Page 96 of Silver Tears

I find her at her locker when the bell goes for the end of the day. She’s standing with a girl from her year chatting about the new season of their favourite show airing this weekend and the girl suggests they could have a sleepover. Not fucking likely. I’ll be hogging her weekend and hopefully it will involve her wearing no clothes.

“Precious,” I greet, coming up behind her and nuzzling into her neck. She giggles and tries to escape me, and I wrap my arm around her waist to stop her from moving away.

The girl blushes and giggles at us. Looking at me with starry eyes. “Anyway, I should go. Let me know about the sleepover?”

Milly nods her head and waves at her.

“Who is that?”

“Her name’s Zara, and I think I might have just made my first friend here at HBA.”

“You have lots of friends here,” I assure her, frowning as I take her bag from her and throw it over my shoulder. “We need to talk about last night.”

Her smile fades, and she looks at me hesitantly. “We do?”

“We do.” I reply firmly.

She nods her head and looks away from me, avoiding eye contact. “Okay, let’s go do this.”

My phone chooses that moment to buzz in my pocket, and I curse internally at its interruption. I frown when I see Peggy’s’ name on the screen.

“Hello.”

“Seb, thank goodness.”

“What’s wrong?” I ask immediately upon hearing the panic in her voice.

“I’m here at the school to collect Charlie, but his teacher tells me his mum and a man collected him earlier this afternoon. They said he had a dentist appointment. The teacher commented that his mum smelled of alcohol.”

“Shit! Okay.” My eyes flick to Mills, who hasn’t a clue right now. “Can you go home and see if they’re at the house?”

“Of course. I’m already on my way back. I’ll call you as soon as I get there. And Seb. I don’t like this. I have a bad feeling in my gut.”

“Same,” I admit. This isn’t good. It isn’t good at all.

“Everything okay?” Mills asks me, picking up on my change in mood.

I look up and down the busy school hallway as I take her hands in mine. “Okay, don’t freak out, but Charlie wasn’t at school when Peggy went to collect him.”

Her face turns ashen. “What do you mean, he wasn’t there?”

“Your mum and a man, whom I’m assuming was Lenny, collected him earlier this afternoon.”

“Oh god!” she grips my hands tightly. “He has them both. What do we do? Seb, we have to find them!”

“I know,” I say calmly and quietly, pulling her into my chest and stroking her head. “I promise you we’ll find them.” She grips my blazer lapels as I call Archer. I fill him in on what’s going on and we agree to meet in the car park.

As I usher us through the school corridors to the exit, my phone rings again and it’s Peggy.

“Well?”

“They’re not here, but there’s been some kind of altercation. There’s a broken chair and a small amount of blood over by the kitchen sink.”

“We’ll be there as soon as we can,” I tell her, picking up pace as we near the school exit. “They aren’t there,” I tell Mills and she whimpers in fear, her bottom lip quivering. I tuck her under my arm so that no gossiping fuckers can see how upset she is, and we reach the boys just as Vee and Eliza do.

“He has them,” I confirm to my brothers.

“Fuck!” Archer exclaims. “We should head over there.”

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