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When we were sitting around the table with Tim and Varesh, I couldn’t stay still after hearing about the cameras. Now, I wanted to wrap my hands around Dustin’s neck and squeeze the life out of him myself.

Ava had been watching my expression closely, and she gave me the smallest smile. “I kneed him in the nuts.”

“Well deserved, from the sound of it.”

Her features sobered, and she let out a loud sigh. “I think that was the last time I felt in control of anything. The rest was… I don’t even know what it was.”

“What happened after you kneed him?”

“He grabbed me a second time.” She pulled her hand away from mine and stroked her upper arm. “I tried to yank my arm free and run, but I—”

“You don’t have to say it. I know.”

Ava’s throat moved as she swallowed. “I didn’t go down there planning to kill him. I never want you to think that about me.”

She’d hidden the nail gun from the woman in Bellmere to avoid scaring her and didn’t want to enter a house where she might have to put down infected children. The idea that she’d run downstairs with murder on her mind didn’t fit with anything I knew of her.

“I don’t,” I said, resting my hand on her knee. “Why the knife, though?”

Ava sighed. “I couldn’t hide the axe—and I hoped I wouldn’t need to use the knife.”

“You thought the underwear-stealing freak who hid cameras in people’s houses might back away from a pretty girl with a kitchen knife?”

She let out a humourless laugh. “It sounds stupid when you lay it all out there like that.”

“A bit.”

The corner of her mouth twitched. “You called me pretty, though.”

I smiled, but when I pictured how easily it could have gone wrong for her, my humour faded. “It could have been you lying on the ground out there.”

She nodded quickly, avoiding my eyes at first. “I know.”

“That’s the part I can’t get past.”

Ava looked at me for a long moment. “I’m sorry. You asked me not to run off without you, and that’s about the first thing I did.”

I held her gaze, my jaw locked tight. “Promise me you won’t do that again.”

She gave me a sad smile rather than arguing. “I won’t.”

We sat together for a while as the storm gathered strength outside. Eventually, I carried the bowl of water into the kitchen, the diluted blood swirling with each step. I washed the contents down the drain, then rinsed the bowl and cloth.

When I went back into the lounge room, Ava was rubbing her thumb over her finger as if she might still find blood there.

I sat beside her, our shoulders touching as rain tapped steadily against the window. Down in the car park, the blood would already be washing away, erased before we’d had the chance to process what had happened.

“We should get some blankets,” I said. “Set up on the couch for the night, if you want.”

She rested her head on my shoulder. “Soon.”

I relaxed against the backrest, head tilted, eyes closed. Just a few more minutes with her in the quiet, then I’d get up and grab those blankets.

Cold seeped into my bones, dragging me into consciousness. I lay half-reclined, eyes closed, trying to remember why I’d fallen asleep outside.

When the creak of a settling building broke through the quiet, it all fell into place.

Sadie’s apartment.