He was surprised the boy knew all the lyrics. When he finished, Derek sighed happily. “That were great—do another.”
“I said one. Now go to sleep,” Ian said, bending down to tuck the quilt around the boy’s feet. As he did, Ian’s dressing gown slid slightly, exposing some of his left shoulder.
Derek looked up at him. “Oiy—what happened to yer shoulder?”
Ian drew the robe closer, covering the exposed shoulder. The skin was red and bumpy, like bubbling lava. “I was in a fire.”
“Same one what killed yer folks?”
“Yes.”
“That’s a rough break, mate.”
“It’s time for bed.”
“Do it hurt?”
“Go to sleep.”
“No wonder ye seem kinda angry all th’time.”
“I should warn you, I’m a light sleeper. If you rob me, you’ll regret it,” Ian said, heading toward his bedroom. “Good night.”
“’Night, Guv’.”
As Ian lay in bed, his shoulder throbbed, as it did in damp weather. He wondered if his injury was the real reason he avoided women—or was it just an excuse, as Lillian had suggested? He did fear they would find it repulsive, but there were darker forces that made him shy away from the fairer sex. He went to bed at night hugging his anger, holding it close as a lover. He feared if he let go of it, he would have nothing. He knew he was holding on to his pain, worrying it as one might pick at a scab, but it gave him a perverse sense of comfort.
He rose from his bed and padded across the green Persian rug, pulling back the lemon silk drapes Lillian had hung over the French windows overlooking Victoria Terrace. So many of his comforts he owed to her. Stunned by his parents’ death, for a while he had existed in a daze, barely able to dress himself or eat. His brother had disappeared even before the funeral, leaving Ian alone with his grief and confusion. He did not know what might have become of him if Lillian had not swooped in and scooped him up in her embrace, transferring onto him the fierce love she had given Alfie. He gazed out at the sleeping city, its inhabitants tucked safely into their beds. It was his job to protect them, to see no other family was savaged by tragedy as his had been. It was a quest worthy of Don Quixote, but it was reassuring to be at his post day after day.
He thought of the boy sleeping on his couch, taken unawares by the swelling in his throat, the moisture collecting on his cheeks. Ian kept his emotions so tightly in check that when one escaped, it was startling. Edinburgh had many Derek McNairs, sleeping on hard cobblestones rather than cushioned sofas. Ian realized he had more in common with the boy than he might care to admit, knowing what it was to be dispossessed. Flicking away unfamiliar tears, he returned to his bed and slipped in between the sheets. His shoulder pulsed and throbbed as he turned onto his right side, the bedsprings moaning and creaking.
That night he dreamed of following a faceless murderer through the streets of Edinburgh as the city burned. The leaping flames danced all around as he trailed him down wynds and alleys, until he cornered the man in a basement. Ian started down the cellar steps, thinking he would finally see the killer’s face, when he awoke abruptly from the dream. A thin gray dawn hung outside his bedroom curtains, and he watched the light gather before sinking into an uneasy sleep.
CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE
The solitary figure standing beneath the shadow of Castle Rock gazed at the city, which lay lost in midwinter slumber. He did not like this time of year. The winter his mother succumbed to cholera, a life that had been bearable became a living nightmare. His father took him and his brother to the city, opened a chemist shop, and never smiled again. The more he tried to avoid his father, the more the old man zeroed in on him for abuse. The barnyard fights were moved to the building’s basement, beneath the apothecary shop, strewn with straw from the horse stalls next door.
Shoving his hands into his pockets, he walked along the High Street, following the route traversed by centuries of warriors and wizards, monks and merchants, saints and sinners. But he was not thinking about any of them; he was remembering the night everything changed forever. It was only a few weeks after his mother’s death, and grief had settled over the house like a grim visitor, encasing the three of them in its miserable cocoon.
Having dragged both boys out of bed on one especially nasty night, his father was muttering drunkenly to himself, twisting his belt around his hands. If the boys didn’t fight well enough, they would feel the belt on their backs. He knew this, and knew his father’s rage had grown and festered in the past weeks until it threatened to destroy them all.
He decided that night not to fight his brother. It was time to stand up to the old man, and he felt if he didn’t now, he never would. He refused to fight, and his father’s taunts failed to move him.
“Nancy-boy! Weakling! Useless old woman!” his father shouted, weaving drunkenly around the room and brandishing the belt, while his brother cowered in the corner.
He steeled himself for the blows, but to his surprise, they did not come. Instead, he felt the leather belt being wrapped around his throat quick as a flash. Before he could cry out, he heard his father cursing in his ear, his face so close, he could smell his whisky breath.
“You think you can cross me? I’ll show you what happens to boys who try that, you miserable little insect!” he hissed, pulling the belt tighter.
He felt the life drain from his body along with his breath, and his last thought was that he was glad it would finally be over. The next thing he remembered, he was lying on the basement floor, his brother, looking worried and terrified, standing over him. His father was nowhere to be seen. Instead of relief at being alive, he felt tremendous disappointment that his suffering wasn’t over after all. What he didn’t know was that it was only just beginning.
CHAPTER THIRTY
A loud pounding on the front door awakened Ian on Wednesday morning. Cursing, he threw off the pile of blankets and heaved himself to the floor, the wide wooden planks icy beneath his feet. As he felt around for his slippers, the knocking continued relentlessly.
“Jesus, Mary, and Joseph,” he muttered, using the curse his mother had always uttered, and grabbed his red plaid dressing gown. By the time he threw open the bedroom door, the banging had stopped. He entered the foyer to find a sleep-tousled Derek McNair standing at the open front door and chatting with a cheerful-looking George Pearson.
“Good Lord, do you have any idea what time it is?” Ian demanded.
“Indeed I do,” Pearson replied. “It is precisely half past six.”
“Is he ta come inside?” Derek asked, giving Pearson an appraising look.
“I have something of interest to impart to you,” the librarian said, his prominent eyes shining.