GLASS NERVE | alex rider

Five.

( tw : kidnapping )

CHAPTER FIVE
HOT FUZZ

Alex was back. So that's great.

Bella didn't seem any better even with the boy back. She avoided speaking and shockingly wasn't anywhere to be found when Alex showed up at her house to pick her up that morning. Her window was locked (it's never locked) and no one answered when he knocked. He didn't hear a peep from Bondcat, the floodlights were shut off, and the motion cameras didn't move when he waved at them. Even James' Porsche was gone from it's usual spot outside.

The house was halfway abandoned.

Turns out, Bella was already at school by the time he got there, sitting on the steps with a bored look on her face. She was absentmindedly playing around on the smartwatch strapped to her wrist, typing something on the miniature keyboard. He knew it wasn't him because she was still not responding to his texts—all 42 of them. She didn't open even one. She answered his calls, almost immediately since Saturday, but refused to text him back. It made no sense.

After Tom hounded him for a moment, the two finally approached Bella.

"Good morning, sleeping moody." Tom's joke earned him a look from Bella that shocked the poor boy to his core. Her dark look coupled with the heavy bags around her sunken eyes was enough to frighten him.

"Alright... You good, Bells?" Bella gnawed at her nails and stood up, slinging her backpack over her shoulder. Alex noticed her hands were wrapped in bandages. "What's with those?"

"I punched a wall. Got upset." She said with narrow eyes. "Shit happens when you've got a piece of shit for a dad."

"What'd he do this time?"

"Just pissed me off." She waved the two off stiffly, struggling to move her arms any higher than her shoulders. There even seemed to be a faint bruise on her cheek, like she'd been punched or slapped. "He doesn't abuse me if that's what you're thinking. James doesn't have the guts to hit a child, let alone me."

Alex didn't mention the bruise, Tom didn't even notice it.

If not James then who?

Bella was more than capable of defending herself. She was top of her Muay Thai class, admitted to beating the shit out of James once for "royally fucking up" as she said, and had not lost an arm wrestling match to Alex once. Bella was an exceptionally talented young girl, she wasn't a girl people usually got the jump on.

"So, you're a NERVE baby, huh?"

"Don't call me that, Tom." She growled in annoyance, shoving her hands into her pockets. "He didn't start working for them until I was twelve. So technically I'm a NERVE teenager."

"Ha. Funny one, Bella."

It really wasn't that funny.

"Thanks? I think." Bella suddenly stopped and Tom smacked into her. She stared Ayisha down as she approached them, tensing slightly at the potential interaction.