It turned out that Irwin Bradley also had an ex-wife, Angie, who he had to make excuses to; and, from what Darkus could tell, Angie still loved Irwin, as Darkus suspected his own mother still loved his father. It brought into sharp focus how dearly Darkus wanted his parents to get back together, even though the whole situation felt like a dropped pie that would take an army of people to clean up. Wolseley Close, as long as Clive was in it, was never going to be home. That was part of the reason Darkus chose detective work over the domestic strife he’d had to endure all those years. Though neither of them made reference to it, Darkus sensed that he and Rufus shared the same feelings about their outlandish dads and long-suffering mums. As detectives do, they weighed opposing theories, they understood both sides of the argument, but they still wished for a solution – no matter how unrealistic that dream might be. Almost as if Jackie knew her son was thinking about her, the secure phone rang and the word Mum appeared on the screen.
