No Going Back by Casey Kelleher (black male authors TXT) 📗

‘We told her to rest and let us look after Riley, but she won’t have it,’ Janey quipped, getting up from the sofa and muting the TV programme that Pete had been watching.

‘I’m glad you’re doing okay,’ Lucy said, genuinely relieved to see Shelby back home and making a quick and full recovery.

‘Well, is there any news? Please tell me that you lot have locked that bloody mental case up and thrown away the bloody key?’

‘Well…’ Lucy started, only Pete was already on a roll.

‘The woman is a bloody psychopath. She’s sick in the bloody head, that’s what she is,’ he said, his anger steadily building, ready for a full-on rant about the woman who attacked his daughter and abducted his grandchild.

‘Dad!’ Shelby said, rolling her eyes then. ‘Give Lucy a chance to speak.’ She was eager to hear the fate of the woman who had abducted her child.

‘Imelda George is being detained under the Mental Health Act. She’s going to be transferred to a secure unit, where she’ll be placed, I suspect, indefinitely. Going on her heinous crimes, and the rapidly deteriorating state of her mental well-being, it’s highly unlikely that she’ll be rejoining society for a very long time. If ever again.’

‘A secure unit? What? So, she’s not going to prison? You’re sending her to some sort of hospital instead? How does that work? She murdered someone. She would have murdered again, too, no doubt. You saw that she was capable of it, and what? You’re letting her off the hook?’ Pete said, raising his voice now, incensed with what he was hearing. ‘What is wrong with you people? Why is she getting special treatment? She’s not right in the head.’

‘Which is exactly why they won’t place her in prison, Pete. You’re right, Imelda George is a very sick individual. But please, trust me when I say the secure unit that she’s going to is no better than a prison. It’s very much the same system. And I can assure you that she will be kept away from the public for a very long time to come. She won’t be hurting anyone else again.’

‘I don’t care where they keep her, as long as she’s as far away from Riley as possible,’ Shelby said, accepting the news that Lucy was delivering to them without question.

Because the truth was, she’d suspected as much. She’d seen with her own eyes how sick and deluded Imelda George was. The woman had been so obsessed with taking a child that didn’t belong to her. With trying to make Riley her own. And nobody in their right mind did that. No one would be stupid enough or crazy enough to think that they could get away with it.

‘As long as she is off the streets and can’t get her filthy mitts near Riley ever again, then that’s good enough for me,’ Shelby said, eyeing her father now in the hope that if she could accept Imelda’s fate, then he could too. And maybe now he would calm down. Though she knew that her dad wouldn’t find any form of punishment fitting enough for the woman, after everything Imelda George had put his family through.

‘The main thing is that Riley is home and safe. Imelda George will never come anywhere near him again,’ Lucy said, wanting Shelby to know that for certain, so that she could move on properly in her life and not worry about looking over her shoulder.

Imelda George had almost destroyed Shelby. She’d taken the one thing she dearly loved the most and she’d snatched him right from under her nose. But in the end, it was Shelby who had won.

‘Well, it’s something I guess,’ Janey said. ‘Oh, how rude of me, Lucy. I didn’t even ask if you’d like a cup of tea. Do you have time, or are you rushing back to work?’ She smiled as Lucy nodded.

‘Do you know what, I’d love one, Janey. Besides, it will give me a chance to stay for a few extra minutes and see how this little one’s doing.’

‘Oh, he’s doing just fine. He’s already got his belongings scattered all over the place. Cribs and buggies and teddies everywhere,’ Pete grumbled, getting up, before casting a look over to where his daughter was now breastfeeding Riley and suppressing a grin. ‘But we wouldn’t have it any other way. God knows what it will be like by the time he’s toddling around. He’ll have well and truly taken over the place.’

Lucy laughed then, seeing the excitement in Pete’s and Janey’s faces at the prospect.

‘I’ll give you a hand, Janey.’ Pete followed his wife from the room, to give Lucy some time alone with Shelby and Ashley.

‘Looks as if Riley’s going to have big scary Grandad Pete completely wrapped around his finger then. He’s going to be super spoiled by his grandparents, isn’t he?’ Lucy said, once they were alone.

‘Don’t!’ Shelby chuckled. ‘The pair of them are both practically falling over each other to look after him. What with me recovering from being stabbed, and Ashley’s broken wrist. We’re a right old pair. They’ve got a full house again. And between us, I think that they secretly love it!’

‘Not so much me being here though,’ Ashley muttered, knowing that Pete couldn’t be overly impressed with Shelby insisting that he be allowed around here. Though in fairness to Pete, he’d kept any gripes he still had to himself, putting Riley first and respecting Shelby’s wishes.

‘Well, like I said, this is about Riley now. We all need to do our best by him,’ Shelby said again, reminding Ashley that this wasn’t a free pass.

He was only back here because of Riley. Nothing else mattered right now, other than their son. Shelby didn’t even want to think about anything else right now.

But Lucy could tell by the way the couple were united together for the sake of their son that