“You want me to...?” Skye trailed off, signalling to 'do the honours'.
“No, I've got it,” Jaz replied. She wasn't planning on letting Skye anywhere near her whilst wielding a needle. Skye seemed relieved by her response, though maybe it was Jaz's imagination.
“You can go now,” Driver said, his tone abrasive.
Skye jumped up, smiled at Jaz and exited the room, closing the door quietly behind her.
Great. Alone again, Jaz thought. She glared at the syringe, tempted to stab him in the eye with it but her nerves were shot after her last attempt at fighting him. He was scarily strong. She eyed him from beneath her lashes.
He was watching her with an indecipherable expression. “I'll get the shower ready,” he grunted.
He walked off towards a door she suspected was a bathroom and was proven right when he opened it and stepped in. She could just see his foot as he leant into a walk in shower that was hidden from her place on the bed. The sound of water running filled the silence.
She rummaged through her luggage. Her towel was the first item she took out before she grabbed a change of clothes, then unzipped her leopard-print toiletry bag, fishing for her usual grooming items, including her razor. She wondered what he'd say about that as she stuffed her clothes and toiletries into the towel, wrapping it around like a sausage roll as she tucked it under one arm. She held the sharp razor with that hand and the iron injection satchel in the other. She wasn't going to hide the 'possible weapon'. He'd have to fight her for it.
I am not gonna be hairy for the rest of my life! she vowed.
She sidled over to the open bathroom door where steam was now pouring out.
Driver was waiting by the stone counter with the built-in metal sink, which was opposite the shower dressed by a wall of frosted glass. The floors were huge square slabs of a rough, milk-chocolate coloured stone and everything looked as if it had been moulded by hand. There was an enamel toilet beside the shower and the right hand wall behind the sink was covered with oak cladding. The left wall was the exposed stone she felt she knew so well; it gave her mixed feelings, mostly the bad kind. She looked away and gazed back at Driver.
He had his head leant over his high shoulders looking down into the sink; his big, long-fingered hands supporting his weight as they rested on either side of the stone top. When he sensed her by the door, he quickly looked up, glanced at the running shower and rubbed the back of his neck as he said, “Uh, it's ready.” The shine of metal drew his attention to the razor in her hand.
She waited uneasily for his reaction.
As if he hadn't seen it he continued, “Well, I see you have your own towel but there's some more there, if you need them.” He pointed to a hand-made, fitted shelving unit by her right side, half concealed by the arch-shaped door. There was a selection of white, cream and brown towels visible on the top and bottom end shelf, neatly folded. She stifled a chuckle as she wondered if the kidnappers had an interior designer locked up somewhere, but the image of her cell and what had happened in there turned her thoughts grim.
“If there's anything else you need, just shout. I'll be outside.”
She moved to one side to let him pass and stepped further into the bathroom so he could shut the door. Before he did, she turned and saw him tap a metal turn and release bolt below the handle. “If it makes you feel... safer,” he prompted.
She bobbed her head in affirmation and he shut the door. She marched straight to it and locked it behind her.
It was an old habit of hers to lock doors behind her, even when there was no threat or need; like being alone in the house when no one's going to walk in on you but you still lock the toilet door anyway. A habit.
But this time it was different. She did feel threatened.
He was right: it made her feel safer after locking it, though she was certain he could break the lock, even split the solid oak door in two if he wanted to. But he hadn't even batted an eyelid when he'd seen the razor in her hand. Something, she thought, he'd remove from her immediately. He knew what she was capable of and yet he gave her that leeway? She hadn't expected that.
She put her things on the stone counter. The mirror above the sink was steamed over. She didn't bother to wipe the condensation away, knowing how bad she must have looked. She stank too. She hated having the same underwear for a day, let alone three days. Or was it four days? She shook her head, then stripped down to her underwear, slid off her dirty knickers and kicked them in the corner.
She then took out the syringe and the iron injection, filling the syringe to the amount she'd seen her doctor, Dr Bhargava, do many times before. He'd even shown her how to use the correct technique though it wasn't recommended to do it yourself.