A Vision of Green (Florence Vaine #2) (30 page)

“
Do you r-really believe that?”

“
Yes,” he answers, his voice low. He's just finished with his sandwich, he scrunches up the wrapper and throws it at the bin that's a good ten feet across the grass from where we're sitting. It goes right in.

“
You've got a good aim,” I say quietly.

“
I always know what I'm aiming for,” he says, some unspoken meaning in his words that I don't want to think about.

“
I wish I was like that. I tend to walk around with my eyes closed, just so that I don't have to see what I'm going to crash into next,” I mumble.

“
If you opened your eyes, you wouldn't crash into it, silly,” Frank teases.

“
Nope. Even with my eyes open it'd still hit me. I've got a magnet on me that attracts disaster.”

Frank feigns insult. “I'm attracted to you. Does that mean I'm a disaster?”

I look down, tracing my eyes over the edges of my shoes, my hair covering most of my face. “Why do you have to say stuff like that to me?” I whisper.

“
Because it's true, and also because you're my girl.”

I pull a blade of grass out of the ground and begin tying it into knots. “You shouldn't still w-w-want me to be, after I lied to you.” I'm still lying to him. Well, more of a lie of omission. I'm simply allowing my top to cover the bruises I don't want him to see.

Frank ignores my comment about lying, pulls the grass out of my hand and holds it up to me. “What's this about?” he asks, looking at the little bundle of knots. “Some kind of outlet for...frustration?”

I fervently shake my head, but smile nonetheless. He always makes me smile. He's so good, I don't deserve to have him, even as a friend. “N-no I'm not frustrated. Not in the way you think anyway,” I nudge him with my elbow.

“
Too bad I am,” he says under his breath, but clearly he wanted me to hear. I just keep staring at him, my mouth hanging open a little. He keeps coming out with stuff that makes me feel awkward, but a nice kind of awkward.

I fiddle with my thumbs, just for something to do since he embarrassed me about the grass knots. He puts his hand on mine, preventing further movement. He pulls me over closer to him, lifts my hips and places me sitting sideways on his lap. He puts his arms around my waist then and leans his head on my shoulder. “What am I going to do with you Flo, huh?” he asks.

“
Do you have to do anything?” I ask back.

“
I don't
have
to no, more like want to, need to..” he trails off and presses his lips to my neck before pulling them quickly away. “I want you to be mine Flo.”

I hold back a gasp and will my face not to go red. I turn a little to face him and for once, nothing but the truth comes out of my mouth. “I think I always have been,” I say, my voice barely audible. At this his arms tighten around me and he grips my chin, pulling my lips down to meet his. He kisses me hard, but when his hold becomes too tight it hurts because of my bruises. Without thinking, I let out a pained groan and shift back from him, holding onto my ribs where it hurts me most.

“
Are you okay? Did I do something?” he asks with worry, eyes tracing every inch of me to discover the source of my pain.

Grinding my teeth I bite it back and plaster a smile on my face. “Of course not, you just surprised me that's all.”

Frank's expression turns suspicious. “That didn't sound like surprise, it sounded like I hurt you. Let me check.” He reaches out for me and I practically dive halfway across the park.

“
What's going on Flo? Why won't you let me touch you?”

I'm standing beside the tree we'd been sitting close to, leaning back into it, letting the rough bark hurt my shoulders. Frank stands and comes to loom over me, all the while looking right into my eyes. He puts a hand to the left side of my ribs and I flinch.

“
I touched you here,” he says in a dark voice. “Are you sore here?”

I shake my head and bite my lip until it bleeds. The salty copper taste touches on my tongue. Frank doesn't breathe a word, but his actions terrify me. This is it. There's no hiding it now, he's going to see me, all of me, really see who I am and what I come from. His hand reaches to the hem of my top and he ducks his head as he pulls it up to have a look. Tears begin to fall down my face.

“
Fuck,” he whispers, the word holds shock, violence, vengeance. A flame blazes beneath my wet eyes as though doused in petrol. It grows bigger, higher. Frank's aura. I close my eyes for a minute, unable to take the intensity of his reaction to seeing my injuries.

When our eyes meet again, his seem a little shiny. He blinks, like he's trying to hold back tears. His jaw is tight, he swallows and the muscles in his throat go tense.

He draws my top back down and cups both hands around my face. “Why didn't you tell me?” he asks with some kind of desperation. I look right at his eyes, not at his body or anything else, because I know that his demon is convulsing. I can sense the thing as it struggles in its cage and tries to break free.

“
I don't know...” my words drift off as my throat catches on a sob. I close my eyes.

“
Don't do that, look at me Flo, listen to me.”

I open my eyes and wait for what he has to say next.

“
This is never happening again. Never,” he vows, his words strong and steady. He handles me like I'm a piece of precious china, folding me into his arms and hugging me gently. He pulls back, laces his fingers with mine and leads me away from the park.

Frank opens the door to John's truck and sits me in the passenger seat, with my legs hanging out over the edge. He kisses me on the forehead and tells me he'll be back in a minute. I twist around to watch him walk away, over to the building site. In the distance I see him approach John and begin talking to him. A moment later they both start walking back toward the truck. The next thing I know, John is kneeling down in front of me and taking my hand into his own. His skin is warm and rough, workman's hands.

I stare intently at his big fingers as he asks, “Flo, listen to me sugar. You're coming to stay in my house for a while. Frank's going to bring you home and help you pack now. But first, you need to tell me where I can find your father.”

I look up then, my eyes wide with fear. “I don't know where he is, he's staying with a friend. And you don't need to let me stay, I'm fine where I am.”

His gaze is sympathetic and caring, and his brown eyes make me want to cry again. I must look a complete mess. I don't deserve people like John and Frank in my life, their entire family is just so good. I don't think I'm a bad person, not really, but if I come from someone like Dad then I must have some of him in me, some of his poison.

John grips tighter onto my hand. “There's no room for negotiation here Flo. Now, do you really not know where he is, or were you just saying that?”

“
I d-d-don't know. Really. Dad can be very hard to find when he wants to be.”

John seems to accept my answer when he gives me one last look of reassurance, before dropping my hand and turning around to Frank.

“
Here's the keys to the truck, when you get home tell Alex he needs to drive into town and collect me at six.”

“
Will do,” Frank replies, grabbing the keys from his foster dad and jumping in the driver's seat.

Our journey to the house is mostly quiet, and I resign myself to letting Frank take care of me. It's nice to have someone protect you sometimes, even if it is from your own stupidity. I know I should have never tried to live with Dad when he came back with Sal. I should have packed my things that very night and took John and Hayley up on their offer of a room.

I guess all of our decisions teach us lessons about life. This one is telling me that I need to listen to the advice of others instead of doing what my irrational mind tells me to. I've also learned that a leopard never changes its spots. My dad might have some messed up reason for living the life he lives, but there's nothing I can do to make him better.

As though sensing my thoughts, Frank reaches over with his free hand and gives my fingers a squeeze. He leads me into the house once we get there and helps me pack up my things. There aren't too many. It all fits into one big camping backpack. He carries it down the stairs for me and opens the front door. I stop when I get to the truck and look back at the house. I say one last goodbye. I'm not sure if I'll stay living at Frank's long term, but one thing I do know is that I'm never living with Dad again. I might be just shy of my eighteenth birthday, but in my mind I'm an adult now. No matter what, I'll find some way to survive. Some way to be free.

Frank takes the rest of the day off work and sets me up in the spare bedroom at the farmhouse. We sit on the bed for a long time, just talking things over. Not once does he confront me about trying to keep my bruises a secret from him. We slip off our shoes and lie back against the pillows, with my head resting on his chest and him playing with my hair.

“
Can I tell you a story?” he asks, just as I'm about to doze off.

“
Sure,” I reply, rubbing my eyes and turning to face him. “What kind of a story?”

“
A story about me, from when I was in my early teens.”

I'm always eager to know more about Frank's past, so I gesture for him to go on.

His face is serious as he begins, “One of the times when I ran away from the kids' home I got in with a bad crowd. It was a bit like a gang. They used to take in young boys like me, boys who had no family, because they could mould us, shape us to fit their purpose. I'd been squatting in an abandoned building for a couple of weeks when another boy introduced me to the leader of the gang, a man named Markus. He was a dickhead, but I was impressionable and thought he was so cool. He had all these great cars and money, big houses, clothes I could never even dream of affording.”

“
Oh so he was like one of those gangster types who listen to rap music, with the tracksuits and tacky jewellery?” I ask with a smile, not being able to picture Frank looking up to someone like that.

“
No actually, maybe I didn't describe him properly. He dressed in fancy designer suits, sort of like a business man. He wasn't the kind of person you'd expect to see walking into a squalid building to talk to young homeless boys. Certainly not what you'd picture if you were to try to visualise a gang leader.”

I give him a funny look. “Oh God Frank, he w-wasn't a paedophile was he?”

Frank's face turns horrified. “No, Jesus, thankfully not, although he was just as bad, but let me tell my story will you?” He gives me a soft pinch on the hip.

I giggle. “Fine continue.”

“
He told me I could come and work for him if I wanted to. That he'd give me a place to stay and wages every week to live on. I jumped at the chance, not even considering what sort of work he'd have me doing. Before I knew it I was pick pocketing on the city streets, stealing cars, burgling houses. I became an expert at all of those things and Markus treated me like I was his golden boy. I thought the fucking sun shined out of his arse. Then one day I messed up. I hot-wired a car without realising that the police had been watching me, I led them right back to Markus' headquarters.”

“
Oh no,” I whisper, completely engrossed in Frank's story. He's lived such a dangerous but colourful life.

“
Oh no is right,” he tells me. “Markus almost got sent down because of that, but he had some dodgy lawyer who managed to get him off. When he came back from the police station he beat me up pretty bad, broke my nose and my right arm, left me looking like something out of a horror movie.”

My eyes instantly fill with tears, picturing a young Frank like that, hurt and wounded. “What happened then?” I ask.

There's a ghost of a smile on his lips. “You'd think I would have gotten the hell out of there, right? Well I didn't. I was so taken with Markus and the way of life he'd given me that I just couldn't picture myself leaving. I needed to earn his approval again, be his golden boy. I was a stupid kid. But it was never the same again after that, I was the one he blamed whenever something went wrong, even if it wasn't anything to do with me. I was beaten black and blue day in day out. He kicked me down but I just kept on crawling back.