"Angus! Are you safe? Have you found Mark yet?" Just mentioning my brother's name made me want to cry. "I miss you," I whispered, half as if I was afraid to admit it.
"I miss you too, little love. We have located your brother, and I'm calling to let you know that we're going to attempt an extraction in a couple of hours. I will phone you again as soon as we're done."
I said nothing as a terrible dread washed over me. Someone was going to die tonight. I felt like I knew it like I knew the sun would rise again tomorrow. Someone was going to die, and I was hopelessly and desperately afraid that it would be Angus' body lying lifeless on the ground at the end of this night's work.
"Please be safe," was all I managed to say eventually, unable to give voice to my dread.
"I met your father tonight," he said.
It took me a couple of beats to process his words, engulfed as I was in anxiety for his safety.
"What?" I was sure I'd misheard him.
"He came to the estate to ask for help rescuing your brother. Mark looks just like him, you know."
"What?" I said again, probably sounding like a complete halfwit at this stage.
"He said to say he's sorry, and that he loves you."
"Right," I said, still not certain I understood what he was telling me. My father. My actual father was alive and about to embark on a mission to save my brother from a vampire. Cue hysterical laughter. I said nothing, though, trying to absorb it all in my sleep drenched state.
"I love you Rebecca. No matter what happens tonight, I want you to know that I love you. More than anything."
I started sobbing then. It wasn't fair. I loved this man so much sometimes it made me feel sick, and now I was going to lose him. I wanted to tell him not to go, but I couldn't, knowing as I did that he was one of the few people in this world who might succeed in rescuing my brother. And he would go anyway, because that's the kind of man he was.
"Don't cry, my love."
"I won't," I said, sobbing through my lie. "Please be careful, Angus. I love you so much. Please come back to me."
He didn't make the promise he couldn't know he would keep, so he told me a bit more about my father, and eventually I stopped crying. We spoke for a while, and then he said he had to get ready to go, and I told him I loved him, and we said our goodbyes. I pressed the screen to end the call, and burst into tears again. I sat crying with my head in my hands for what seemed like ages, until someone turned a light on in the room, and I looked up to see Julia framed in the doorway.