Page 82 of Kiss Me Honey Hone

Kenny blinked. “What?”

“I know. Weird, right? Maybe he needs them because he’s got no lips. I don’t know. But the brand is like a really shitty, cheap make. It’s not Vaseline or even anything half decent.” Aaron pointed to the picture. “And that’s one of them.”

“That’s a lead.” Kenny petted Aaron’s neck like a good little puppy. “Well done.”

Aaron couldn’t have prevented his grin if his life depended on it. He responded to praise as much as he did Kenny’s scent. And as Kenny stroked his fingers along the nape of his neck, Aaron found it hard to concentrate on anything else.

But Kenny pressed for more. “What can you tell me about him?”

“Not much. Late twenties, early thirties, maybe. Hard to tell cause of all the scars, and he keeps his hood up. Don’t talk much. Limps. It’s like he’s been in some freak accident or something. Could explain the no lips. Comes in most Wednesdays. That’s all he buys.”

“Wait.” Kenny bolted to a stand.

“What?”

Kenny didn’t answer. He just left the room.

Aaron listened to footsteps above the ceiling and he sipped on his wine, taking in the rest of the images on thetable. When Kenny returned a short time later, his face pale, he fell back onto the sofa clutching a sheaf of printed out notes.

“What’s that?” Aaron asked.

“The Howell case file.”

Aaron clenched. The Howell file from upstairs? Kenny’s home office? The one he’d ransacked days ago? What had started all this? Had Kenny noticed it was out of order and bits taken? If he had, he said nothing. He just stared at the report, lines across his brow deepening as he read.

“Peter Middleton,” Kenny muttered under his breath.

“Who’s that?”

“A survivor.”

“Of what?”

Kenny looked at him. “Frank and Roisin.”

“Oh.” Aaron drank from his wine, glancing down at all the photographs, an unsettling feeling prickling his stomach.

“Age thirteen, lured from a playground where he’d been with his friends.”

“Lured?”

Kenny flicked his gaze to him. “Encouraged.”

“I know what lured means, you prick.” Aaron shoved Kenny’s leg. “Wouldn’t you say kidnapped, is what I meant?”

“Kidnapped eventually. But lured.Enticed.”

“By who? Roisin never left the house.”

Kenny didn’t respond. He kept reading. “Taken into the back of a car where Frank and…” He then stopped, cracked his neck from side to side as if omitting details. Probably for Aaron’s sake, and he was grateful. “Then taken to the house and…tortured.”

“Tortured? How?”

Kenny looked at him. “You really want to hear how?”

Aaron gulped, thought about it, then didn’t want to think about it and waved a hand. “Gloss over the deets.”

“He escaped after three days. A hiker found him crawlingthrough the woods, bleeding and dehydrated, but alive. The psychological damage was as bad as the physical.”

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