Chapter Fourteen
Lilith
“The freaking Crawfords?” Misha’s high-pitched screech pierces my ears, and more than a few people turn toward us. “I can’t freaking believe it.”
Misha came to the rescue, suggesting I get out of the house for a while to stop me from falling down a rabbit hole of panic. It’s not as if I was helping anyway. If anything, I was getting in everyone’s way.
I needed this more than I realized. Colter’s abrupt exit had made me uneasy. I can’t get a read on the guy. One minute, I’m sure he’s out to get me. To make me feel small and trapped. The next moment, butterflies are fluttering in my belly and I’m on the verge of collapse from giddy excitement.
And it’s always the wrong kind of excitement.
If it were as simple as blushing at the way he looks at me, or the strange things he says, I wouldn’t be struggling.
But no, Colter seems to have a direct line to my pants, eliciting a response from parts that shouldn’t want anything to do with him.
He’s going to be my brother next Saturday for goodness’ sake.
“Neither can I.” Lackluster enthusiasm pours out of me in spades, made worse by where we are.
Of all the places Misha could’ve chosen for us to go, she landed on a Crawford Enterprises-built mall. One of Midnite City’s earliest mega-constructions, with five floors of shops on the lower levels, and six more rising into the sky, with added low-cost housing.
She chose it before I dropped the bombshell about who my future family would be. And although we’ve often come here before, to escape reality for a while, today it’s a tomb of reminders that my life has been stripped of control and irrevocably changed forever.
“I don’t get why you’re so down about it,” Misha shrugs, raising a blue slushy mix to her mouth. She sips long and hard on the straw, pulling funny faces at the drink’s icy tickle before continuing.
“You’re gonna be a real princess. Midnite Royalty, even. You should be over the moon.”
Her excitement isn’t helping my anxiety. I want to vent my frustrations about the situation, not be bombarded by how great it’s going to be.
Guess I’ll save it for Dr. Rice.
“I don’t want to be someone else’s princess.” Least of all the Crawfords’.
This new circumstance flies in the face of everything I’m trying to accomplish. I want to find independence in a world that seems to want to keep me wrapped up in a box.
“That’s what a princess is.” Misha scratches the side of her head, confused by my statement. “You can’t be one without a king and queen.”
I sigh and turn away from her. In that moment, and from the corner of my eye, I spot something. No, someone, standing halfway behind a pillar with a small camera in his hands. My heart jumps into my throat at the low brightness of a flash picture being taken.
In a blink, the man vanishes. Probably just behind the pillar, but I’ve got no intention of heading over and finding out. Seeing him for a second was chilling and enough to freeze me the way Misha’s slushy freezes her brain.
“Did you see that guy?” I ask, pointing carefully, with my hand below a dividing wall that separates the food court tables from the rest of the mall.
Her head snaps toward the pillar, and she gives it a long, hard stare. Eventually, her head settles back into its normal position, tilted to one side, eyebrows up, glaring at me like I’m a lunatic.
“I don’t see anyone.” She opts for a calm soothing tone, but her face betrays. “Unless you mean the tall drink of chocolate milkshake eye-fucking his reflection.”
“Jeez, you really do need to get laid.” I shrug in hopes of easing the tension that’s building in my shoulders. “But no, I don’t mean him.”
I immediately regret saying that. Misha only mentioned him to calm me down.
“It’s probably nothing, then. But I’ve just got this funny feeling that—“
Colter. Thinking about him shuts me up.
Is this what he meant when he said I’ll see you soon?
Can’t be. He probably meant his dropping by our place this morning.
But both things can be true at once. And who better to have following me around than a small, thin man who lacks everything that makes up the Crawford brute.
In an attempt to still my mind, I run through some different possibilities of who it could be, if not Colter.
Maybe he’s a photographer, hired to snap candid pictures of the lovebirds swooning under the bushy arches next to us.
Midnite Mall is a hotspot for tourists and social media stars looking for their next viral hit.
Other than that, I’ve had run-ins similar to this before. Encounters with journalists and gossip-rag bloggers, all because of my parents, or what happened to Tom Henderson. They don’t believe my account of what happened, but that never stopped them from picking me apart for a scoop.
It dawns on me that, more likely than those events, word has gotten out about Mom and Alistair’s wedding.
Probably leaked by one of the members of staff on duty last night, or one of those publicity stunts, where it looks as if it got out when it shouldn’t have, but which was actually released by Alistair himself to announce his love for my Mom to the world.
It could be any of those scenarios. But the guy ducked away too fast to be someone who was comfortable getting seen. Usually, being spotted is an open invitation for the paparazzi to rush over and ask invasive questions that they’ll later twist for their tabloids…
“Yup, you’re going nuts.” Misha goes for another slurpy suck on her straw. “You really should leave spotting the danger to me, anyway. You’re not very good at it.” A half-wink flashes across her face, before it scrunches up in the excruciating pleasure of a brain freeze.
“You want to get out of here?” I jump to my feet before she can answer. Whatever reason someone has for following me, it is a sign to keep moving. “On the off chance your radar’s broken and mine isn’t.”
“Sure.” Her chair grinds against the floor when she stands. “Where to next?”
“Shall we just walk around? Some retail therapy might calm me down.” I latch onto her wrist and pull her far away from the food court.
Keeping my attention high, we stroll past one store after the next for a bit, until Misha finds a clothing retailer with signs outside that brag about having all the latest and hottest fashion out of Japan.
Jackets with color-shifting LEDs. Experimental temperature regulating bodysuits. Headwear that links to your smartphone…
The future really is now.
“What are we doing here?” I ask, glancing at the price tag on a glittery dress. It comes in at half my paycheck, and the number makes me sick to the stomach. “We can’t afford this stuff.”
“We can’t, but do you know who can?” A devilish little grin spreads across her face.
“Don’t say it…” I groan.
“The Crawfords.”
“Our parents can too,” I remind her. “But that isn’t our money.”
“Well, it sort of is, if you think about it.” Misha crosses her arms. One hand stays halfway behind, a finger left tapping against her chin as if stuck in deep contemplation. “It’s all coming to us someday, regardless. Why not play around with the inheritance a little?”
I know she’s joking but an uncomfortable heat flushes over every inch of my skin anyway.
Maybe it’s because of that earlier encounter outside, but I’m more inclined to believe it’s because I want no part in that sort of thinking.
It’s easy to lose track of yourself, when money isn’t an issue.
Without struggle or purpose, it’s easy to fall into the trap of living a life so void and meaningless, there’s very little use in living it at all.
That’s why, although I don’t approve of her methods, I’m glad Mom has never given up or become complacent, even when she might have been tempted to. Her drive has taught me that this world is a cold and cruel place, and relying on others is a surefire way to become its victim.
I sigh, and take Misha’s hand.
“I think we should go.” This time, I don’t mean to a different store.
It’s time to face the music. To integrate myself into the Crawford household and become acquainted with my new life.
“What?” Misha pouts, but she comes with me, albeit reluctantly. “Come on. I was messing around, trying to make you feel better.”
“I know,” I whisper. “Thank you.”
We merge with the bustling crowd flooding the main hall. Misha says something, but her words are drowned out by the loud hum of people pushing past and the music that emanates from every other shop or vendor.
And then, just like before, it hits me. An uneasy jolt of lightning that courses up my spine. The weight of a nameless, faceless pair of eyes pushes me down.
I speed up, making haste toward the wide-open doors in the distance.
Every part of me screams, Don’t do it. Don’t look back. But the dangerous curiosity is too overwhelming for me to ignore, and I do. Just a quick glance over my shoulder, enough to see if I can spot him… her… whoever.
Stupid is the only conclusion I can reach.
Shoppers, salesmen and more, all swarm around and between each other.
None of them seem particularly suspicious, yet none of them are above suspicion.
With so many people, it’s like looking for an incredibly small needle in a planet-sized haystack.
Midnite City’s mega-malls house thousands of faces every day.
My fear only intensifies, knowing that the voyeur could be anywhere. It settles deeper into me, gnawing at the marrow of my bones, until my whole body feels numb and heavy.
Misha grabs my wrist and tugs it to slow me down. That breaks the swelling tension long enough for me to breathe.
“Lil? What’s going on?” she asks, her free hand moving to my shoulder for comfort. “Tell me so I can help.”
“Nothing,” I lie, forcing a smile and starting for the exit once more. I move more slowly this time, to add believability to what I’ve said.
Breaking out of the mall and into fresh air, eases the unsteadiness I felt inside it. I don’t care what anyone thinks or how I sound because of it.
Someone is watching. I’m absolutely certain.
And even though I try to bury the thought, my gut’s screaming the culprit’s name.
Colter Crawford.