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He buzzed the delivery guy in and received the food without any need to use the weapon.
My stomach growled audibly. I couldn’t believe how quickly the food had arrived. It was like magic.
“Here.” He carried everything to the dining room table and laid it all out. “I’ll grab some plates.”
He returned with a couple of plates and some cutlery balanced in one hand. In the other, he had two cold bottles of beer, the tops already removed. He opened the individual packages, revealing the noodles I’d ordered—a pad Thai, a kind of flat, rice noodles—and the others to display spring rolls, prawns in tempura batter, spicy chicken wings, prawn toast, and then a ball of sticky rice to go with a green curry that was his main meal.
I surveyed the feast. “We’re never going to eat all of this.”
He picked up a tempura prawn, dipped it in some sweet chili sauce, and took a bite. “Wanna bet?”
I didn’t have anything I could bet him, so I ducked my head and focused on my noodles. There was a sprinkling of crushed peanuts and finely sliced red chillies over them, and beansprouts and egg stirred in. I slurped up a mouthful, realising this wasn’t the most gracious thing to be eating in front of a man, but it was so delicious I didn’t care and scooped more in. I ate a mouthful of the red chillies, not considering how hot they might be. The spice hit me at the back of the throat, and I coughed and spluttered.
“Spicy!” I gasped, reaching for the bottle of beer and chugging it back.
To my surprise, he laughed. “Red chillies will do that to you.”
I wasn’t used to spicy food. I pushed the rest of the chillies to one side, and, when I could feel my tongue again, continued to eat my meal.
He watched me with amusement. “You still sure we won’t get through this? You’ve made short work of the noodles.”
Sure enough, I had, so I reached for a spring roll and then a prawn.
“It’s very good,” I said, between mouthfuls, keeping my hands raised to hide my mouth.
“I know. Can’t beat London for a good choice in food.”
He took a long swig from his beer, and I picked up the bottle he’d set in front of me and drank, too.
What were we going to do now? It was getting late, and to say we’d had a long day was an understatement. It felt like a week had passed since we’d been in the cabin. I wondered if anyone had found the man’s body yet. I shuddered. I still hadn’t reconciled myself with the fact I was a killer. Perhaps I never would. It might have been self-defence, but he’d still be living and breathing if it wasn’t for me. The memory of how his dead weight had slumped on top of me after I’d stabbed him, how I’d wriggled and struggled to get out from under him, even as he was convulsing and taking his final breaths, would stay with me forever.
I stifled a yawn.
“Before we can sleep,” Leo said, “there’s something I need to do.”
“What?”
“I need to send your father a video.”
“What of?”
“You really want to know?”
I hesitated for a moment, unsure. Did I? But then I decided knowledge was power and I nodded and leaned in. Leo held out his phone so we could both see.
At first, I struggled to piece together what was on the screen. The image was dark. Something pale was in the corner. It grew closer—or at least whoever was holding the camera got closer—and I suddenly understood what I was seeing.
“Oh.”
I was looking at myself sitting in the cupboard after I’d suffered from multiple panic attacks. My eyes appeared to be hollows in my skull. The way I wasn’t focusing on anything, not even the man behind the camera, who I now knew was Leo, was unnerving.
“Okay, enough. I don’t want to see any more.”
Leo hit send.
“Well, I hope your father will at least watch the whole thing so he can see how traumatised his daughter is.”
I didn’t know how I felt about that. I was happy to be out from under his roof, and out from under his iron grip on my life, but did I want him to torture himself thinking I was being hurt? Would he even care? A part of me wondered if Leo had even considered this. My father might be angry that someone had dared to come onto his compound and take his daughter, but the reason for his anger would be that someone had stolen something that was his.
