You'll Thank Me for This Nina Siegal (red white and royal blue hardcover .txt) 📖

“I just had to make sure they were out of the way,” Martijn said. “They made it quite easy for me. I caught them when they were out in the woods, doing things they weren’t supposed to be doing. I just told Dirk that he’d better get going or else I would make sure their parents and the Scout leaders were well informed about their misbehavior. He took off into the woods after that. Margot I had to deal with a little differently. But when I left her she was still breathing.”

“Still breathing?” Karin felt like she was speaking to a complete alien. What had happened to her stepfather? Was everything that mattered to him in the world contained in this metal box?

Karin was absolutely sure now that what she felt behind her back, in the hole in the tree, in the hollow, was the box he wanted. It was very small, no bigger than the size of a cell phone. It probably didn’t contain film negatives—no, it was either a small hard drive or just a memory stick. The tips of her fingers were touching it, of that she was sure. But what would happen if she told him? What would he do once he had it? Was he going to “take care of” her as well? She just couldn’t imagine that he would simply let her go.

“What did you do to Margot?” she asked. “Is she hurt? What did you do to Lotte?”

“I didn’t want to hurt anyone,” he said, as if he were completely innocent. “I just needed to get you alone out here, that was all. There are a lot more lives at stake than just a few girls in the Netherlands. You have to understand that. There are hundreds of thousands of people being killed over there.” Now he was making it sound like he was some kind of humanitarian. But Karin already knew that he was only trying to save his own skin.

Martijn’s pocket lit up. He pulled out his phone, which was vibrating. It had probably been vibrating all evening, over and over again, and he had been ignoring it. Karin figured it had to be her mom calling. She wished she could somehow get the phone out of his hands. Martijn just looked at it, as it lit up his face, and didn’t answer it. He looked at her.

“Let me talk to her,” said Karin. “Let me tell her what you’re looking for. Maybe she can help. I’m sure she knows better than me. You can tell her what you want and she can help us find it. She’s good at that sort of thing. Then we can all make sure you’re exonerated, just like you wanted, and we can all go home, no problem, all safely. We won’t tell anyone what happened. We’ll keep it to ourselves, in the family. We’ll just keep it between us.”

Martijn let the ringing die out and the phone went dark again. “I’m not ready to talk to her,” he said. “I don’t think we’re going to find what I’m looking for, so now I have no more recourse. I have to end this and just escape.”

“What do you mean, ‘end this’?”

“I’ve already caused too much damage,” he said. “There’s no turning back at this point. So I have to go forward. That means I have to get away from here, and I have to just leave the country. The Dutch authorities will be chasing me.”

The phone rang again. He picked it up and looked at it but still didn’t answer it. “Let me talk to my mother,” Karin said. “Please. Please, Martijn. I’ll explain that we got lost in the forest and that you are helping me find my way back. I’ll tell her that we’re fine and that we’re on our way to the campsite. And I’ll say that nothing at all is wrong. We all just got lost.”

Martijn looked at her, as if considering this idea. But the ringing ended again, and the phone went dark again. “I think you have a good head for this,” he said. “You’re smart. You probably got that kind of thinking from your dad. But unfortunately, if we don’t find the photos, I can’t go back. I’ll be arrested and put on trial, and I’ll face the highest penalties for treason. There’s no going back now. It’s over for me.”

Karin was pretty sure this meant that he didn’t care much about her life either. Would he try to kill her now? Or could he let her go? He had told her everything, confessed to her. That probably meant he couldn’t let her go now.

She moved her fingers and tried to grasp the small box in the hollow of the tree. If she could get it, she would give it to him, because that was the only way he would stop. But she had to find a way to get it, and then get him to untie her first. If she gave it to him when she was still tied up, he would leave her there, or he would kill her. If she got him to untie her, at least she could try to make a run for it. She was faster than he was, and if she got out ahead of him she could get away—she knew that much, at least.

Martijn’s phone was lighting up again, and he was looking at it again. Like maybe he’d answer this time. She prayed he would answer. Maybe her mom could talk some sense into him. Maybe at least she’d be able to use some kind of GPS thing to figure out where they were. Martijn stared at the phone, as if it would maybe talk to him without him answering it. It was at least enough of a distraction for Karin to have time to thrust her bound hands back and reach into the hollow for