Page 63 of She Saw What He Did

‘I didn’t mean …’ she begins.

‘Where is it?’ snaps Jared.

‘She doesn’t have your box,’ says Kristof. ‘You come here making all kinds of accusations.’

‘Where is it, Maria?’ I say gently. ‘We really need to have it.’

Jared lurches towards Maria and grabs her roughly by the shoulders.

‘Haven’t we been through enough, damn it? It’s not yours. Where is it?’ he roars. ‘Give it to us now!’

Maria screams and Kristof leaps at Jared.

‘Get off her,’ he yells.

Jared lifts his arm to hit Kristof and I step between them.

‘Stop it. For God’s sake,’ I yell. ‘They have Sam. The people who want that box have our daughter. You must let us have it. Please Maria,’ I beg.

Kristof releases Jared and there’s silence. Finally Kristof repeats. ‘They have your daughter?’

I nod. Marie lets out a little cry and rushes from the room returning a few seconds later with the shiny box. I want to hug her, I’m that grateful.

‘He said he would give us a lot of money,’ she says, her eyes sad.

‘He?’ I ask.

‘The foreign man,’ says Maria.

The man I spoke to on the phone wasn’t foreign.

‘Is it the man who has Sam?’ Jared asks, turning to me.

‘He didn’t have a foreign accent,’ I say.

‘Let’s go,’ says Jared, taking my arm.

At that moment there is a loud banging at the front door. Maria freezes and Kristof looks at us anxiously.

‘They’re here for the box. We called them earlier. They said they would come.’

I look around frantically.

‘Maybe if we give them the box …’ I begin.

‘These aren’t the same people, Abby,’ says Jared. ‘If they knew Maria had the box why would they have stopped Mum? These are different people.’

My head spins.

‘Can we go out the back way?’ I say, clutching the box.

‘They will see you,’ says Kristof, grabbing my arm.

He ushers us into a room full of old computers. I’m afraid. What if we can’t trust them? They’ve already stolen from me to get money. There are raised voices and Jared gestures to me to keep quiet. I feel sure they must hear my heart pounding.

‘Where is it?’ yells a man in broken English.

‘That’s not the man,’ I mouth to Jared.

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