Read Online Please Don't Leave Me Here by Tania Chandler - Free Book Online

trips, tai chi, bloody aromatherapy.’
    â€˜Aromatherapy is good.’
    He scoffs.
    â€˜Might go make a cuppa. Want one?’ Brigitte says.
    â€˜Nah, just had one thanks, love.’
    At the kitchenette she slams down a cup and drums her fingertips on the sink while she waits for the kettle to boil. Wait till she sees Aidan!
    She drinks her cup of tea quickly back in Papa’s room.
    â€˜Anyway.’ He yawns. ‘Did ya see those fat people, Brigi, on — what do ya call it — Big Loser? ’
    â€˜No.’
    â€˜Can’t understand how people can get that fat.’ He sucks his teeth, sounding like the suction device at the dentist. Brigitte grinds hers.
    â€˜OK, Papa, It’s time for me to go.’ She picks up her bag and stands.
    â€˜So soon?’
    ***
    Brigitte sits on the love seat watching, from behind dark sunglasses, Finn and Phoebe playing on the newly mown grass.
    She starts at the scrape of the bungalow door opening, and her eyes are drawn to his bare feet, faded jeans, and white T-shirt with Captain America emblazoned across the front in blue lettering. It’s warm in the sun, but she shivers. A black tattoo peeks from under his left sleeve: some sort of foreign script, maybe Gaelic.
    â€˜Hi.’ He smiles his crooked smile, squints, and shades his eyes with his hand. So fucking smug. He goes back inside for a minute and comes back with a pair of sunglasses.
    â€˜What are you doing here?’ she says without looking at him.
    â€˜I live here, remember?’
    â€˜Why aren’t you at work?’
    â€˜On night shift.’
    â€˜Sam’ll be home soon.’ She glances at the back door.
    He walks over and sits next to her — too close. The love seat creaks as he stretches out his long legs. So it is true, what they say about big feet.
    â€˜Nice day,’ he says.
    â€˜What happened to the grass?’
    â€˜Mowed it.’
    â€˜Nobody asked you to.’
    â€˜Don’t mind.’
    â€˜Why the hell were you talking to my grandfather?’ She feels the blood rush to her face.
    â€˜Funny coincidence, huh?’ He laughs. ‘Eddie’s a nice bloke.’
    â€˜Just answer the question.’
    â€˜His old house was in the vicinity of an unsolved murder. Might have remembered hearing something.’
    â€˜His memory’s not so good.’
    â€˜Oh, he remembered.’ He turns his body and looks at her. His knee brushes hers. ‘It was the same time your grandmother had her heart attack.’
    â€˜I lived there, too. Why haven’t you questioned me?’
    â€˜What would be the point of that? I know you don’t remember.’
    Good point. ‘So this has nothing to do with me?’
    â€˜Not everything’s about you.’
    She doesn’t want to talk to him anymore, and wishes he would just go away — crawl into a hole somewhere and never come back. And that his leg touching hers wasn’t causing such a warm, prickly sensation. She should move over, but doesn’t.
    â€˜Are the scars from the car accident?’
    She pulls a section of hair across the one on her forehead and doesn’t answer.
    â€˜And your knee?’
    She stares straight ahead and crosses her legs, ignoring a primal urge to part them.
    â€˜What’s wrong?’ he says.
    She pushes her sunglasses higher up on her nose.
    â€˜Thought you liked me.’
    â€˜Not much of a detective. No wonder you’re on the cold cases.’
    He clears his throat. ‘You wanted it as much as I did.’
    â€˜Wrong again.’
    â€˜Why did you tell me you were separated from your husband?’
    â€˜I did not say that.’ She sits up straight and glowers.
    â€˜Yes you did, at Manny’s party.’
    She chews a fingernail.
    â€˜That’s what you wanted me to think.’
    â€˜I was drunk, OK. And upset — if you really have to know.’ The skin around her fingernail starts to bleed;