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Elin

Parque Nacional, Portugal, October 2021

Elin swings around, freezes.

Steed.

How long had he been there? Watching?

‘Christ, you scared me …’ She quickly moves back, putting some space between them.

‘Didn’t mean to startle you.’ An odd, lopsided smile is fixed on his face. ‘Called your name a few times, but you were in a world of your own.’

Elin watches as his eyes travel across her face, the hairs on the back of her neck standing up on end. The same sharp prickle of fear she felt when he’d come into the Airstream.

He hasn’t slept , she thinks, taking in his red-rimmed eyes, the crumpled clothes.

There’s an emptiness in him that she’s never seen before. He looks hollowed out, a shadow of the person she knew.

As he takes a step towards her, dirty boots sending a cloud of ash up into the air, her mind starts to spiral .

He’s followed her up here . An isolated spot. She was right. This is what this whole thing was about. A game. Toying with her. Bringing her out here and then trying to get her alone.

The wind whistles past them, shaking the trees. Training kicking in, Elin backs away again.

Steed holds up his hand. ‘Don’t be frightened. I’m just trying to find out what’s going on.’ He’s trying to sound calm, but his eyes, darting around the clearing, are telling her anything but. ‘This is one of the places on Kier’s map, isn’t it?’

Elin doesn’t reply, her mind still trying to process his presence, how he’s here at the same time as her. ‘How did you know I was up here?’ Her voice is shaky.

‘I saw you leave the van. Just wanted to know where you were going.’

‘Have you been watching us? Watching what we’ve been doing?’

Panic flickers across his face. ‘Not watching. Just wondered where you were heading.’

Anger washes over her.

How does he think she’ll interpret that, after everything he’s done this past year?

He’s arrived here, confessed he’d been the one watching her, sending her those messages, and now he’s done the same thing again ?

‘Can’t you see that following me here—’ She stops, lost for words. For a moment, she’s not angry, just sad.

How has it come to this? One of her closest friends …

Steed’s face twitches. ‘I didn’t think, I’m sorry. It’s just hard, Elin. This waiting. I know how you want to play this, but surely what we’ve found about the camp already is enough to do something? Confront them? They’ve got my sister embroiled in whatever twisted shit they’re up to out here. My sister .’ The word hangs in the air and as he looks at her, his face flushes an angry red.

Elin takes another slow step back. She doesn’t like this. He looks if not on the brink, then pretty close to it.

‘You’ve found something, haven’t you?’ Steed demands when she doesn’t answer. ‘I saw you looking at something. That’s why you’ve come here, isn’t it?’

Watching his eyes skitter across the space, Elin’s thoughts lurch to the fire.

If he sees the remains of Kier’s clothes while he’s in this state, he’ll assume the worst: that she’s dead. If that happens, there’s every chance he’ll storm down to camp and blow the whole thing up.

Keep it together , she tells herself, keeping her gaze away from the site of the fire. Don’t look at it. Don’t give him any reason to think something’s up.

Her pulse ticks in her throat as his gaze flickers back and forth across the grass.

An uneasy silence settles between them.

‘Look,’ she says finally. ‘What you’re doing, following me here, it isn’t part of the deal.’ Her voice holds a steel that she doesn’t feel. ‘Isaac told you that, didn’t he? If you want our help, you have to do this our way. When we find something we can work with, we’ll let you know.’

‘It’s just knowing the camp are down there, that they probably know what happened to her. I want to do something.’

‘You can’t.’ Elin keeps her face set. ‘We go crashing in there without anything concrete, they’ll bolt. Any hope we have of getting answers … it’s gone.’

‘I get it.’ Steed’s shoulders slump. ‘Just feels like I’m living some kind of nightmare. It’s not only this, but what’s happened between us. It’s like I’ve lost both of you at once. Knowing I can’t make it better – I hate it. Hate that I can’t even talk to you.’ His eyes are drilling into her face, something hungry, desperate in them, and she knows what he’s looking for: forgiveness.

But she can’t give it. Not yet. Not on his timings. Maybe not ever.

As he continues to look at her, Elin picks over his words, anger coursing through her again: what’s happened between us. There was no us. It was all on him. How can she even contemplate reconciling when he hasn’t grasped the enormity of all this, his culpability?

‘Look, I should get back.’ Elin takes a long, slow breath. ‘You should too. ’

Steed opens his mouth as if to protest and then closes it again, his face going slack.

He no longer looks on the brink, she thinks, but already broken.

She’s seen it too many times in the job she does. People who’ve got nothing left to lose – they’re unpredictable, dangerous.

Watching his face twitch, fear consumes her again.

Biting down on her lip, she strides away, but it’s an effort to keep her gait steady. She can feel his eyes on her with every step she takes.