Read A Savage Hunger (Paula Maguire 4) for Free Online Page B

over.’
    ‘Anything else I need to know?
    ‘Well, the blood in the church – it’s same type as Alice’s.’
    Part of her had been hoping it was animal blood, or even a Halloween prop or something, not evidence that a living girl had been done some terrible harm. ‘Did they get into the shed at her cottage?’
    ‘God, the shed. What a palaver that was. It’s a listed building or something. Anyway, look what was in it.’
    Corry pulled up a picture on her phone and Paula leaned in to see. ‘Is that . . . food?’
    ‘Yup. Alice’s little secret.’ Even on the small screen, it looked as if the shed was packed out. Boxes of biscuits, multipacks of crisps, jars of peanut butter, sugary cereals, and bags and bags of sweets. ‘It looks like my kids’ dream meal,’ said Corry, putting the phone away.
    ‘So what, she was bulimic?’
    ‘Looks that way. We’re trying to get her medical records but she hadn’t registered with a GP since she left the college. And they aren’t exactly cooperative over at Oakdale. You’ll see.’
    ‘Do we know much about the rest of her life, her friends and so on?’
    ‘We’re going to the university in a minute. I say we – that means you’re coming too, so don’t get comfortable.’
    ‘Any boyfriends?’ Paula had been hoping for an obvious suspect, a jealous lover, a rejected friend, someone with an ‘arrest me’ sign on their forehead. She had so much on with the wedding and Maggie, it was entirely the wrong time for a girl to go missing. Because Paula knew herself, and she would never be able to let it go until Alice was found.
    ‘There’s a fella she was seeing, according to the college secretary. Bit of a gossip – best kind of witness, for our purposes. I don’t know if they even have boyfriends these days, it’s all Tinder and hooking up and what have you. So come on, get your things.’
    ‘Have we time for a bite to eat first?’ Paula hadn’t got around to buying lunch – all that research into starvation had put her right off – and she and Aidan never had anything in the house to make a packed one. She wondered if that would magically get better once they were married. If they’d be like proper grown-ups.
    Corry shook her head. ‘You should have brought something. Will I make you a packed lunch when I do Rosie’s, is that what you want?’
    ‘That’d be good actually.’
    ‘Come on. You can get a sandwich on the way.’

Alice
    I’m throwing up. I hate this normally, I can’t stand it, choking my throat, panic in my chest – what if I can’t breathe ? – but it’s all they’ve left to me. All the poison they’ve fed me, I can feel it coming out, leaving me clean. I’m hugging the toilet, the lovely ceramic curves of it cold under my arms. I rest my head against the seat. It smells of piss and bleach but I know I’m safe here. The floor is checked in black and white. Eight tiles each way. I count as I vomit, trying to stay in control.
    Into the toilet I am puking my guts. I heave and heave, feeling the body take over, the terrifying power of it. Out. Out. Getting rid of it. Everything they’ve forced down me over the past weeks. I can beat them. I can puke it all out. It’s all gone, in stringy ropes of bile. The smell is so disgusting it makes me want to cry. I imagine it leaching out of me, off my stomach and hips and thighs. They won’t have won. I won’t swallow this poison. In this place, everything is so controlled. They weigh you, they watch you bleed, they calculate every ounce of you. Well, this is my revenge.
    Down the corridor I hear the alarm start to scream, and the sound of running feet. They will find me. There’s nowhere to hide. But I’ve still escaped, for now, because I am purged and clean and new. I lie down on the floor and wait for them to come, and as they wrench the door open I put my head on the tiles and start to cry.

Chapter Six
     
    ‘Do they know we’re coming?’
    ‘They should do.’ Corry was