Page 69 of A Wedding in a Week

His hand rises for a third time, my lucky number apparently the opposite for him, and the last time I felt this powerless, I’d hung over frothing water. Then Marc says, “Not sure that was better, to be honest,” and that’s it. I’ve heard enough.

One-handed or not, I’m going to track down who left Marc hanging and kill them.

Marc slays me first.

“So I counted down the days until I could make my own decisions. Thought no one could stop me coming to stay in Cornwall full-time the minute I turned eighteen.”

Fuck.

I sent him away.

Marc has a different interpretation. “But it’s good that didn’t happen. That we didn’t happen until now. It meant I could keep a close eye on Noah even when I lived in university halls. And it made me work so hard to score every bursary going.” His drive makes so much sense with this information. “Interning every summer instead of coming back to the farm meant I could see more of him when my stepdad finally left.”

“He went?”

“For a while, and it was good. Mum was good too. Back to how I remembered.” His head hangs so I can’t see his face, and his voice through my headset turns ghostly. “Then he came back, and she let him. Well, not let him. They fought and I got in the middle. That’s when he stopped me from seeing Noah for a while, so I had to do it in secret. Kids shouldn’t have to keep those. Then he let him see me sometimes, and I didn’t like how Noah was changing.” There’s a long, slow inhale I recognise but his exhale is raspy. “Thought if I got a really good job, I could swoop in before it was too late.”

“You were worried your stepdad would—”

“Hurt Noah? His own son? No.” His next look is grim. “That he was training him to step into his shoes? Yes.”

“Doing...?”

“You don’t want to know how he earns his money.” His pause draws out and I don’t fill it. Instead, I wait like Dad used to until Marc continues. “With a decent job, I could afford a flat for us both before Noah was in too deep. For all three of us, which is stupid. Mum’s made her choice. Then the spot came up in Penzance, and it seemed like perfect timing. I could get it, and you, and give Noah a taste of what I had every summer. Show him that life could be so much better. And if things got really bad, I’d be a good prospect to Social Services. You know, able to keep him full-time.”

Marc’s motivation has never been clearer. So is his distress.

“Noah never told me he was already in trouble.”

“With your stepdad—”

“With a gang. With drugs.”

“Taking them?”

“I fucking hope not. Running them probably.”

“You think so?”

Marc nods, suddenly ferocious. “That’s what the police think.” He cradles his phone, maybe recalling a conversation I only heard one half of, and Marc’s as pale now as when he took it in the practice manager’s office. “There’s no avoiding it on the estate. It was bad when I was a kid. Now it’s worse. Noah’s fifteen, the perfect age to get recruited. Plus he had two phones in his pockets. Two fucking phones, Stef.”

I must look blank.

“It’s a classic sign. Runners are given a separate phone for drop-offs and pick-ups. The last time we spoke, he told me he had a new bike. I should have guessed Mum didn’t buy it for him. She isn’t even in the fucking country.” He’s back to hollow. “Neither of them is. They’ve been somewhere in Spain for weeks, and I didn’t know he was on his own. If I hadn’t come back to Cornwall, I could have—”

I reach for him then, and yes, it’s a hassle in this harness, and it must signal a cockpit alarm, because Rex Heligan’s voice floods my headset. He warns me to fasten it again, but at least I get a moment of seeing Marc’s hand in mine. Then I sit back and watch him do what Dad taught him, one deep breath followed by another, before he meets my eyes. “I’m not leaving London again without him.”

I nod, telling Marc what I hope will come true.

“We’ll bring him home together.”

But once we get to the hospital, I’m not sure we’ll be bringing anyone home with us at all.

Lukas meets us, grim-faced in a way I don’t recognise from either our father or our mother. He’s also far from the pixie I’ve always thought him. He’s his own person here, driven and professional in this world of closed doors that open for him, of beeping monitors and phrases like penetrating cardiac injury, ventricles, and hypotension. He commands a vocabulary a million miles from crops and cows and cream, and I’ve never felt so far from Cornwall.

He also translates while hurrying us down to a high-dependency unit, where he stops us, and I realise we aren’t alone. The duke’s hand lands on my shoulder, his other on Marc’s, and he’s an old man, but he’s big and steady. So is his grandson—steady, I mean, if not as big. Marc staggers, but Rex is there to brace him when Lukas admits, “Noah got through the surgery, but he isn’t out of the woods yet.”

I’m a big guy too, but I can move fast when I have to. I take over from a Heligan who’s as kind as his grandfather. It’s right there in Rex’s gentle worry and his quiet offer. “Go on. We’re only a phone call away if you need us.”

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