Hello! A little more for you here. I hope everyone is enjoying it. This is the last chapter in Alex's POV, next chapter it's in Alice's the main character really of this story.
Enjoy!
I've forgotten to say this in the others chapters but I do not own Ashes to Ashes, all the characters except Alice and the manager and his son belong to the BBC.
I stop when I reach the stairwell, for a moment Sam had managed to make my depressing thoughts disappear and I had responded by flirting back. Gene was right; I really am a tart.
Sam smiles at me, clearly wondering why I am frozen at the top of the staircase. I shake myself a little and go down, and into the pub. It is practically deserted; there are one or two men slumped at the tables, fast asleep and that is it. Apart from, of course, the people I have come to see.
"Hello Alex." The older man smiles kindly at me, standing up and offering me his hand. I place my hand in his and he lifts it to his mouth, kissing it lightly. Normally this would freak me out a little but with this man it seems so natural I barely think to question it. The younger man stands as quickly as the elder, but he pulls out my chair and quickly goes to get me a drink. He comes back with a glass of red wine.
"I hope it's not too presumptuous of me Alex? This is what you normally drink I know." He smiles widely at me and then as he hands my drink to me our fingers brush and I am almost knocked out by the feeling that swamps me. A feeling of kindness, happiness and warmth, a feeling of friendship, belonging and love.
"Please do sit down DI Drake." The older man commands me softly. The please does not hide it, this man is a leader. His presence is just as powerful as the younger man's but his is more of power, a leader but completely trustworthy.
Who are these people? I wonder; the way they make me feel is indescribable.
"If it doesn't sound too rude, which I hope it doesn't, who are you?"
"I am the manager of the pub, and this is my son."
"Hello Alex." The young man laughs. It is a sound of such joy that I am once again dumfounded by this strange pair.
"DI Tyler, could you leave us for a few moments?"
"Of course sir. I'll be talking to Nelson if you need me."
"So, DI Drake. You are unhappy here." He really doesn't beat about the bush this guy, does he?
My wine glass is over full. I sip the top without picking it up, like a child with a hot chocolate. "Yes. I am unhappy. I know I should be but I'm missing the people that made me happy."
"Gene and Molly."
"Yes."
"If you had to choose one of them to go back to. Who would you choose?"
I stare at him in horror. He can't seriously be asking me this?
The younger man elbows him. "Dad!" He whispers, mortified. He sounds so much like Molly when I've embarrassed her that I smile faintly.
"I need to know. I'm sorry DI Drake but you need to answer me." He continues smoothly.
"Just try and analyse it like you would a case Alex, detach yourself from it." The younger man speaks soothingly to me.
"Detach myself from it?" I ask squeaking a little in my horror.
"Yes." He says, still soothing and his voice calms me a little.
"I love Molly. She needs me. I'm her mother. I'm supposed to look after her, she can be looked after by Evan well enough, I know that but she needs a mother. Girls need their mothers. Gene doesn't need me, not really. He'll have other DIs, he's stronger than Molls and me. I'd go to Molly." My voice is monotonous but tears leak down my cheeks, my heart breaking.
The younger man reaches across and grabs my hand. The older man passes me a handkerchief. His eyes portray a glimpse of his sorrow and I realise I would need to be much older, and have gone through so much more pain to even begin to be able to understand his pain. "I'm so sorry Alex but I need to know." I accept his offering, believing every word that he says.
"If we could offer you a chance to go back to Molly, would you take it?"
"Of course." I sniff a little, wiping my face with the handkerchief he handed me, staining it black with my mascara.
"If someone had to be sacrificed, if someone had to die for it?"
"Who would die?" I ask, my voice shaking.
"Say a friend of hers, her best friend. A child of 15 years."
"No. Never. I love Molly but I am not killing a child to go back to her." I say, almost venomously. Who does this man think I am? "And I wouldn't kill an adult either. I couldn't live with myself!"
"Thank you DI Drake."
He gives me a moment to compose myself. I sip my wine until my breathing has steadied and then I ask "Why did you need to know?"
"Your friend DI Tyler decided that he was sick of you and his once while DCI sitting there defeated, alone and unhappy. He decided you deserved another chance. Along with his friends he has arranged a chance for you to go back to DCI Hunt."
I can't think. I can't speak. I can't even breathe. When I finally manage to get some words out they are not the ones I wanted.
"What about Molly?"
"You could never go back to her DI Drake, I'm sorry but that doorway is closed. I promise you though Molly will be safe and looked after."
"Then yes. Yes I would go back." The words fall from my mouth but I feel unreal, floating inside. I'm going back to Gene.
The older man stood up, and went towards the bar and Sam. The younger man stared at me.
"Strange thing isn't it? Love I mean. Even when they hurt you, and when you argue and they wind you up. Even when you ought to hate them, you want nothing bad to happen to them. You want nothing more than for them to smile at you, for them to be safe."
"Yes. It is strange." I reply, giving up on excuses. This man seems to know me the way Evan does, better. I know I have barely known him five minutes and it is not so much in the way he has spoken to me but the way I feel around him, relaxed, and the way we interact so lightly. There's a saying or something that exactly describes how I'm feeling but I can't remember it for the life of me so I let it slide.
Sam and the older man come back. "So DI Drake, would you like to know how exactly we plan to return you to your DCI Hunt?" I notice the possessive pronoun in front of DCI Hunt. Gene would hate that, belonging to me. I smile inwardly and nod. "If DI Tyler would care to explain?" He pulls up another chair for Sam who immediately drops down onto it and smiles at me like an excited ten year old.
"Well, basically we need someone to go into that world that doesn't belong there, because you've moved on and if there's someone there who doesn't belong it means they can leave but they leave space for you. You can't go straight back because well, I don't really understand but there isn't room for you really because you've already been there and come in here."
"Who would go?" I ask, trying to tie down the excitement building inside me.
"A child." The younger man says calmly.
What the hell?
"Your daughter's best friend; Alice Moorland." The older man finishes his son's sentence.
I stand up and my chair falls backwards. I let out a long list of expletives. Gene would be proud of me. The completely irrelevant thought flickers through my head. I blink back the tears. I can never be with him.
"How could you think I would let a child into that hard, screwed-up world? Just to save me?"
"And Gene." The younger man reminds me. Sam is silent, his face looks ashamed.
"YOU KNOW NOTHING ABOUT HIM! HE WOULD NEVER LET AN INNOCENT CHILD GO THERE JUST TO SAVE US!"
Us. Us. Gene and me. Us. Together.
"HOW COULD YOU EVER THINK HE WOULD ALLOW THIS? YOU KNEW HIM FOR SEVEN YEARS! SEVEN YEARS!" I yell, my fury undisguised at poor Sam.
I slap him furiously across the face and tears begin to stream down my own. Sam grabs my hands and pulls me into his arms, my shaking frame relaxing into him. When they have calmed me down sufficiently for me hold a glass without dropping it Sam pours me another glass of wine.
"Alex?"
I freeze as the older man says my name. He has always referred to Sam and me by our titles; DI Drake and DI Tyler. Gene only ever used my name in serious situations. I have a feeling this man is the same.
"What if to bring her to DCI Hunt's world was the only way to save her?"