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

Tom.’
    ‘It’s just a matter of delegating the work,’ Maddie
interrupted.
    Tom smiled at his daughter. ‘Perhaps you’d be good enough to
go to the kitchen and pour us all a nice glass of lemonade. There’s a fresh
bottle in the fridge.’
    Maddie pouted. ‘So you can both talk about me?’
    ‘No. So we can all have a nice cold drink. I’m parched.’
    Maddie flounced off to the kitchen. When she was out of
sight, Tom shook his head. ‘She’s got a lot of her mother’s stubbornness in
her. Sometimes that’s a good thing, but sometimes it can be a hindrance. All
I’m asking is that you both take a step back and try and see the wood for the
trees.’
    ‘I don’t want her to come with me if it’s going to cause
trouble, Tom.’
    Tom took a handkerchief from his jacket pocket and dabbed
his forehead. ‘Madeline gets a bee in her bonnet, and next thing you know,
she’s got a working hive.’
    Ben smiled.
    Pastor Tom didn’t. ‘Trouble is, son, those bees can
sometimes sting.’
    ‘Like I said, I don’t want her—’
    Tom held up a hand. ‘I’ve always let her have free rein to
make her own decisions. Even when she was little. Children need room to grow.
They need to make their own mistakes because ultimately they will be stronger
for it. But there’s a whole world of difference between allowing a child to
grow and allowing a child to walk in front of a ten-tonne truck. Do you see
what I mean, son?’
    Ben did. He’d spent most of his life trying to avoid
ten-tonne trucks.
    ‘If she ends up going with you, all I ask is that you take
care of her as best you can. That girl is the most precious thing in the world
to me.’
    Ben looked at the floor. His best had never been good
enough. Not for his father. Not for Whittle Investigations. Not for his
playground tormentors. Stutter-buck hadn’t even been able to put a proper
sentence together without getting all tangled up. So how was he supposed to
take care of Maddie?
    Ben spat out the words lodged in his throat. ‘I can’t do
this, Tom.’
    ‘Don’t put yourself down, son. I can still remember that kid
who jumped out of the conker tree.’
    ‘Fell,’ Ben corrected.
    ‘Do you remember him? The kid with the nasty stammer?’
    Ben nodded. How could he ever forget the day that
Stutter-buck took flight after spending the best part of two hours trapped in
that conker tree?
    ‘What was it you said that day?’
    Ben tugged his earlobe. ‘I can’t remember.’
    ‘You said that you wished you were dead. Do you remember
saying that?’
    Ben nodded. He remembered only too well the humiliation. The
searing pain in his right knee. Pastor Tom bending over him.
    ‘You said that you couldn’t see any point in carrying on?
But there’s always a point, son. Even when we don’t see the point of the point,
if you catch my drift?’
    Ben wanted to reach out and hug Pastor Tom. Hug him close.
Father to son. Something he’d never been able to do with his own father. ‘I
suppose.’
    ‘But I watched that kid grow.’
    ‘Like a beanstalk,’ Ben joked.
    Tom didn’t laugh. ‘I watched him lose that stammer. I
watched him battle against all the odds, bit by bit, word by word. Do you
remember how we talked about climbing a mountain that summer?’
    ‘Yes.’
    ‘How I said that it’s important not to look up. You remember
why it’s important not to look up?’
    ‘Because it always looks a lot higher than it is.’
    ‘Too right, it does. Same thing as if you look down from the
top. It looks a mighty long way to fall. Do you remember how I said you need to
find footholds to help you up the mountain?’
    Ben nodded. He remembered almost every minute of that summer
eight years ago. Pastor Tom had called the weather schizophrenic. One minute it
was pouring with rain, the next, scorching sunshine. Tom had told Ben how the
weather always played havoc with his joints, but it hadn’t stopped him teaching
Ben how to work Old Joe’s mechanism with his misshapen