“Catherine,” Shireen said. “Alex. Everyone who’s passed through those cells. Have you ever looked at them and talked to them?”

“Why does that matter?”

“You haven’t, have you?”

“So?” Rachel snapped. “What, you think talking to them means you’ve learnt something special?”

“YES!” Shireen shouted. “When you actually meet someone who’s going to die because of what you’ve done, when you look into their eyes and listen to their voice, it makes you think about what you’re doing! And that’s why you haven’t done it! Deep down you know what you’re doing is fucked up, but as long as you don’t talk to her you can pretend it’s not real. But it is, and if you keep doing this you’ll be murdering her the same way Tobruk murdered her boyfriend.”

Rachel flinched but didn’t look away. “Why are you doing this?” She sounded hurt, betrayed. “I thought I could trust you.”

“You can trust me,” Shireen said. “But as long as we’re in this mansion we’re always going to belong to Richard.” She glanced around. “Where is he?”

“He’s gone after Lesandra,” Rachel said unwillingly. “But he’ll be . . .”

“Whatever,” Shireen said. “I’m not sticking around to see who wins.” She started walking towards the far end of the chapel.

“Wait! What are you doing?”

“What I should have done a long time ago. I’m getting out and I’m breaking Catherine out too.”

Rachel’s eyes went wide. “Are you crazy?” She ran around, blocking Shireen. “You can’t!”

“Can you think of a better time?” Shireen demanded. “Richard’s busy with Lesandra. We’re not going to get a better chance than this. We’ll be out of the country by the time he even figures out she’s gone.”

“He’ll come after us!”

“When’s he ever done anything like that himself?” Shireen asked. “Even when Alex tried to break Catherine out he didn’t lift a finger. He just let Tobruk handle it all for him.”

Rachel stared at Shireen for a long moment, then shook her head. “Wow. You really don’t understand him at all, do you?”

“What?”

“Richard’s let us do whatever we like because we’ve never threatened anything he really cares about,” Rachel said. “He doesn’t care if we mess up the mansion or fight each other. But he cares about this. I don’t know where he’s going or what he’s going to do once he gets there, but it’s really, really important to him. If he loses that girl you think he’s going to say, ‘Oh well, too bad, let’s go home’? He’s going to come after her with everything he’s got.”

“So we go to someone who’ll help.”

“No one’s going to help! They didn’t help Alex and they won’t help us!”