Discarded M. Hunter (the snowy day read aloud TXT) 📖

the history books, and in a way she’d already started packing it away. She couldn’t remember the last time she’d thought about her mum and dad. Presumably they were out there somewhere, though she couldn’t be sure if they’d still be looking for her. Grey had told her that her parents had given her to them, and if that was the case they’d have no reason to look.

‘Ha!’ Grey exclaimed, pointing a finger in the air and moving across to his jacket on the chair with a gleeful grin. Reaching inside the jacket, he extracted a metal hip flask, unscrewing the lid and taking a swig. He lowered the canister and offered it to her, but she shook her head.

‘You don’t need to be scared,’ he told her, moving across to the table and dropping onto the cushioned seat beside her. ‘It’s only a drop of scotch. I won’t tell if you don’t.’ He pushed the flask towards her again but she pushed his hand back.

The pungent aroma caught in her throat, causing her to dry retch.

‘Suit yourself,’ he admonished, taking another swig for himself. ‘S’pose it’s not to everyone’s taste. What sort of stuff do you like then? You like sweet wine, right? I’m sure Precious doesn’t drink it all on her own, right?’

In any normal situation, asking an eleven-year-old what her favourite alcoholic beverage was would be a weird question, but not here.

‘When’s Precious going to be back?’ she asked, deliberately fluttering her eyelashes as she did.

He looked away when she caught him looking at her. ‘I told you, I don’t know. All I was told was to bring you back and wait with you here until Mr Brown returned. That’s what I’m doing.’

‘But when will they be back?’

‘How long’s a piece of string?’

She considered him: the scar on his forehead that broke one of his eyebrows in two, the scar tissue stopping the hair follicles from growing. She’d been so terrified of him that night in the woods, but that fear had diluted since she’d experienced just how terrifying Mr Brown was by comparison. What was it Precious said about him? My enemy’s enemy is my friend, or something like that.

‘You’re scared of Mr Brown too, aren’t you?’ she said, reaching out and gently resting her hand on his.

His head snapped round at the comment as if he was planning to bite her head off, but instead he looked at her hand and then into her eyes. ‘We could get out of here, you know.’

The lust she’d seen so many times in the photo studio was there again, constricting the veins beside his eyes and dilating the pupils. She began to withdraw her hand, realising her plan to sweet talk the information out of him had been misjudged, but he caught her fingers and gently pulled her hand towards his lips, kissing it.

‘I’m not a bad man. You understand that, don’t you? I’m not like Mr Brown. I care for you girls.’ Lust dissipated into trepidation. ‘I care for you, Kylie. You know that, don’t you? You’re special to me. The way I feel about you…’ He chuckled to himself. ‘I know how ridiculous it must sound, but I’ve never felt this way about anyone before.’

His confidence grew and he shuffled round so that he was facing her and could hold both of her hands. ‘What if we left this place now? Together. You and me. I can’t believe I’m even suggesting this, yet somehow I know you won’t laugh in my face. I’m in love with you, Kylie. There, I’ve said it now and I can’t take it back. I love you, Kylie! I am in love with you, Kylie. That’s why I didn’t want any of those other men to be with you tonight. That’s why I’ve kept you from attending those bloody parties for so long. You don’t have to say you love me, but I think if you got to know me – away from this place – then you’d see I’m not as bad as you might think now. I’m not the most handsome guy, but you could do a lot worse.’

Her head was spinning. She had not foreseen this turn of events.

‘We could go now, somewhere they’d never find us. Somewhere we could just be alone. We could go to South America; they’d never look for us there. What do you think? Nobody would judge us there either. I know you’re still developing, and I promise I won’t touch you until the time is right and when you’re ready. Please, Kylie, just say the word and we can go right now, before Mr Brown gets back. What do you say? Will you give me the chance to love you as you deserve to be loved?’

She had no intention of going anywhere with him, and she couldn’t leave Precious behind to face Mr Brown’s wrath alone. He would be angry if Grey took her away, and he would only have Precious to take it out on. Precious had already suffered because of her, and she wasn’t prepared to repeat the mistake. She was about to tell him as much when they heard the squeaky brakes of a car pulling up outside.

Grey dropped her hands like they were diseased and hurried to the door, peering out before quietly cursing and hiding the hip flask back in his jacket and retaking his place on the chair, as if the last five minutes hadn’t happened. His cheeks were flushed and his hairline bore the sheen of perspiration.

‘Not a word about what we discussed,’ he said in a loud whisper moments before the door opened and Mr Brown hurried in out of the torrential rain.

He pulled the door closed behind him and locked it. There was no sign of Precious. Joanna could only hope she was still in the car and would be brought in shortly.

Mr Brown saw her staring at the door and launched towards her, dragging her out from behind the table by her