Sins of the Father by Fyn Alexander Read Free Book Online

Mum. Was he your boyfriend?” She was starting to get upset, but I was just a kid and I wanted what I wanted and that was to know something about my father.
    Mum stood with the box of Typhoo tea bags in her hands, looking at me. She said, “I was only eighteen. I was working in the Adelphi Hotel as a chambermaid, and he was there as well. That’s all I know about him. Are you hungry again? Do you want some Jaffa Cakes?”
    I was always hungry as a kid because I grew so fast. Half of Mum’s wages probably went on feeding me when I was home. But I wouldn’t give up. I never did when I wanted something. “I just want to know his name, that’s all. Did you go on a date with him? He must have told you his name.”
    She was really getting upset now. “No, I never went on a date with him. Now shut up about it.”
    But I wouldn’t shut up. “You mean you just had sex with him? Just one time and that was that?”
    The kettle began to beep, and Mum turned her back on me to unplug it and pour the hot water into the mugs. She said, “Yes,” very quietly. I don’t know where my next words came from: cruelty, stupidity, ignorance? It could be any or all of those, but I’ve always regretted them. I said loudly, “Did he pay you?”
    Mum put the kettle down slowly and carefully without speaking. She turned and looked at me, and her face was so hurt and so sad that I hated myself. Mum had never laid a hand on me, not even when I was the most annoying little know-it-all sod in the world. But I thought she was going to then. She didn’t though. She said, “You little horror.” Never in my life had she called me a mean name. It was always luv or my big son or my Kael. Then she ran to her bedroom.
    For the next couple of hours, I sat on the couch, turning the television up louder and louder because I couldn’t stand the sound of her crying and I didn’t know how to make it stop. When she did stop and there was no sound from her bedroom for about twenty minutes, I made her a cup of tea and carried it in to her. “I’m sorry, Mum. I’m sorry,” I said.
    She drank the tea, and she gave me a hug.
    I spent the rest of the holidays trying to make it up to her without speaking directly about it. I had her meal ready every night when she got home from work even though I couldn’t cook and some of it was probably inedible. She always said it was great and ate it anyway. I cleaned the flat and did the washing up and generally tried to be a perfect son.
    I never mentioned my father again.

Chapter Three
    “I’ll see you tomorrow after school,” Kael said. They stood to one side as the other boys, all in smart uniforms, streamed in through the gates of Redmond Independent College. It was the first day back after the holidays, and everyone looked cheerful except Angel, who looked worried.
    “You’re not going out of the country, are you, Daddy? If I’m leaving in September, I don’t want you going away for days at a time.”
    Straightening Angel’s red-and-black-striped school tie, Kael said, “No. I’ll be in the city, and as I said, I’ll see you tomorrow. It’s not a dangerous job, and it’s only twenty-four hours.”
    Angel reached up to touch the outline of Kael’s gun secreted in a shoulder holster under his black jacket. He always wore all black on a job, smart trousers and jacket with a black crew-neck shirt underneath. No one looking at him would notice the gun, but Angel knew he always went to work armed. “You’re not wearing the heart necklace I bought you.” Kael had worn it every day since Christmas, but this morning he had left it on the bedside table.
    Taking Angel’s face between his hands, Kael kissed him tenderly on the lips. “No jewelry on a job. No identifying features.”
    “What about a tattoo?” Angel asked. “You would look so cool with a tattoo.”
    With a smile, Kael tapped his nose. “No tattoos either, and that goes for you as well.”
    An oversize lad of about eighteen walked past,