, and Iain is out of this bed, then we can bare our souls as much as you like.” He dug his hand in his pocket. “Besides, you have your own fair share of secrets.”

“You’re right I do. But some aren’t mine. Some were forced on me.”

“Like Daisy?”

“My responsibility to Daisy is part of it. But her secret isn’t mine to tell.” She sighed. Another legacy from the great Paul McMasters left for her to deal with. “Not until I find the right time to tell her first. Daisy has a right to know before anyone else. But I’ll hold you to your promise, Stephen Granger.”

“And I’ll see that you do, Miss McMasters. Maybe I should have done that in the first place to get you to quit me.”

Realising what he had just said, he tried to backtrack, but she stopped him. “Just don’t do anything like that again. I recovered once, but I’m not sure I could do it a second time and still live to be your friend. And that’s what we have to do. Get to know each other. And I mean really know each other. Become friends first, lovers second.”

“The right way round this time?”

She nodded, taking hold of Iain’s hand. “We’ve all done things we’re ashamed of, but if we keep secrets we’ll always be strangers, and we need to be friends, Stephen. We never gave ourselves a chance to be friends. We need to take a risk with our secrets. Be honest with each other.” Deep, lasting relationships grew out of friendship and mutual respect. No good loving someone if you didn't take the time to get to know them. Worse, maybe that was what tore you apart.

“You want honest? Right then.” He drank the coffee in one go, as if summoning up the courage to speak. Gripping the pitcher to his chest, he gave the impression he was about to give a pledge. A drunken one, at that.

“Are you making fun of me?”

“Do you mind? I am trying to say something to you here.” He placed the pitcher on the bedside table, and took hold of Iain’s other hand. “I want your help with this sister of yours, OK?”

With his free hand he reached out to her, and they bridged hands across the bed. “I promise to share my soggy bacon with you.”

“Thanks... I think.”

“That’s not all. I’ll open every door for you.”

“For me and all the nurses in the world? I’m honoured, but unnecessary.”

He ignored her quip. “But most of all, I promise I’ll always want to wake up next to you.”

That caught her breath. She was lost for words.

“And however far away I am, I will always wake up next to you.”

Alight with emotion, their eyes seemed to set fire to the room. The rain died down. Bright sunlight followed, filtering its peach haze through the window blinds, filling out the shadows. The glow of the room enveloped them; three linked in a circle standing in the silence and the growing light.

Like moonlight, she thought. But why does it make me think of Molly?

In that moment, a gentle tremor fluttered in the palm of her hand. She thought she was trembling at first, but looking down she saw it was Iain, moving his hand in hers.

Do that again!

Fighting back her tears, she stared into her brother’s face, coloured by the same burning light of the room, not daring to hope. For some reason she thought of Molly again, as his eyelids flickered the tiniest sign of life.

And when the Moon burns, miracles happen.

“Iain, baby. It’s Sally. I’m here, sweetheart. Open your eyes! Please open them!”

And slowly, he did.

End of Chapter 14 | Read Chapter 15

Yours in love,

Her Bad Boy (Chapter 13)

How does a girl cope when her twin flame is the definitive bad boy? (18+ Erotica)

Chapter 12 | Chapter 13: The Real and the Imaginary

Stephen was the first to break out of their emotional reticence, which was surprising. “You need to get some food down you before it gets cold.” He led her away from the bed, and sat her in the armchair, placing the boxes on her lap. “Now, eat.”

Oh, Stephen... How can I think of eating at a time like this? Her body was hungry, but Sally felt stronger pangs than hunger. She doubted she could eat while her brother remained in his present condition. There was a knot in her throat the size of a tennis ball. Trying to override the guilt, however, her stomach grumbled in support of Stephen’s remonstrations.

“You hear that, Sally? Even your stomach agrees with me.”

“Thanks for pointing that out. You’re a real gentleman.”

She grimaced at him, but he was insistent. “No arguments. Eat. Please.”

“Yes, sir!” Sally gave her impression of an army salute, adding a smile she didn’t feel in return. She opened the boxes, and began searching through them listlessly. She didn’t have the energy to eat. Or maybe she didn’t deserve to eat.

“No one ever tell you not to play with your food? What are you looking for?”

She looked a little shamefaced. “A fork.”

“No forks.”

“OK... So, no forks. What are we going to eat with?”

“The time honoured way. With our fingers and out of the box. Got anywhere to wash your hands?”

She inclined her head towards a door situated behind the armchair, and he diverted his eyes up to look. “Is that the bathroom?”

“Yes.”

“Well then, job done. Now enough with the delay tactics. Eat, will you?” He stared directly at her with an understanding look. His voice was low. “You need to be strong for him, Sally. Punishing yourself won’t help him, OK? Just try.”

She nodded, without looking at him. How do you know to say the right things? I wish I knew what the trick was. Sometimes I think I can read your mind, but other times I think I don’t know you at all. How do you do it?

Focusing on the open box in front of her, from amongst the greasy strips of meat, she picked up a round object wrapped in a foil wrapper. With some surprise, she recognised it as a childhood confectionery.

Pointing to it, Stephen remarked, “I was wondering what that was when I gave the food a blast in the microwave. Nearly set the bloody thing on fire.”

“Don’t you have these down in England? It’s a Tunnock tea cake.”

“Never heard of it.”

“I grew up eating these... It’s marshmallow on top of a plain biscuit, covered with chocolate. Tunnock tea cakes and bacon. Interesting combination. Never had them together for breakfast before.” Her eyes lit up at a distant memory. “Iain would love this, though. They’re his favourite...”

“Consider it a treat, then, for when he wakes up.” He leaned over, took one of the foil wrapped tea cakes and put it on the bedside table. “You can thank Mr. Laidlaw when you see him. My mate, the legend.”

Laidlaw. Why did the surname sound familiar? She racked her brain, trying to remember where she had heard it not long ago. Unwrapping the foil of the Scottish sweet in her hand, she took a small bite of the chocolate. Then it came to her. The soldier who saved more than twenty-three lives patrolling the local cliffs where his wife had taken her own life. She knew she had heard that name before, but never made the link until now.

“Is he the angel of Seaton Cliffs? Is he that Kevin?”

Stephen tipped his head. “The one and only. But he doesn’t like to talk about it... or to be called that. The guy is as humble as they come.”

She nodded her head in acknowledgement. “I’m sorry about his wife...”

“We all were. He doesn’t show it, but... it hit him hard. He blamed himself. She never wanted him to go on his last tour, you see.” He took a pause of several seconds, as though stewing on his thoughts. “He’s a good man. One of the best. I’m lucky to have him as a mate... Don’t tell him I said that, though.”

“You’re a good friend, too,” she said, reaching across and taking one of his hands in her own. “I can imagine how difficult it must have been for him.” Their gazes connected, and a whole world of feeling flowed from one to the other and back again. A sharing of present strife and past misgivings, some unspoken but ambient in the air between them.

“Right, that’s enough chit-chat," he coughed, breaking the rising morbidness in mood. He let go of her hand, and backing away, his foot knocked something on the floor. “What’s this?” he asked, holding the wicker flask up to her line of vision.

“Oh, that? It’s coffee.”

“I could do with a cup.” He took a pitcher from the bedside table and poured out the liquid. “Care for some? Mind if I do?”

Shaking her head, she chewed absent-mindedly at the chocolate sweet as she watched him take a long sip of the drink.

“Not bad... So, who do I have to thank for this godsend?”

“I had a visitor just before you. She must have left it here.” The memories of Molly and her flask began to crystallise in her mind, and she turned to look at the bedside table expecting to see two more used pitchers. They were all clean.

Now that’s strange. Molly must have rinsed them out in the bathroom before she left, she surmised, struggling to remember exactly when she had fallen asleep. Her recollection was still hazy in parts, and she couldn’t picture Molly leaving. If it wasn’t for the flask she might have thought the visit more a lucid dream than a memory.

Stephen took another sip. “She?”

Sally noticed his eyes widen in astonishment, as she replied, “Would you believe me if I said she’s a fortune teller I met at the fair last night?”


As they neared his Land Rover, Kevin felt Daisy resisting his hold as best she could. “You’re going to do yourself harm,” he said.

“Will you stop pulling at me then, please? You’re hurting me!”

In response to her plea, he promptly let go of her hand. As she snatched it back, the force threw her to the pavement. She sat on the ground with a bump. “Owww!”

He looked at her, having gleaned enough from their conversation in the tea shop to see through her hurt girl act. “Do you want to cause a scene here, or shall we get in my car?”

Rubbing at her wrist with an injured look on her face, she exclaimed, “You did that on purpose.”

“Get up, will you?”

“Not until you tell me where you think you’re taking me.”

“Where do you think?”

“To the police station?” she asked, laboriously getting back on her feet.

He clapped his hands. “Give the girl a gold star.” A few passers-by on the street turned to look at them. “I’ll ask you again. Do you want to cause a scene here, or shall we get in the car? Because you’re going to talk to the police whether you like it or not, even if I have to sling you over my shoulder and carry you there myself.”

“I’d like to see you try.” She jutted her chin out in defiance, staring up at him, dainty hands curled into balls of fists, her glittering pink fingernails disappearing from view. He would have admired her gumption, he thought with more than a little wonderment, were she not so very, very wrong in keeping this to herself.

“You just don’t get it do you? You don’t get what you’ve done. There’s a young boy in hospital, and a girl has gone missing. You need to tell the police what you know.”

“What I’ve done you mean, You said it yourself.”

He exhaled deeply, closed his eyes, and placed a thumb and forefinger on the bridge of his nose. Summoning a great deal of restraint, he said, “I can’t for the life of me fathom out your actions for last night, but despite all that, this isn’t about you. The police need to know what you know, it may help them. And don’t you think Sally needs to know, too?”

Hearing her friend’s name set her off her again. Hands in the air, she gesticulated wildly. “I don’t need you to tell me that! I know already! Shit!”

“Do you think you could raise your voice any higher? Not everyone in the near vicinity has heard you yet.”

“Oh, fuck you.”

“Such ugly words are unsuited for such a pretty mouth.”

“What century are you from exactly?”

He took his keys and unlocked the vehicle’s passenger side door. Opening it with a flourish, he said, “Are you going to get in by yourself, or do I give you a hand?”

“Using force on women turns you on does it? Like to use those big hands of yours to slap us around?”

“I can honestly say I’ve never hit a woman before, but trust me, if I did slap you, you really would be speaking out of your arse.”

“Oh, very funny. I like what you did there.”

“So help me, I’ll not think twice to picking you up and putting you in the boot if you keep this up. We can do this your way or my way. You choose.”

The sudden truth of it seemed to weigh down on her. She lowered her head, before flashing him an upturned stare. “Iain’s lying in hospital because of me.”

“He could be lying in that bed because of someone else. Anything you tell the police could help them.”

“What do you mean?”

“I mean you left a sleeping boy home alone with the front door open.”

Her eyes widened in horror at the realisation. She began to tremble. “Where anyone could have walked in... You mean there might be some psycho on the loose and I just left the door open for him? I don’t believe it, not in our town.”

He took her hand, more gently this time. “I can’t say, but I won’t let you waste any more time than you have already on self-pity. If you really want to feel sorry for someone, feel sorry for Iain.”

“Fuck, go on guilt trips much do you? I know I have to tell the police, it’s just-”

“It’s just what?”

“I’m scared, OK?”

He recognised the fear in her eyes. It was genuine. The real little girl inside her had made an appearance finally. He softened his voice. “I know you’re scared, but this is the right thing to do.”

“Doesn’t make it easier, though.”

“It’s not meant to.” Although he still couldn’t believe the sheer naivety of her actions, while watching her drop her act something had shifted inside him. “But you’re not alone. I’ll be with you,” he said.

After a moment’s hesitation, she blurted out, “This doing the right thing shit is really, really overrated.”

He guided her into the passenger seat. “Trust me, you’ll feel better once you do.”


Stephen stared at Sally, watching her eyes widened in surprise to match his own as he described Molly to her.

“I wouldn’t have taken you for the palm reading type,” she said finally.

He reached out for the flask again. “You think? I met her downstairs in the waiting room. She came up and introduced herself large as you like.”

“With me she happened to be passing by. Looking for the third floor.”

He began to describe his meeting with Molly. By the look on her face, his description of the fortune teller was too accurate to have been a dream, not unless they had both dreamt her. But how did that explain the fairground and finding himself in the tent?

You were half-asleep as it was. He could have fallen asleep after speaking to her, and not remembered it. It could have happened that way.

They looked at each other, not really believing it. But what was the alternative?

Stephen watched as she picked up a piece of warm bacon with the aid of the wrapper from her half eaten cake. All fingertips and foil, she tentatively placed the bacon in her mouth, chewing thoughtfully, lips closed. He grinned, glad to see her eating at last.

“What?” she asked, hand over mouth.

“Nothing. Sure you don’t want some coffee?”

“No...” Swallowing slowly, she picked up another strip of bacon. “Molly said she saw you there asleep. Didn’t mention you spoke though... Thought you were handsome. Looks to me you have a fan.”

Stephen downed his drink in one go, and said with a wry smile, “You think I’m in with a chance?”

“Oh, definitely. Look at you, even dreaming about Molly.”

He sat down on the laminated floor next to her. “Great. Looks like I’m sorted for life. I always wanted to join a travelling fair as a kid. And she can make good coffee. Could you put in a good word for me?”

Sally smiled, and crossed two fingers. “Yeah, me and Molly are like that. You should have heard us before I dropped off. Like Plato and Socrates debating the great themes of life.”

“I would have liked to have heard that.”

“You would. Molly is a spiritual Einstein.”

“I meant you, get your take on life.”

“Me? You wouldn’t thought much of what I had to say. Crying and moping.”

“I care a lot about what you have to say.” He reached for the boxes and placed them on the floor. “Want to sit with me?”

Before she could respond to his invitation, Iain’s breathing apparatus gave a particularly mournful hiss. Abruptly, she looked up at the bed.

Reading the faraway look in her eyes, he took her hand. “If I could take this all away, I would.”

“A mother is meant to be able to protect their child. What he needs is a proper mother.”

“He needs someone who loves him. That’s you.”

“I just keep thinking, why? Why him?”

The sound of her voice and the sadness in her eyes did something to him that he didn’t have the wherewithal to put into words. It was then he felt he would have to tell her what Kevin had told him. She needed to know the truth, he decided, but the problem was he didn’t know yet what that was, either. “I don’t have an answer to that. I wish I did.”

“I wish I did, too. We’re going to have to learn to live with that, I suppose. And blaming myself, or my mother, or anyone else isn’t going to change that.”

“There’s my spiritual Einstein right there.”

“Einstein?” She rubbed her hands together in tired frustration. “I feel more like Frankenstein, and just as moronic. You know I did something I never did before. I prayed. To a dead mum. Who deserted us. How stupid was that?”

“I don’t think that was stupid.”

“No?”

“No." His voice thickened, as he said, “You prayed because you believe in love.” Where the fuck had that come from? Embarrassed he raised his hands to his head, leant back against the foot of the armchair. “Besides, having a mother is no big deal. Sometimes you’re better off without one.”

He saw in her face something had hit its mark. She squeezed his hand and said, “You, too, huh?”

He frowned. They had rarely spoken about their parents in the short time they had been together. He shrugged his shoulders. “Most kids have imaginary friends growing up. I had an imaginary mother. And my father might not have been there, for all I saw of him growing up.”

He blinked in surprise at how bitter he sounded. Even after all this time. All this fucking time and I still feel small when I talk about him.

His one constant memory of his father as a child was of the man telling him how he had to learn to take what he wanted. A real man knew how to take, because no one gave you something for nothing. So, you had to grab what was yours with both hands.

Yeah, Dad I know. You have to grab the world by the throat, and make it give you what you want - friends, money, freedom, someone to talk to, someone to love. It’s the only way to live in a world that’s tough on quitters.

But Stephen was beginning to realise if you grabbed too hard, you could choke the very life out of the thing you cared about the most.

“Hey, you.” Sliding off the armchair, she came to sit next to him on the floor. She cupped his face in her free hand. He tickled her palm with his day old bristle. “You would make a great father, you know.”

He shook his head. “You can’t fight genetics, and I wouldn’t want to inflict a father like mine on anyone. But you... any child would be lucky to have you as their mother.”

He noticed her body tense as he spoke. It wasn’t the reaction he’d been expecting. Had he said something wrong?

“You OK?”

She averted her eyes, shying her thoughts away from him. He couldn’t understand what had just happened.

“Sally?”

The heavens opened up outside and unleashed a flurry of cloudburst against the window in response.


Halfway to the city’s main police station, the rain began to fall in heavy bursts. The Land Rover’s windscreen wipers squeaked at full speed as Kevin kept a firm grip on the wheel, and tried to ignore her fidgeting. She obviously wanted to tell him something.

“I just had an idea.”

He didn’t look at her. “What?”

“We were going to go to Sally’s first, weren’t we? So, let’s get that out of the way.”

He stopped himself from sending her a dark look. “It’s no good putting this off. It has to be done.”

“I’m not, but we could take ages at the police station. Besides if what you think is true, they might not let us in the house after... and I don’t want to go back to Sally empty-handed.”

He considered her proposal. It might be a better idea if he did go to the house first after all, and have a look around himself. What she had to tell the police could strengthen the argument either way. The boy could have woken up and fallen out of his bedroom window from a sense of heightened fear brought on by his autism, or someone could have easily crept in and disturbed the boy.

“So what do you think?”

What did he think? What kind of psychotic nut could throw a young child out of a window, but he kept that to himself. It took all sorts to make a world, his sweet old dad used to say, but some of those went far beyond his comprehension.

“I guess it wouldn’t make too much of a difference, if we were quick.”

“I know where everything is. It won’t take me long to grab a few essentials. Some books for-” her voice faltered momentarily, “-Iain. A peace offering for Sally.”

He sighed.

“What now?”

“I don’t doubt your love for them, but damn it was a foolish thing you did.”

“I’m never going to hear the end of this am I?”

“If I had my way? No. It might just make you grow up.”

“Well, who died and made you an expert on me? You worked all that out yourself in these short wee hours together, did you?”

The muscle in his jaw flexed. “What you’ve told me is enough. I mean you got into bed with your best friend’s boyfriend, didn’t you?”

Her only response was to dig her fingers into the seat cushion. She turned her face away from him towards the falling rain and slick road. The atmosphere in the car hardened over into a thin sheen of icy silence.

“Why don’t you try the radio?” he said. “See if you can get an update.”

Without saying a word, she pushed at the archaic buttons on the radio until she found an all-talk, local news station briefing listeners on the ongoing manhunt over the missing girl.

She turned up the volume as the announcer said, “Police officials still have no line on the whereabouts of sixteen year-old Rachel Laing, who is believed to have been babysitting the nine year-old son of the late mining magnate Paul McMasters, found seriously injured at his home last night. Shaken by the events, the small town community, built around the McMasters mines, is currently protesting controversial drilling plans by an international mining company, recently merged with the McMasters enterprise. More news at ten. This is-”

She turned the radio off. “You know we could save on time, if we go to the local police station there, if you want. Our town is a good way out of the city, it’ll be closer and- and I know them all,” she confessed quickly at the end.

“You’re a tight-knit community, aren’t you?”

Her voice was almost inaudible. “Sometimes too tight I think. Everyone is in everyone’s business. But at a time like this I’d prefer not to have to spill my guts to strangers.” She chewed on her bottom lip. “I feel a complete idiot as it is.”

“Well, pretty soon your entire little town is going to know it.” He regretted the remark the minute it came out of his mouth. It was a cruel thing to say. What was wrong with him? He expected her to cast a glare at him, but she gave no visible outward reaction.

“It won’t make no difference. They all think that anyway. Sally’s the only person that really gives me any time of day. If it wasn’t for her standing in the community, I don’t think anyone would notice I existed.”

“Bullshit. You’re noticed whenever you go. And you know it.”

“Men! That wasn’t the sort of notice I meant. But when that’s the only attention you’re given, you take what you can get.”

“And you get plenty.”

“Fuck you, OK! Just fuck you!”

“Calm down, will you? I didn’t mean anything by it.”

“Yes you did. And I love a good fuck, so what? But that’s all you know!” She looked at him, and from the corner of his eye he could see her eyes were brimming with tears. “Shall I tell you something you’ll never understand? What I really want is to find a man that can share the tenderness after...”

“I do understand that.”

“I imagine him sometimes, what he will look like, and I think that I won’t care. I’ll only know him once he holds me.”

“I didn’t realise...”

“What? You didn’t get that from the few minutes you’ve known me? Tenderness is what I really want,” she said in a small voice. “But sex is the only way I know how to get it.”

He hated himself suddenly. “I’m sorry,” was all he could say.

“Yeah, I am too. But I don’t need your pity, OK?”

“That was an apology, not pity.”

She crossed her arms over her chest, scowling from under his jacket. “Had my fill of both. Don’t need either.”

“As you wish,” he replied, and focused on the rainy road ahead.

End of Chapter 13 | Read Chapter 14

Yours in love,

Her Bad Boy (Chapter 12)

How does a girl cope when her twin flame is the definitive bad boy? (18+ Erotica)

Chapter 11 | Chapter 12: Daisy’s Dilemma

Kevin eyed the sky as he strode out of the A&E department with Daisy. There was a peach coloured sheen to the dark underbelly of the clouds. “Looks like the rain has cleared up,” he said.

Daisy only nodded in reply, and he looked back down to see her shivering intensely. He quickly took off his khaki coloured bomber jacket and placed it across her slim shoulders to ward off the cold. She almost disappeared under its size.

“You all right now?” he asked her. She nodded again, snuggling into the residual warmth left by his own body heat. The kind act had surprised her, which in turn had surprised him. What did she expect? He’d let her freeze? Her teeth were almost chattering, and if it weren’t for her troubled expression, it would be almost comical.

He lightly put an arm around her to direct her towards where he had parked his vehicle. He pointed to a dark green Land Rover Defender a few feet away from them in the hospital’s car park. “That’s mine, over there. Tough as old boots, but don’t expect a comfy ride.”

Daisy still said nothing. She had barely said two words to him outside of commenting on his height. She’s in shock, too, he thought suddenly, and gave her a quick, searching glance. She looked small, defenceless, afraid. His heart went out to her and he felt guilty for having poked fun at her just moments before with Stephen. “You know what I think you need?”

Daisy looked up at him. “What?”

Hallelujah, Kevin said to himself, she speaks. “A hot cup of something, before we get on over to Sally’s. What do you say?”

He caught the thin sliver of a smile trying to snake its way past the corner of her lips, and it felt like a small victory. “Yeah,” she responded. “I wouldn’t mind that.”

Seeing the thankful look that crossed her face, it occurred to him that she might not have had breakfast, either. “Hey, have you eaten?”

“No.”

“You must be famished, then. I’ll shout you breakfast. Then we’ll grab a few things for your friend. What do you say?”

Daisy nodded gratefully, but said nothing more, and they walked to his trusty old Land Rover in silence.


In the hospital elevator, Stephen held up the tray with the warmed breakfast boxes. “Thanks for letting us use your staff microwave on these, Tony.”

“Think nothing of it.”

The lift stopped at the second floor, and with a metallic sounding ping, the doors slid open. “It was good of you nevertheless,” Stephen remarked, stepping out into the corridor.

“Well it’s the least I could do.” Tony coughed, as though trying to get his words out. “Maude told me before she signed off... I’m mortified to be honest that I didn’t recognise Miss. McMasters straight off. I can’t tell you how bad I feel now for grabbing at her the way I did.”

Stephen held a hand up to the man’s chest, and stopped his exit through the open doors. Obstructed, the metal doors shuffled back and forth in their slots, pinging indignantly.

“You shouldn’t grab any lady like that, no matter who she is.”

The edges of Tony’s neck flushed a dark red, and he lifted his hands up in a conciliatory gesture. “You’re right about that an’ all, more than right. I’ve no excuse for it.”

“Well, we’ve all made our apologies, so best leave it at that, eh?”

They resumed their walk. “It’s just I was wondering if you could give my apologies to the young miss? She don’t know me personally... but she’s done a lot for the people here abouts.”

“It doesn’t surprise me.”

“She even brought that travelling fair here to raise money for the charity she’s set up for kids with special needs... My youngest daughter is one of them. It’s the doctor bills, you see, I-” The man fell silent, clearly embarrassed. “Treatments cost money,” he said at last.

Stephen’s tone was full of understanding. “I appreciate it was hard to share that with me. I’ll tell her.”

The man bit his top lip. “I can’t help feeling some guilt over this.”

“How so? About last night? No real harm done.”

“No, I’m talking about her brother.”

Stephen stopped him again. “What do you mean?”

“Before I came on my shift last night, the wife said she would call Miss. McMasters. Our youngest has complications, and our doctor isn’t helping. She wondered if the miss could put a good word in for us with Dr. Merryweather. He’s near retired now, but still the best. All she wanted was a phone number, but when I called my wife she told me that Miss. McMasters came over herself with the good doctor to see to my daughter.”

The man’s emotions visibly glistened in his eyes, as he concluded, “She must have left her own brother at home to come to the aid of a stranger. And then this happens.”

As Stephen listened, his mind was trying to put the pieces of last night’s puzzle into place. There were huge gaps in his understanding, but of one thing he was certain - it had been a strange night of coincidences. He felt in his gut, however, that all these tiny coincidences were somehow linked, the dots joining together to reveal a picture he couldn’t quite see. Like doing a jigsaw puzzle in the dark, his mind was sifting through what little facts he knew.

“I wouldn’t blame yourself. It’s not your fault. Trust me on that.”

“I appreciate you saying that, sir.” Tony pointed at a white door with the number 11 painted in large numerals some ways in the distance. He looked at the paper in his hand. “There you are, it’s room number eleven you be wanting. I’ll leave you two alone. My shift’s nearly over, so the best of luck. If I don’t see you again-”

“Thanks, and the name’s Stephen by the way. People only call my father sir.”

Without needing to say another word, Stephen put out his hand, and Tony took it in a respectful handshake. Then he turned the way he had come, his footsteps creaking faintly away on the linoleum to leave Stephen to walk up to the door on his own.

What had happened last night to bring them all here?

He faced up to the numbered door. He knocked. He waited. No response.

He knocked again, rapping harder this time.

No response again.

After a few seconds to think, he turned the door handle, and pushed the door inwards. It glided open noiselessly, and he peered in trying not to feel like an interloper.

Sally was peacefully asleep in an armchair, her head resting on the bed beside her brother, holding his hand.

Stephen stepped into the room. The door fell silently back. He stood watching them, as the daylight brightened momentarily through the blinds, to pull the last strands of the peachy hazed shadows away.


The Dundee All Tea & No Sympathy Inn was only a street away from the hospital’s emergency wing, and it did just what it said on the tin. It served tea, while it expected you to dish out the sympathy. Kevin prided himself on being a good listener when the need arose, and so he found himself listening to Daisy silently stirring her tea now, because her silence spoke volumes to him.

There was clearly something on her mind, other than the obvious, he thought. She looked troubled, but there was also fear churned up in the mix of her worries. She looked like a frightened child caught red-handed with her fingers in the cookie jar.

“You’ll stir a hole into that cup.”

She put the spoon down self-consciously. “Sorry.”

“The food will be a while yet. Do you want to talk about it?”

“About what?”

“About what’s bothering you.”

“My best friend’s brother is in the hospital.”

“And?”

“And? And what? Isn’t that enough?”

“There’s something else.”

Daisy puffed out her cheeks in annoyance, and Kevin was glad to see the first real spark of life she had shown him so far. “Is this how you treat everyone you don’t know?” she asked, affronted.

“Offer them free tea and sympathy you mean? Only if they’re lucky. And breakfast? Only if they’re very lucky.”

Daisy smiled at his last remark, and stuck out her tongue. “Comedian aren’t you?”

“I try.”

“You are, very trying indeed.”

Kevin outwardly groaned. “Now that is an old one!”

Daisy scrunched her nose up at him in agreement. “It is isn’t it?” They laughed, and it seemed to clear the air.

“Now, isn’t that better?” Kevin asked.

“Yeah, thanks.”

“So, you want to tell me about it?”

“About what?”

Kevin persevered with the patience of a saint. “About what’s got you so frightened. What have you done you think is so bad?”

“And have you hate on me like everyone else?”

“I promise I won’t judge.”

She picked up the spoon again. “Really? What makes you think you’re any different from everyone else?”

He reached out to stop her from stirring her tea again. She didn’t pull away from his hand.

He said, “Why don’t you try me? What have you got to lose?”


Stephen watched as streaks of sunlight from the window placed highlights in Sally’s hair. The sound of her breathing was soft, regulated, and at that moment was the most calming sound in the world to him.

The breathing apparatus was a jarring interloper, though, and it reminded him why they were here. He walked over to the bed, and his stomach tensed as he took stock of the boy’s condition. Iain was still, and looked defenceless under the mess of wires he lay under. Seeing him like this made him want to catch the person responsible more than ever. To mete out some justice. Put whoever did this in a hospital bed of their own.

His mind was still humming with interlocking thoughts, trying to come up with an answer that made some sort of sense to him. Something he could reach out and hold. Something he understood. But his mind seemed to join up distant dots to a picture that became clear for a second, only to haze out in the next. Link upon link, forming patterns on a map drawn in the dark. It seemed to reach all the way to Afghanistan, to the horrors he witnessed, bringing him to Scotland, and to Sally.

If he had never gone into recruitment, met Kevin, shared a tour in Afghanistan, come to Scotland, would he have ever met Sally? Become a part of her life so quickly?

He stared down at Iain. And destroyed it just as quickly.

As if she had heard him, Sally lifted her head and blinked, trying to work out her surroundings. She locked eyes with him in a sleepy daze, looking unsure, giving the impression she thought she had dreamt him there.

He didn’t feel like an apparition, however. He felt more like a tightly coiled metal spring, standing uselessly over Iain’s bed, poised to strike. If he moved, he thought he was likely to punch a hole through something, but he managed to temper his movements and show her the tray. “I brought you breakfast. Courtesy of Kevin.”

“How did you get here?”

“I made a new friend. Remember Tony from reception?”

She stretched, and yawned. Looked around her. Was she searching for someone?

“Was there anyone else in here when you came in?”

Stephen assumed she meant a nurse. “No. What have they told you about him? How’s the little monkey doing?”

“I’m waiting for our family doctor to arrive.”

He averted her stare to focus on Iain. “Do you think he can hear us?”

“I don’t know. That’s the worse of it. I don’t know if they’ve sedated him, or if he’s-” Without finishing her sentence, she got to her feet and walked over to him.

She stood close. His body braced hers, as he brought his hand down on her own and gave it a squeeze. But he didn’t look at her. She continued in a low voice, “The doctor that brought me up here said he was just under observation, but I’m waiting on our family doctor to tell me what’s really facing us. I was going to come down and get you as soon as I knew what was going on.”

“Well, I’m here now,” he said. “You should eat something.”

“I know, I will.” With her free hand she took the tray from him, sniffing at the boxes. Glancing sideways, he saw a sudden expression of hunger etch itself across her tired face. “Thank you,” she said.

“For what? You know there’s no need.”

“I know. Just, well, just. OK?” They fell silent, holding hands, staying like that for a while.


“Is Daisy your real name?”

She stared out of the tea shop window. “It’s Davina. Daisy was my favourite flower as a kid. Used to play that love me, love me not game a lot. The name just stuck.”

“That’s not liking a flower. That’s pulling it apart.”

“Story of my life,” she sighed, rather eloquently she thought, but his face said different.

“Is that what you do to things you like, then? Pull them apart?”

“Are you psycho- diagnosing me?”

“That’s psychoanalysing, and no,” he said. Then a moment later, “I prefer Davina.”

“So what? You expect me to do somersaults?”

Kevin looked around the small tea shop, with its lace covered tables for two, and dollied cake stands. “It’d be a bit like a bull in a china shop if you did.”

“Great. Thanks for that. Go easy on the compliments, you’re likely to give me a big head.”

He gave her a charming smile. “Not at all, I think you have a lovely head.”

“Now you’re just making me fun of me.” Two minutes with this guy and he was already pushing her buttons. She stared at him, as though trying to work him out, gave up begrudgingly, and continued to stare out of the window. The Friday morning traffic was in full swing. Suddenly she wished she was out in it.

“Are you going to tell me what’s worrying you?”

“I told you I pull things apart. Story of my life.” Sally would never, ever forgive her for this, she thought. Fuck it, if I have to tell someone, why not this joker?

She began to tell all, with the absolute certainty that she had lost her only friend. “Not to make a long story of it, everyone thinks I saved Iain’s life finding him when I did, but the fact is it’s all my fault. When Sally finds out she really will never forgive me, and now she has Stephen she won’t want to anyway.”

Kevin couldn’t hide his astonishment. “You telling me you’re responsible for the missing babysitter?”

“Missing babysitter? What are you on about? She never showed up.”

“You mean you went and left a vulnerable boy home alone?”

Daisy was surprised to find she was more than a little upset by tone of his voice. She simply nodded, not knowing how to respond.

He said, “I think you better tell me all about it, from the beginning.”

“Look, you have to believe I love Sally and Iain. They are like family to me, we grew up together.”

“And then Stephen came along,” he said, sitting back in his chair slowly, accurately reading the timbre of her voice.

“Ever since Sally met your friend, she hasn’t been the same. How can you be so sure of someone you only just met in a matter of minutes?” She remembered how Sally and Stephen had been together, and felt a pang of envy for the girl who could be so sure of her boyfriend whatever he did.

But the first time she laid eyes on Stephen she had recognised the type. The fuck them and leave them bastards she had met all her life. All she had wanted to do was protect Sally from that. Now she simply felt gutted, remembering how she had handled herself in the men’s room. He must love her very much.

How could she have got it so wrong?


“Do you regret ever meeting me?” he asked in a tight voice. His eyes were dark. His hand, rough, warm and comforting, still held hers.

“I guess I did. Not now though. A man who brings a girl breakfast can’t be all bad.”

“Cold and soggy bacon? You’re very easy to please.”

“It’s the thought that counts. Right?”

When he didn’t reply to this, she stared at him. It looked to her as though he was debating something inside his head. “I sent Daisy with Kevin to get you a few things,” he replied after a moment. “A book or something for Iain to read.”

“You remembered...” she said. It called to mind how her brother had immediately taken to Stephen, showing him his treasure trove of books. They were his most prized possessions, and you were honoured if he shared them with you.

“That he’s a bookworm like his sister? Not easy to forget.”

Sally squeezed his hand in response, “I’ll read to him. I’m sure he’ll hear it.” With the whole world turning around portable computing, last Christmas Sally had bought her brother the latest model smartphone and tablet thinking they would be what a computer-savvy nine year old boy would want, but he had shunned the gadgets for physical books, treating them as if they were almost alive.

To Sally it felt like Iain purported human qualities to his books, acting as though he sensed the energy of the trees pulped to make them - and it would be sacrilege to ignore that sacrifice. His favourites were the vintage Choose Your Own Adventure paperback children books they had found one time rummaging around their local chapel’s charity sale. Her brother had been fascinated with their interactivity, of the choices given to the reader, choosing which way the story went and ultimately ended, and going back to read it again, with different stories and different endings.

Stephen had spent an entire evening patiently reading and re-reading one of those adventures to Iain until they found a happy ending. If only interactive books read like life, she thought, where you could go back and choose another adventure, but how real was that?

She looked up at his face, closed off from emotion. Quietly, she said, “He missed you when you left.”

“I missed him. I missed you both.”


Daisy looked away from his stare and said uncomfortably, “I hid her phone.”

Kevin was incredulous. “You hid her phone... forcing her to leave it at home?”

“It was for her own good.”

“Her own good?”

“Is there an echo in here? Will you stop repeating everything I say?” She sat very upright, staring before her, her eyes wide so that she might stop her tears. Not that it helped; they tumbled silently down her cheeks and she wiped them away with a finger.

His look was grim. “I can’t help it. When I thought you were hiding something, this was definitely not it.”

“Will you please just listen, while I try to explain? You said you would. And that you wouldn’t judge. You don’t know how bad I feel right now.”

“Go ahead.”

“After what we planned with Stephen, Sally was... I can’t describe how upset she was. I felt guilty, and I just felt if she went out, she would forget him, get on with her life, you know?” She looked at him, as if expecting him to cut in. She wiped her eyes. There was a lot of make-up, and a lot to smear.

“Go on,” was all he said.

“I wanted her to have an uninterrupted evening of fun. She deserved it for God’s sake! She was the one that organised the fair in the first place. I pestered her, telling her to let me get a babysitter for the night. I wanted to handle everything, show her I cared. To do one good thing for her, and I couldn’t even get that right.”

“And so you hid her phone?”

“I knew if she took her phone she would be calling the house up every five minutes, and yeah, so I hid her phone.”

Kevin was still struggling with the logic, but he kept silent and let it pass.

“Then she gets a call on the home phone, I’ve switched her phone off you see, about someone needing old doc Merryweather, so she goes out.”

“You did actually get a babysitter did you?”

“What do you take me for? Of course I did, the daughter of Sally’s nearest neighbour. I told Sally I would wait until the babysitter arrived, and for her to go on ahead with Merryweather. We planned to meet at the fair.”

“Let me guess the rest. The babysitter never showed up, you got tired of waiting, and you just left him alone thinking that was an OK thing to do? You never thought of checking up after the sitter?”

She began to squirm under the interrogation. “Sally had already put Iain to bed. He never usually gets up after that. I got bored waiting.”

Kevin listened intently as Daisy spoke. It was a childish voice. She was complaining, the way a child would complain about something that isn’t fair, or when someone had been mean to them. Said over and over again, but in a hopeless voice, as if the wrong done could never be righted. However rather than be irritated by her, Kevin found himself strangely feeling sorry for her.

“You never thought to tell Sally you left her brother on his own?”

“I thought the babysitter might arrive late, so I left the door off the latch. Don’t look at me like that! It’s a small town, everyone leaves their doors open.”

“Possibly, when they are in.” He looked at her, but he didn’t see her tears, or her crumpled looks. He saw something else. He marvelled at how she seemed to exist in her own world. It reminded him too much of his late wife.

“You hate me don’t you?”

“No I don’t hate you...” He took a deep breath, “But don’t expect any false sympathy from me, either. It looks to me like you haven’t been turned over one knee and spanked enough in your sheltered life.”

Daisy’s pretty little chin dropped. “What?! How dare you-”

“You’ve been so irresponsible, acting twenty-odd going on thirteen. Didn’t you think the police would need to know this? A boy’s life is at stake, your best friend’s brother.”

She raised her hands to her head. “Don’t you think I know that?”

“Then it’s about time you acted like it.” He slapped some money down on the table, and grabbing her hand pulled her unceremoniously up from the table. “Come on.”

“Where are we going?” she asked, clutching at his jacket from behind her chair.

“To do the right thing. It’s about time you learnt what that is,” he said, making for the door and dragging her with him.

End of Chapter 12 | Read Chapter 13

Yours in love,