Blood Tears (55 page)

“
Did
you kill Dad? Was it you? You were missing from the list. Where the
hell were you? He was like a father to you, you
bastard!”

He was taken aback,
startled by my fury. He grabbed my fists to stop me assaulting
him.

“
No,
Tessie. No. It wasn’t me. I wasn’t involved in any of what
happened, I swear.”

I deflated immediately.
“I suppose you were with Dorrie.”

His eyes were earnest
as they looked into mine. “No. I went back to work. I was at the
prison the whole time. You can check if you want.”

“
What? Why did you go back to work? You were on
leave.”

“
I
thought the funeral was a disgrace. I couldn’t believe my family’s
behaviour. It was so disrespectful to Denny. It was as if nobody
cared about him at all. And I could only bear thirty minutes at the
wake before I left, because I could tell it was going to turn into
a gigantic piss up. I can’t even speak to my family at the moment,
I’m so angry with them.” He let go of my wrists and captured my
hands, and I let him, lost in those beautiful amber eyes again. He
rubbed his thumbs across the tops of my hands.

“
Tessie, I’m devastated about Trev. As you said, he was like a
father to me. I’ve never had an older man treat me so well and
teach me so much. I can’t believe what’s happened.”

“
It
was your family who did it, Bycraft,” said the Sarge in a nasty
voice.

“
Do
you mind, Maguire? Can I just talk to Tessie alone for a moment?
For once.”

The Sarge stalked away,
but not too far.

“
Thank you,” I said to Jake, looking down, not wanting him to
see my fresh tears. It wasn’t something I wanted to share with him
anymore.

“
I
know I’m a total hypocrite, and I’ll understand if you tell me to
piss off, but I’m really hoping you’ll let me go to his
funeral.”

“
Of
course. He would have wanted you to be there,” I said quietly. “You
meant a lot to him too.”

“
Until the end of us.”

“
Yes.
He was very angry with you.”

He was silent, but I
could feel his eyes on me. I didn’t want to look at him.

“
Thank you. You’ve always been a better person than me.” He
fleetingly kissed me on the cheek. I pulled my hands from his and
moved away.

“
That’s enough. Off you go,” said the Sarge.

“
Who
put you in charge of Tessie?” Jake demanded. “She can speak for
herself.”

“
The
Super put me in charge to protect her from your family. I’ll show
you out now,” the Sarge said coolly.

“
I
have other things I want to discuss with her.” His eyes beseeched
me. “Things about us, Tessie.”

“
I’ll
show you out now,” the Sarge repeated in a voice that would brook
no opposition, and, unless he wanted to make a scene, Jake had no
choice but to comply.

The Sarge closed the
door after him with unnecessary force and came to confront me.

“
Why
the hell are you letting him go to your father’s funeral?” he
demanded.

“
Because it’s not about who I’d like to be there, it’s about
who Dad would like to be there. And Dad and Jakey were very close.”
I sat down on the lounge. “I suppose I’ll have to think of all
that. I don’t even know where to start.”

He sat next to me. “I
can help.”

“
Can
you take me to my house?”

“
I
don’t think that’s a good idea. Not yet.”

“
Please?”

Against his better
judgement, we drove in the patrol car to the smouldering ruins of
the house in which my mother and my father had both been murdered
by Bycrafts. The Fire Investigation Unit was present when we
arrived, searching through the scorched timbers for clues about
what had happened.

Seeing the patrol car
pull up, one of the inspectors approached us, and poked his head in
the window.

“
G’day. I understand there’s a daughter of the deceased in
town. Can you tell me how I can get in contact with
her?”

“
That’s me,” I said, my voice subdued.

“
Oh,
sorry, love. Condolences. You might be able to help us.”

I spent the next ten
minutes sketching out a rough plan of the house and answering some
questions, one of which was particularly upsetting.

“
We’ve found two bodies inside. One seemed to be in bed in . .
.” He checked the plan. “. . . the main bedroom.”

“
That
was probably my father, Trevor Fuller,” I sniffed, a bit teary
again. “He used a wheelchair, so wasn’t very mobile.”

“
And
a body in the hallway.”

“
That
was probably his girlfriend, Adele . . . Oh, I’m sorry, my mind’s
gone completely blank about her last name.”

He patted me on the
back. “That’s okay, love. We can find out.”

Just then, a gaggle of
clucking came down the side of the house and my chickens appeared
out of nowhere, probably recognising my voice.

“
Oh,
my God,” I said, crying again. “I thought they were gone too.” They
clucked around my feet in desperation. Adele must have forgotten to
coop them for me last night. I’d never been so glad about something
before.

“
Probably fled from the flames,” said the inspector. He winked
at me. “Pity. I’m partial to a roast chook.” I gave him the evil
eye. He looked awkward. “Sorry. You tend to develop a bit of
gallows humour in this job.”

I nodded to show there
were no hard feelings.

“
Tess, what are you going to do with them?” asked the Sarge.
“Their coop’s destroyed.”

“
We’re going to take them back to your place. They can roam
the yard during the day and sleep in your shed at night. I can
vouch for its comfyness,” I said with a touch of
tartness.

“
How
are we going to get them there?”

“
In
the patrol car. How else?”

“
Tess.”

“
In
the patrol car,” I insisted stubbornly.

“
You’re cleaning up the mess.”

“
Fair
enough.”

So, to the bemusement
of the fire inspectors, with some difficulty, we rounded up the
five chickens, placed them in the back seat of the patrol car, and
took them for a spin into town. By the time we drove up the police
house driveway, the Sarge had Lady Sara nestling in his lap and
another chook on the back of his seat pecking at his ear. The other
three sat obediently on the back seat, enjoying the ride.

When I pulled Lady Sara
from his lap, the death-stare he gave me made me giggle
uncontrollably. “She likes you.”

“
Tell
her I’m quite fond of her too,” he said dryly.

“
I
hope you don’t mean that in a Sunday roast kind of way.”

He quirked an eyebrow.
“You be the judge of that.”

I spent a happy hour
settling the girls in to their new home and cleaning out the patrol
car. I realised that it helped for me to stay busy as it took my
mind off Dad. And thinking of that I settled down to arrange a
funeral.

The next few days were
taken up with that. The Sarge considerately tracked down Adele’s
family so they could decide on her funeral arrangements, in the end
taking her back to her family town to be buried.

Dad’s funeral was a
very respectful, touching, and well-attended affair. The only
marring moment was when the Sarge and I arrived a little earlier at
the cemetery to be there to greet the presiding reverend, only to
be met with a bunch of lounging Bycrafts waiting for me.

“
Don’t fucking like it now, do you, piglet?” yelled Rosie.
“Don’t like it when
we
crash
your
precious father’s
funeral.”

My face fell at the
thought of them ruining my carefully planned memorial to my father.
I knew they’d been released from house arrest pending further
investigations, but I never expected them to have the nerve to turn
up at Dad’s funeral to heckle me. Especially as one or more of them
were responsible for his death.

The Sarge stepped
forward, but I restrained him with a hand on his arm.

“
Just
ignore them. I refuse to engage with them,” I said with soft
calmness. I kept walking. On this day, of all days, I would not let
them psych me.

“
That’s right,” sneered Rick. “Run away, little piglet
bitch.”

“
Dunno why you’re bothering to bury your dad,” yelled out
Rosie after us. “He’s already been cremated.”

Mocking laughter
scorched my ears.

I spun around, marched
right up to her, and slogged her one in the face, possibly busting
her nose and my fist in the process. Blood flooded down to her
chin. I was pleased with that result.

Without a word, I
returned to a shocked and dismayed Sarge, nursing my fist, but
regaining the solemn dignity the occasion required. He stared at me
warily.

“
What?” I asked.

“
Tess. I don’t know what to say to you sometimes.”

“
She
deserved it. Let’s be ready for the reverend. I don’t want to keep
her waiting.”

And if that good lady
wondered why I cradled my right hand throughout some of the
beautiful ceremony, and winced when she shook it afterwards, she
was too tactful to ask.

Jake attended, but kept
a polite distance from me, and I was glad about that. Fiona
attended with Ronnie, but she held her tongue for once, and I was
glad about that. Dave and his mother attended, and more than one of
the townsfolk approached him before and after the ceremony to thank
him for his efforts in putting out the fires, and I was glad about
that. I even saw Young Kenny lurking in the background, and I was
glad about that. I realised then that I had a lot to be glad about,
just as I had a lot to be sad about.

I gave a simple eulogy
to my father, hoping to do the enormous love I had for him justice.
Other members of the community wished to speak about him too, and
it was nice to hear what they said. I listened intently, flanked by
the Sarge and Ronnie, each holding my hand, the Sarge being
particularly careful of my aching right hand.

Abe had volunteered his
functions room to hold the after-ceremony and his chef excelled
himself with simple, but tasty, finger food. I was occupied
accepting the condolences of what seemed to be a never-ending
stream of people; almost having to shake more hands than my own
poor hand could bear. It was only then it really struck me just
what a respected man my father had been in the community, and I
felt proud about that.

At one point, Lavinia
approached me. “I always knew you’d be the last of the Fullers,”
she purred. “Want to know your fate now too?”

She was saved from a
vicious knifing. Marianne, who’d travelled from the city for the
funeral, and Gretel distracted her by pretending to be interested
in her predictions. I didn’t even know why she was there, because
she had nothing to do with my father while he was alive. He would
not have stood for her fake psychic bullshit for one moment.

Though I was busy, I
still found a moment to take Young Kenny a cup of tea and three
plain biscuits to where he sat outside on one of the remaining logs
of Abe’s fence. He clasped my hand and squeezed, and I tried not to
react to the pain. But he didn’t have to say one word to me to let
me know he was also giving me his deepest commiserations.

Chapter
39

A few days later, on
Christmas Eve, it was my twentieth-eighth birthday. Since Dad had
died, I’d had up and down days, and my birthday was a down day.
When I looked at myself in the bathroom mirror, I saw nothing but
gloominess looking back at me. Twenty-eight-year-old
gloominess.

My first birthday
without any family with which to celebrate.

The Sarge had prepared
me a special birthday breakfast, complete with an eclectic
collection of wild flowers in a thin vase for which I suspected
he’d raided the local park. That raised a smile from me.

“
You’re too nice to me,” I said, tucking in and demolishing
all the food he’d served me. I left the flowers, though some of
them did look rather tasty.

“
I
have a gift for you,” he said.

“
You
didn’t have to do that.”

“
I
know, because living with me is a daily gift, right.”

I rolled my eyes.
“Right.”

He handed over a
beautifully wrapped rectangular box. I opened it carefully to find
a gorgeous crystal sculpture of an orchid. “Oh. That’s so
lovely.”

“
I
thought you might like something pretty to look at,” he
said.

“
For
when you’re not here?” I laughed.

“
Never been called pretty before,” he smiled. “Do you like
it?”

“
No,
I don’t like it. I
love
it. Thanks so much,
Sarge.”

“
Uh-uh. You can’t thank me until you do it
properly.”

“
Thanks so much, Finn. I love it.”

“
That’s much better. I feel terrible leaving you alone on your
birthday and Christmas.”

“
I
don’t have to be alone. I’ve had lots of offers. Fiona virtually
ordered me to spend the holidays with her and Ronnie. I’m choosing
to be alone. It’s just too soon to pretend to be jolly with other
people. But anyway, you’ll have a lovely Christmas with your mother
and stepfather in the city. That’s something for you to look
forward to.”