Chapter 47 Jillian
JILLIAN
“And there’s a storm you’re starting now”
— “Hurricane” by Halsey
Rae picks me up early on Saturday morning so we can drive upstate to go visit her brother at his rehab facility.
The Honda’s heat is cranked to the max and still barely winning against the December cold seeping through the windows.
I take control of the aux, obviously—Rae’s taste in music is notoriously awful.
“I’m just saying, if there are that many deer, maybe we should be worried,” I remark, squinting at another yellow animal crossing sign as I slurp the last watery dregs of my iced coffee.
“Think they’re plotting something?” Rae teases. “Rebellion?”
“Don’t mock,” I warn her, keeping my face dead serious. “You’ll be the first one against the wall when the deer uprising comes.”
She giggles. It’s the first real laugh I’ve heard out of her in weeks, which is a pleasant surprise. She’s being really tight-lipped about everything that’s happening in her life, but I’m glad to see I haven’t lost her completely.
“There she is,” I say, giving her a warm look. “I was starting to worry my bubbly best friend had been body-snatched.”
“I’m just tired,” she promises. “Late night at work.”
“Did he do something new?” “He” meaning Lukas, of course, the bane of both our existences, albeit in very different ways.
“No, no, no. I was just stuck on a… a hard project.” She swallows and looks away toward the passenger window. “Nothing untoward.”
“Mhmm.”
I don’t push. I want to. God, do I want to.
Every instinct I have is screaming at me to pull this car over and shake the truth out of her about whatever Lukas Lazarev is doing to my best friend.
But Rae has that look in her eye and a death grip on the steering wheel, and I know from long experience that poking at that particular dam right now will only make it crack in a way neither of us is prepared for.
So I give her space. I’m good at that. I’ve had a lot of practice needing it myself.
My phone lights up on my thigh. I glance down. Kir again.
I press my lips together to keep from grinning and/or word-vomiting about how disgustingly happy I am.
I don’t want to believe in this good thing, because good things and I have a complicated history.
It feels like a mirage in the corner of my eye: If I don’t look at it too hard, it’ll stay right where it is, just how I want it.
“Speaking of distant and distracted,” Rae says, glancing over at me, “you’ve been kind of out of it lately.”
My fingers tighten around my iced coffee. “What do you mean?”
“I mean that you, Miss I Never Set My Phone Down For Longer Than I Can Help It, have been taking for-freaking-ever to respond to my texts this week. And now, this morning, you keep looking at your phone like you think you’re gonna get news that you won the lottery.”
I pretend to puff out a weary exhale. “Work stuff” is the vague non-answer I offer up.
“Still can’t talk about it, I’m guessing?” asks Rae.
“No.” I shake my head, thankful that she bought the lie. “Soon, but not yet. It’s sensitive. And honestly, the less you know right now, the better.”
That’s true in a multitude of ways.
Things are good. Since Wednesday night’s post-date kiss in the rain, I’ve been living on Cloud 9.
When I’m not texting Kir incessantly, I’m flying through work, and I can finally see the light at the end of this Elena Lazareva tunnel.
I know the core of the story, thanks to Kir, so what it comes down to at this point is just verification, proof, evidence, all that stuff that’s part and parcel of my job.
But I can’t tell Rae any of it. Not the Kir stuff or the article stuff.
She’s drowning in her own Lazarev mess and barely keeping her head above water.
Even with Kir promising he’ll keep me safe, I can still hear that stranger’s warning from Sleep No More rattling around in my skull.
People close to me are targets. By definition, that includes Rae.
So I keep my mouth shut and change the song.
Thankfully, we get to Westgate Recovery Center before she has the chance to ask any follow-up questions.
It’s a good visit with her brother. Since their parents died, Gideon has had more than his fair share of troubles, but speaking of lights at the ends of various tunnels, it feels like he’s about to enter his happiness era.
He’s gained weight, filled out, and there’s life in his eyes again.
We hang out in the common room for a while, laughing like old times until visiting hours are over and it’s time to head back home.
We push through the double doors into the parking lot, and I’m mid-sentence about grabbing dinner on the way home when Rae stops walking.
I follow her gaze… and then I freeze, too.
Kir Lazarev is leaning against a black sedan, scrolling on his phone.
Rae pales beside me. Her hand finds my forearm and squeezes.
I know why she’s confused. Kir is her boss.
Or was. Then is again? I’m actually not clear on the details.
More to the point, he’s the son of the man who bought her at auction and is slowly dismantling her life.
Kir showing up at her brother’s rehab facility, unannounced, is a violation of every boundary she has left.
But my stomach is dropping for an entirely different reason.
Because I know without having to ask that Kir isn’t here for Rae. He’s here for me.
Something happened after we were texting this morning. Something bad enough to make him drive two hours north and track my location to a recovery center in Saugerties.
Kir pockets his phone as we approach. He looks at Rae first.
“Kir,” Rae blurts. “What are you doing here?”
“Visiting a friend,” he says.
It’s a terrible lie. He’s not even trying. His attention is already sliding off Rae and landing on me, and the difference between the two looks is so obvious that I’m surprised Rae doesn’t notice right away.
What he gave Rae was flat, polite, and meaningless.
What he’s giving me is a flashing red alarm.
My pulse kicks up hard.
“Jillian Pierce, right?” Kir extends his hand. “I’ve heard so much about you.”
I intentionally refuse to shake it. “Who are you?” I ask, keeping my tone blunt and flat, because Rae is standing right next to me and she cannot know that I’ve had this man’s belt around my throat and his penis inside me.
“Kir Lazarev. Rae’s boss. Well—” He grins. “One of them, anyway.”
He pockets his hand. We all stand there.
The wind picks up and sends a gust of dead leaves skittering across the asphalt.
I can feel Rae beside me, panicking, confused, trying to figure out what she’s looking at.
And I’m glaring at Kir, and Kir is glaring at me, and to Rae it probably reads as mutual hostility. Hate at first sight.
That’s not quite what’s going on.
What happened? my eyes ask.
Not here, his eyes say back.
“We should get going,” Rae interjects, her hand finding my elbow. “Long drive back.”
“Of course.” Kir steps aside and gestures toward Rae’s beat-up Honda with an air of mock gallantry. “Drive safe, ladies.” His gaze locks onto mine. “Highly dangerous roads out here.”
Then he’s folding himself into the black sedan, and the engine comes to life, and he pulls away through the bare winter trees.
Rae’s breath fogs in the cold. “What the fuck was that?”
I watch the empty road where Kir’s car was a second ago. My heart is going a mile a minute. Whatever spooked him enough to show up here was something he couldn’t say in front of Rae, which means it’s bad. Really bad.
“… Jilly?”
I blink. Rae is looking at me, waiting for an answer.
“No idea,” I say. “Your boss is a weirdo.”
Rae doesn’t laugh. She doesn’t seem remotely reassured. But she unlocks the car and we get in. I crank the heat and the music and pretend everything is fine.
I get the feeling everything is not fine, though.
Not fine at all.