Page 73 of Two for Joy

“I want you to let Chad go.”

“I don’t force him to come here.”

“I know you don’t, but you could refuse the visits, you could let him go for good. Let him move on from all that happened.”

“He doesn’t want to move on, he wants to be with me, and I want him here, too.”

Zac gestured to the room, the barrier between them, the camera behind him. “He can’t be with you, and you can’t be with him. Why can’t you see it? The kindest thing you could do for Chad is let him go.”

“You mistake me for a man with a heart. If he chooses to stop visiting me, then so be it. I can’t do anything about it, but I won’t abandon him. I won’t scream, and shout at him to leave. I won’t make that mistake again, not when the stakes are so much higher this time.”

Zac gave him a long hard stare, then stood up. “I’ll be in touch.”

“Wait…”

“What is it?”

“When you do convince the DI it’s not Chad, if the killer reveals himself by calling from number two’s address, you need to get Chad somewhere safe until you catch the real killer.”

“Somewhere safe? Why?”

Romeo bit his lip. “I think he could be in danger.”

“I think it’s his mind that’s his worst enemy at the moment. He’s at breaking point.”

****

Romeo had always openly looked at car crashes.

His mother had told him off for doing so, but he preferred to be honest about looking, rather than side-eye the scene. Destruction and death were fascinating. When he asked his mother why he shouldn’t gawp, she told him it was the wrong thing to do, and when he asked what the right thing to do was, whether he should ignore the sight out the window, she fell silent.

All the cars passing slowed for a look, despite knowing they might see something horrendous. Broken glass, blood, a flung-out body, people trapped as the car caught fire. Horrible, and despite trying to convince themselves they didn’t want to see it, it was wrong to look, they still did.

Romeo looked because he was interested, and no scene, no matter how bloody, or disturbing, would ever truly affect him.

Romeo only understood the whole “I can’t look, but I can’t not,” when he watched the endless news reports about Chad. He didn’t want to look, thought he’d be better off not watching, but he couldn’t help himself.

First the Canster Times, courtesy of Holly Stevenson, exposed that Chad had been visiting the prison regularly for almost a year. Romeo knew the DI had tried to keep it hush-hush, but once it was out in the open, he couldn’t deny it to the media.

Chad had been visiting Romeo since the first week he’d been locked up.

Chad piqued the media’s attention, the new countdown killer, the good cop turned bad. They started digging into his past, found out about his drug addict mother that had no time for him, who didn’t love him, who loved making money from her body to feed her addiction.

Blueprints for a serial killer, according to Holly at the Canster times.

But she wasn’t done assassinating Chad’s character.

She dug deeper.

Chad didn’t have friends at school. His teachers didn’t have time for him once they found out about his mother. He went into the care system, but refused to settle with any family, he even lived on the streets for a while.

There was no mention of Toby, Chad’s savior, his happiness, his companionship. The most important thing in Chad’s life wasn’t important to anyone else, wasn’t worthy of a mention, or even remembered by the people Holly unearthed from Chad’s past.

Instead of running a story where despite all his setbacks, Chad became a detective. Chad turned his life around. They ran with articles stating he had infiltrated the police force. As if he had somehow snuck his way in, a time bomb ready to blow. Chad hadn’t been found guilty, the evidence was all circumstantial, but the media and Holly Stevenson didn’t care.

The media had been Romeo’s best friend during his spree. They championed him, glorified him, gave him a paper trail of mementos, but looking at the news, knowing every newspaper in the country would have Chad shown in negative light … the hatred boiled Romeo’s blood, and he lashed out at the walls.

He was to blame.

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