"Before you start I will tell you that any point if you decide to lie to me I will know, I will ask you questions you will honestly reply. You owe me that".

He hisses through his teeth. "I owe you nothing, you send demons to torture me so why don't you now torture me yourself until I'm dead, you filthy fucking abomination, you'd like that wouldn't you".

I slap him across the face repeatedly my anger flowing out of me, his blood splatters across my hands from his split lip, he is trying to goad me into killing him. "Dying isn't an option for you right now, the only option is to either tell me what I need to know or I'll make you. Either way, the outcome will be the same".

He spits the blood that's oozed in to his mouth from his split lip into my face, I wipe it away with my sleeve trying to hide my repulsion.

"Fine have it your way, hard way it is". I grab his pudgy sweaty swollen face, he tries to wriggle away but I simply push my fingers into his eye sockets, prepared to do this until they both pop like water balloons. "You do not need to be able to see, to tell the truth !"

He screams out in agony but I carry on, even through his begging and howls of pain, I keep pushing harder and harder until he gives in. He whimpers that he agrees to tell me whatever I need to know, Death has not permitted for the vicar to be killed but he said nothing about torture. I slowly remove my hands. "You will tell me about your relationship with my mother". I sit back on the cold floor as his head lulls down weighed by the pain.

"I don't know what you want me to say....? I met her while she was volunteering. From the first glance of her angelic face I was entranced under her spell, her skin soft like the first flutters of snow, her voice pulled me in and called me to come closer. I had no respite from her, even in my dreams, she haunted me until my every thought was consumed with only her. I thought once I had her it would somehow ease but it only intensified and like a drug addict I needed more and more, I longed to hear her voice, to see her smile".

His words about her slice in to my heart, hearing this vile creature describe someone I should have known. "So you wished to possess her ?"

He growls angrily. "No! No! You're not listening, I didn't want to possess her, I loved her, I loved her more than anything I'd ever loved and she loved me .... she loved me. But then I found out she was Bells' daughter. We knew we could never let the church or Bell find out about us. The church was already watching Bells' every move, they would have done the same to her, they would have pulled us apart and I couldn't lose her".

I slide back finding it harder and harder to be so close to him. "If you loved her so much, why would you convince her to take heroin ? You killed the person you say you loved more than anyone, you destroyed her !" His words are making no sense.

He starts to laugh like a maniac as if I said something so funny. "It was never intended to kill her, it was intended to kill you". I feel the tingle of pain shoot in to my chest, none of this was about her but me. The tears start to trickle down my face as I squint my eyes to try to stop anymore tears flowing.

"I protected her from everyone but I couldn't protect her from you !" he spat at me. "She was so happy when she found out she was pregnant with you, but I knew it would be impossible to protect her from the church if they got wind that not only did Bell have a living child but a living granddaughter as well. Bell would find out about me and expose me, then what....? You needed to be gone".

He crawls up leaning on his back legs the rope cutting into his arms, blood running down his face as he catches his breath as exhaustion washes over him from hours of torture.

"She was so scared that Bells' curse was passed onto her that her desperation clouded her mind. I convinced her to leave and that if she could somehow disconnect her love from you, you would somehow survive. I told her of the recovering drug addicts I'd worked with and how their need for a fix overpowered their love of their families and friends. I said once you were born I'd come and get you both, I was sure she would miscarry you or have a still birth and then I could bring her home to Whitstable, back home to me, but like the little soul destroying demon you are you somehow fucking survived". His eyes burn into me with his hatred.

I stand up towering above him on the floor rage pulsing in my veins. "None of this was about her but saving your own skin, what did she see in you? A little pathetic weak man, who manipulated her when she was at her weakest. She was vulnerable, scared of losing her baby and you used that to your advantage hoping the church wouldn't find out about you and her and more to the point Bell, or should I say 'Lilith wouldn't find out'? You knew if she ever found out she'd hang you up by your ball sack and let the feral boys at you".

He screams to block out my speaking. "I loved her !"

"You killed her !" I scream back even louder. He falls down sobbing, but I feel no pity, I'm not done with him yet. "Tell me about that night".

He shakes his head and mumbles, "I can't" over and over again. But I've come this far, I can't walk away now not knowing about the last time he saw her. What he said that drove her to the edge.

I grab him by the hair and yank it, pulling his head back. "Tell me!" he yelps and tries to wriggle free.

"I know you can't kill me" I nod in agreement "Your right father, I can't kill you but I can hurt you to the point you wished you were dead".

He chuckles. "I've wished I was dead from the moment I found she was gone but had no choice but to carry on, holding my secret deep inside of me, she is a scar on my heart that will never heal. It doesn't matter how hard I pray, how hard I try to forget, that I marry another, still all I think of is her, even after all these years it's still her".

His love he declares for her simply revolts me, it's not love. The self pity is wasted on me because I don't believe a word of it.

"What did you say to her the last time you saw her ?" I push on needing this last piece to the jigsaw of her demise.

"I told her I wouldn't take her home" He howls at me. "When I walked into that flat and saw YOU, I knew there was nothing more I could do. She was desperate to go home but your existence would bring too many questions and at this point she had figured it all out. She realised my intentions were never to save you but to get rid of you. I tried to explain I was trying to protect her but she was blindsided by you, she wouldn't fucking listen. She told me she had met someone else, someone who was going to look after you both...."

"And .... I know there's more". I whisper, scared to hear the rest but needing closure finally.

"I told her you would be in danger, that the church would realise your link to Bell through her and if they didn't .....I would tell them. I thought I would scare her enough that she would give you up or she wouldn't ever return, I didn't realise that she would ......"

I finish off his tailed off sentence. "That she would take so much heroin until she faded away, so no one would know the link of me to Bell through her ...as she would be gone, I would be safe, she thought she was protecting me from being exposed to the church by you".

I watch as he falls down onto his face and slithers on the floor in agony like the snake that he is, finally accepting his part he played in her destruction. The poison he flooded into her mind as well as her veins in the pursuit of keeping her, his guilty little secret. He may not have put that last hit in her hands but he filled her mind with such lies and deceit that he as good as well handed her a loaded gun.

As he lays, face-first into the ground, I could just stamp on his head, my foot could come down on his skull again and again until he would be gone but with his death, the church would learn about me and everything my mother did to protect me would have been for nothing.

I step back I now see why Bell wished to have her pound of flesh from him. "You had her love but couldn't stand that she loved me more. More than you. More than her own life. So remember this, over everything else, she chose me, she chose to sacrifice herself for me. You may have memories of her ...something I'll never have but I'll always carry her love with me. Whatever you've done, whatever you do you can't take that away from me, you can't poison that".

I look in to the vast emptiness of the darkness and call out. "Death, I'm done".

I look up to the black night sky the stars one by one start to shine again like diamonds scattered in the sky, the moon light beams down onto our little piece of home and I feel the warm glow of the courtyard lights trickle in around me as they come back to life. The shadows that covered Dad, Bell, Alto and Death lift and with it the knowledge that I now have the truth regardless of how painful it was to endure.

The vicar is still flat out on the floor sobbing into the ground the harsh realisation of his actions crushing down on him.

I run over, flinging my arms around Bell, at first she is stiff as a board not accustomed to such displays of emotions but she melts in to embrace the first hug from her granddaughter. I lean in to her ear and whisper. "There is no need to kill him, that would be too good for him. To live with the fact that he destroyed the one person he ever loved more than himself will eat him up inside out and do far more damage than we can ever do".

She stares me in the eyes to read my face to know I speak the truth about him, she cranes her neck past me to glance over at the crumpled mess that's on the floor, she smiles as she watches the agony wash over him and for the first time in a while I see the relief on her face and a hint of a smile "maybe your right Jane, it's done".

Dad's hand slips in to mine and squeezes it, just once, his way of saying "I'm here" I wink back at him, my way of saying I'm going to be ok, our bond still just as close that words are not even needed.

Alto hovers in the background, not entirely sure where he fits in, I nod for him to come closer, like a wild dog he edges cautiously to us and with my free hand I pull him in close to us. "Are you ok Jane ?" He growls lowly, not comfortable showing his concern in front of the others.

"No, but I will be, we all will be".

This is my family it might be broken but it's mine.

Death ushers the feral boys to pick up the vicar and return him back to where they found him. They drag the vicar out of the courtyard like roadkill being slung to the side of the motorway.

Death glances over at Bell who blows him a cheeky kiss, he sniggers. "Lilith, until our paths cross again. I would say behave but we both know an old dog can't learn new tricks". She huffs as if offended, he simply blows her a kiss back. "Child it was a pleasure to meet you, your mother would have been proud of the young woman you are going to become". With that, he fades away becoming nothing more than black smoke that catches in the wind until completely gone.

We are now alone, Death has departed, the feral boys following orders and the vicar gone ......I know I will never see him again, once he's seen out his notice he will leave Whitstable but he won't be able to run away from the memory of what he did to my mother, it will follow him, haunt him and with that thought I finally feel at peace. To know his suffering will know no end, he will be tortured until his last breath. His poison will not rot our family no more.

The end

(Not entirely)

At the packed train station in Whitstable, on the warm summer eve sits an older gentleman on the bench all on his own with nothing more than a shabby old suitcase. Around him is joyous laughter from the tourists travelling home from a day at the seaside enjoying fish and chips and ice cream. Children run up and down the station whilst mothers laden with buckets and spades call out to them to be careful. Groups of men loudly sing as the combination of too much sun and beer lowers their inhibitions and heightens their volume.

But the gentleman doesn't pay any attention to any of the festivities that play out around him, he rubs his neck often as if something is missing, his face is bruised, the shade of green that bruises go before they fade away and leave the skin but not the soul.

Over the speakers the announcer's voice tinny and robotic states the train will be arriving soon then lists of every station it will stop at. Nobody is listening but him, maybe because his desire to leave is greater than theirs. He stands up eagerly waiting for the train with just his suitcase in his hand, the rails start to crackle with the impending train that is in sight as it chugs its way closer.

The men's singing gets louder, the giggling children with exasperated mothers get louder but still, he blocks them all out.

Maybe if he hadn't been he would have heard the spinning wheels and clicking peddles that were whizzing down the platform. As he watched the train coming down the rails towards the platform his tense body eased for a second at the thought of the sanctuary of being on the train carriage and far away from this place.

As the train approached the platform speed slowing down ready to stop the gentleman moves a little closer just behind the yellow line, his thought is of leaving, the train will be his safe passage away.

But still the whizzing and clicking moves closer as people gasp as the bikes fly along the platform ducking and diving between the many travellers.

The face of the train is finally clear in his vision, hypnotised by it he doesn't hear the screech of the wheels behind him, maybe drowned out by the crackling rails and the happy tourists or maybe he did but just didn't see it anymore. He feels a hard force push into his back, so strong it takes him off his feet as he flies through the air landing on the rail tracks, there he lays on the cold metal rails, he closes his eyes not wanting to see what is happening, there are piercing screams from stunned travellers, while others stunned into silence gape and gasp in horror. He hears their cries for help but it's drowned out by the rattling of the impending train. He feels the electricity beneath his body as his crumpled body aches with the impact, as he opens his eyes he sees the four hooded youths staring down at him whilst perched on their bikes ... he needs not to see their faces to know who they are.

The roar of the train is now so loud he simply shuts his eyes as the carriages trample and crush his body, breaks his bones while every organ in his body is either smashed under the weight or simply goes into failure, he does not scream or beg to be saved he simply mutters only these words. "Please forgive me". Until he dies......

Amongst the chaos the boys on the bikes speed off the platform darting in out of the hysteria, once out of the train station they speed out down the alley as they get whipped by thorns and bushes that are overgrown they don't stop until they arrive at the underground that leads out to the built-up houses that surround the high street.

They wait there until the sound of a pair of light footsteps are heard approaching them. They lower their hoods in acknowledgement of the familiar face that beams with pride at them.

"Is it done ?" She whispers consciously taking in her surroundings and that anyone passing by could overhear their conversation. They nod in unison her beautiful obedient dogs. The elderly lady smiles at her boys, her wild feral boys.

"Now death was very clear I couldn't kill him while he worked for God as he was living under the protection of the all-mighty by doing God's work. Imagine our luck that he has now left the church, he will be missed by his congregation".She winks at the boys. "And he said I couldn't kill him, he didn't say anything about you killing him, I believe that's what they call a loophole, you don't live as long as us and not have the savvy to read between the lines" She chuckles to herself.

She gestures to the boys to follow her as she trots off through the houses, making her way to the High Street to go home, they circle her like guard dogs but to the outside world looking like four teenage boys escorting the elderly sweet grandmother. "Let's go home boys, our family will be waiting for us".