Nine Perfect Strangers

Yao knew it was over, and he knew he’d never love anyone ever again quite the way he loved this strange woman.

His voice rasped in his throat. ‘What have you done?’

chapter seventy-one

Frances

Still it went on. The burning. The crashing.

Frances’s fear peaked and then plateaued. Her heart rate slowed. A great tiredness swept over her.

She had always wondered how she would feel if her life was in mortal danger. What would she do if her plane began to plummet towards earth? If a crazed gunman put the barrel to her head? If she was ever truly tested? Now she knew: she wouldn’t believe it. She would keep thinking right until the last word that her story would never stop, because there could be no story without her. Things would keep happening to her. It was impossible to truly believe that there would be a final page.

Another crash. Carmel startled again.

‘Wait a moment,’ said Lars sharply. ‘That sound – it’s the same sound as before. It’s exactly the same.’

Frances looked at him. She didn’t understand.

Napoleon sat up straighter. He removed the towel from his face.

Jessica said, ‘There’s a pattern, isn’t there? I knew there was a pattern. Crackle, whoosh, small bang, crackle, crackle, crackle, huge scary bang.’

Frances said, ‘I’m sorry, I don’t get it.’

‘It’s on a loop,’ said Tony.

‘You mean it’s a recording?’ said Ben. ‘We’re listening to a recording?’

Frances couldn’t get her head around it. ‘There’s no fire?’ She could see the fire clearly in her head.

‘But we saw smoke, we smelled smoke,’ said Heather. ‘Where there’s smoke, there’s fire.’

‘Maybe it’s a controlled fire,’ said Zoe. ‘She wants us to think we’re in danger.’

‘So this is her way of making us look death in the face,’ said Tony.

‘I knew she wouldn’t let us die,’ said Carmel.

Lars threw the wet cloth on the floor and went to stand in front of the screen. ‘Well done, Masha,’ he shouted. ‘You’ve successfully scared us all half to death and we’ll never be the same again. Could we please go back to our rooms now?’

Nothing.

‘You can’t keep us in here forever, Masha,’ said Lars. ‘What’s that mantra you keep repeating? Nothing lasts forever.’ He smiled ruefully and pushed his damp hair back from his forehead. ‘We feel like we’ve been down here forever.’

Nothing lasts forever, thought Frances. Masha had made a point of saying that so many times. Nothing lasts forever. Nothing lasts forever.

She remembered how she’d told Masha there was no code in the doll and Masha had answered, ‘Exactly.’

Frances said now, ‘When was the last time someone tried the door?’

‘I honestly think we’ve tried every possible code combination there could be,’ said Napoleon.

‘I don’t mean the code,’ said Frances. ‘I mean the doorhandle. When was the last time someone tried the doorhandle?’

chapter seventy-two

Yao