Carter Brothers: Adrian (Rated R Novel)

Chapter 19

Chapter 19

“Hey.”
“Hi Liam, thanks for doing this by the way.”
Sam slides into the simple old brown sedan. It’s not much but at least Sam’s not catching several buses at the crack of dawn to get to the orphanage.
“Don’t worry about it. I’m just glad for something exciting to do, something other than chasing purse snatchers and petty thieves,” shrugs Liam with a roll of his eyes that has Sam smirking.
Liam cranks up the stereo as he pulls away from the sidewalk and Sam’s content to listen to the radio.


They arrive at the orphanage an hour later, around 10 that morning. Pleased to stretch out, Sam glances assess the building while Liam makes his way over to her. It’s nice enough. 3 stores high along-well, 4 including the attic; the white paint is chipping and dulling but it’s not in bad condition. It’s no Oliver Twist situation that’s for sure. The front garden is a little small and littered with toys ranging from dolls to action figurines to a variety of different sized balls. They make their way to the front door where a proud plaque states ‘St Helena’s Children’s Home’.

Just as they’re about to ring the doorbell, the door swings open and they have to part to allow some moody teenager to storm through. Sam raises her eyebrows as she sees the hooded figure slouch away and smirks to herself, oh boy she’s glad she doesn’t have to deal with that. Speaking of that; the person who does, is running after with her face flushed red and blonde wisps flying from her ponytail. Upon seeing them, she stops suddenly and darts her gaze from them to the leaving teenager.
“Derek! I swear to God, young man!” she cries only to have him ignore her.
So with a frustrated sigh she mutters, “forget it. I so chose the wrong career.”
Then turning to Sam and Liam she forces on a smile and says, “can I help you folks? Looking to adopt?”
Sam’s eyes go wide as Liam snorts.
“Um, no...No. We’re actually...uh, we’re looking for someone called Mrs Nelson. Is she around?”
“Oh! Yeah, yeah, come on in.”

They’re lead down the long corridor filled with children’s paintings into a side room being used as an office.
“Just take a seat and I’ll go get here,” she chirps heading out.
Sam gazes around the room as they wait. Behind the wall of the desk is a large corkboard filled with photos of happy adoptions and letters from what looks like old kids of place as well as thank-you cards. A smile lifts as her lips as she realises that books have it all wrong. ‘Orphanages’ aren’t all awful. This one’s pretty nice; not the depressing, soul-sucking, black holes that there are such misconceptions about.
Glancing to her side she spots Liam trying to take out his badge. Slapping his arm lightly she frowns.
“What are you doing? We don’t need that. I got a cover story sorted,” she hisses at him. Maybe ‘sorted’ isn’t the right word but hopefully with some good lying and a lot of luck this Mrs Nelson will believe her.
“Oh, right. Cool. So...what is it?”
Sam’s nose wrinkle’s slightly in frustration. She can’t help but compare him to Adrian. Had it been Adrian that she’s hissed at and only just told him about her plan-he would have gone mental; however Liam-Liam’s so calm about it, as if it’s not Sam’s fault; and as strange as it sounds, Sam doesn’t like it. But maybe that’s because she enjoys hers and Adrian’s little tiffs. There is a certain rush to arguing that she weirdly has from it.
“Well-”
Just as she’s about to reveal her plan to Liam they hear the door knob twisting as the door creaks open. She gives him a look that she prays conveys the message ‘play along’ and smothers on a pleasant smile as Mrs Nelson approaches.

The woman is large to say the least. In fact, everything about her is large, from her physique to her personality. It’s quite nice actually; especially to think that such a woman is working with such lonely children really is reassuring. Her fashion sense is also slightly wild with her teaming a violet ankle-length skirt with a gypsy orange blouse and pink sandals. As a woman of colour her long braids seem to be the only thing that doesn’t appear so odd about her.
“Now then dearies, what can I do for you? Helen says you’re not looking to adopt, are you sure I can’t change your mind?” she asks, sinking into her heavily cushioned chair.
“Oh no, actually Mrs Nelson, I’m here to see you.”
“Me?!” asks the woman in surprise.
Sam nods before continuing, “yes. I believe you know someone that used to be here-his name’s Shawn Hanson.”
The woman’s face breaks out into a wide grin, “oh Shawn! He’s such an angel, always donating when he can. God bless him!”
“So you know him quite well?” questions Sam with genuine hope in her voice.
“Of course. He’s been with us from when he was 2 all the way up until 18....But what is it that you want to know about Shawn, sweatheart?”
Now comes the tricky part.
Making sure her smile falls into one of slight sympathy and worry Sam gulps slightly before continuing.
“I don’t know if you’ve talked to him recently but Shawn and I are...well, dating,” explains Sam.
Beside her Liam has to bite his tongue in order to prevent himself from saying something that could ruin Sam’s whole lie.
“Dating? Oh my Gosh...of course, it’s you!” cries the woman with Sam this time having to calm her expression to one of just a single eyebrow raise.
“Shawn’s one of those people who like to keep themselves to themselves but when I was last speaking to him, he was saying about some woman that had captured his eye. Said she was his Deputy or something. Gosh, he really did have it bad-claimed he would ‘make her his’.”
With great effort Sam manages to coo at that even though internally she’s gagging. Ew, as if she’d date someone like Hanson. Sure she likes arguing but arguing with Hanson is just...like banging your head against a brick wall. There’s no playfulness there, it’s just utter annoyance.

“So what is it that you need sweetie? And who’s this?”
“Oh this is my step-brother Liam. I just, well it’s like this...Shawn doesn’t like talking much of his childhood and I know that I should just wait for him to be ready to open up to me...but we’ve not been dating long and I just...I don’t want to say something that’s going to upset him without knowing and I-I’ve dated a few guys like him before-the ones from the ‘wrong side of the tracks’ and every-time it ended horribly. I don’t want that with Shawn; which is why I need to know of his childhood. I want to know completely what kind of guy I’m getting involved with and since he won’t tell me yet...”
“You thought you’d come to me?”
“Yes...Look, I know I’m being a horrible girlfriend by not trusting him. And I know I’m putting you in a hard place by asking you to go behind his back but...I really wouldn’t if I thought Shawn wasn’t worth it.”
It seems that paired with her words and her pleading expression the woman caves in since she sighs loudly and nods.
“Sweetie as long as you promise me you won’t give up on that boy, then sure...I guess I can speak about him since he’s no longer a child here and you are a senior officer.”
“Thank you so much Mrs Nelson, and of course I won’t give up on Shawn!” cries Sam. No, she won’t give up on him, not until she’s ruled him out as an accomplice for Santiago completely.

“Okay, well then I guess I should start with how Shawn ended up here....
   He was born out of rape. His momma-bless her soul-was just a waitress at one of the downtown cafes and even on her salary she kept him and managed to make it work. But although the state had provided her therapy when the sessions ran out, the woman kept sinking in and out of depression, not that many people noticed. When Shawn was 2, the brother of the rapist had just been released from state prison and heard about his brother being sent away. Bent on revenge, he attacked Shawn’s momma and left her to bleed out in the streets. Since the cops couldn’t track any close relatives, Shawn was dropped off here.
We do the best we can for the kids here by trying to allocate them as quickly as possible into safe, loving, stable homes and Shawn was no exception to that; except he seemed to be unlucky since many of his potential adoptions fell through. By the time we had more people looking to adopt he’d outgrown his sweet toddler years, in which many people generally adopt in. Still, he seemed relatively happy here despite that and we were all fine with it.
 He was a generally good kid. I know that many people look at this side of town and these neighbourhoods and think all the kids are hooligans but Shawn wasn’t like that. He was a smart boy, very smart and he was also quiet-not shouting and swearing like some of them. The only time he wasn’t reallyhimself was during his teenage years, which I guess is expected.”
“What do you mean ‘not really himself’?”
“Well...he got in with a bad crowd. He...joined some silly gang but it didn’t last long. I don’t know what those boys did to him but I do remember him coming back one day with his face bloody and bruised. That’s when I told him I wouldn’t allow that kind of behaviour under my roof and he told me he’d already left. Thankfully after that all the shenanigans were over and he returned to himself.”