Cody couldn’t sleep. Kath snored softly beside him in his double bed, her head on his arm. He shuddered. She wasn’t his type—much too forward and sexually aware for his liking. However, he planned to keep her around for the rest of the night and most of tomorrow if he got his way. So he needed to keep her sweet.
He eased his arm out from under her and swung his feet out of bed, sitting on the edge. He wanted to call his dad to make sure everything was okay, but most of all to make sure his father had managed to keep his hands off Ruby. However, he would have a job explaining a call to his father at 3am while a hot and wanton hussy lay in his bed. No—he needed to be patient.
He thought back to the first girl he took home to his father—a French back-packer called Simone. He met her on the beach after she’d hitchhiked to the Welsh coast from the channel tunnel. He’d convinced her to go home with him, offering her room and board for a few odd jobs. She never even flinched when she realised the jobs they required of her were of a sexual nature.
After one rampant night, she left without a word, leaving behind one of her bags in Cody’s car.
Cody felt sorry for his dad, he hadn’t got over his wife vanishing—none of them had. But he never left the house anymore, never walking any further than the car and back. He hated open spaces and consequently, had never met any other women in years. Bringing women home seemed the only solution.
After the French girl, they began advertising in magazines—room and board in return for chores. They got a number of girls that way—always turning the males away. They were never disappointed, until the girls got tired of the strange set-up, of course, and decided to leave. They always left without a word in the middle of the night.
That’s when they decided to find a girl to keep.
Felicity Crew had been perfect—she had a sweet innocence about her that he and his dad both liked. When he met her on the coast road, her car wouldn’t start. The area was a notorious black spot for mobile phones and so convincing her to get into his car had been a doddle.
They’d already set up the room off the garage by then and they managed to spend two wonderful nights with her when, suddenly, she vanished.
Cody blamed his dad for not fastening the ties tight enough. But the strange thing was Felicity never made it home. They spent night after night expecting the police to raid their place but nothing. Felicity’s image remained all over town on billboards and in local newspapers—her disappearance a total mystery.
Ruby was only their second guest—he thought of them as guests, not victims. She would be treated well, like any other guest would be, the only difference being she wasn’t allowed to leave.
Why did women always leave?
“Come back to bed,” Kath groaned, reaching for him.
“In a minute.” He unhooked her hand from his arm and placed it back under the duvet. “Shhh, go to sleep,” he whispered.
He took a cigarette out of the packet she’d left on the bedside table and lit it, taking a deep drag. The room was briefly illuminated in an orange glow. He didn’t smoke all the time, just when he was stressed.
His mind raced. If he was going to pull this off, he needed to keep his cool.