‘We don’t have a choice,’ Nicole adds, with a resolute nod. ‘You can tell he’s not the kind of guy to mess around. I’ll sort out Evelyn, don’t worry.’ Nicole veers off toward the cafeteria. ‘Coming?’

Alex stands still, a thousand thoughts passing through her brain in one beat. As though for a second, she is more than just Alex. Tectonic plates shift deep in the ground. Lava churns. ‘Yep.’ She follows her friend across campus, the professor’s camera heavy in her backpack.

CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE: TUESDAY, 15 SEPTEMBER 2015

CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE

TUESDAY, 15 SEPTEMBER 2015

OLI NEEDS TO LEAVE. NEEDS TO PACK HER THINGS AND LEAVE. ON some level she knows that she will need to confront Dean, that she can’t just disappear, but the primal pulsing urge is to get out. She does her best to ignore Amy and Kate’s pale faces lurking behind Dean’s in her mind. She momentarily wonders if they will care if she leaves, but this thought morphs into a more pressing question: Are they safe?

The Toyota roars beneath her as she overtakes a delivery van on Swan Street. Its driver leers at her as she passes, a cigarette wobbling on his lip as he yells obscenities.

Jesus, she needs to calm down. Is it really possible? Could Dean be involved in all this? And if he is, how could she not have known? She thinks about Amy’s night terrors. Could they be a result of abuse? Anxiety grips her like ice. What if Isabelle found out that Dean was harming the girls. He would have done anything to cover that up.

God, she wishes she could talk to Cooper. She calls Lily.

‘Oli. Hello.’ Lily drawls. ‘This is a nice surprise. What’s been going on?’

Her sister’s voice triggers something, a disorienting sensation, like the road beneath her is water. ‘Lily,’ she manages to choke out.

‘Ol?’ Lily’s voice loses all its sarcasm. ‘You okay?’

‘Not really.’

‘Okay.’ Oli can tell Lily is nodding. ‘Where are you?’

‘Driving.’

‘You safe?’

Oli is flooded with nostalgia. That used to be their thing. You safe? they would text each other when one got home to find the other still out. Yep, safe, the other would reply.

It started after their mother was released from hospital, hollowed out and broken with guilt about what had been going on under her roof for all those years. About what had been done to Oli.

Well, it had actually started before that, when Oli would wake up in the morning with a migraine and refuse to go to school, and Lily would wait for Sally to leave for work then sneak into Oli’s room, her eyes asking the question. Oli always nodded, even though she wasn’t.

‘I’m safe,’ she says now.

‘Are you working?’

‘No, I just left.’

‘Want to come over?’