Page 120 of Convict's Game

No answer came. The first room, a little-used cinema, was empty and dark. Prowling further down the corridor brought us to a formal dining area, bathed in moonlight and vacant.

Convict walked a step ahead of me, his hand wrapped around mine and his focus sharp.

The hall opened out to a vestibule, and I pushed open the kitchen door. It made no sense that a visitor had just left, but no one was around to see him go. I called out again, but no reply followed.

In the kitchen, my gaze locked on to a barometer on the wall. It had come from a ship, and my grandfather would tap it to check the rising or falling pressure and predict the weather.

A wave of sadness captured me.

On almost every other occasion visiting here, he’d been alive. I’d hear him before I’d see him. That’s what was so odd. The silence that came after death. The lack of a man who’d been so larger than life that his energy had filled the space around him.

As if he sensed my turmoil, Convict ran an arm around me from behind to hold me with my back to his chest.

I turned to face him. “It’s so weird. I miss him in the oddest moments.”

He brushed a stray lock of hair from my eyes. “I’m sorry.”

I rested my head on his chest and let the unhappiness well and fade in the tiny moment of peace in a fraught evening.

A figure loomed at us from across the kitchen, something flashing in their hands.

I screamed. The sound erupted from me and cut through the still air. It was a repeat of the burger place where Esther’s mother had tried to stab me. Except this time, in a heartbeat, I was behind Convict and he’d palmed his blade, his stance protective.

But our assailant uttered a matching scream and tumbled to the floor, a cereal bowl dropping from his hands and shattering. The shiny spoon he’d been holding clattered across the tile, and milk and frosted flakes pooled at the feet of a man I knew well.

“Wallace,” I gasped.

In a blue satin dressing gown, and with headphones dislodged from his ears, my uncle scurried back until his spine hit the cabinets. His focus stayed fully on the man guarding me.

I exhaled my panic and squeezed Convict’s arm. “It’s okay.”

Wallace’s terrified gaze jumped from the knife to me. “Emilia? What the hell?”

At last I’d get to speak to him, but with his expression souring by the second, Wallace was not so happy to see me.

Ten minutes later, with the mess cleared up, we’d relocated to the den.

Wallace regarded me with a baleful expression which sank to fear each time he snuck a look at Convict. Every word since our shock encounter had been a gripe.

“You should have let me know you were coming.” He took a sip of the hot drink he’d made himself, a swig of something stronger added.

I huffed an unfunny laugh. “I’ve been trying to speak to you for a month and you never replied to a single message.”

He wafted a hand. “What can I say? I’ve been busy.”

Busy sunning himself, from the deep tan. “You managed to go see my family.”

“I was in the area. I thought your mother might make you see sense.”

Yeah, right. “You were paying her off to talk to me.”

“It worked in the past. She took my parents’ money to have you.”

I fought to keep my expression clear. Convict had once guessed that little fact. I hated that it could be true. “Is my grandmother here?”

“No. She doesn’t want to see you either, so I don’t know why you’re harassing her. Let the poor woman grieve.”

Pain pierced my frustration with him. “I’m grieving, too. The company is in turmoil. It’s important that I see her before the meeting on Friday.”