Monsters & Angels (Cate & Kian Book 7)

by Louise Hall

  They’d just got back from the Sunday morning service at their local church. Kian must have been feeling guilty about spending so many late nights at the office recently because he’d actually come into the church with them today. Unlike Cate, he wasn’t very religious and so he usually skipped the service and met up with them afterwards at a nearby coffeehouse.

  While Kian stayed warm and dry at home, having a father-daughter brunch with Lola and Sierra, Cate was going to brave the bitterly cold winds and take their son, Mateo down to the waterfront so that they could join the beach clean-up team.

  Kian snaked his arms around Cate’s waist, sliding his hand up her jumper so he could stroke his thumb over the sensitive skin around her belly button. “You do realise,” he murmured gently, brushing his lips against the back of her neck, “that I’m probably going to end up with either my hair braided or my fingernails painted bright pink, don’t you?”

  Cate giggled, “I’ve told the girls I’ll double their pocket money next weekend if they can manage to do both.”

  “Ugh, I need coffee,” Heidi grumbled as she and her son, Diego, joined Cate and Mateo at the clean-up station to collect their grabbers and plastic sacks. “I’ve literally had like two hours sleep.”

  Cate raised an eyebrow, “do I really want to know?”

  Heidi chuckled, “ha, I wish it was because of that. Nah, there was a private party at the Shack last night. The tips were really good but the last stragglers didn’t leave until like 3am and then there was all the cleaning up to do.”

  Heidi owned the Taco Shack which was Cate and Kian’s favourite restaurant.

  “That sucks,” Cate sympathised with her friend. “You should have texted me. I could have stopped by your place and picked up Diego on my way down here. There’s no point both of us having to be here.”

  It was winter so there wasn’t much litter on the beach but Mateo and Diego didn’t seem to mind; it was like a treasure hunt for them but instead of pieces of gold, they competed with each other to find empty soda cans and sandwich wrappers.

  They were about halfway along the waterfront when Cate’s phone rang. It was Kian.

  “I need you to come home.” She knew right away that something wasn’t right. He didn’t sound like the same man she’d said goodbye to less than half an hour ago. She pressed a hand to her tummy; tendrils of fear coiled themselves tightly around her insides.

  “What’s wrong?” she choked out. “Are the girls OK?”

  “No, they’re fine. I just… I need you to come home.”

  “OK,” Cate stuttered. “I’ll be there as soon as I can.”

  “Are you OK, hun?” Heidi asked, placing her hand on Cate’s arm. She’d just come back from the promenade, where she’d been getting them both coffee. “Do you need to sit down? You look really pale.”

  Kian hadn’t told her why he suddenly needed her to come home. He’d said that the girls were OK but she got this feeling that something really bad had happened. “I’m sorry. Something’s come up. I’ve got to go.”

  Mateo and Diego were a few yards ahead of them on the beach. “Mats,” Cate called, “can you come here, buddy?”

  “Aha,” Diego grinned. He’d found an old shoe wedged between the rocks.

  “Aw, man,” Mateo frowned, “you find all the best things.”

  “Mateo,” Cate’s voice was harsher, “I need you to come here right now!”

  Mateo stomped towards her. “But we haven’t even got to the best part yet,” he complained when Cate told him that they needed to go home. There was always plenty of litter on the section of beach surrounding the ferry terminus which was just a bit further along the front. He stabbed his grabber into the cold, hard sand.

  “How about if I watch Mats while he and Diego finish up here and then I’ll drop him off at your house on my way to the Shack this afternoon?” Heidi offered.

  “Are you sure you don’t mind?” Cate’s feet twitched inside her black wellies. She wanted to be on her way home already.

  “Of course not,” Heidi smiled. “Text me if you need anything, OK?”

  “Thank you.” Cate walked as fast as she could along the waterfront, breaking into a run when she rounded the bend of the coastline and their house came into view. Kian had sounded so tense on the phone that she’d expected to be met by flashing lights and loud, blaring sirens. But there were no police cars or fire engines in their driveway. It looked just like any other day in their quiet neighbourhood.

  She let out a shaky breath. Maybe she’d overreacted?

  Kian was waiting for her by the front door, his car keys already dangling from his fingers. He was still wearing the same navy-blue suit he’d worn to church that morning but he’d loosened his grey silk tie. “Are you going somewhere?” Cate asked, a little breathlessly.

  “I’ve got to go to the office,” Kian brushed past her to get to the Tank. “Where’s Mats?”

  He looked a little panicked that their son hadn’t come back with her. “He’s with Heidi,” Cate explained, “he wanted to stay at the beach.”

  Kian nodded but he didn’t look happy, “will you text me as soon as Heidi brings him home?”

  “Kian, what’s happened?” She reached out to touch him but he flinched. “You’re scaring me.”

  He softened for a moment. “I don’t mean to.” He reached up as if he was going to touch her cheek but then quickly pulled his hand away. “I promise, angel.” He choked on that last word.

  He quickly looked down at his watch. “I’ve really got to go.”

  Cate watched him get in the Tank and reverse down the driveway.

  “Mommy?” Sierra slid her hand inside Cate’s. “Where’s Daddy going?”

  “He’s got to go to work, sweetie,” Cate plastered on a fake smile.

  “We painted his nails but we didn’t get to braid his hair. Does that mean we don’t get double our allowance next week?”

  “We’ll see.”

  “I’m starving.” Lola joined them, rubbing her tummy.

  “I thought Dad was going to make you pancakes?”

  “It’s really weird,” Lola followed Cate into the kitchen and hopped up on to one of the stools at the kitchen counter. “He was just getting the mixture together when his phone rang. He told us to go wash our hands and when we came back, he was pouring the mixture down the sink. He said that he had to go out and you were coming home.”

  That awful, twisty feeling in Cate’s stomach returned tenfold. That just didn’t sound like Kian; he might have been a workaholic but his children were really important to him and when he was at home, he always made sure that his focus was 100% on them.

  Cate grabbed an apple from the fruit bowl and tossed it to Lola. “That should tide you over while I make the pancakes.”

  “Mum?” Lola asked, chewing on a chunk of apple, “is Dad OK? I mean, you should have seen him when he was pouring the pancake mixture down the sink. It was like he didn’t even realise what he was doing?”

  “He’s fine,” Cate lied. “You know what he’s like when he’s working on a deal. That ability to focus so intensely was part of what made him such a good footballer.”

  “I guess,” Lola shrugged.

  After both girls had finished their pancakes, Lola went into the lounge to watch the highlights from Saturday’s Premier League games and Sierra went upstairs to play with her dolls.

  While Cate finished putting away the breakfast dishes, she kept looking over at her cell-phone which was on top of the refrigerator. She had this sneaky feeling that Kian hadn’t gone into the office. She’d never even thought about checking up on him before; she’d trusted him implicitly but the feeling just wouldn’t go away.

  She dried her hands and leaned her hip against the kitchen counter. It wasn’t like she was thinking about hacking into his e-mail or doing something outlandish like hiring a private investigator to trail him. Besides, he’d left the house in such a hurry; she was allowed to be worried about him. He was beh
aving completely out of character. She picked up her phone and scrolled down her contacts until she’d found her brother, Ben’s number.

  Kian and Ben were joint partners in their own venture capital company.

  This is OK, she reassured herself. I’m not technically checking up on him. I’m just having a friendly chat with my brother. Although, what she was really hoping for was that Ben’s wife, Erin would answer the phone instead and tell her that Ben had hurried out of their apartment too.

  “Hey Cate,” Ben answered. Cate felt as if her poor tummy had plummeted right down through the kitchen tiles. “What’s up?”

  “Oh, nothing,” Cate tried to make her voice sound really light. She didn’t want her brother to suspect that anything was wrong. “I just thought I’d check in and see how Oliver got on in his karate competition.” Oliver was her nephew.

  “Are you sure you’re feeling OK, sis?” Ben teased. “The competition was last weekend. Oliver got third place. You were there, remember?”

  “I appreciate you meeting me on a Sunday,” Detective Light said as Kian unlocked the door to his office. “I’m sure you’d much rather be at home with your family.”

  Kian gritted his teeth, “leave my wife and children out of this.”

  “I apologise.”

  “Can I get you anything to drink?” Kian asked. He desperately needed to do something.

  “Coffee would be great,” the detective smiled, “I’m a little jet-lagged.”

  Kian handed him a steaming mug of black coffee and sat on the other side of his desk. The silence was suffocating and he drummed his fingers on the solid oak. Detective Light raised a grey, bushy eyebrow when he saw that Kian’s fingernails on his right hand were painted bright pink.

  “My daughters…” Kian started to explain. His eyes were drawn to the framed photograph on his desk. He allowed himself one last look before he reached out and placed it face down on the desk. But even that was tainted because how could he ignore the Manchester Rovers shirt that Lola was wearing in the photo? After all these years, the demons of his past had finally caught up with him and he didn’t want his wife and children to witness this.

  “I know this is uncomfortable, son.”

  Kian flinched, “don’t call me that.” He felt angry all over again with his dad.

  “My apologies,” Detective Light held up his hands. “Let’s try again, shall we? What do you know about Joe Hunter?”

  Bile rose up the back of his throat. Even just hearing the name was enough to take him back to that dark, hateful place. He slammed his hands down on the desk and pushed his chair back so quickly, it crashed back against the wall. He walked out of the office but before he could even make it to the men’s bathroom just down the corridor, he was retching and had to suffer the indignity of throwing up in the wastepaper basket at the side of his assistant, Anna’s desk.

  He felt a hand on his back, “it’s OK.”

  Kian spun around angrily to confront the seasoned detective. He wiped his mouth on his sleeve, “don’t give me that shit. It hasn’t been OK for over twenty years.”

  “I know. That’s why I’m here.”

  After he’d finished talking to Detective Light, Kian cleaned out the soiled wastepaper basket. It was exactly the same as the one he had in his office so he switched the two, giving Anna the cleaner one.

  He knew that Cate must be worried about him but he couldn’t go home, not yet. Ever since that first kiss on Christmas Eve, he’d always called Cate his “angel” but it wasn’t just a term of endearment, that’s what she was to him. She might not have known what had happened to him but she’d saved his life anyway. Her purity had won out over his depravity; her abundance of light had banished all of his darkness. He ached with how much he wanted her sweetness to take away the bitterness of what he’d been forced to talk about this afternoon.

  Kian was so angry that after all these years, after everything that he’d achieved, with just two words he could be catapulted back to the communal showers at the Rovers Academy and that scared, young boy naked and cowering in the corner. He could still feel the cold, grey tiles against his skin and smell the generic brand of soap the club provided; he could hear the other boys larking about in the locker room next-door.

  “No,” Kian shook his head, as if he could clear out the images that were haunting him.

  His cell-phone vibrated on his desk. Cate had texted him that Heidi had brought Mateo back home from the beach clean-up.

  Although he was relieved to know that his wife and children were safely ensconced at home, he was still too fucking angry to join them there. He needed to do one of three things; fuck, drink or beat the absolute shit out of something.

  He chose the safest option and grabbed his gym bag from the cupboard. There was a gym in the building which was open 24-7 but even though it was a Sunday and most of the people who worked in the building would be at home with their families, he still didn’t want to risk seeing anybody he knew. He felt so exposed, as if all of his dirty little secrets had been written on his skin in thick, black marker pen for everybody to see.

  He walked through the front door of O’Malley’s and was immediately hit by the pungent smell of sour sweat. He stopped and took a deep breath, filling his lungs. It was everywhere in this cramped, little gym; it coated the off-white walls and stuck to the black, plastic floors. If it ever closed down and the landlords wanted to rent the space to new tenants, they wouldn’t just be able to get rid of the foul stench with a fresh coat of paint and some fucking potpourri. They’d need to bring in industrial-strength cleaners and even then they’d probably struggle to get rid of all the layers of grime that had built up over the years.

  It was so far removed from the fancy gym in his office building with its fluffy, freshly laundered towels, sparkling clean mirrors and hand sanitiser dispensers.

  His expensive, Italian suit might have been neatly hung up in a garment bag in his office but it was the dirt and grime at O’Malley’s which made Kian feel at home there. The last thing he fucking wanted right now was to stare at his own goddamn reflection. As he walked towards the back of the gym, none of the blokes there even gave him a second glance. He stashed his bag in one of the cubbyholes and took out his wrist guards. The rhythmic thumping of wrapped-up fists against cracked vinyl pads calmed him down.

  A couple of hours later, when he stumbled out of O’Malley’s, he was drenched in sweat and he had a fresh bruise marking his abdomen like a badge of fucking honour. There were a couple of shower cubicles at O’Malley’s but the locks didn’t work so he walked back to the office and took a quick shower there and then changed back into his Italian suit.

  When he got home, the children were already asleep. Cate was sat at the kitchen counter folding laundry.

  “Hey,” Kian said softly. He gently brushed his lips against the top of her head.

  “Hey,” Cate smiled back at him.

  He reached out and gripped the back of Cate’s stool. A bead of sweat trickled down his forehead. He’d really thought that by putting himself through that punishing workout at O’Malley’s and then scrubbing himself clean that he’d bought himself some time away from his demons but Cate’s smile just then had hit him like a lightning bolt.

  He was catapulted back to the kitchen of the house he’d grown up in back home in Manchester. He’d had training after school that day and when his dad had picked him up from the bus stop; he’d told him about the bruise on his abdomen. His dad had told him to stop being such a wimp – if he wanted to play the game professionally, he needed to toughen up.

  Later on, he’d gone downstairs to the kitchen looking for some frozen vegetables to put on the dark-purple mark which was slowly spreading like an ink blot across his skin.

  Cate and his sister, Sinead were sat at the kitchen table. They were supposed to be helping his mum with dinner by peeling carrots and potatoes but he could tell that Cate was doing most of the work. Sinead hated doing chores.

  �
��Where’s Mum?” Kian asked them, rummaging through the freezer.

  “She’s gone next door to water Mr Johnson’s plants.”

  Kian found a bag of frozen peas wedged at the very back of the freezer and tugged them out, trying not to wince at the sharp pain in his abdomen.

  “Ow,” Sinead yelped, rubbing at the tiniest little piece of ice on her forearm. “You totally did that on purpose.”

  Kian rolled his eyes, “you’re such a drama queen.”

  Sinead folded her arms across her chest, “I’m so telling Mum you threw ice at me.”

  Kian glanced across at Cate. She smiled shyly at him before looking back down at the unpeeled carrots and potatoes. There was something about her smile which had made him feel good even though he’d had a really crappy day. There was nothing sexual about it; she was still a child and he wasn’t a total freak. It was just so sweet and innocent. When Sinead smiled, it was usually because she wanted something. Cate’s smile was a reminder that even though there were monsters in the world, there were also angels too.

  “Are you OK?” Cate put her delicate hand over his, bringing him back to the here and now.

  Kian shook his head. He wasn’t ready to let go of that memory just yet but he didn’t want to worry Cate any more than he already had.

  “I’m just tired,” he sighed.

  “Are you hungry?” Cate asked. “I saved you some dinner. Do you want me to warm it up?”

  “No, it’s OK. I’m not hungry. I think I might just go to bed.”

  “How was work?” Cate asked when they were upstairs in their bedroom. She’d got changed into a simple, white cotton nightgown and the moonlight streaming in from the large glass windows behind her made it look like she was surrounded by an unearthly glow.

  “It was fine,” Kian started unbuttoning his shirt. He really hated lying to his wife.

  Cate chewed on her bottom lip. “Did you and Ben manage to sort it out?”

  “It was a fuck up with one of the contracts,” Kian explained. “Ben and Anna didn’t need to be there. It was just me and Bram.”