The Mysteries of Brambly Hollow

clinch with Bill Barber, although what a close shave.
    “Cal?” She stumbled forward into a pair of grasping arms and collapsed against her husband, grimacing as he crushed her wrist in the process, but right at that moment, she didn’t care; the pain was wonderful evidence that she was still alive, that her ordeal was over. Her face and neck were assaulted with frenzied kisses, until her skin burned under the wonderful bombardment.
    “Oh, Meli,” he eventually breathed against her cheek. “Are you okay?” Meli could only nod as she was gently led outside. Squinting against the blinding day light, she accepted a cup when someone pushed it into her hand. Lifting it she gulped at the contents. The cool, sweet water, at that moment, tasted better than best Bollinger.
    “Take it slow.” A female voice advised her.
    Meli could smell smoke now, and twisting her neck, she saw a tall spiralling pillar of smoky grey pouring skywards; not from the lean-to, but from a bonfire Finn must have built a short distance away. The compound was brimming with people, including several in police uniforms. She caught Bill’s eyes. He was flanked by two policemen, who were deep in conversation with him. Their glances met, and their traumatic ordeal flashed across the distance between them, binding them for ever more she suspected. She watched him turn away and begin to speak urgently to one of the officers. He looked frantic. He was probably worried about Finn.
    “What’s going on with Bill?” She asked Cal. There was something odd about the scene, although she couldn’t quite place what.
    Cal followed her gaze, and his eyes hardened to cold steel when they lighted on Bill.
    “What is it?” She asked again, alarmed by his homicidal look.
    “He has got a lot to answer for,” Cal growled. His fingers were buried so deeply into the thin flesh of her shoulder that she thought he was about to dislocate it. “I read your notes, this morning, before anyone realised that Bill had vanished as well.” His gaze settled back on his wife, instantly mushy as anguish devoured the anger, and she watched him struggle to swallow the vast lump that had attached itself to his adams apple. “The police were very interested in them too.”
    “But Bill was a prisoner as well,” she told him, as she tried to recall exactly what she had written. Things like ‘I think Bill’s out to get me’ and ‘he murdered Elsa’ made her cheeks burn. “He and Elsa had a secret son, another child Elsa called Finn. It was Finn who kept us both captive, befriended the twins. And Elsa’s death, well, it appears to have been an accident.”
    Cal’s grip eased slightly. “But in your notes...” His features warped with confusion, which Meli had to admit, he was more than entitled to feel in the circumstances.
    Meli gave a miniscule shrug. “I was wrong. Bill explained it all to me, while we were imprisoned. He’s had a raw deal over the years, he’s really not such a bad guy.” Boy, did that hurt to say! But you didn’t share an experience like that with somebody, and walk away unscathed.
    “But when he couldn’t be found this morning, I thought it was because he’d done something awful.” The blue of his eyes misted over, and staring through them, Meli could see his inner pain as clearly as if his heart had been torn from his chest and was lying bleeding in the palm of her hand. “I thought he might have, well you know,” he struggled with the words, and she felt his whole body physically tremble against hers. “You know, killed you.”
    Meli’s knees turned to jelly, and it had nothing to do with exhaustion from her ordeal. He had actually been afraid that he would never see her again. If she’d ever doubted his love for her, this poignant moment proved her wrong beyond question. “Oh Cal, I’m so very sorry,” she said, burying her face against his chest.
    “You’ve got nothing to be sorry about,” he reassured her instantly, tenderly resting his cheek on her head. “I’m just so relieved that you’re safe.” These breathy words were whispered into her hair.
    They remained fastened together, Meli savouring the feel of his strong regular heart beat through his shirt, the gentle flutter of his breath on her skin. After a moment, Meli reluctantly extricated herself from his embrace. “I’d better go and straighten out the misunderstanding,” she told him, “before they clap Bill in irons and chuck him in the dungeons.”