The Stranger in the Room: the addictive and unsettling new thriller from the author of TRUST IN ME by Luca Veste

Author:Luca Veste [Veste, Luca]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: null
Publisher: Hodder & Stoughton
Published: 2025-01-15T16:00:00+00:00

29

I was a couple of miles from home, but it already felt like a foreign world. I hadn’t realised how constricted I’d been feeling, being stuck in that house for hours on end. Waiting for news that would never come.

Yes, I got a few looks. A double-take here and there. I guessed that people didn’t really know why they recognised my face, but it would come to them soon enough. I didn’t care.

I knew some of them would have seen me on the news. Social media. That statement we’d given – on the driveway of our home – seeming more and more like a mistake.

‘We could have just met at mine,’ Val said, her spoon clattering to the plate as she finished stirring sweeteners into her coffee. ‘I’m not sure this is where you need to be right now.’

The café was one we’d met in before – a lovely little independent, that was probably not going to last much longer since the second Costa opened a few weeks earlier. It didn’t matter if the coffee, the food, everything tasted better . . . people seemed to prefer the blandness of a chain.

Val lived nearby. Probably knew everyone in the place by name. She was that type of woman. She took an interest in everything it seemed. I was the total opposite. I preferred my bubble.

‘Don’t you start,’ I replied, staring at the large latte in front of me. I didn’t want it, but I knew if I started, I’d finish the whole cup and then want another. ‘I’ve had enough of him back there telling me what I need to be doing.’

‘Okay, okay,’ Val said, holding her hands up in mock surrender. ‘Sorry. I just don’t know what to say for the best.’

‘No one does. So you’re not alone in that. I don’t think there’s anything that can be said. I don’t mind you trying though. It means you care at least. I just couldn’t sit in the house again – I feel claustrophobic in my own house.’

‘I know you understand, but it doesn’t stop me feeling useless. I’m your big sister – I’m supposed to, you know, protect you.’

‘I think that responsibility ended about twenty-five years ago, Val.’

‘It never ends,’ Val said, lifting her coffee and sipping at it delicately. ‘Anyway, what’s the latest? Have they made any headway yet?’

I shook my head. ‘They keep telling us that they’re working hard and they have a wealth of information and I guess “leads” to go through. Doesn’t feel like they’re any further than they were at the beginning, though.’

Val leaned forwards and lowered her voice. ‘What about the girlfriend?’

‘She wasn’t his girlfriend,’ I said, perhaps harsher than I intended, not that Val seemed to mind. ‘She came round with her mum earlier today. I . . . I kind of lost it a little with them.’

‘Unsurprising,’ Val replied sitting back in her chair. ‘I didn’t think she’d show her face. What happened?’

I ran her through the visit and how it ended.

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