say now.
Sophia nestles her head under my chin. “Thank you, Daddy.”
“You’re welcome, pumpkin.”
“I’m so cold.”
Her body feels warm against my chest, but when I drop my lips to her forehead, it’s icy. I jiggle my upper body so she wobbles from side to side. “Come on. Up you get. Exercise time.”
She stands up, and I almost cry out at the mix of pain and relief that comes from relaxing my shoulders and pulling my feet up toward my body. “Do you remember how to do star jumps?” She nods. “Give me twenty, then. Go, go, go!” As she pumps her limbs in then out, in then out, I move as much of my body as my restraints allow, pins and needles crippling my extremities as the blood starts to flow. Sophia finishes, out of breath and laughing. “Now run on the spot. Go!”
I make her work out, knowing it won’t be long before the exertion makes her hungry but balancing that against her getting hypothermia. She protests when I tell her we’ve done enough, but if she breaks into a sweat, it’ll cool on her skin and make her feel worse.
“Can we play I Spy?”
I look around the cellar, my eyes now fully adjusted to the gloom. Stone. Steps. Locked door.
I spy, with my little eye, absolutely no way out…
“I’ve got a better idea. How about you be my eyes and we go exploring?”
“Outside?” Sophia says hopefully.
“In here for now.”
She sighs. Draws out a reluctant agreement. “Okaaay.”
“Start in the corner. Over there.” Dutifully, Sophia skips over to the far corner of the cellar. “Now, run your hands over the walls. Tell me everything you find.”
“I’m scared of the mouses.”
“Mice. There aren’t any mice, sweetheart. That was a silly story Daddy made up. What can you feel?”
“Bricks.”
“Feel on the floor as well. Is there anything there?” A loose brick, a forgotten tool, anything.
At police training college, we were taught how to search a house for drugs or weapons. Pairs of officers, starting in opposite corners of a room, then crossing over and going over each other’s patch. Dividing the area into quarters, making sure each one’s clear before moving to the next.
“Pretend you’re a police officer,” I say now, “searching for clues.”
“I’m going to be a pilot.”
“Just pretend.”
She finds a nail and a can of Diet Coke from before we realized the damp put fur on whatever we’d tried to store down here. “We can drink it.” I’m suddenly desperate for it, my throat scratchy and my lips sore. “Do you think you can open it?”
It takes an age, her little fingers struggling to lift the catch. Eventually, she manages, the can pinned between my feet and Coke fizzing over my socks. Sophia drinks first—excited to be allowed a drink normally forbidden—then she tips it to my mouth too fast, so sticky liquid dribbles down my neck. When we’ve finished, Sophia lets out a huge burp. She tries to say excuse me, but another burp comes, and she claps her hand over her mouth. Her eyes are wide, expecting an admonishment, and she’s shocked when instead I make myself burp too.
“Daddy!”
I tell her off all the time, I realize. I tell her to be quiet or be good, to eat nicely and don’t talk back. I tell her off far, far more than I praise her. Is it any wonder it’s Mina she wants?
I burp again. “Sophia!”
“That was you!” She jumps on me, heavy on my legs, and clasps her hands around my face, squashing my cheeks and laughing at the face it makes when I smile.
“I wish I could give you a cuddle.”
Sophia tugs at my arms.
“They’re very stuck, I’m afraid. So unless you can magic up a key…” I rattle the cuffs against the metal bar.
Sophia lets out the oh! of an idea. She scrambles off my lap and picks up the nail.
“Nice idea, pumpkin, but that only works in films.” Sophia’s face falls, so I twist around, showing her the hole in the cuffs where a key should fit. “Go on, then: do your worst.” I lean forward, giving Sophia free rein and wondering if my strange and beautiful daughter is going to surprise me with a hidden talent for lock picking.
We must have been down here for hours. How much longer will we be here?
I call out for Becca again, but there’s no reply, and not knowing what she has planned for us fills me with terror matched only by my fear for Mina. Flight 79 was