Charming Criminal | Light Yagami ✓

Charming Criminal [32]

"No handcuffs this time? Well, aren't I lucky," you said sarcastically as L showed you to the room you'd be staying in. Talk about a complete invasion of privacy; the only place without a camera was the bathroom, but they still didn't hesitate to put microphones in there too. You shuddered at the thought of being watched while you slept.

"You can move around the hotel, but you can't leave. We'll make an exception for visits to the hospital, but you'll always have to be accompanied by one of us."

"Gotcha," you muttered, walking over to the bed and sitting down. "Ooh, soft bed."

"Yes, we've tried to make accommodation as pleasant as possible. If you do decide to reveal what you know, you won't be implicated and I assure you'll be back home in no time. If you withhold cooperation, who can say how long you'll be here."

"And if I don't know anything?"

L shrugged. "That is highly unlikely."

You followed him with a glare as he bowed briefly and backed out of the room. Then you were alone. When you noticed the camera blinking in the corner, you stuck your fingers up at it and then went into the bathroom to refresh yourself. Running the tap, you splashed your face with icy water and lifted your eyes to the mirror, beads of water still webbing your lashes. Your face looked tired; your eyes were dark, your lips looked bloodless, pale and thin. Maybe it was just the lighting, but your face looked ghostly, everything was sunken and hollow. You supposed that's what colluding with a serial killer did to you; rotted your mind, your body.

Once you'd patted your face dry and fixed your hair, you wandered back into the room and climbed under the covers. Not only were you mentally exhausted, but physically too, and you fell asleep in a matter of minutes, lulled by the soft swish of the curtains and purr of traffic outside.

When you woke up it was dark. The window was still open and the curtains were still drawn, revealing the darkened swathes of sky beyond. Stretching out your cramped limbs, you dragged yourself out of bed, pausing when a spell of dizziness struck you, and walked over to the window. Goosebumps raced along your arms and neck as a chilly wind seeped through, and you grappled with the latch to get the window closed.

After you'd drawn the curtains closed and switching on the lamp by your bed, you looked around. Everything was as you had left it; your shoes were still by the door, tucked neatly together, and your bag was still resting on the foot of the bed, no evidence to suggest someone had been rifling through it. The camera in the corner was still blinking, still recording, as your eyes skimmed past it.

Without your phone - which had been dutifully confiscated by L - you had no way of knowing what time it was. But the sky suggested it was late, so you assumed the only person likely to be still awake was L.

Without bothering to put your shoes back on, you left the room and ascended the stairs in near-darkness, gripping firmly onto the railings as you blindly put one foot in front of the other. Reaching the bottom without falling to your death, you walked into the main room. It was lit with a soft blue light from the computer monitors, in front of which L was stationed, balancing on his feet in that odd position of his. He didn't bother facing you.

"Have a good nap?"

You didn't bother answering as you dropped into a seat a few metres away from him, pulling your knees right up to your chin. "So do you just stay up all night and watch us all sleep?" You asked, plaiting your hair out of boredom.

"Pretty much," he answered with equal nonchalance, his dark eyes looking even more haunted in the dimness of the room, like hollow sockets. Eyes like that could hide a lot of secrets.