Bryony is right, the crackers and water settle the nausea but they do nothing to alleviate the terror, the confusion, the rage. When I take a closer look at the windows, any hope I had of smashing them and jumping out, dissolves. The glass is thick and, in places, uneven. I think it’s shatterproof and even if it wasn’t, it wouldn’t matter because on the other side are iron bars. I try the door hoping Bryony didn’t lock it, and predictably, find she did. With no way out, I start frantically looking for a weapon. In the dressing table is a tiny compact mirror. It’s so small, a shard wouldn’t big enough to inflict damage. I dash to the bathroom, hoping to find a larger mirror. Of course, there isn’t one. No razor, either. Nothing I can use as a weapon. Just another grand room. If this were a hotel and not a prison, I’d have melted into the freestanding, rolltop bath. Instead, paranoid Heath might barge in while I’m naked, I hop in the shower still wearing the pyjamas and wash quickly.
When I’m done, I wrap myself in the fluffy white towels and open the wardrobe. Inside there are dresses – only dresses – all in my size, all from my favourite shops and in my preferred colours. It’s like this room has been waiting for me. Given how many clothes there are, they plan to keep me here for a long time. I browse the rail, looking for something that isn’t restrictive so if I do get a chance to fight or run, I can. I settle on a cotton midi dress in navy and change quickly in the bathroom, one eye fixed on the closed door. I search for shoes but don’t find any. Looks like I won’t be taking a trip outside any time soon.
I dry my hair facing the door in case someone comes in. It feels surreal, dressing up to have drinks with my captor and the sister I haven’t seen in sixteen years. I wonder where Fake Olivia is and how she fits in to all of this? Why have I been brought here? And what do they plan to do with me? Did my sister wake up in a room just like this? I try to imagine her, only thirteen years old, terrified and alone, sick and dizzy from drugs, being told to dress up for her masked abductor, and I feel nauseous all over again.
I go to the window. The sun is slowly sinking, spilling inky purple and deepest indigo across the sky. The grounds of this house are vast and green, mostly wild and overgrown. The only part that is carefully maintained is the area around the small lake. Bowed willow trees graze the water, and there is an island at its centre with a stone, weathered statue of a couple embracing, collecting just enough moss to look pretty. There are no other houses, though. Not one. Hope withers in my chest and I sink to the floor, pressing my knees into the hardwood. I didn’t realise it is possible to feel claustrophobic in such a large space but the walls of this extravagant cage seem to close in on me. Either my heart is expanding in my chest or my ribs are shrinking. I fall forward, onto my hands and can’t breathe.
I don’t even hear the door open but Bryony kneels beside me, brushing sweaty strands of hair back from my face. She makes soothing noises and instructs me to copy her breathing. In and out. In and out. We sit like that until my pulse slows.
‘It’s the drugs,’ she tells me.
‘Not drugs,’ I say. ‘Fear.’
She’s quiet after that.
‘They’re waiting for us,’ she says eventually. It’s only now, as I let her help me to my feet, that I notice the wedding band and sapphire engagement ring on her left hand.
‘You’re married?’ I ask. ‘To Heath?’
She frowns then looks down at her hand as if it doesn’t belong to her. ‘Yes.’
I blanche. Didn’t Fake Olivia let slip she was married? Didn’t she tell me she could find me the perfect husband? My stomach flips and flips again. Panic starts to rise, threatening to close over my head. She reaches for me and I see a shiny pink scar, snaking from wrist to elbow on her left arm. Did she do that or did Heath? Tears start to blur my vision. ‘What’s going to happen to me?’
She presses her lips together in a silent, pitying line. ‘Right now,’ she says softly, ‘I’m going to put these on you.’ She reaches past me to the windowsill where a pair of handcuffs wait. She must’ve set them down when she came in and found me mid-panic attack. The chain on this pair is only a few inches long. I shake my head and back away. ‘No.’
She sighs. ‘Caitlin …’
‘No.’
She glances at the door. ‘You won’t be able to see Olivia if you don’t let me put them on.’
My mind races. ‘Pretend to do them up and then—’
She’s shaking her head. ‘He isn’t stupid. And even if you aren’t restrained, there are two of them.’
‘Two …’ I’m breathing too fast again. ‘But there are two of us and my sister.’
She frowns.
‘Please,’ I say. ‘Listen—’
‘He’ll kill me,’ she says flatly.
I taste fear in the back of my throat but swallow it down and push on, knowing I have to convince her to help me. ‘Bryony, please—’
‘Put them on or don’t,’ she snaps. Startled by the sudden change in her demeanour, I take a step away from her. Gone is the patience and concern, replaced by something harder, something steely. ‘Look, if I don’t take you downstairs in the next few minutes, he’s going to come up here and then we’re both in trouble.’
Fear rises like bile. I swallow, weighing up my options. I don’t want to be restrained but refusing means being locked up in this room with zero hope of leaving. Zero hope of seeing my sister. Decision made, I hold out my wrists.
As I’m led from the bedroom, I glance back and see the deadbolt on the outside of my door. We turn left and walk down the long, wood-panelled corridor. The light comes from either end where there are identical, enormous arched windows that overlook two sets of stairs. My gaze swivels left and right. There are at least seven bedrooms. Three, including mine, have deadbolts on the outside. One has a padlock. It’s becoming apparent that I’m not just being held in a house, but in a stately home.
We descend the stairs to a large hall. In front of me is a sturdy wooden door, tall and broad, the kind you’d find in a castle or barn. The idea of making a run for it sets my heart skittering. I imagine myself fumbling with the lock, yanking the door open and sprinting from the house. I’d scream and scream and scream because even though no other houses were visible from my room, it doesn’t mean there aren’t any across the street. I step towards the door. Bryony grabs my upper arm, tearing my attention from it.
‘Please don’t,’ she whispers in quiet terror. ‘If you run, he’ll blame me.’
Every instinct shrieks for me to flee but logic dictates that my chances of making it outside are slim to none. It’s more than likely locked, so throwing myself at it won’t help. I take a moment to tamp down the urge to try before nodding at Bryony. She gives me a tiny, grateful smile and leads me through a door on our left. In the sitting room are three patterned sofas in warm hues, expensive, dark-wood furniture and a fireplace so big I could stand up in it.
Bryony cups my elbow and guides me through another door. Three of the four walls house floor-to-ceiling bookshelves, complete with rolling ladder. I’ve never seen this many books outside of a public library. Ornaments and trinkets are sprinkled among the hardbacks: a globe, a marble bust, brass candlesticks. There’s another lattice, arch window and more mahogany furniture, a stone fireplace. At the centre are two navy-blue armchairs and a three-seater sofa arranged around a coffee table. In the corner is a fully stocked bar cart. Behind that is another door.
Bryony tells me to sit in one of the armchairs. Reluctantly, I do. She kneels.
‘What’re you doing?’ I ask in a rush.
‘Cable tie,’ she answers, pulling one from her dress pocket.
I surge to my feet. Bryony looks panicked. She rises, too. ‘Sit down,’ she whispers sharply. ‘You agreed to this.’
‘I agreed to come down here to meet my sister. I was even mad enough to agree to the handcuffs. No one said anything about being tied to a chair.’
‘Well, I didn’t exactly have a terms-and-conditions document to hand for you to sign,’ she bites. She rubs her forehead as though she’s getting a headache. ‘If you don’t do this then Heath will come in here and escort you back to your room. I thought you wanted to see Olivia?’
‘I do.’
Her patience has all the integrity of a threadbare carpet and my refusal to ‘obey’ is rubbing it ever thinner. I reason that my hands are already secured and useless so does it really hinder me any more if one of my ankles is anchored to the armchair? I can’t spend even one night in this house knowing my sister is here without seeing her. Taking a couple of deep breaths, I sink obediently into the armchair.
Bryony exhales, relieved I’m complying. Once she’s pulled the cable tie tight enough that it pinches, she stands. ‘Try not to anger him,’ she says quietly. ‘It won’t end well.’
And with her warning still ringing in my ears, she leaves, closing the door behind her. Of course the second she’s gone I give the cuffs an experimental tug but the metal cuts into my wrists. My mind pendulum-swings between thinking about my seeing my sister and plotting my escape. I’m wondering whether I can drag the armchair over to the window and reach up high enough to smash it when the library door opens.
Adrenaline floods my veins.
I twist in my seat. Our eyes meet.
She is silent, waiting for my reaction.
I open my mouth and I scream.