As she wolfed the food down, she realized how starving she was and how little she’d eaten during the day. She thought again how strange it was that she’d been given such a large plate of food last night—enough for two—and as she remembered that huge plate of food, an idea came to her.
It wasn’t a full-fledged concept, more of a dark suspicion, but once it was in her mind, she couldn’t get it out again.
It had started with the way that Ms. Rossi had continued eating while Cassie had told her what her older daughter had done that day. She had said she was shocked, but she hadn’t seemed to be. Despite the distressing news she’d been given, she had eaten calmly and even with relish, as if Cassie’s words were no more than background entertainment. Cassie had been too distracted by what she needed to say, to realize how inappropriate the other woman’s behavior had seemed, but now it was troubling her.
The more she thought about Ms. Rossi’s response, and about the children’s strange actions that day, the more Cassie began to fear that she’d been wrong about everything, all along.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
Cassie took the rest of the leftovers out of the bar fridge and headed down the corridor to the children’s wing, before tapping on Venetia’s door.
The young girl was still reading. She looked drained and heavy-eyed, and Cassie thought she might have been crying.
“Your mother’s gone out. I brought you a snack, in case you were hungry,” Cassie whispered.
Venetia’s eyes lit up as she saw the food.
“Thank you,” she whispered back.
Sitting up in bed, she attacked the plate, devouring every morsel of food that was there. From the breadsticks to the dip, the slices of prosciutto to the mozzarella balls, Venetia wolfed it down as if she was a starving child.
Cassie was beginning to understand this was exactly what she was.
“Venetia, if you are so hungry now, why didn’t you eat today?” she whispered.
Venetia shook her head, stuffing the last piece of roasted pumpkin into her mouth.
“Were you upset after the hide-and-seek?” Cassie asked.
“No. I enjoyed the hide-and-seek,” she said. “But we are not allowed to play it again.” Her face grew solemn and Cassie had the sense she was clamming up inwardly.
Ms. Rossi had been wrong. This trauma was not caused by the hide-and-seek.
Cassie remembered how Venetia had flinched away from her when playing tag. She had blamed herself, thinking she’d hurt the young girl. There had even been a visible bruise which she had assumed she’d caused.
Bruises took time to develop. A red mark would have been there instantly, but bruising was bleeding and took longer to appear. Therefore, she hadn’t caused that bruise.
“May I see your arm?” she asked gently.
Cassie caught her breath as she pushed up the nightgown sleeve.
The bruise was worse now, and there was more than one. It looked as if Venetia’s arm had been clamped, or pinched, causing two deep bruises that were now blue-black in color.
Cassie felt sick as she stared at them.
She’d suffered those herself, growing up, when her father had been angry or drunk or impatient with her. Then her boyfriend Zane had proved to be an abuser, grabbing her arm in anger and causing a very similar bruise to appear. It was at that moment Cassie had decided she had to get away—from Zane, from her life, from her own inability to escape the destructive cycle. Staring down at the livid marks on her arm, she had realized that if she didn’t make big changes immediately, she might never be able to.
Cassie had gotten away. Now, seeing the same mark on Venetia’s arm, she had a terrible suspicion that these girls were exactly where she had been.
“Do you know how you got this bruise?” Cassie asked gently.
Venetia’s reply sounded rehearsed.
“I fell off my horse,” she said.
Cassie raised her eyebrows. She was beginning to wonder if horse riding was used as a convenient excuse to explain away bruises and marks.
“Did someone grab your arm to try and stop you falling?”
Venetia shook her head and Cassie saw the blankness in her eyes again.
“I don’t remember,” she said.
Cassie decided to leave it. After the long, hungry day she’d had, Venetia didn’t deserve to be interrogated now.
“It’s time for you to go to sleep. Would you like me to read you a story first?”
“No, thank you.”
Venetia looked exhausted, as if after the much-needed food, her body was desperate for rest. She turned over and curled into a ball before Cassie reached the door.
Cassie’s mind was spinning as she turned out the light. What was life like for these girls? What had made them into the people they were? She was beginning to suspect that this had nothing to do with grooming them to be business leaders, and everything to do with something darker and more evil.
Venetia not eating, and staying at school all day when she didn’t have to. Nina sitting alone with her broken doll in that cold room.
She hadn’t caused this to happen, with her game of hide-and-seek.
The children were victims, and Cassie was willing to put money on the fact this had been going on long before she arrived.
She tapped on Nina’s door and found her in bed, already half asleep, with the book she’d been reading lying face-up on her chest.
Cassie carefully removed it and put it on the bedside table, and Nina blinked at her, confused by tiredness.
Hoping that the girl’s sleepy state might make her more relaxed about a question, Cassie asked casually, “Did you go into that room by yourself this morning? Or did anyone tell you to go there?”
“I don’t know,” Nina whispered.
“Have you been there before?”
Nina didn’t answer. She stared at
