Chapter 22

"Hi Birdie" I greeted.

"George, hey" was her reply.

There was silence for the next few seconds and I had to check my phone to see if we were disconnected; we weren't.

"Robin? You there?"

"Yes, yes. I was uh, I was calling to tell you I am coming over, so we can talk about your grandfather, face to face" she said and I grimaced.

"I'm not home right now"

"It's…11:43pm, where in the world would you be?"

"Long story, I will be home in two hours"

There was silence then she asked-

"What are you doing George?"

"Nothing harmful. Just took a drive to sightsee, I couldn't sleep" I lied through my teeth.

"I am in front of your house and your car is here"

I sat up in alarm.

"In front of- I took an Uber"

"George-" she began.

"I'm not lying Birdie; I swear"

She sighed.

"Ok. Come back quick, yeah?"

"Ok"

I didn't wonder why she decided to have this conversation by this time of the night because I knew she needed to gather her thoughts and perhaps it took her the whole day to do so.

***

The delivery went without a hitch, thankfully but I couldn't find a means of transportation until 5am when the first bus arrived. I regretted not telling the Uber driver to wait for me so he could take me back, but the last thing I wanted was an innocent person getting hurt for seeing or hearing something he shouldn't have due to my negligence.

I managed to get on the first bus and according to the map on my phone, I'd have to enter another bus at a certain station much to my chagrin but I couldn't do anything about that.

By the time I got to my house, it was nearly 7am. Slowly turning the handle of the front door so I don't alert anyone inside the house about my arrival but what I saw in my living room had me screeching to a halt.

My mother was sitting on the reclining chair, an empty ice-cream tub perched limply on her laps and her neck at an uncomfortable angle, but seeing my best friend curled on the couch had me cursing under my breath. I had totally forgotten that I promised to be home in two hours.

My dogs were also asleep in the living room and unfortunately for me, Corporal slowly woke up, when we locked eyes she let out an excited bark. I tried to no avail to shut the Husky up but that didn't work out for me and to make matters worse, my German Shepard joined in.

"George?"

"Honey?"

Robin and my mother called out simultaneously.

I ground my teeth in my mouth in frustration and my dogs ran in excited circles around me.

"George, what the hell? You said two hours"

"Yeah… the driver, the Uber driver left and the first bus arrived this morning" I stammered.

"George!" She suddenly yelled with a glare startling all of us, "you aren't making any sense so can you please tell me what the fuck is going on?"

"Honey" came my mother's timid voice and I turned to her with my own glare making her shrink back a little. "W-Why don't you two prepare for school and, uh, pick this up later in the day?"

I turned back to Robin who now had tears in her eyes. Seeing it made me feel like an arsehole. It's not like the situation was entirely my fault but I wasn't completely faultless.

I followed her upstairs and stood as she silently undressed. I could see the anger in her motions but I had no idea which words I should string together that would be considered right in this situation.

While I was busy feeling guilty and sorry for myself, I heard a knock on my door. When I opened it, I saw the one person I really wasn't in the mood to tolerate; Liz.

"Did you lose your way?" I rudely asked but she ignored my question and walked into my room. She looked around then went to my table and wrote something down on the last page of a notebook. If I found that shocking, there is no accurate word to describe the emotion the sentence that came out of her mouth evoked.

"Martin said you can only call her if it is an emergency. Emphasis on emergency."

I'm pretty sure my eyes were the size of baseballs.

"Who the fuck are you?" I had to ask. That seemed like a legitimate question to ask at this point right?

"Liz. And to answer the unasked questions; yes, I work for Egypt Martin and the reason I was planted in your house is to protect you. She kinda sent me here to keep you safe from Isabella."

I didn't know what to think. That thug had one of her lackeys sent to my house before we met? Was our meeting beyond a mere coincidence?

"Jemima-" I began.

"Doesn't know. Truth be told I'm impersonating her dead daughter she just doesn't know that"

My knees nearly gave out. This Liz was a whole different person from the annoying cunt I met weeks ago. Protection? Impersonation? Death? What exactly was going on here?

"Please do not tell Jemima else the bird dies" she said with an exaggerated whisper.

The hairs at the back of my neck stood and my scalp prickled.

"Did you just threaten Robin?"

"I wouldn't have had to, but desperate times calls for desperate measures"

I marched right up to her fuming and a mere inch separated us. Oh how I wanted to bash in that ugly smirk on her face.

"You listen to me and you better do it well"

She raised an eyebrow at me and beyond my expectations, she was able to make that horrid smirk even uglier.

"Be a good little bitch and go tell that motherfucking thug; if anything happens to Robin..." I trailed off.

"You'd what exactly?" She asked like she was genuinely curious then lowered her voice and said-

"You can't catch what you can't see, you can't kill something that is already dead, sister. All you'll have to do is keep your mouth shut George, I can assure you, you wouldn't want the one person on your side to leave you to the wolves or worse, devour you herself."

"George?"

I flinch at the sound of Robin's voice and stepped away from Liz like she was a minefield.

"Hi Robin, see you at school" was all she said then disappeared.

"What was that about? Why was she in your room?" Robin asked, confusion written all over her face.

There and then I made up my mind; it was time to come clean.