Free The Revelation Room (The Ben Whittle Investigation Series Book 1) by Mark Tilbury Page B

her face. Her blonde
hair looked bleached white.
    Ben wanted to take that smile and keep it forever. ‘Why do
you think people join cults?’
    ‘I don’t know. Bad childhoods? Who knows?’
    ‘What’s the difference between a cult and a church?’
    Maddie frowned. ‘How do you mean?’
    ‘As far as I can see, they’re both two sides of the same
coin.’
    ‘Two sides, perhaps. The same coin? No. Not really.’
    ‘Religion’s just a leap of faith,’ Ben said. ‘No one knows
for sure that God exists, do they?’
    ‘True.’
    Ben tried to order his thoughts. ‘This Rapture thing isn’t
any more daft than the idea of Heaven and Hell is it?’
    Maddie pursed her lips. ‘It seems a lot more dangerous.’
    ‘Can I ask you a question?’
    Maddie nodded. ‘Of course.’
    ‘Do you believe in God?’
    ‘I don’t know. I sometimes think God is our conscience. That
way he’s in every single one of us. That way he watches everything we do.’
    ‘If God’s inside everyone, how come there’s so many evil
people in the world, then?’
    ‘I don’t know.’
    ‘Why are there so many wars? So many earthquakes? So many
people suffering?’
    ‘I don’t know, Ben. I’ve asked my dad that question a dozen
times. He seems to believe it’s all some kind of test.’
    ‘Some bloody test.’
    ‘But that doesn’t mean we just give up, does it? We have to
keep trying whether we want to or not.’
    ‘Even when all your instincts are screaming “no”?’
    ‘Especially then.’
    ‘Even when you know your best isn’t good enough?’
    ‘You’d be surprised what you can do when you have to.’
    ‘You’d be surprised what I can’t do.’
    ‘Stop putting yourself down.’
    Ben looked at her. He loved the way her green eyes made him
think of shady trees. ‘What if we don’t make it, Maddie?’
    ‘We will.’
    ‘You don’t know that.’
    Maddie took his hand. ‘We can be strong together.’
    Ben wanted to believe her, but he was just the kid in the
conker tree who barely had the strength to tie his own shoelaces. ‘What about
your dad? What’s he going to do if anything happens to you?’
    ‘My dad’s strong.’
    ‘That doesn’t mean it won’t tear his world apart.’
    ‘I’m probably in more danger crossing the road.’
    ‘I doubt it.’
    Maddie stood up. ‘Come on, it’s our stop.’
    Ben followed her off the bus and into the bustling street.
As they neared the meeting point with Marcus, Ben dodged out of the main throng
and stepped into the doorway of a newsagent’s.
    Maddie joined him. ‘Ben?’
    ‘We should just forget about this and go home before it’s
too late.’
    ‘We can’t just forget about your dad, can we?’
    ‘He’s probably already dead.’
    ‘You don’t know that.’
    Ben looked at the ground. ‘Maybe I don’t care.’
    ‘If you didn’t care you wouldn’t even be here now.’
    ‘I spent all of my childhood trying to be good. Eating up
all my dinner. Folding away my clothes at night. Making my bed in the morning.
Being good at school. Learning all my sums. Trotting out my times tables like a
p-parrot. He never once gave me a single word of praise.’
    ‘Men don’t always show their emotions, Ben.’
    ‘I won a prize once for painting. Guess what he said?’ Ben didn’t
wait for an answer. ‘Nothing. He didn’t even acknowledge it.’
    ‘You’re reading too much into it.’
    ‘I couldn’t do anything to please him. I’ve lost count of
the number of times he’s reminded me I was two years old before I walked.’
    ‘He might be pulling your leg.’
    ‘He probably blames me for Dominic dying.’
    ‘Now you’re being plain daft.’
    ‘Am I? It makes perfect sense to me. I bet he thinks Dominic
would have grown up to be all the things I’m not. Captain of the rugger team.
Head boy at school. The perfect heir to Whittle Investigations.’
    ‘And who did he call when he needed someone to help him?’
    Ben scoffed. ‘A useless idiot that couldn’t catch a