Page 176 of These Tears

The lavatory is barely big enough for one person, let alone both of us. The sloped ceiling presses low above his head, the sink digging into my thigh. His body fills what little space remains with smoke, cold air and violence held back.

‘What did you tell Inga?’ he asks quietly.

My fingers grip the porcelain behind me until the edge bites into my palm. ‘Nothing.’

His eyes move over my face with that same awful focus I remember from the prison, the plane, the cabin – every moment he has looked at me as though he knew he could peel something open without ever laying a hand on me.

‘Leah?’ My name is not a warning this time. It’s something that precedes it.

At the peak of my terror, my teeth clamp together. Something hotter than fear pushes through it.

Gritting my teeth, I raise my chin as he takes that last step towards me and washes us both in shadow.

‘I said nothing, Jakob. She, however…’

His eyes narrow and lose their focus. The colour drains from his face.

We can still hear the women talking downstairs. A baby fussing. Someone laughing. The sounds press against the locked door as if they want to break in.

His gaze slips past me, fixing on something that doesn’t exist on the wall.

I see the skin between his dark brows furrowing, his eyes flashing before they darken.

‘You don’t know anything.’ The words scrape out of him raw.

‘That sounds familiar. We’re back to that?’ I shoot back.

His jaw unclenches, head turning and dipping towards mine until every inch feels loaded.

I flatten myself against the wall as if plaster and paint might yawn open and take pity on me.

‘That doesn’t scare me any more,’ I lie. Despicably. Because he makes me want to scream even at a distance.

The air thins to the damp warmth of his breath and the scent of smoke in his hair.

But his face—

It’s not rage.

His eyes shine without spilling, and every swallow catches visibly in his throat. Whatever chains he’s pulling on now seem to hurt.

That pain sits in his cold eyes and the rigid line of his mouth.

‘Did she dress it up in professional terminology?’ he asks through gritted teeth. ‘Hm?’

I hold my ground, though every instinct in me is counting the inches to the door.

‘Did she tell you Melody had been coming into my room since the night she moved into the mansion with Isak? Did she tell you I was sixteen? What does that piece of information offer you now?’

My tongue turns into stone.

I watch him force out the words as though keeping them in has become more painful than the alternative.

‘Did she tell you…’ His voice drops, then catches, ‘that whenever Isak stayed late at work, Melody was with me? That she came in like the Crane house was already hers. Like I was hers?’

His forearm hits the wall so suddenly I flinch, but he just keeps it there. Then his other hand rises to brace the wall at my opposite shoulder in a movement so slow that I can’t help but brace. His knuckles crackle as he stares down at me with glazed eyes.

‘That she took what wasn’t hers to take,’ he says, ‘then walked out and had breakfast with my brother the next morning.’ His throat works. ‘And every morning after that.’