Chapter 15 Megan
MEGAN
“Gio?” I stare at the radio which has become a dead inanimate object in my hand. “Gio!”
My vision is blurry with tears when I face Ric.
“Where is he?” I shove the radio back into his hand with more force than I intended.
He looks at the device, brow furrowed, as if he’s never seen it before. “I don’t know, Meg.”
“Don’t lie to me!” My voice is shrill with anger, fear, panic. “Don’t you dare fucking lie to me, Ric. This wasn’t part of the plan, so where is he?”
The rear passenger door of the car that arrived without Gio, the car that left his apartment building with him in it, is open. Amber is asleep on the back seat with a jacket thrown over her to keep her warm.
Gio’s jacket.
I bet it still smells of him. I can picture him placing it gently over her, tucking it around her shoulders so that his scent would comfort her if she woke up during the journey, and I feel the buildup of heaving dry sobs inside my chest.
“I’m not lying to you.” Ric’s voice follows me to the car. “If this was part of the plan, I wasn’t in on it.”
I fix my stare on the bodyguard who accompanied Amber in the back of the car. Somewhere along the way, they traded places, and Gio and Demi left my sister in this car with a stranger. Anger coils up tightly inside me.
They left her with a stranger, but I can’t be angry with them because they’re doing it to protect us. It doesn’t stop me being afraid for him though. For him and Demi.
Especially when I have no idea what he’s planning to do.
“He’s gone to the airport, hasn’t he?”
The bodyguard has thick dark hair, olive skin, dark eyes that appear almost black now in the gloomy, derelict industrial estate with the sound of a gushing waterfall close by. He’s as tall as Gio, with the same broad shoulders, but he isn’t Gio.
“He didn’t want to tell you. He was worried that you might try to stop him.”
“So, you all kept it a secret.” I peer at each of them in turn.
No one speaks. Not even Ric.
I believe him when he says that he wasn’t kept in the loop.
Gio must’ve known that I would want him to turn the car around, and the entire plan would’ve been blown apart if we hadn’t made the rendezvous as planned.
But there’s a horrible sickly feeling swirling around inside my gut that has been there since Ric had to divert to Plan B.
After he gave Gio the code “Shark bite” over the radio, I felt the vibrations of the engine through the bottom of the car.
He hit the gas. I didn’t need to be looking out of the window to know that we were breaking the speed limit, or that he was navigating the traffic like a professional Formula One racing driver.
It was part of the plan. Gio had accounted for Amber’s father following us, but it didn’t stop the adrenaline from pumping through my veins, because while he was hot on our tail, I knew that he wasn’t chasing Amber and Gio.
I could handle him finding me. I could handle anything as long as they were safe.
But what was I supposed to do now, knowing that Gio was risking his life for us?
“Take me back to New York.” I address Ric first.
He’s the one I’m closest to. He’s the only one who has gotten to know Amber. He also knows how I feel about Gio.
“I can’t do that, Meg.” He shakes his head.
“Can’t or won’t?”
“Both. I promised the boss that I would get you to Vermont, and that’s what I’m going to do.” He squares his shoulders and straightens his spine to his full, impressive height. He’s pulling his weight without giving me direct orders.
“Fine.” I turn to the dark-eyed guy who took Gio’s place in the car alongside my sister. “You can take me then.”
“Sorry, ma’am. No can do.”
“How about you?”
The other men are all standing around watching the abandoned warehouses for a hint of movement. I’m aware that we’re wasting time. I’m also aware that I’m wasting my breath; they work for Gio, not me. But if I don’t try, I’ll never forgive myself.
“Sorry, ma’am.”
The answer is the same all around the group.
“Meg, we should go,” Ric says gently.
“No.”
I’m not ready to leave Gio behind. I replay in my head how he held me before we left his apartment, crushing me against his chest and then leaving without saying goodbye. He knew. He knew what he was doing, and he knew there was a chance that we might not see each other again.
It feels like a crushing weight pressing down on me, constricting my chest and making it difficult to breathe.
Without thinking, I pound Ric’s chest with my fists, realizing with sudden overwhelming clarity that he’s wearing some kind of body armor, and that Gio wasn’t when I last saw him.
“Take me to the airport! I’m not leaving without him, Ric. Take me back or I’ll find my own way there. Take me back! Please, Ric, please take me back…”
I’m sobbing uncontrollably.
Strong arms scoop me up and slide me onto the back seat of the car beside Amber, and I lay down, folding her into my arms. She stirs, rolls over, her eyelids flickering. There’s a moment of recognition before she closes them again and settles next to me, her face pressed up against mine.
Doors close.
The engine jerks to life.
The car starts moving, carrying me away from Gio, and I cry until I sink into a heavy, dreamless slumber.
It’s the middle of the night when we arrive in Stowe, Vermont. Ric carries Amber inside and settles her straight into the bed in the main bedroom, while I follow them around in a dry-eyed daze. There are whispered voices. Doors opening and shutting. Curtains being pulled shut.
Something feels wrong, but I have one foot planted knee-deep in the dreamscape of unconsciousness and I don’t quite latch onto it.
Perhaps it’s my brain’s way of dealing with what happened when we left New York City, but I allow myself to be tucked up in bed beside Amber without fully appreciating our new surroundings.
It feels good to give into being helped, if only for a short while.
So, I sleep right through till morning.
When I wake up, Amber is gone.
I sit up abruptly, the room swimming while my brain cells play catchup.
I’m still dressed. I don’t recognize the room, the pale walls, the heavy gold embroidered curtains that remind me of a princess dress from an old fairytale book, the matching gold comforter on the bed.
There’s a solid wardrobe made with pale wood pressed up against one wall, a dressing table with a gilt-edged mirror, and snowy mountain scenes framed on three walls.
Then, it all comes flooding back to me.
The plan.
Demi.
The car chase.
Gio not meeting us at the rendezvous point.
“Amber!”
I swing my legs over the side of the bed and stand up, surprised when my legs buckle. I sway unsteadily, my head spinning with tiredness, and stumble across the room towards the door.
Voices reach me as I make my way along the hallway and into the open-plan kitchen where I find Amber sitting at a pine table eating waffles smothered with cream and berries.
Ric is sitting next to her, a mug of coffee in front of him, and a coloring book between them with a pack of colored pencils.
It’s the kind of domestic scene that Amber and I have only ever experienced together, and it feels off-kilter to see her sitting there with Ric, chatting about what her school in London serves for lunch.
Ric spots me first as I stand in the doorway watching them. He immediately rises. “You’re awake.” He goes to the coffee machine and fills a cup for me. “Did you sleep well?”
“Why didn’t you wake me?”
“You always say it isn’t nice to wake someone up.” Amber spoons a creamy piece of waffle into her mouth and watches me while she chews.
I can’t be angry with her. It must be so confusing, going to LA to see Nikki, staying in Gio’s apartment in New York, and now traveling through the night to stay in yet another new place. No wonder she’s doing something normal like coloring.
“You’re right, sweetie. It isn’t nice.” I sit in Ric’s vacant seat and pick up a red pencil, automatically filling in an image of a balloon on the page in front of me.
Ric slides a coffee cup across the table towards me and leans against the counter.
“Thanks, Ric. For taking care of her.”
“Hey, no thanks necessary. It’s my pleasure.”
I’m still trying to process what happened, which is easier if I concentrate on the simple picture in the child’s coloring book. I’m aching to know that Gio is safe, but I don’t want to ask in front of Amber. What if the plan went wrong? What if…
The sickly feeling congeals in my gut again. I study Ric while he watches Amber; he wouldn’t be standing there so nonchalantly if anything bad had happened to Gio. Would he? I mean, worst case scenario…
No. I refuse to let myself think about it. I’m not getting those kinds of vibes from him, and I should trust my instincts. I would know if the plan had gone horribly wrong. I would sense it, the way I would sense if a light had gone out even with my eyes closed.
“Ric said we can make cakes today, Meggie.” Amber squashes a blueberry between her teeth and pokes out her tongue. “Is my tongue blue?”
I smile. “Yuck. So blue.”
“Look Ric.” She shows him her tongue and then dissolves into giggles.
“It’s the bluest tongue I’ve ever seen,” he says, humoring her.
“I won’t be able to make cakes here though.” I talk over the sound of her laughter. “I don’t have the equipment.”
“Yes, you do.” Amber points at the kitchen, and Ric stands aside so that I can peek around him. “Gio sent cake stuff here for you.”
I blink. The kitchen is equipped with a state-of-the-art electric mixer, and hanging from a rack attached to the ceiling, is every kind of pan, baking tin, spoon, and spatula that I could ever possibly need.