Page 2

‘What do you mean?’ she asked.

‘No luggage. Is your toothbrush in your pocket?’

‘My bag’s in the car.’ She looked at Otis. ‘You put it in, right?’

‘I think I know where this is going,’ Ryan murmured to Mary, a moment before Otis shook his head.

‘No. Why would I?’

Sally’s mouth formed into an ‘O’ and her eyes widened in a cartoonish look of shock.

‘Oh. My. God.’ She folded her arms. ‘I told you to.’

‘I didn’t hear you. And it’s your bag.’

Sally pursed her lips and stared at Mary. ‘You need to take me home. I’m not staying here without my stuff.’

‘You don’t need much,’ Mary said. ‘We’re only here one night.’

‘So you’re saying you won’t give me a ride home?’

‘It’s a three-hour round trip.’

‘So?’

‘So it’s a three-hour round trip.’ Mary tried a smile to break through her daughter’s frown. ‘That’s quite a long way.’

‘This. Is.’ Sally shook her head. ‘Unbelievable. I knew this would happen.’

She marched out of the door, in the direction of the lake.

‘I’ll talk to her,’ Otis said. ‘There’re clothes and stuff here. She’ll be fine.’

‘Thank you,’ Mary said.

She watched Otis jog to catch up to his sister, and turned to Ryan. ‘A great start.’

He shrugged. ‘They’re teenagers. If it wasn’t this it’d be something else.’ He held up the knife. ‘Back to the important stuff. You want to see?’

She didn’t really, not now, but she also didn’t want to disappoint him.

‘Go on, then,’ she said.

‘With a normal knife – even a sharp one – you need pressure to cut the tomato,’ he said. ‘But this is so sharp the weight of the knife alone is enough.’

He placed the sharp edge of the cleaver’s blade on the smooth skin of the tomato. It puckered slightly, before yielding as the knife sank through the flesh of the tomato.

‘See?’ he said. ‘That is one sharp knife.’

Three Months Earlier, Elsewhere

The woman emerges from the changing rooms, her wet hair scraped back into a ponytail. Her towel is rolled up and tucked under her arm, a pair of sneakers dangling from her fingers. In her other hand she holds a set of car keys and a phone. As she walks into the entrance hall of the gym, her phone buzzes and she glances at it, then pauses to tap out a message.

You observe her from your seat at a table in the corner, a cap low over your eyes.

You have finally found her.

It was not easy.