Chapter 28 #3
“—and I swear to God if you apologize to me right now I will reach through this phone and strangle you, because you have nothing to be sorry for, you absolute disaster of a human being, I love you so much?—”
She's crying. I’m crying. Rodrigo stands next to me, close enough that his shoulder touches mine, and waits.
“Where are you?” I ask, wiping my eyes with the back of my hand.
“I’m with Agent Rakowski,” Melissa says, and her voice shifts— still Melissa, still loud, but with an edge of something new.
Purpose. “A friend of Rodrigo’s Interpol contact.
She’s right here. She’s been tracking the Twin Ledger for years, Billie.
Years. And she says—” I hear a muffled exchange, like Melissa is turning to someone else in the room.
“She says there’s a bounty out on you— a bounty— and she says this is the closest they’ve ever been to having enough to bring them down. ”
My heart does something complicated. Half terror, half hope. The two feelings wrestle in my chest, and hope wins— barely.
“Mel, listen to me.” I grip the phone cord tighter. “We want to help. We want to take them down— the whole thing, the Twin Ledger, all of it. And we have Alana with us.”
Silence. Then: “Alana. The Barbie assassin.”
“She's not an assassin, she’s an arms dealer. There’s a distinction.”
“Billie, that is not the comforting clarification you think it is.”
“I know.” I take a breath. “But she knows things, Mel. She knows how the organization works, she knows where the money is, she knows about the rings. And I think— I really believe— that together, we can do this. All of us. We can end the Twin Ledger for good.”
Another pause. Longer this time. I hear Melissa exhale— the kind of exhale that carries the weight of a decision being made.
“Agent Rakowski wants to come to you,” she says. “And I’m coming with her.”
“Mel, you’re eight months?—”
“If you finish that sentence, I will name this baby after your worst ex-boyfriend. We’re coming.”
I laugh. It comes out wet and shaky but real. “Okay. Okay, we’re at—” I look at Rodrigo, who gives me the address, and I relay it.
When Rodrigo reaches over and hangs up the phone, the click of the receiver settling into its cradle sounds final. Definitive. Like a door closing behind us.
We turn around.
Alana is standing in the doorway to the kitchen.
She’s changed clothes already— somehow, in the twelve minutes she’s been inside, she’s found time to put on a different outfit, this one a coral wrap dress that has no business being in a Tuscan countryside chalet.
Her arms are crossed. Behind her, Benny hovers, pretending to clean the hallway table.
“So,” Alana says. Her voice is sweet. Dangerously sweet. “Interpol.”
My stomach drops.
“Alana—”
“You called Interpol?!” She uncrosses her arms. Crosses them again. Uncrosses them. “You literally just stood in this adorable kitchen and ratted me out to an international law enforcement agency while I was, like, trying to find a pillow that doesn’t smell like mothballs.”
“It’s not ratting you out,” I try. “It’s?—”
“Telling a federal agent where a person is and what they know? That’s ratting.”
“Alana, please?—”
“I’m not cooperating.” She puts her hand up. Her nails are very close to my face. “I’m not talking to Interpol.”
Rodrigo steps forward. His voice is calm and measured.
“That’s too bad,” he says simply. “Because Melissa and Agent Rakowski are coming. Whether you like it or not.”
Alana’s eyes narrow. “Excuse me?”
“Billie and I will not keep running forever, Alana.” He says her name like it’s a word he’s been trying to stop using. “This ends. It ends here. We take down Marco, we take down the Ledger, and we do it the right way. With your help, or without it.”
For a moment, Alana is quiet. Genuinely quiet, which might be a first. She looks at Rodrigo, then at me, then at the phone on the wall as if it has personally betrayed her. Behind her, Benny stops dusting the table and stares at all of us.
“I don’t want you to run forever,” she says finally. Her voice is different now— still her, still Alana, but with the bubbly coating stripped away. She sounds— human. “I just need more time. I need to get the other ring. What’s in that vault will fix all my problems.”
She turns to me.
“Billie.” Her voice goes quiet. “I let you have my boyfriend.” She gestures at Rodrigo, who visibly flinches. “I didn’t even make it weird. I was, like, super chill about it. Can’t you just help me get the ring?”
My breath catches in my throat. She’s waiting for my answer.
“Alana, I don’t think those two things are?—”
But she’s already turned away, staring out the kitchen window at the Tuscan hills rolling golden in the afternoon light, her jaw set in a way that looks almost— hurt.
“This totally doesn’t fit my vision board at all,” she mutters, and I can hear the heartbreak in her voice.
And despite everything— I feel a pang of something that might be guilt. Because Alana is ridiculous. She is a criminal and a manipulator. But somewhere underneath all of that is someone who’s running, and has never reached her destination.
I don’t know what to do with that yet.
But I’m going to figure it out.