The Rose Petal Beach Read Online Free Page B

Challey.
    ‘Ah, yes, Mr Challey. Brought in a couple of hours ago,’ he says without looking at his computer or the book I’d imagined they had for writing down who they’d carted off in front of their family. ‘Yes, he’s here.’
    I didn’t ask that, I asked if I could see him,
I think. ‘Can I see him?’
    His expression becomes the equivalent of someone taking your hand before they impart bad news as he shakes his head slightly as he says, ‘I’m sorry, Madam, that won’t be possible, he’s still being questioned.’
    ‘What’s he being questioned for?’ I ask. ‘And how much longer will it take?’
    ‘I’m afraid I can’t tell you either of those things,’ he replies.
    ‘Can’t or won’t?’ I reply, in frustration.
    ‘I’m sorry, Madam.’
    I curl my hands into my palms again, to stop myself shaking and to stop myself wailing. I want to throw my head back and let out a huge, primal scream that empties my body and soul of all the emotions racing around them. I don’t understand why this is happening, why my life is unravelling, and I don’t understand why this man won’t help me.
    ‘Can I at least see the detective who arrested him?’ I ask.
    ‘I’d imagine she is questioning your husband right now.’
    ‘Please? I only want to talk to her. If I can’t talk to him thenshe’ll have to do. I just want to know from someone who’s seen him that he’s OK. If she tells me he’s all right, I can go and take care of my children and wait for him to come home. Please? Please?’ I don’t like to beg, but sometimes, that’s all you can do. Sometimes, the ends justify the means.
    The Kindly Policeman’s kindly eyes study me for a few long moments. He can see the panic, fear and confusion on my face. Part of me still thinks this is not happening, that I am not standing in a police station asking a kindly policeman to let me speak to the detective that arrested my husband. I do not live the sort of life where my husband is arrested, so that’s why I am still struggling to believe this is happening.
    ‘I’ll see what I can do,’ the Kindly Policeman says, ‘please take a seat.’ He nods towards the bank of seats near the door. I need to keep upright – I’ll seem weaker, less effective if I sit down. He nods again towards the seats and I know I have to do as he asks or he won’t try very hard at all to see what he can do. Not so kindly after all, then.
    I go to the seats, settle myself between a man so thin and ravaged – probably by drugs and drink – I’m not sure how he walks without snapping, and a white-bearded man who is wide in girth because he is wearing everything he owns. Every item the white-bearded man wears is encrusted with black dirt, as are his hands, fingerless gloves and shabby, holey shoes. He’s giving off a smell combination of stale urine, sweat, dirt and beer that hits the back of my throat and then trickles down, turning my stomach every time I breathe in.
    The policeman actually waits for me to sit before raising the handset of the phone beside him. He stares at me as he pushes three buttons, then continues to stare at me until the phone is answered. Then, he twists, while he talks quietly into the phone, presumably so I can’t read his lips and find out what he’s saying.
    I feel sick.
    Properly sick, not just a bit nauseous, I am seconds away fromthrowing up. It’s not only because of the man sitting next to me, it’s the slow, creeping dawn of reality: Scott has been arrested and the children have been traumatised by seeing that. I want to call Mirabelle and find out if the girls are OK, but I daren’t in case they wake up and I’m forced to go home before I can get some idea of what exactly is happening.
    My eyes lock with the Kindly Policeman’s and his register pity. Pure, unadulterated pity. ‘
I’ve seen this a million times before,
’ his expression is saying. ‘
Some poor deluded wife who has no idea what her husband is like, coming here,