I ignored that. I was as attuned to our violent world as any brother, but every time I thought of Mateo with a gun—withthegun Alexei had given him to kill the man who’d stabbed me—I felt sick. “He doesn’t read so well.”
Alexei frowned. “Dyslexic?”
“I don’t think so. Maybe it’s more he never learnt properly. I don’t think he went to school much.”
“Neither did you, chaplain. You were born on the road, no?”
I leaned against the big sandstone behind me. “In a caravan on the old Redruth fairgrounds.”
“So what is your connection to this horse farm? Mateo said it was your grandfather’s.”
“It was, once upon a time. He died years ago.”
“Were you close?”
“I never met him.”
Alexei was as nosy as I was. Part of his arsenal was to know what had made the people around him. I knew this about him. Expected it.
I spoke again before he could press me. “My cousin Joe owns Whisper Farm now. Our fathers were brothers. But they hated each other. No one round here knew I existed till years after my dad passed.”
“How old were you then?”
“When my dad died?”
“Da. I mean, yes.” A faint, rueful smile crossed Alexei’s face. “You people make me careless.”
“We make you comfortable. There’s a difference.”
“We were talking about you, chaplain.”
Alexei reached for Mateo’s discarded riding jacket and stole a cigarette from the crumpled box. “Do not tell Saint.”
“I would never.” I made the sign of the cross on my chest and kept talking. “My dad’s family were horse trainers in the circuses back in the day. Then my grandfather came here and won the farm and some other things in a card game. He rescued horses till he died here. Now Joe does it too.”
“What about your mother?”
“She was from the fairgrounds. We stayed on the road after my dad died, until I was about twelve and the gorgers said I had to go to school properly.”
“Where did you go to school?”
“Truro.”
“The nurse has a new job at the hospital there.”
“Skylar?”
“Yes.” Alexei exhaled sideways out of his mouth before stubbing out the half-smoked cigarette. “It is why I hacked your records. Our mole has moved on.”
“Nice.”
“I thought so. If it is any consolation, I did not allow Cam to read them.”
“But you read them.”
“I did.”
“Nosy fucker.”