Chapter Text
Part 1
Kent stared at his hand, a look closer to shock than horror on his face, and by the time his head tipped back and his eyes came to rest on the already darkening bruise around Mansell's eye they had taken on a glassy quality.
"Hey, mate." Mansell said, reaching out. He'd been all too ready to give the little bastard a whaling for hitting him, but Kent's expression, coupled with the flinch that near sent him tumbling backwards into the hall, brought Mansell's police training to the fore, and just like he would any scared victim he stopped perfectly still and said in his most reassuring voice. "I'm just going to call your sister yeah?"
And he took a careful step back, giving Kent the space he so clearly needed to regroup and called Erica. She picked up after the first ring with a cheery "Hello?"
"Erica, You need to come home." Mansell said quietly.
"Finn? Why? What's wrong? Has someone broken in?"
"I came over to pick up my jacket, only Emerson was here and we had a bit of an arguement."
"That's all the both of you seem to be doing nowadays. I'm not surprised."
"Yeah well, he took a swing at me and blacked my eye and now he's-"
"Emerson HIT you?" Erica sounded worried suddenly, and Mansell knew it wasn't worry for him, and from the way Kent had slid down the wall during the conversation and buried his head in his hands he couldn't hold it against her. "I'll be right home."
"Anything I should avoid doing?" he asked.
"Don't loom." she informed him, and hung up.
So Mansell didn't loom, he squatted down beside Kent, not too close. "You ok mate?" he asked.
Kent heaved a shuddering breath and nodded. "Sorry." he forced out quietly, his voice cracking.
"Nothing to be sorry for. I'm sure I deserved it for something." Mansell told him with a small grin. It didn't have quite the effect he'd intended. Kent looked at him scandalised, eyes wide and there was the beginnings of some deeper rooted fear and horror there. And suddenly Kent was tripping over himself to tell Mansell that he hadn't deserved it, no one deserved it, but there was a hint in his voice, just a slight catch that told Mansell everything he needed to know, as if the rest of this whole thing wasn't damming enough.
He wondered how he hadn't noticed it before, but Kent was always just Kent, and Erica had been so well adjusted that he hadn't even realised. But suddenly a whole lot of things were beginning to make sense, and he didn't like the implications there at all.
But then Erica arrived, and Mansell bowed out gracefully, leaving his jacket for another day, and giving Erica the space she needed to comfort her clearly distraught twin.