I don't own Ashes to Ashes
---
Alex's head spun as she walked out into the abandoned hallway, feeling a chill wash over her as tears threatened to spill over, searching in vain for Gene's hulking figure, shivering and shaking as she stumbled down the corridor. She turned the corner, her eyes blurred slightly, lip trembling as she lifted her gaze to Gene's face. The scowl on his face faltered as she did so, transforming into a look of concern as she lifted her hand to cover her mouth, shaking her head as her eyes stung viciously, still stumbling towards him.
"Bols, what-?" Gene was cut off as Alex collapsed against his chest, shaking and quivering as one of Gene's arms wrapped around her waist, his lips in her hair whilst he moved to settle the steaming cup of coffee in his other hand onto the window ledge at his side, before tugging her tight into his arms, one hand stroking her hair as the other rubbed gentle patterns into her lower back. She continued to sob, eyes wide, tears streaming down her cheeks, and Gene could feel the anger bubbling away in his stomach, a small torrent of hatred that he couldn't quell.
"Did he hurt you?" He growled, pressing a hard kiss to her forehead, gripping her tighter. She let out a noise halfway between a laugh and a sob, but shook her head, pulling back just enough to look at him whilst she cupped his cheek, her thumb brushing across the slight dusting of stubble that covered his face. She attempted to calm herself, drawing in deep, shuddering breaths as she wet her lips with her tongue, still shaking her head as she did so.
"Do- do you love me, Gene?" She whispered, Ciaran's words echoing in her ears as Gene's silvery blue gaze fixed upon her for several moments, his large hand covering her cheek as he looked at her, fingers tangling in locks of hair, before he leaned forward to press a soft kiss to the flesh at the base of her ear.
"Yes, Alex," he murmured, tugging her gently closer once more, while his fingers traced tenderly down the column of her neck, his voice gravelly with emotion and certainty, "I love you."
He wasn't sure what he'd been expecting; a sigh of relief? A smile, maybe? A whispered 'I love you too'? Whatever it was, he knew for certain that for her to burst into renewed sobs hadn't been it. She clung onto him, arms around his neck as she continued to tremble.
"Bloody hell, Bols, if I knew you'd sob all over me like a tap I'd 'ave said no!" His voice was unnerved, and for a few moments he wasn't sure whether it was simply because she'd sobbed at his declaration, or because she'd had to ask him in the first place... Before he could question her, Alex had shaken her head, drawing back with her eyes red and puffy as she looked up at him.
"No... I'm sorry, Gene, I just-" she faltered, unsure of what to say, turning her face away from him as she bit down hard on her lip. "I'm sorry." She whispered again. Gene hesitated only briefly, before he gently twisted her head back to look at him, pressing his lips to the corner of her mouth.
"What happened, Alex?" He murmured, breath teasing over her cheek as he gently rubbed his nose against her skin.
Words failed her, and though she attempted many times to say something of consequence, it came out in a rambling mess, with Gene catching only three words from the whole thing – "he loved her."
----
Once Alex had calmed down enough to breathe normally, Gene sent her off to the toilets, telling her gently to put her face back on and go back upstairs to the Super's office. He pressed a soft kiss to her forehead, pushing her gently into the Ladies room before turning back down the corridor, jaw tight, still unsure exactly what Alex had learned, and momentarily scared that the little jerk had managed to get out of the station in their absence; he was surprised, when he got to the door, to realize that his worry had been unnecessary- Ciaran sat in the chair, still covered in blood, with no sign that he had even thought about escaping.
Gene met Ciaran's calm gaze as he closed the door, grinding his teeth slightly before he sat down heavily in the chair opposite, glowering darkly whilst he slammed one hand forcibly onto the record button of the tape machine.
"You're quite the little shit, ain't yer?" Gene growled softly as the recorder began to whir, leaning forward on the table and never once breaking eye contact. "'cause you might've fooled DI Drake with all that lovey-dovey mumbo-jumbo you spurted out, but you ain't foolin' me; you didn't love old McKellen's daughter any more than I love the image of a fat bloke prancing around a pole in zebra-print knickers, so you best get your story straight if you wanna walk out of here with both bollucks still intact!" His voice was low and menacing, but Ciaran barely even blinked.
"With respect, then, you must like that image quite a lot Sir..." There was no sarcasm, no snide undertones, and the cool, calm, sincere tone of the young man before him caught Gene off guard, "'cause I did love her, and I still do."
Gene narrowed his gaze slightly, fists clenching under the table. "I ain't in the mood for games, Merlot; I want a bloody honest answer, and none of your crap about being in love with a girl you openly slagged off yesterday afternoon- got it?"
Ciaran rolled his eyes. "You believe everything you hear, do you? I was bloody in love with her from day one, and-"
"You said you leant her a pencil once yesterday- only contact, right? So when'd you have the time, between fumbling in yer pencil case an' handin' the thingy over, to decide you wanted to settle down and 'ave kids with 'er, lumps an' all, while she's shaggin' some other bloke blind?"
He could tell Ciaran was getting worked up- his arms were tense, the veins in his neck standing on end as he turned his head away. "That was just the first time I spoke to her – it was first year of secondary, and I'd wanted to talk to her for ages... And she wasn't shagging him in first year, alright?"
"So you were eleven an' decided you were in love with some bird who touched yer pencil?" Gene's smirk was cool before he added in a soft growl, "I ain't buying it Merlot, so start talking!"
"I didn't know I was in love with her when I was eleven!" Ciaran retorted, his cool composure from the day before disappearing before Gene's very eyes. "We started talking – we ended up as friends for Christ's sake! I didn't even realize I loved her 'til she stopped talking to me! I always just thought I fancied 'er or something but it weren't like that! It was just-"
"I ain't a bloody nancy boy, and I ain't a bird who's gunna believe everything a bloke says if there's 'love' in the sentence; you don't love Rosa McKellen, and I ain't letting you out of 'ere until you tell me why bloody Jeremy McKellen was so much of a big thing that you told us you'd never met him!"
"It wasn't anything to do with bloody Jeremy!" Ciaran retorted, slamming his cuffed hands on the table as he turned angry eyes on Gene.
Gene raised an eyebrow. "Must've been something to do with 'im else you'd 'ave told us right out you knew he shagged yer sister and that yer drank with him..." He leant forwards, his voice low. "I ain't as thick as I look."
Ciaran shifted, gulping slightly, then looking away. "It wasn't Jeremy."
"Bollucks."
"It wasn't," he repeated softly, "it was Joe."
Gene's immediate reaction would have been to swear vehemently and kick the cocky little shit into co-operation; it would have been, but Alex's earlier words rang in his ears, his brain dredging up vague memories of tape-recordings from Joe Ellison's interview. "Told not to... asked not to... couldn'... shouldn'... not allowed... shouldn' tell..."
He stared at the young man for several moments, eyes still narrowed and accusatory, but he knew a spark of recognition had flickered in his gaze the moment he saw Ciaran's eyes close, in what Gene assumed to be shame.
"Ellison?" Gene asked eventually, voice tight.
Ciaran nodded, staring at his hands.
"What about him?"
There was a pause, a hesitant moment where Ciaran seemed to teeter on the edge of indecision, before shaking his head slowly. "Before I tell you, will you just-?" He gulped, and then murmured, "Will you just believe that I do love her, and that I'd never have done it if I didn't?" His gaze lifted, eyes desperate and pleading. Gene chewed on his lip briefly before answering.
"Still sounds to me like you're talking out of yer arse," he said, eyes narrow. "But for arguments sake, let's say I'm trying to believe you, alright?"
Ciaran nodded, opening his mouth to speak, but Gene interrupted before he could manage anything.
"Why'd you love her?" The question took Ciaran aback, and Gene saw the confusion in the younger man's eyes as he blinked, shaking his head in confusion.
"I- what d'you mean?"
"You love her," Gene said, arms crossed and gaze unfaltering. "Why?"
"How can you ask me that?"
Gene rolled his eyes. "What'd you love about her? Must've been summit other than the lumps an' the fella, so what was it?"
Ciaran stared, mouth slightly wide as though he couldn't believe what he was hearing. "What-? Everything- I don't know! I just did! She was just-"
"Good in the sack?" Gene suggested, eyebrow quirked. Ciaran shook his head, jaw tight.
"No, it wasn't like-"
"Nice arse?" He supplied, his eyes narrow. "Good tits? Let you cop a feel when nobody else was looking?"
"NO!" Ciaran's voice was nearly hysterical, tears brimming in his eyes as he glared angrily at Gene, desperation in the depths of his gaze. "It wasn't like that! It was like you and DI Drake, it was different! It was special! It was-"
Gene was leant across the table in moments, his hand grabbing Ciaran's shirt and lifting him slightly off his chair as he growled his retort. "Myself and DI Drake ain't got a tarts todger to do with this you lousy scum, so you better stick that tongue back behind yer teeth before you say something you'll regret!"
"You look at her the way I looked at Rosie!" Ciaran snapped, eyes flaring with hatred as he attempted to shrug from Gene's grasp; he failed, and fixed his glistening eyes on Gene's. "You look at her like she's heaven, like she could sprout another fucking head and it wouldn't matter because she's still your fucking perfect girl! You can't explain that away and put it down to bollucks about tits, and arses, and sex!" His face was red, his eyes wide and angry, his hands struggling against the cuffs on his wrist as he tried - and failed, once again - to tug Gene's arm away.
He fell still, his lip quivering slightly, voice falling to an anguished whisper that grated against Gene's ears. "She's everything to you for Christ's sake! You look at her like she's made of glass, like she's everything you've ever wanted, and you'd walk on hot coals just to make sure she didn't cut herself on a piece of paper!" Tears slid from his eyes as he shook his head, Adams apple rising and falling as he tried to collect himself, several minutes passing with Gene's hand clenched impatiently on the scruff of his shirt, refusing to let go, resisting with all his might the urge to slam the teenager into the wall...
When Ciaran spoke again, he did so with anger, with venom, with pain and hatred so raw that it echoed through the room and rang in Gene's mind endlessly. His fingers dug painfully into Gene's arm as he glared at him jaw clenched. "And you're fucking sitting there, telling me to describe that? Have you ever tried? You can't possibly explain that! It's just completely fucking illogical! The only thing you understand is that everything about her drives you crazy; her smell gets in your nostrils and it won't leave for days, and you'll sit there in the dark remembering the way she felt in your arms, and how she tasted of things you'd never even liked until they were all her! And suddenly your favourite smell isn't a fag, and it isn't vodka, or whiskey, or beer, or wine anymore- it's fucking vanilla shampoo, or bloody Chanel, or the stink of her washing powder on the top that makes her look so damn good that you can't believe she's yours! And you don't want to taste anything except that stupid lipstick she wears that smudges on your face and won't wash out of your collar for days! And however much you tell yourself differently, nobody else ever fits against you like that, nobody else clicks into place or wraps around you like a second skin!" He was sobbing, shaking where he stood, and Gene's grip slackened slightly as he stared at the younger man, eyes widening briefly with a dawning sense of kinship.
"They're just people," Ciaran said softly, blinking angrily against his tears, looking at Gene imploringly, desperately, searching for understanding..."They're just stupid, idiotic people who could never measure up to her, because she's all you can ever think of – even when you hate her, even when she's angry and you know she's with someone else! Even when you think it'd all be easier if you weren't with her, if you were with someone simple- someone who'd never have the power to fucking hurt you the way you know she could..." His voice dropped slightly, falling to a softer pitch that was barely above a sad whisper. "But it doesn't matter what she does - you're always craving her, thinking about her, completely wrapped up in your own thoughts, and fantasies, and dreams where it's just the two of you... And even when you're exhausted, when you're completely shattered and don't want anything more than to sleep, you'll always be out of bed in a second if she rings to tell you she needs you, always be round her house as quick as a shot just to let her cry on your shirt and beg you to tell her it's alright, because it's her!Anyone else, you'd just say you'll ring 'em in the morning, tell them to turn on the lights and get themselves a cuppa- but if it's her, nothing matters but making sure she's alright here and now, getting round there and pulling her into your arms just to know she's still in one piece..."
Gene's hand fell away, and he found himself sinking back into his chair, staring blindly at the young man in front of him, not really seeing him. His mind swam with images, memories, faint hints of scent and taste that had tortured his mind for weeks and weeks before he and Alex had even considered breaking down the barriers of their working relationship.
He recalled with frightening clarity the worry in his mind as Alex phoned him in tears from her old flat above Luigi's, the desperate need to see her as he raced across town just to see that she hadn't done something stupid, that she wasn't falling to pieces without him... He remembered the feel of her in his arms as they stood on the landing outside her flat, the smell of her hair, the warmth of her body pulled so tight against him, the relief he'd felt at the knowledge she was safe, followed by the horror in the pit of his stomach at the knowledge that she was so broken, the urgent need to reassure her, to protect her, to make it all go away so that she never had to feel that way again...
He remembered the horrible sense of dread at the thought of leaving her again, the blissful respite whenever she asked him to stay the night once more, and the putrid taste of disgust in his throat when he'd left her side for a few hours, losing himself in the stripper whose name he couldn't even remember, who'd paled in comparison to Alex, even before they'd admitted to their feelings, even before he knew what she was like to kiss, to taste, to love...
Jesus, had he loved her even then? He remembered thinking it once; wrapped in her arms, his lips pressed to her forehead as she washed away forty-years worth of grieving with her tender touch and reassuring words, he'd considered it... But he'd never believed it- he hadn't really believed in love at that point, at least not in that way, not in the mind-numbing, consuming manner that he did now, not in the way that devoured him every time he saw her, or thought about her... Had he really felt that way, even way back then?
He could still remember the overwhelming sense of solace he had felt the moment he'd returned to her from his brief excursion with the nameless stripper, could still recall the moment he had wrapped Alex in his arms, his clothes still stinking of cheap perfume, sex and fags... He could still feel his stomach unclenching as her perfect, smaller body pressed against his chest, remember burying his fingers in her hair, crushing her against him, inhaling her scent and imprinting it on his memory as though nothing else had ever existed but her...
Gene's head swam. The memory of their first kiss, so tentative, so awkward, followed by their perfect union the next morning, and the incredible upheaval he'd felt as she gave herself to him completely, without question or worry... And then the insane jealousy as he'd watched her flirt – even falsely – with another man, the sick sense of vexation that she'd realize she could do so much better, that she'd leave him and take up with someone younger, better looking, richer...
He blinked back to reality, suddenly cold as he looked at the boy before him; and he was just a boy, he realized. He was just a boy, who'd fallen in love with the wrong girl.
Ciaran was broken, and plainly so, now Gene took the time to look at him; he was slumped over, covered in his own blood and not even bothering to complain, taking everything on the chin because he felt like he had to. There were bags under his eyes, and his fingers were twitching in the same way that Gene's did when he desperately needed a cigarette or a drink, when he needed to forget everything but the burning alcohol searing down his throat, or the haze of nicotine infiltrating his bloodstream... He was exhausted, and he was lonely. He was still a bloody pretty boy, mind, but something was missing, something huge, something that made him whole...
"I told you," Ciaran murmured. "I loved her." His own, sapphire blue eyes met Gene's, and for a moment Gene could see every emotion he felt for Alex reflected back at him, burning vehemently in the depths of a gaze too young to really comprehend it. "She was everything to me – and every day I had to watch her suffer, see her break down and cry when she was in so much pain she couldn't move, stand by as some other bloke made her feel like complete and utter shit, had to watch as she just let it happen, because she thought I could 'do better'!" The distaste and revulsion turned Gene's stomach, but he couldn't break Ciaran's gaze, listening more intently than he would ever admit as the boy went on, pain splintering across his young, troubled face.
"Do you have any idea what that was like?" He asked, voice cracked and abrasive as he spoke. "Do you know how many nights I sat up wishing that, if she couldn't get better, I'd get ill, just for the chance that maybe then she'd let me hold her, instead of that bastard, who never seemed to want anything except to make her feel as shit as he did?" He laughed bitterly as he added, "do you know how many days I ended up in detention for smacking him in the gob? Everyone else thought I was just doing it for the kicks, the laughs, the fun of it – I don't get off on punching people though; not unless they earned it."
Gene looked at him, searching for something to say, wetting his throat before speaking, his mind struggling with the varying personalities he'd seen this boy put forward in the last two days. "You seemed pretty damn against her yesterday- weren't just 'er fella you were slaggin' off... So why all the bleeding sentiment today?"
"I'd been drinking yesterday." Ciaran said softly. "I lie better when I'm drunk."
"You didn't know we were comin'," Gene answered. "Why'd yer get pissed?"
"Didn't say it was deliberate," the teenager replied coolly, "I had a shit night, so I started drinking before I came in."
"No slurring, though?" Gene asked, quirking one eyebrow. "I ain't exactly a virgin drinker, sonny; I know a piss'ead when I see one."
"It wasn't like I'd downed five whiskeys, 10 pints and a vodka chaser," Ciaran snapped, "It was just one for confidence- makes me feel better. I ain't exactly dancing around in perpetual bliss right now, alright? It was just a drink, an' when you spoke to me I wasn't cuffed and panicking and-"
"What'd you 'ave?" Gene asked, settling back in his chair. Ciaran frowned.
"'ey?"
"Drink... what was it? Vodka? Whiskey? Gin? Rum? What?"
He sighed, rolling his eyes. "Double whiskey, no ice." In a mocking tone, he said, "I had it in a glass tumbler and I downed it in one," with a patronising lilt, he added, "anything else officer? Shall I tell you the brand an' all? I can, if you think it'll help?"
Gene glowered across at him, clenching his fists as he lowered his voice to a menacing growl. "You're a cocky son of a bitch, an' I'd watch it if I were you." There was a moment where he stayed silent, watching the boy before him as he sat there, not even bothering to retort. "You were in a drug-bust last year, right?" Gene asked, leaning back in his chair, his voice light, almost casual.
Ciaran nodded. "Yeah, I was."
"Coke, weren't it?"
Another nod.
"Got off though?"
Again, a small nod.
"But you were there?"
"Yes."
Gene waited a few moments, and then spoke. "D'you do alot of it?"
Ciaran shook his head, face ashamed. "No... It was just a one-off. The bloke said if I helped he'd give me some free..."
"So you were gonna use it?" Gene asked.
"I was," Ciaran admitted honestly. "But it didn't happen."
"Tickle yer fancy did it?" Gene murmured, eyebrow raised, "Thought it'd be fun, 'ey?"
"No," he answered, voice pained and bitter. "I got pissed 'cause I'd spent a day watching Rosie stick her tongue down that scrotty Bragden's throat, and he came up in the pub and suggested it – at the time, it sounded like a good idea. I ain't proud of it, and he got busted before I'd even managed to sober up... I'd only have regretted it in the morning anyway."
"So, in a nutshell," Gene said, eyebrows raised, "she's shaggin' Bragden, you ain't good enough for her, so, yer get pissed...? What 'appened next? Ran into 'em on the street? Lost control o' yer fists?"
"No," Ciaran sighed. "I thought I upset her once, so I went round to make sure she was ok, and she told me how shit she felt, how unhappy he made her, and we just- we hadn't spoken properly in a year... I stayed over, and she asked to see me again- I couldn't say no."
"Well, you could," Gene supplied sardonically, snorting in dry amusement before shaking his head.
"No, I couldn't," Ciaran answered, meeting his gaze. "I wanted to- really, I did. But it was Rosie... I missed her; I hadn't spent time with her for a year, and I just- I couldn't help it! She made me feel like I was important to her, for the first time since she'd got ill, she was paying me some attention, and not Bragden. She was just- she needed me, and it was everything I'd ever wanted! She wanted my help, she didn't push me away because I was 'too good'! I just couldn't stop it after that... I kept seeing her- told her I loved her, and that I'd do anything for her, and she said I was her Angel... said she loved me too..."
"And you believed her?" Gene asked, voice laced with amused disbelief.
Ciaran stared at him blankly. "Of course I believed her!"
Gene rolled his eyes, not unsympathetically, before speaking again. "So she loves yer... but she was still with Bragden, right?"
He nodded glumly. "She said it was better that people didn't know... said everybody was used to her and Bragden being together, and nobody would like her if she ran off with me..." He shifted uncomfortably. "She stopped seeing him as much, though..." A small smile tugged at Ciaran's lips, "she started seeing me more..."
"Ever tell anyone about yer?" Gene asked, reaching into his pocket and withdrawing cigarette and lighter, lighting up swiftly and ignoring the look of need in Ciaran's eyes as he watched, his fingers cracking on the desk as his eyes followed Gene's lit cigarette with longing, before he shook his head, meeting Gene's gaze.
"No," he said softly, sniffing slightly and cringing in pain. "She wanted me to be happy – didn't want people thinking badly of me."
Gene couldn't help the snort of derision that left his nostrils as he exhaled. "You're more bloody stupid than I thought if you believed that crap! You'd just set yer bollucks on a plate sayin' you'd do anything for 'er you stupid twonk- 'course she said she loved yer!"
"She wasn't like that!" Ciaran hissed, voice defensive and angry, eyes flashing. "You don't know what it was like! You didn't know her!"
"I know enough!" Gene growled. "I know she didn't dump 'er fella after you told her yer loved her. I know the night before she died, Rosa McKellen asked Bragden to do it for her. I know that in her diary, you never have a name other than 'Angel', and I know that she never mentioned anyone but Benji to her Mam... you still gunna tell me she loved you?"
"Yes," he said softly, gaze not faltering once. "Because I knew her... And I don't care what Bragden, or her Mum, or her diary said; 'cause when you're holding someone that close you just know- you can tell. And it doesn't matter what they call you, or who they tell, or what they ask you to do- not when it's real like that. Because you can't fake that sort of feeling, or that look in her eyes when she thinks you ain't looking; it's just there, and you know it!"
Gene said nothing, watching Ciaran for several moments before he shook his head, more at himself than to the boy before him; there wouldn't be any convincing him, Gene realized. And though he knew he should carry on with the interview, knew Alex would scold him later for not having followed it through to the end and finding out Joe Ellison's involvement, he couldn't bring himself to do so; he had no idea what Rosa McKellen felt about Ciaran – not really. He'd heard Shaz reciting extracts from her diary, reading sections about 'Angel' that were full of some sort of idolisation that Gene had never been able to pin down.
He had never taken it as real love, that was for sure, and though he could feel sorry for the boy before him, the bitter, cynical side that Gene had tried to bury in recent years was rearing its ugly head, and he couldn't bring himself to believe, no matter how much Ciaran insisted to the contrary, that Rosa McKellen had loved him as completely as the boy thought.
Part of him – the part, he realized, that echoed Ciaran's strikingly honest sentiments of love and obsession – felt he owed it to the apparently misled teenager to find out as best he could just what twisted mind games he'd been a victim of. The other part wanted to tear him limb from limb, knowing where this whole investigation was going, knowing deep down that there was no other explanation, no excuses... And yet his mind whirred back to another conversation, wrapped in Alex's arms before they'd even got together when she'd asked if he could kill her; he'd said no – of course he had. He was too selfish to let Alex go, he'd thought... but could he blame another man for giving the woman he loved whatever it took to make her happy? Even if it meant sacrificing his own life and happiness to do it?
Gene shivered, his head fighting unfamiliarly with his heart as he considered all the laws he'd ever tried to enforce, all the hatred he'd ever felt for anyone low enough to kill another human being... and then he thought about Alex; Alex, in pain, in tears, in despair and horror, begging for relief, for help, for something that he wasn't allowed to give her, but would cut off his own limbs to attain... He looked at Ciaran, whose gaze hadn't left him for a moment; he didn't know whether to hate him or admire him, and the indecision turned his stomach. The copper in him despised every hair on his head, wanted to tear him limb-from-limb and throw him into a cell with five horny poofters for being such a low form of scum... But then, the part of him that rang so true a reflection of the boy's all-consuming love, felt a striking well of sympathy that would have made the old Gene – the Gene that Sam had known – throw out a string of heartless insults and barbs. Something about Ciaran's desperate love was admirable, even if the bastard had broken the law to follow it through... With a jerk of the head, Gene met Ciaran's eyes once more... but it still didn't make sense, he realized.
"Thought you didn't believe in killin'? Ain't that what you said? Ten commandments and all that bollucks – good rules, yer said..."
"I didn't kill her," Ciaran said flatly. "Killing's violent, it's meaningless, and it's just... it's wrong... I didn't kill her."
"So her windin' up dead weren't anything to do with you?"
He shook his head. "It was to do with me, I just- I didn't kill her."
"Knife wounds, hacked flesh an' blood some sort of voodoo wedding ritual fer you then is it?"
Ciaran flinched, looking away. "It wasn't- I didn't kill her... I just helped her... it wasn't murder it was just-"
"I don't care what you bloody call it," Gene interrupted, fists clenched beneath the table, "did you end her life?"
Though his head was still turned away, a single tear could be seen to escape his eye as Ciaran nodded. "Yes."
Gene looked at him for several moments, watching his shoulders slump and his tears fall. For a moment, he simply sat there, his clenched fists falling slack in his lap before he stood up, half-heartedly jerking Ciaran from his seat before leading him from the room and towards the cells.
"Lock him up," he murmured to Viv, pushing Ciaran away, wanting nothing more than to leave, even as a large pair of hands grasped his wrist, the clinking of cuffs telling Gene all he needed before he had even had the time to look round. When he did, Ciaran's eyes were red and puffy, tears streaming down his blood-smeared face, a desperate look in the blue orbs that were so frighteningly reminiscent of Gene's own.
"Tell me I did the right thing," he said softly, ignoring Viv as he attempted to tug him away. Gene gulped, glancing awkwardly at the floor before meeting Ciaran's eyes again, saying nothing. "Please," Ciaran whispered, voice pleading and cracked, "tell me you'd have done the same... Tell me it wasn't for nothing?"
Gene averted his eyes. "The law's the law," he murmured quietly, feeling his throat tighten as Ciaran let out a choked sob. "Don't matter what I would or wouldn't 'ave done..." Unwittingly, he met Ciaran's gaze one final time, knowing that his indecision was evident in his eyes. "I'm just a copper, son- I can't help yer... You want help then you'd better tell it to the judge."
---
More to come soon with a bit of luck, however, once November 1st comes around, I'll be taking part in the NaNoWriMo challenge 2009, so unless I finish it early, the next TAoL update shall be 1- this week, or 2- December some time.
Thanks for your continued support with this story – I hope you're still enjoying it.
Another huge thank you to Feline for beta-ing :-)
Mage of the Heart