CHLOE

I don't hear Harry get into bed. The exhaustion and stress from the last few days must have wiped me out, because the next thing I know the sunlight is streaming in through the net curtain (neither of us drew the main curtains last night) and the clock next to the bed reads 5.27am. I stumble out of bed and stagger to the bathroom for a glass of water, close the curtains on my way back and fall into another deep sleep. By the time I wake again it is 7.48, and when I roll over on the lumpy mattress, Harry is wide awake in the other bed and staring up at the ceiling in silence. 

"Morning," I mumble, and receive a grunt in return. I give myself a couple of minutes to wake up properly and summon the energy to start another day on the end of Harry's bad temper, before pushing the covers back and making my way to the bathroom again. I feel Harry's eyes on my bare legs and I hurry the last few steps self-consciously, glad when I can shut the bathroom door on his appraising gaze. 

A shower isn't strictly necessary given my hour-long bath not even twelve hours previously, but yet again I am left uncertain when I will next be able to have a proper wash, so I take my time under the shower head, thinking long and hard about today's journey and how best to approach the subject with Harry to get him on my side. It is only when I am standing on the shower mat, having dried myself and brushed my teeth, ready to walk back into the bedroom that I realise I didn't bring any clothes in here with me, and will have to exit the bathroom wearing only this small towel. Cursing myself for my lack of forward planning, I open the door and scuttle across the bedroom to my bed, where my rucksack is on the floor containing the few items of clothing I brought with me. I daren't look at Harry, or even in his direction, but wait until I hear him hauling himself out of bed and the bathroom door closing behind him before I turn around to make sure he is safely out of sight. 

I grab my last clean top and pair of shorts from my bag, and curse myself again for not washing my clothes last night when I had the chance. They would likely have been dry by this morning, or at least dry enough to shove in my rucksack and transport to our next destination without adding too much weight to the already heavy load. I make a mental note to find somewhere as soon as possible to do some washing. 

By the time Harry emerges from the bathroom, his hair dripping wet and a green bath towel slung low on his waist, I have packed everything up that I can and am sitting on the bed, ready. I try not to stare at his bare chest, but my eyes seem to have a mind of their own, lingering over his tattoos and wondering what they mean, and how long they have been there. 

"I was thinking," I begin nervously, staring past him at the wall in an attempt not to embarrass myself, "that we could use the hotel restaurant this morning to have some breakfast?"

He eyes me for a moment, and then sits down on the bed to rifle through his bag and retrieve a pair of jersey shorts and a grey vest. "As long as we're quick. I want to be away from here as soon as possible."

"Do you have an idea where you want to go?" I ask, already knowing the answer but asking anyway because his lack of planning will only help my case.

He bites his lip as he pulls what looks like a pair of black boxer shorts from his bag. I quickly look away. "Dunno. Not really. Just somewhere far from here."

I nod, concealing a satisfied smile. "I guessed as much. I've got an idea, then."

"OK."

"Do you want to hear it?"

"I'm literally on the edge of my seat." There is no mistaking the sarcasm in his tone, and I would dearly love to tell him to fuck off and make his own plans if he is going to be so damn rude, but I don't.

"I want to go to Kent. Or more specifically, to a seaside town called Broadstairs."

"As long as it's nowhere near Frodo, or wherever the fuck we are now, I don't really give a shit."

"Frome," I correct him, as a rush of nervous anticipation floods through me. "We're in Frome. West of London. And Broadstairs is about as far East of London as you can go."

He shrugs, in his typical Harry way. "Whatever, then."

I begin pacing around the bed, voicing the plan I have been formulating since yesterday evening when this idea first came to me.

"We'll have to get the train back to London, probably Paddington or Euston or somewhere like that, and then change trains out towards Dover..." I am babbling away, more to myself than Harry as I doubt he is even listening, when to my surprise he interrupts me sharply.

"Woah woah woah, hold on. I'm not going anywhere near fucking London."

"But it'll be the quickest and easiest way to get to Broadstairs," I protest, coming to a stop at the gap between the ends of our beds.

"Tough shit. You want me to go back to the place I ran away from, where the police will be on high alert, and risk getting caught and thrown in prison? Nice try. Not fucking happening."

"But," I begin, feeling anxiety forming in my belly, "I don't know how else to get there, other than taking a main route through a major city!"

"Looks like we're not going to Broadstairs then." 

"No, please," I beg, clasping my hands together as though I am praying to some sort of God. "We have to. No one will be expecting you to turn up in London! The police think you're in Totnes!"

"I'm not risking it."

"But it's the perfect decoy!" I wail, hot tears now burning at the backs of my eyes. "No one in their right mind would expect you to go back there!"

"Exactly!" he hisses, his eyes flashing as he glares at me across the bed. "So if it would be fucking idiotic to expect me to do it, there's a reason for that: because it would be fucking idiotic!"

I rub my face in frustration, trying to think of a way to convince him to trust me.

"Look," I begin again, "have I ever led you into danger before? Have I ever done anything to risk us getting caught?"

"That doesn't mean you're right about this."

"Well it should have some sway!" I plead. "You must have got to know me a little bit by now! You must know that I don't want you to get caught, and I'm doing everything I can to help keep you hidden."

"I'm not going back to London, no matter what you say. It's too risky. So if you're hell bent on some particular place you want to go, you'll have to find another way of getting there. A way that doesn't involve going into London."

"Fine," I mutter, blinking back tears. "Fine, if that's what you want." In my excitement at our next proposed destination, I had stupidly assumed Harry would automatically go along with the suggestion once I had sold it to him. It hadn't even entered my head that he would refuse any part of it, having no ideas or plans of his own. I shouldn't have told him the finer details of the plan - although I suppose I can sort of understand his reluctance to return to London. It just means I will need longer to figure out how to get across the south of England without using major transport routes, and time is something we do not have right now considering we know the police have traced us as far as Totnes and could even be pulling up outside the hotel as we speak.

"Are we going down for breakfast or what?" I mutter, changing the subject and keen to get things moving quickly.

"Well I will if you let me get dressed," he snaps, indicating to the towel still around his waist and the clothes lying next to him on the bed.

I turn my back on him, expecting to hear him disappear into the bathroom to change, but instead I hear the sound of rustling, of the bed creaking, and of cotton against skin. I close my eyes, visualising our location on the map, and wondering how on earth we can make our way across the bottom of the country using public transport without using a major route that will take us through London. I try not to think about Harry standing behind me, wearing absolutely nothing, and that if I twitched my head just to left I could probably catch a peek out of the corner of my eye -

"Ready," he says brusquely. I stand up to see him opening the door, his hair still damp but obviously towel-dried, a couple of droplets of moisture glistening in the dip of his collarbone. I feel a strange flush of heat creeping across my skin as I follow him out of the room, the scent of his shower gel washing over me in his wake. I overtake him in the corridor to lead the way down the back staircase to the restaurant I saw when I checked in. 

"By the way, I forgot to say - if anyone asks, your name is David," I mutter out of the corner of my mouth.

"David?!" He looks nothing less than offended.

"Yeah, David Wilde. And I'm Elizabeth, your sister. I've lost my bank card, and our dad gave us the cash for this hotel until my replacement card arrives."

Harry is staring at me like I am speaking Dutch, and I almost giggle at the look of utter confusion on his face. "What? I had to make up some sort of story when I was checking in," I add defensively. "It would have looked weird if I didn't make any sort of conversation."

"I never make conversation."

"Exactly," I mutter under my breath, but loud enough for him to hear. He says nothing else to this, but follows me into the dining room. It is a large space, about twenty feet by twenty feet, with a handful of tables already laid out with cutlery and crockery, and a buffet table at one end of the room with heated plates containing sausages, bacon, hash browns, several different types of egg, beans, tomatoes, black pudding, mushrooms and toast. On an adjacent table is a selection of breakfast cereals, croissants, muffins, fruit and an assortment of jams and spreads. Like the rest of the building, the room is decorated in dark colours, with heavy wood pannelling and fussy patterns. There is only one small window at the far end which is covered with a net curtain, so even on this bright June morning it is flooded with artificial light from several dusty chandeliers above our heads. We take a seat at the table the furthest away from the food, but I can practically hear Harry's mouth watering. His eyes have lit up, and he is almost smiling. Almost.

A waitress wearing a white frilly pinny comes over to our table to pour tea and coffee and take our room number, and tells us in a flat and disinterested tone to help ourselves to the buffet when we are ready. Harry is out of his seat before she has finishing turning to walk away, plate in hand, and I watch as he approaches the hotplates and takes at least one of everything before returning to our table. I take a more modest helping, not wanting to give myself stomach ache lugging our heavy bags around on the next leg of our journey. 

Once we are seated again I take a look around the dining room while we eat, to observe not the dated décor, but the company we are keeping. The room is empty except for an elderly couple sitting at the table next to the buffet, not speaking to each other. I'm not sure if the hotel is fully booked and people have already had their breakfast and left for the day, or whether there is only a handful of guests currently staying: either way, the fewer people that see us the better, in case the police come knocking.

We eat quickly, and in silence. My mind is racing, trying to work out our next move. Ideally we need to return to the little train station up the road and pick up a rail map to give us an idea of where is accessible from here, and if we can easily make it to another major city that could get us on a main route to Kent. I am working pretty much blind, so we are just going to have to wing it again and hope our luck holds out.

Once we have finished our breakfast, and Harry is looking decidedly sick and full, I send him up to the room to start getting our bags together while I make a detour to the reception desk to pay our breakfast bill. The same waitress who served us in the dining room takes my cash, barely looking at me as she hands me a couple of coins in change. Sometimes it has its uses, being invisible to those around me. No one ever really notices me - I am entirely forgettable - and for once this has worked to my advantage. 

There is a copy of the local bus timetable on a table in the tiny lobby, and I pocket this as I make my way back upstairs to retrieve the luggage and Harry. Just as I reach the top of the first flight of stairs and turn to ascend the second flight, I hear the front door opening and footsteps walking in the door. I'm not sure what makes me duck down to peer towards the entrance to see who has just arrived - maybe some sort of intuition, or sixth sense - but my heart comes to a complete stop when I see two uniformed police officers strolling in, radios attached to their vest crackling away as they approach the reception desk and ring the bell.

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Hello, how are you all? I'm trying to get back to updating this regularly, especially as I have so many chapters already written thanks to my word-vomit for NaNoWriMo last November. I have just skim read the next few parts, and apart from some basic sense-checks they're almost ready to post, so I'll do my best to get another one up before next weekend.

Are you enjoying this book so far? Feel free to drop me sone comments - all feedback is welcome! Thanks for reading xx