About to dial, Elin stops, noticing the no-signal icon on her screen. “Signal’s down.” She tries to keep her voice steady.
“It isn’t great here, not compared to the main island.” Farrah gestures toward the bedside table. “Try the landline.”
Elin stands, reaches for the phone. But all she gets is silence. “It’s dead. Either the storm’s taken it out or Caleb’s cut the line.” She bites down on her lip. “I don’t want to leave you like this, but I’m going to have to go to the main island to call. I’ll get one of the first-aiders over to you at the same time.”
Farrah picks up on the hesitancy in her tone. “It’s fine, really. You go.”
Still reluctant to leave her, Elin mulls it over. With no idea of Caleb’s whereabouts, it’s a risk. But not going back to the main island is also risky.
“Go.” Farrah squeezes her hand. “Honestly, I’m fine.”
“Okay, but you need to lock the door behind me, from the inside.”
Farrah nods. After giving her one last once-over, Elin lets herself out of the villa, the door slamming shut behind her.
Water, everywhere.
Pools formed in the dirty hollows, bigger streams carved out between the leaf litter.
Jumping between them, Elin finds the path, slips between the trees. She breaks into a jog, the saturated ground kicking up a mix of spray and dirt.
As she powers through the final thicket of trees, a gust catches her hair, sending it lashing around her face. It momentarily blinds her, and she skids to a stop.
Reaching up, Elin roughly tugs it away, but too late: a sudden movement at the edge of her vision.
A searing, sharp pain.
Everything goes hazy, a liquid blackness that seems to push up from the base of her skull, pouring over and through her like a wave. For a moment, it sounds like the rain is inside her skull, a soft pitter-patter.
Her vision seems to tunnel, an inky black surging from the outside in.
Then total darkness.
92
When Elin comes to, she’s soaked through, bitterly cold.
For a moment she thinks she’s in the water, floating, waves breaking around her, but as her ankle judders—a jerky up and down—she realizes that while she is moving, she’s not on water, but land.
She blinks once, twice, but can see nothing; she’s been blindfolded.
Panic flares as she tries to move her arms, tug it away, but she’s on her back, her hands tied behind her.
Fingers dig hard against her ribs.
Caleb. Holding her under her arms, dragging her backward.
All she can hear is the wild thrashing of the sea. With every step, the sound gets louder, more intimidating.
Bile rises up the back of her throat. He’s pulling her toward the water.
While there’s a chance he might just throw her in, there’s an equal chance that he’ll make sure she really is unconscious before doing so. In these conditions, if that happens, it’s all over.
Fear closes over her throat, makes it hard to swallow.
Questions dart through her mind: How long has she been unconscious? Has he already gotten to Farrah? Done the same to her?
Think, Elin, think.
For a moment, she can’t process it, but then her brain stutters into gear.
A decision: if she stands any chance of getting out of this, she has to play for time. Pretend that she’s still unconscious, wait until he stops, and then make her move.
A spray of water hits her face. They’re only a few feet from the sea; she has to act now.
In one smooth motion, she propels herself forward; a clumsy jerk of head and torso.
But it works: unbalanced, Caleb rocks from side to side, the hands clamped under her arms briefly slackening.
Falling forward with a thud, Elin scrambles awkwardly to her knees, inches herself onward.
Her ribs are heaving, sore from his grip. A few yards on, she puts her right foot out, tries to stand, but Caleb’s already rallied.
His hand grabs her leg, jerks her back, toward him.
Elin attempts to wrench herself forward again, out of reach, but he’s quicker. Stronger.
The grip on her ankle tightens; his fingers are just beneath her ankle bone, pushing, pressing.
No time to think: she simply has to move. Elin rolls, cheek pressed stickily to the ground. The movement dislodges not only the grip on her leg, but loosens the tie around her wrists; the pressure from the ligature gives, ever so slightly. Sliding her wrists backward and forward across the ground, she tries to loosen it further.
One, two, three, hard strokes across the ground.
It works: Elin wriggles her fingers free with a sudden euphoria, bringing her hands back around in front of her, but she didn’t think about what might come after—the vulnerability of being on her back.