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“Fuck. I’d completely forgotten that whole thing with the sound. They never replaced the cameras, did they?”
“No.” I racked my brain, trying to think back to that first day and what Camille had said about the dodgy cameras. “I know mine and Nico’s was out. And she definitely mentioned one of the cabana cameras, and at least one other villa.”
“Ours was out,” Santana said. She looked resigned. “I remember that Camille girl coming round to try to fix it. Fuck.” She kicked angrily at the foot of the bed and then swiped at a mosquito whining past her. “Fuck, fuck, fuck. Why does everything keep stacking against us? How can he keep having all the luck?”
“He cannot,” Angel said. She said it calmly, but there was a grimness to her tone that I didn’t like. “Lyla, these broken microphones, they work two ways. Yes, they make it easier for him to kill us. But they will make it also easier for us to kill him.”
“We are not killing him,” I said through gritted teeth.
“We may not have a choice,” Angel said. “Are you prepared to sit there and let Santana die without insulin?”
“That won’t happen,” I said. “There’s three of us and only one of him—”
“Two, counting Zana,” Angel broke in, but I plowed on.
“And if it gets to that stage, we will make him give us the insulin.”
“What do you mean?” It was full dark now, the quick tropical dusk that turned the sky from milky lemon to deep night in just a few minutes, so I couldn’t see Santana’s face, but her voice was curious. “What do you mean, the missing mics will make it easier for us to kill him?”
I clenched my fists. I didn’t like that will. Not would but will.
“Because if he dies, they will have to prove motive,” Angel said calmly. “And without the microphones, we will not have one.”
“We are not killing him,” I said. I lay down on my mattress, pulling the thin sheet up to protect myself from the mosquitoes. “It’s not going to come to that. It won’t.”
But as I lay there, staring into the darkness, a picture came into my head that was not entirely comforting.
It was Conor, standing on the beach, shading his eyes as he looked at the boat with an expression on his face that was not relief.
It was calculation.
And it took me a long time to fall asleep.
CHAPTER 28
“WHERE IS ZANA?” Santana was standing, her hands on her hips, facing up to Conor. Her sarong was bunched up around her waist, and from where I was standing I could see the livid red scar where she’d been slashed in the storm. It should have made me feel better in a way, proof of my first aid ingenuity, and of the human body’s power to survive and heal itself, but it didn’t. The scar was proof of one other thing: how long we had been on this island. Long enough for a cut like that to heal over and scar. And that was increasingly terrifying. How long had it been? Two weeks? Three? All I knew was that I was starting to lose track of time, that things like baths or flushing toilets or hot meals were starting to feel like a distant memory—and that Conor still hadn’t given us our water for today. Now he was standing in front of us with empty hands and an infuriatingly calm expression on his face.
“That’s none of your business,” he said. “She’s fine.”
“Yes, it’s my fucking business!” Santana shouted. “And I don’t believe you!”
She tried to push past Conor to the gangway out to the water villa, but Conor held her back easily with one hand, and I made up my mind. We weren’t going to get past him, so I would go around.
I pulled off my T-shirt, dropped it onto the sand, and waded quietly into the sea behind Conor’s back, breaking into long strokes as soon as the water was halfway up my body.
Conor was so busy arguing with Santana, I was halfway to the water villa before he realized what was happening. I heard the splash as he dived in after me, glanced behind me, and felt my pulse quicken as I saw his dark shape moving through the blinding turquoise water.
“Zana!” I yelled, pushing the wet hair out of my eyes, and I saw a silhouette move in front of the windows of the water villa. “Zana!”
I glanced over my shoulder again. Conor was head down, scything through the water with an easy powerful stroke. I broke out into a crawl, but Conor was faster and more powerful, and as he came up beside me, I felt his hand close on my shoulder, pushing me down into the water.
For a second, I honestly thought he was going to drown me. The sea closed over my head, my nostrils filled with brine, and I thought, this is it. He’s going to kill me like he killed Dan, like he probably killed Joel. Only he’s going to do it right here in front of everyone. But then, just as I was beginning to thrash with panic, I felt a hand in my hair, and he dragged me up and out of the water.
“Let go of me!” I snarled as soon as my face broke the surface, and I twisted myself out of his grip. Conor laughed, derisively.
“I was saving your life, Lyla. Maybe you shouldn’t go out of your depth if you can’t swim.”
He was panting, treading water, and there was a cut on his eyebrow where I must have caught him as I struck out in panic.
