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I don’t know what causes me to glance behind, but the quiet young guy has got up and followed me, and I stop and wait for him. He grimaces when he reaches me.
“You okay?” I ask, and he tilts his head at me as I look at his narrowed eyes. His face is almost shimmering in the sunlight. I stare off toward the squat, and the drum has disappeared from view, just a wreck of ground and wild grasses growing everywhere.
“I’m good,” he says softly, still watching me. Why is he looking at me like that? And when I reach out to touch his arm, suddenly I feel something strange take me over. My head wooly and dislocated, the horizon swimming.
The guy’s face washes in and out. “You’re Fabian, aren’t you?”
I frown at him. I don’t remember telling them my name.
I don’t see the blade that pierces my side. I just feel an excruciating pain that washes through my body. And my hand locks around his wrist, his face looming over me as I stare up at the stubble on his chin. “You should keep your nose out of other people’s business,” he whispers, “keep your nose out of South Africa.” And his feet blur as he walks away from me. I watch him wipe the blade on the grass—my blood. And I think about Kate and Josh’s little lifeless body, and how much I wanted to look after her, as I go down on my knees. I have no ability to defend myself or run away, and he’s back now and his foot comes up and he kicks me in the face. Pain sears through my head before everything goes black.
38
Kate
The apartment seems eerily quiet when I arrive and head through to the bedroom: The room is dark but the bed is empty. I move back through to the lounge. Fabian’s phone is sitting on the coffee table, and I pick it up and tap in his security code. My message from last night saying I was heading here after work and another one from this morning saying, “I’m coming over,” are the last ones there, unread. I walk slowly into the kitchen. It’s exactly how it was when I left it, my dishes still in the sink.
On impulse I pull my phone out of my pocket and press Jo’s number.
“Hey,” she says.
“Did Fabian crash at yours last night?”
“No, why?”
“I don’t know.” I look at the food crusting on the dishes. “I’m at Fabian’s and he’s not here.”
“Is that unusual?”
“Maybe not. He’s probably out on a run, clearing his head.”
“What do you mean, clearing his head?”
I give her a blow-by-blow account of how I found him high as a kite with the door open and our argument. “I came back this morning to talk to him, but he’s not here and his apartment …” I stare around the kitchen again. “It’s like he didn’t touch anything after I left.”
“What’s that?” I hear Janus’s voice in the background.
“Kate’s at Fabian’s, and he’s not there. Hang on, I’ll put you on speaker,” Jo says, as she talks him through what I’ve just told her.
There’s a loud rustle on the line.
“Do you think he went on a bender?” Janus echoes through the speaker, warm voice reassuring in my ear and so like Fabian’s.
God, maybe those people that followed him came back and … “Maybe, but I’m in the apartment and everything’s here, his phone, everything.”
“He’s not just popped out for some milk? Or parkour? He can be out for hours, can’t he?”
“Yeah.” But … “Without his phone?” I swallow. “Janus, a couple of months ago he was followed and drugged on the street.”
“Youwhat?Drugged?Are youkiddingme? How?”
“It was in June. Months ago. After parkour. He went for a drink with Darren and someone followed him when he left the bar. He started feeling really odd and thought maybe the guy had slipped something in his drink. So, he got an alarm installed and said he was watching the messages of those hackers that attacked your company. He said that he didn’t think anyone knew where he lived.”
“Followed.Fucking hell!The crazy shit. Why didn’t he tell me?”
“He didn’t want to worry you. I’m sorry, Janus. Tell me what to do.”
He blows out a long breath. “I can’t believe that happened and he didn’t tell me. Jesus Christ. What was hethinking?” I can hear him pacing over the floor through the line, the urgency in his voice when he says, “The alarm: was it on when you got there?”
