A Long Way Back (Unfinished Business #2) - Barbara Elsborg Page 0,90

way he’d walked home, show him any other route Ru might have taken. The woods. The park. But there was no sign of his brother.

If you’d let us have phones… But Killian wasn’t going to say that.

When they returned to the house, hope that this was nothing, had changed to fear that it was something. They’d left his frantic mum phoning round Ru’s friends. His father called the police—and he hated the police—and things began to happen, though not quickly enough. His mother stayed by the phone. She hardly moved. Killian felt blackness seeping into his soul.

Police came to the house. Ru was considered high risk because of his age. Words that made Killian shudder. A family liaison officer stayed with his mum. Phone calls were made to family, friends, neighbours. His dad even called his brother, Uncle Felan, despite the bad blood between them. Photos of Ru were uploaded. Details of what he’d been wearing given out. Questions were asked as to whether he’d run away. Ru would never run away. Killian might have if he could have disappeared forever, though he’d hate to have left Ru. Ru would never run. Especially not with Bela missing.

Killian had to sit with a policeman and talk about his brother, tell them everything he could think of, what he liked to do—be with Bela, what he talked about--Bela. Did he have a special friend? Girl? Boy? Misha. The only one Ru ever talked about. How had Killian hurt his face? Rugby. They took his unwashed kit and he pictured that bloody T-shirt and cringed.

The police searched Ru’s room. The walls were plastered with drawings of Bela. Ru was a brilliant artist. They searched Killian’s room too, much to his irritation, but he said nothing. There was nothing for them to find except for the stories hidden at the back of his bookcase. They took the computer from the dining room even though his father had said there was no need. They looked in the shed, everywhere in the garden. There were policemen all over the house taking stuff away in bags. His father, who had always seemed to be so strong, was diminished, powerless except to wrap his arm around his wife. For a change, not in anger.

Later that night, Killian left a note in his room saying he’d gone to search for Ru, and snuck out of the house while his mother and father sat in the kitchen with a policewoman. He went to all the places in town he imagined Ru might have gone. He went to places he doubted Ru would have gone. But he didn’t go to the old mill where Ru had found Bela, because his father had forbidden either of them to go there. It wasn’t safe, the ruins unstable. Plus, it was too dark, even with a flashlight.

Killian showed a photo of his brother to everyone he saw. He almost willed cars to stop, men to try and pick him up thinking they might take him to his brother. When Killian limped home three hours later, his father burst out of the living room, and Killian saw the moment realisation sank in that he wasn’t Ru.

“Where the fuck have you been?” his father snapped.

“Looking for Ru.”

His father pulled him by the shoulder into the kitchen and shoved him down onto a chair. “Tell me everything again.”

So Killian did. Except not about threatening his teacher. Not about the bullying.

“Did you tell him to wait?” his father asked.

“I told you I did.”

“I know what you said.”

Killian swallowed hard. “After I put the games equipment away, I ran to his school to get him, then told him to wait because I needed to shower. He promised he would.”

“Or did you forget your little brother was out there in the rain while you fucked around in the showers with some boy and only when you came out did you remember you were supposed to come home together?”

“Why would I forget? We always come home together.”

“If anything’s happened to him, it will be your fault. Stay in your room. Keep out of my sight.”

His father slammed out.

It’s not my fault. It’s not.

Killian went to his room. He ached and tears threatened. Where are you, Ru? Please come home.

He put everything back the way it had been in his room. They hadn’t found his stories. He could tell they’d not been touched. If he’d had anywhere to keep them outside the house, he’d move them. But they were even less safe