The Passenger by Daniel Hurst (great book club books TXT) 📕

her in a minute,” I type back. That threat of violence will hopefully speed things up a little because he can just show my message to Amanda, and she’ll see that I’m getting irritated with her stalling tactics.

‘Who are you texting?’ Louise’s voice sounds close, and I turn around to see her standing right behind me.

‘No one,’ I say, shoving my phone back into my pocket before she can try to grab it.

‘Another girl?’

‘No, of course not.’

‘Show me.’

Louise holds out her hand for me to give her my phone. But I’m not going to do that. Then she’ll see the messages about her and her mum, and I really will have no choice but to hurt her then.

‘You don’t trust me. Is that it?’ I ask, shaking my head. I guess I’m going to have to play the frustrated boyfriend part now.

‘I did, but now you’re being all secretive.’

‘I’m not being secretive.’

‘Well, show me your phone, then.’

‘You show me your phone!’ I say, but I regret that when Louise holds out her mobile towards me because that’s easy for her to do.

She isn’t the one with something to hide.

‘This is ridiculous,’ I say, stepping away from her and taking a seat on the arm of the sofa.

‘I knew it. You’re just like all the other guys,’ Louise says.

‘What other guys?’

‘Just show me who you were texting!’

‘Why should I?’

I can’t believe I’m having to go along with this argument just to kill some time. There was me thinking I got lucky when I met Louise and found out her mum had a small fortune stashed away in her bedroom. But the longer this goes on, the less fortunate I’m feeling.

I want to send another message to chase up that code, but I daren’t look at my phone in case it irritates Louise even more. But then she just walks to the front door and opens it, and I guess the argument is over.

‘Just go,’ she says to me.

I guess this is it. I can’t put it off any longer.

‘Fine,’ I say, throwing up my hands and walking towards the door.

‘Don’t forget your rucksack,’ Louise reminds me, referring to my bag on the sofa.

‘I don’t need it yet,’ I reply, not even glancing in its direction.

‘Why?’

‘Because I’m not going anywhere.’

Then I turn the lock on the door, which only reinforces my point. ‘What are you doing?’ Louise asks with a hint of concern in her voice. But I don’t care about answering her right now.

I only care about the fact that she can no longer escape.

15

AMANDA

The numbers run through my head over and over again. There’s eight of them in total, and in the wrong order, they are useless. But in the correct sequence, they will give the owner access to piles of cash. There’s a reason why I’m the only one who knows that sequence, and that was the way it was supposed to stay. You don’t give out your credit card number. You don’t give out your bank details. And you definitely don’t give out the code to your personal safe.

Unless some madman tells you that your daughter’s life depends on it.

I’ve done my best to stall him up until this point. I asked him questions, I called Louise, and I even made a run for it off the train. But here I am again, back in this familiar seat, the same seat that is just one example of how routine my life has become. It’s that routine that has allowed this stranger to know my precise habits and thus trap me in this scenario.

He followed me home, and he followed me to the office. He even followed me on my lunch hour. All that time and I didn’t suspect a thing. Through the crowd of people who rush around me each day as I go in and out of London, I thought I was the clever one. I thought I was the one with the plan to escape. But it wasn’t me, all along.

It was the man following me.

I look at him now, and he is still staring at me. His phone is in his hand, and I know he is just itching to send that code to his partner. But for the time being, that code is locked away in my mind, and it will only come out if I let it.

‘Tick-tock,’ he says as the train continues to race towards the south coast, but I don’t need reminding of how long we have got until we reach the end of the line. I’ve taken this route so much that I almost recognise every field, tree, and fence on the other side of this window. That’s because I didn’t always use this time to write. For a long time, I simply sat in my seat and stared out of the window despondently during my commute, dreaming of an escape but unable to make it a reality. Sometimes I would distract myself with a game on my phone, or a song in my headphones like most other passengers do, but most of the time I would just look through this window. Even here, as the train moves through these wide-open green spaces, I always felt restricted and squashed in. It was almost as if the feeling of freedom you got from seeing the rolling hills outside was just an illusion, and life was really nothing more than a series of cages and traps.

This train. That desk. My flat. Everything in my life is keeping me restricted and tied down when really all I wanted was to be out there, in the open space, free to go wherever I want, do what I want, and be who I want. I guess that’s why Louise wants to go travelling. She wants exactly the same things as I do.

She just wants to be happy.

Maybe I should have been more understanding with her. Perhaps I should have given her some of my money so she could have left these shores