On the way back, Radzi looked over at Nikki but didn’t say anything. She was gazing out the window, her eyebrows curved in a way that made her look eerily sad.
He hesitated, then spilled out what he’d been thinking the whole drive. ‘I shouldn’t have encouraged you to find out. It’s more than you need to know.’
‘Since when did you get to choose what I need or needn’t know?’ she snapped.
Radzi stared ahead at the winding road. There was more to say, more truth, but she wasn’t paying attention to the way his hands quivered on the steering wheel – everything in her head was about Nick, about the innocence of a gifted teenage coterie.
As the car slowly went up the driveway, she guessed that her mother was drunk again. None of the lights were switched on except the one in Jean’s room, and her mother wasn’t waiting on the garden swing where she would be if she was sober.
‘Come on in,’ she said, an offering of reconciliation.
The living room was untidier than usual, and there was no sign of her mother passed out on the couch. In the small kitchen, a table was upturned, and coffee mugs and dinner plates lay in sharp shards on the floor.
‘Wha –?’
Then she ran to Jean’s room, calling out, yelling Jean’s name. Up the flight of stairs, three steps at a time, Radzi at her heel, and she kicked the door down. Then she stopped breathing. There was no one at all.
‘It’s okay,’ said Radzi, pulling Nikki to him. ‘It’s okay. Maybe they’re still at the movies. Maybe they rushed out and made a mess downstairs and – ’
He was jerked from her into the darkness. She felt someone cover her head in a rice sack and pull her hands back. There was a whamming pain at her temple, and then she lost herself.
When she came to, everything was wrong. Everything was dark and dizzy and she was still seeing stars. Then she made out a familiar voice, a voice that rang out in the dead silence, so shocking that it sent her mind reeling again.
‘I told you not to hurt her, you stupid fools! Just carry her out, I said! Look at those bruises!’
‘They tried to fight back, sir,’ answered a slow, thuggish voice.
‘Of course they tried to fight back! That’s what the sedative was for, you great old brute, and now you’ve brought that boy as well!’
There was a slow grunt. ‘Aye, he was fighting hard.’
‘Untie them now, and get out of my sight. I have work to do.’
Then her hands were freed, and the rice sack was pulled off.
‘Gui? What’s – Omigod – Jean – my mother – ’ Nikki was both confused and angry. Then she noticed Radzi curled up unconscious at her side. ‘WHAT HAVE YOU DONE TO HIM?’
‘He’s out for a bit longer. Stupid thugs put a whole syringe of sedative into him. He’ll be fine,’ he added hastily. ‘We have more pressing matters. Your sister and mother were taken today, and I’m almost a hundred per cent positive it’s the Iyseeks.’
This isn’t really happening, she thought. It’s too much, all of it, at once.
‘I realized it almost immediately after you left,’ he continued. ‘I kept asking myself, why had you three been so safe, even after Nick’s death? Surely they wanted a clean job of it? Then I understood. You were only safe as long as they thought you didn’t know.’
But Nikki’d had enough of everything. ‘WHAT DIFFERENCE IS THERE? IT’S NOT LIKE I’M GOING TO HUNT THEM MYSELF!’
‘Paranoia is a funny thing. It can get very powerful, and very driven. It doesn’t matter what you would or wouldn’t do, it’s what they think you could do.’
‘STOP THE WORD GAMES! TELL ME WHAT THE HELL –?’
‘I guessed correctly: when you came here, they knew what you’d find out. So I sent some people after you, to take you back here, the single untouchable place in all of Coska Island. The Iyseeks want you dead now.’
A chill crept down her spine, and then anxiety set in. ‘But my mother and Jean – what will they – there’s nothing – what do you think –’
In the big screen, Gui’s face hardened. ‘If you’re lucky, they’re still alive.’
‘If I’m lucky – YOU – BASTARD!’ She ran up to the screen and started hitting at it, her fist half the size of Gui’s nose. ‘YOU LEFT THEM FOR DEAD!’
At this, he was taken aback. ‘But I didn’t, Nikki. You did. You wanted to know, you came here, you left them for dead.’
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