40. Alana #2
“Um… Aunt Alana?” Ian whispers. I drag him forward. Then I kick open Grae’s door.
“What the actual living hell?”
He looks from me to Ian and smirks. “Nice job, kid.”
“Yeah, no problem,” Ian says proudly. “You’re buying the candy for my hockey team.”
“Done. Sign me up for twenty-four boxes.” What? How far does this little conspiracy go?
“That chocolate tastes like dust and chalk,” I snap. “What the hell is happening?”
Grae just grins at me. A full, shit-eating grin. He’s leaning back in the hospital bed like he’s on vacation—one arm tucked behind his head and legs crossed at the ankles. “Going somewhere?” he asks.
“You know damn well—”
“Nope,” he cuts in. “Baby. Where are your car keys?” I pat my jacket. My pockets. My purse. Nothing.
“What the hell?”
He watches me unravel, amused. “You didn’t really think I was going to let you leave, did you? You walked past Lena and Amanda,” he says. “Whose job—literally—is to entertain and distract you.”
I replay it in my head. Nobody touched me. Nobody got close enough. The only one—
“Son of a—”
Grae lifts my car keys from underneath his pillow and rattles them. “Looking for these?” Ian snickers. “Kid, you can go,” Grae says. Ian beams and darts out the door.
“I don’t even know why you thought you were the only one with power and influence. You wouldn’t be able to leave even if you had the car,” he continues. “There’s a remote immobilizer in it. One click, and the battery’s done.” He taps his phone. “Thank you very much, Macie.”
“You’re kidding me.”
“Nope.” Grae’s grin only widens. “And while we’re at it? Why don’t you go look out the window.”
I don’t move at first. Then I turn, and two things hit me at once. Every rooftop across the street is lined with Hunters. Every single one. Arms crossed. Watching. When they notice me at the window, they lift their hands and wave. I flip them off automatically.
Then I look down and that’s when I see it. People. So many people. They’re gathered outside the hospital entrance, packed across the sidewalk and spilling into the street. Holding signs and—
“Are they… singing?” I whisper. Grae lifts his phone and waves it at me.
“You haven’t been on the internet lately, have you?”
My stomach drops.
The video is shaky as Amanda comes into frame.
She smiles at the camera, “Hi my Chasers. I’m here at Medical East with a very special friend.
Jasmine is nine years old and has terminal cancer.
” The camera moves to a little girl in a hospital bed, deep circles under her eyes and not a hair to be found on her head.
“Jasmine, can you tell everyone what you want?” Jasmine nods looking directly into the camera.
“I want to go to an Amanda Chase concert.” Amanda sits on the bed with the little girl.
“Why?”
“Because I want to hear everyone singing your songs at once.” Her voice squeaks, “I think it’s really cool we all know the words.”
Amanda smiles at Jasmine, “I think that’s pretty cool too.”
“Um,” She pulls at Amanda's shirt and points to the camera.
“Do you know who’s holding the camera?” Amanda asks.
The little girl turns to the singer. “Do you?”
Amanda laughs. “Maybe if enough people show up to sing to you, we’ll show the world. How does that sound?” The video loops again. It was posted an hour ago, and it already has ninety thousand likes. Unbelievable.
“You weaponized a kid with cancer?”
Grae’s expression widens into a mock innocence that makes me want to slap him or kiss him, or both. “Only you would think that granting a kid her ‘forever dream’ would be used as a weapon.”
I raise my eyebrow. “Did you or did you not use Amanda’s clout and society’s empathy to gather a crowd of people outside of the hospital to what end? Make it harder for me to leave?”
“You should see Lena’s post.”
The low growl escapes my body without permission. I click on Lena’s post, it's a five second clip. She’s lying on the hood of my SUV. The camera is far above her head, my license plate isn’t shown but most car gurus will be able to tell it’s not a standard make and model.
“Where’s Lena?”
I hate her little ‘Where’s Lena?’ trend. It’s a security nightmare. Then Lena pulls down her sunglasses and winks. “If you see this car, don’t let it leave the parking garage. Kay, byeeee.” I’m going to kill her. Security protocol be damned.
“The three of you are using your fans to keep me here?”
He doesn’t answer, instead he reaches out for my arm and yanks me away from the window and onto his bed. It’s not very comfortable, but his body is warm.
“I looked for you for twelve years, you were the one who gave me a stupid timeline. But that doesn’t mean I was going to let you go without a fight.” I rest my head on his chest, listening to his heart and feeling the gentle rise and fall. Damn it feels nice here. “What are you running from?”
“Reality and fear.” I’m quiet. Admitting this is hard enough, but it’s worse knowing there’s a good probability that everyone’s listening. “I can’t lose you again. I thought it would be easier if we part ways on my terms, but no. That didn’t work, because my family sucks.”
“I beg to differ.” He kisses the top of my head. “I think they love you very much.”
“Blegh.” I grimace and draw a little circle on his chest. “There’s so much that can go wrong. Between Mastodon and Grasshopper, and trying to keep the Four Families alive, two weeks was the most I could justify in my life.”
“Do you want more time?” His voice sounds gravelly, like he’s afraid of the answer.
“Of course I do.” I let out a groan. “But your life is crazy, mine is, well, you know. I don’t see how we can have a future. And if I can’t have one with you… I’m not sure if I want that at all.”
“If it’s a time management issue, I’m sure we can work something out.” He pulls me closer. “The problem becomes if you don’t actually want a future because you can’t forgive me.”
“I guess the only thing we have going is that I can’t have kids and you don’t want them.” My heart tears apart saying the words. A family wasn’t something I wanted because I couldn’t have it. But with him, I feel like for the first time I'm missing out.
“We’ll figure something out,” he reassures me, but there’s a hint of sadness too. “Let’s take this one day at a time,” he says, squeezing me closer.
There’s a knock at the door, followed by Izzy popping her head into the room with her eyes closed. “Has Alana pulled her head out of her ass yet?”
Grae chuckles and calls out, “Yeah.”
The room fills in with the women. Macie, Izzy, Waverly, Jenny, and Katya. Along with the pop stars, Amanda and Lena. Izzy’s arms are filled with binders and a huge grin.
“So about three months ago, Penny came to us.” Son of a bitch, I should’ve seen this shit coming. “She said her husband was putting a plan into motion, but he’s a hopeless romantic and doesn’t think of the details and all the ways something could go wrong.” Yeah, that also sounds like Hadeon.
Waverly steps in, “She told us we needed to figure out all the reasons why you would leave a good guy. Of course she didn’t say who it was, we figured that out a few days ago.” She mouths the word ‘sorry’ to me.
Jenny grabs the binder. “And once we figured out that Terk Henderson was involved, I let my little fan girl, hyper fixation brain kick in, and we created a revenge plan that will make your soul jealous you didn’t come up with it.”
Katya flips through the binder and says, “And we figured out a way to get the Four Families out as well.”
“I used your murder board as the backbone, and we fleshed out the details.” I glare at Macie, and my assistant blushes. I told her I didn’t want help. And now, I can see the cracks in my reasoning, and Macie is filling them with logical spackle.
Izzy steps in again and says, “There’re roles for all of us. And all you have to do is say, ‘I need some help.’”
All Grae’s muscles tense as he groans and puts his head on my shoulder. Through gritted teeth I say, “I would rather lock all the doors to this hospital and burn it to the ground with you in it than ask for help two times in a day.”
Macie pushes Izzy out of the way and grabs the binder out of Katya’s hand. “Boss, I was hoping you could provide me with actionable feedback and assist me with delegating responsibilities to the appropriate roles. It would really help me grow as a manager.”
“Oh absolutely.” I take the binder out of her hand and ignore that smirk she gives Izzy. Katya hands a second binder labeled GRAE to him. Flipping through my binder, my stomach knots as I quickly get the gist of the plan.
I would step away from Mastodon and leave it to Izzy and Lance.
Markus would be a secondary manager and lead agent, which is an edit I would make.
I have other plans for him. But I would take the position of CEO at the new renewable energy firm the Olympians have been building for the last three years.
It sounds like a ton more work, but the setup is similar to Grasshopper, so it’s nothing that I haven’t done before. In fact, it frees hours in my week.
Grae is busy reading his binder. “Um… does yours have very graphic images of us fucking on Terk Henderson’s desk?”
“No. But I’m still reading the first part.”
“I drew that,” Jenny pipes in. “I figured that’s how you would celebrate.”
“Well, you’re not wrong,” Grae says, “but you grossly overestimated my flexibility.”
This plan is thorough, pristine and… yes. I can see my own ideas baked into the DNA. It does create a roadmap that navigates away from all my possible mental detours. This could work, and a feeling of unfamiliar peace creeps into my brain.
As I am about to say something Macie asks, “Um, so are you in a good mood now?” I look down at the binder and lean on Grae, his fingers wrap around my waist.