Page 194 of Depraved Boys

The door opened, and Uncle Trevor burst through. His rumpled clothes hung off his body as though he’d shoved them on in a hurry. “Willow, what’s going on?”

I stood. “We found Ashley like this in a boy’s bedroom.”

His hazel eyes bulged. “Whose?”

“He didn’t do it.”

“How could you know that?” Uncle ran up to the foot of Ashley’s bed and clutched the metal rails so hard, his knuckles went as white as his face.

“Someone framed him. Ashley had a lot of enemies, and—”

“Who is this boy?” He whirled on me. “A friend of yours?”

I nodded. “His name is Prakash. And he’s the one who went looking for me that night I was left drunk and assaulted on the mountain.”

Uncle Trevor ran a hand over his mouth. “What makes you think he didn’t do it?”

“Whoever hurt Ashley was a monster.” I gestured at her swollen face. “They would have hit her over and over to make her look like that. It’s not the work of someone so kind-hearted.”

“Help!” whispered a small voice.

Uncle Trevor rushed to the head of her bed. “A-Ashley, what happened to you?”

I bolted out of the room, where the doctor stood in the hallway, chatting with a pair of nurses. “Excuse me!” All three of them turned around. “My sister’s awake.”

The doctor followed me to the room and pulled a penlight from his pocket. “Excuse me.”

Uncle Trevor stepped aside and let the doctor shine a light in her eyes. “My name is Dr. Nash, and you’re in Cumberland Royal Infirmary. You’ve suffered a terrible assault, but we’re here to take care of you.”

I clasped my hands to my reverberating chest and backed against the wall, while the nurses entered the room and crowded around the doctor. My throat dried. I swallowed hard and strained to listen to her whispered words.

“I want to talk to the police,” she rasped.

“Who did this, Ashley?” The words spilled from my lips.

Ashley fixed me with a glower that looked monstrous through her swollen features. “Get out.”

My eyes bulged. “What?”

“Out!” she shouted through a hoarse voice.

The doctor and Uncle Trevor turned and fixed me with near-identical impatient stares. My back straightened. All they saw was a damsel who urgently needed help and me as the person hindering it.

With a sigh, I walked out of the room and waited in the hallway. Eventually, Uncle Trevor would tell me what happened to her.

Several minutes passed. Nurses, healthcare assistants, and even the tea lady went in and out of Ashley’s room. The doctor left but didn’t give me any information. I waited on a bench by the ward’s reception desk, bouncing my knee like an addict desperate for their next fix. If Ashley didn’t clear Prakash, he might spend the night in jail.

Two police officers arrived through the accident and emergency ward’s double doors. A large woman with shorn, blonde hair, and a smaller man with a neat beard.

I leaped off my seat. “Are you here to take Ashley Evergreen’s statement?”

“Yes,” replied the man. “Are you a friend or relative?”

“Sister.”

The policewoman glanced down at her notebook and opened the door to Ashley’s room. “You’d better come in, then.”

Ashley rested in the hospital bed, which was arranged with her back raised. Dried blood no longer caked her face, revealing patches of pale skin that made her bruises stand out.