Free A Place of Safety by Natasha Cooper Page A

religious panel, not one of the complex allegories.
    ‘Did you hear what I said?’ Ben demanded.
    ‘I heard. But I can’t do it.’ Toby couldn’t believe what he’d just said. He’d had no intention of rebelling when he’d left the house. Muscles in his legs twitched and he put down a hand to hold over the worst one in his thigh. Where on earth had his subconscious found this terrifying courage?
    ‘Either I’m not hearing you properly,’ Ben said quite calmly. ‘Or you’ve forgotten who you’re talking to.’
    ‘No, I haven’t. I should have told you to publish and be damned in the first place. But I’m doing it now. You can tell my board of trustees and every bloody newspaper in the country the truth about the Clouet drawings, if you want. I don’t care. But I am not going to buy or sell any more of your fakes. OK?’
    Ben laughed. Toby had his freezing hands behind his back now. They were already painful, but he dug the nails of the right hand into the palm of the left to keep his courage up. He felt Ben’s hand tucking itself cosily into the crook of his elbow. His resolution slipped, along with his grip on his own hands, and he asked himself what he thought he was doing.
    ‘My boss keeps wanting me to give you one of his demonstrations,’ Ben said in the easy voice an old friend might use about his plans for a children’s party, ‘but up till now I’ve managed to persuade him that you’ll do what he wants without anything like that. You will, won’t you, Tobe?’
    ‘No. I know I’ll lose my reputation, my job, my home, and most of my friends, but so be it. Anything would be better than helping you flood the market with fakes.’
    ‘I doubt that,’ Ben said. ‘Not that it matters now. You see, the stakes have risen a bit. I didn’t want to have to tell you, but I see I’ve got to. It’s not just your reputation you’re risking. Not any more. My boss hasn’t decided yet which one of your boys he’ll go for, but it’s usually the youngest. He’s found that’s the quickest way to make any parent do what he wants. Could you bear to watch your young Meredith screaming as first his arms are broken, and then his legs, and then God knows what else is done to him?’
    Ben spoke so casually that it was a moment before Toby understood what he’d heard.
    ‘You bastard.’
    Toby wanted to grab Ben’s neck and throttle him, but there were too many people around, and Ben was bigger and stronger than he was, and he was a hopeless coward anyway.
    ‘Now, now. There’s no need to be offensive,’ Ben said. ‘Do as you’re told and you’ll be safe. So will your sons. Rebel again, and they will be hurt.’
    Where exactly was Peter in all this? Toby asked himself. Did he know what Ben was threatening now? Had he sent him to do it? Could anyone have changed that much, even in eighteen years?
    Ben reached across the narrow space between them to flick his fingers against Toby’s cheek. The patch of skin stung.
    ‘Concentrate,’ he said. ‘And remember that it usually takes only one child killed to make anyone toe the line.’
    ‘Christ! You’re unreal.’
    ‘You wish. Don’t forget, Toby, I’m all that stands between you and my boss. If you screw up, or if you so much as breathe a word of this to the police or anyone else, he’ll pick up one of your boys straight away and take him to pieces in front of you.’
    Toby shut his eyes. He could feel the helpless, humiliating tears seeping out through his lashes. This couldn’t be happening
to him. He’d made mistakes, been a fool – worse than a fool when he’d faked the Clouet drawings with Peter – but he hadn’t done anything nearly bad enough to warrant this.
    ‘Oh, don’t be so pathetic.’
    When Toby opened his eyes again Ben had gone. But he’d left behind a kind of miasma. Toby had never felt anything like it. He wanted to rush home and scrub his whole body under the shower to get rid of every trace of it before it could