Undertow

5. Chaos Of The Mind

5

CHAOS OF THE MIND

I log every turn and landmark as Adrian and Julia lead me deep into the recesses of the mansion. An escape route is already forming in my head, in case it becomes necessary.

“Almost there,” Julia whispers.

Adrian pulls back a curtain at the far end of a bedroom, exposing a hidden door.

I know rooms like this.

Perfect place to hide a prisoner.

Or a body.

My blood curdles with clots of old panic as he punches in a code.

Memories rush in.

“I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m sorry!”

My small fists beating frantic rhythms. Hot liquid dripping from eyes clenched-shut.

Forgotten and ignored until the infection of night,

Became fear of the light.

Rooms that hide resistant screams and forbidden dreams...

I allow some of my real fear to escape as we wait for the lock to click. Everett Shaw The Poet would be afraid. This is new for him, secret doors and clandestine meetings.

Julia runs her hand over my arm in a gesture of reassurance, and somewhere deep in my frigid soul, a terrified boy pleads for an ounce of compassion he never received until it was too late.

When the door finally opens, Mama H waits inside like a queen on her rocking-chair throne. Another man is rooted behind her with a stony, blank expression. If I had to guess, it’s Robert Hartford, her younger brother.

Mama H’s cold gaze fastens on me as she motions for us to approach. Julia and Adrian shrink into submission beside me.

“We’re alone now,” Mama H says. “No one can hear us.” She pauses to emphasize the double meaning. You’re safe to speak openly. You’re also fucked if you don’t.

“What did you see, son?”

I relay an anxious look from Julia to Mama H so everyone thinks I’m terrified. Maybe I am.

The ice running through my veins is a perilous dance between steeling power and a traitorous shiver.

“They…” I swallow and study my feet.

“It’s okay, son. We can protect you. We just need you to tell us what you know so we can help you.”

I force my gaze up again and search the woman’s face. With a sigh, I close my eyes and pull in a deep breath. “They operate an illegal gambling business at their resorts.”

Mama H deflates into her chair. “Is that so? How did you discover this?”

Her frosty, bored tone indicates she already knew that. I’ll need to give her more, but how much? My heart rate picks up at the dangerous equation. It will have to be enough to satisfy her without upsetting McArthur. This is why I needed more time.

Think, Shaw. Ride the line.

“I went down to the wine cellar to find one of the special reserves for a VIP guest. That’s when I saw it behind the rack. They must have forgotten to cover it up.”

“Saw what?”

I look down and shove my hands in my back pockets like the scared poet I’m supposed to be. “A huge safe,” I say quietly.

The energy in the room shifts with excitement, and I breathe a sigh of relief.

“Really. What kind of safe?”

I shrug. “Bigger than anything I’ve ever seen in person. The kind they’d have in a bank or something. At least, that’s what it looks like in the movies.”

“And how do you know it’s related to gambling?”

“I heard them.”

Mama H lifts her brows, waiting. Another good answer.

“I hid when I realized others were there and I overheard them talking about it. They also referenced The Drop which makes me think there’s more going on. Something either just happened or is about to happen.”

They exchange a look that sends another surge of adrenaline through me. Was that too far? They probably already suspect their rivals are in deep in other markets besides gambling, so this is nothing revolutionary, but McArthur wouldn’t want me giving too much away.

“You said you were hiding. They didn’t see you?” Mama H asks.

“No. I heard them coming and ducked behind another rack. They were pissed when they saw the safe exposed and covered it up again.”

“Who was there? Who did you see?”

“Our GM Merrick and another guy I didn’t know.”

It’s frightening how much of this lie is true.

“So if you hid, how did you get fired over this?”

I force my gaze back to the floor. “I…”

“Shaw, you need to tell us what happened.”

“I know. It’s just…”

“You’re lucky they didn’t do worse than fire you,” Adrian says, drawing a sharp look from Mama H. “They’re known to be brutal,” he explains with a shrug.

He’s testing me. I should be dead if my story is true.

I allow more of the fear to the surface. “I didn’t get fired… yet,” I say faintly.

After a quick glance around the room, I rest my gaze on Mama H. “As soon as they were gone, I went back upstairs and called out sick for the rest of the day. Then, I grabbed my things and got the fuck out of there. They don’t know I quit. They think I’m in my room. I hitched a ride out of Palmetto Acres on the Great Escapes shuttle to the marina. I don’t know what’s going on at that place, but I want nothing to do with it.”

Four sets of eyes light up with a developing plot. Now to sell the rest.

“And yet, you’re still in Undertow. You’re not worried they’ll find you?” Adrian asks.

“Fucking terrified,” I say, studying my shoe as it scrapes small patterns in the worn carpet. “But I’ll be gone by the time they know. I stopped in Mama’s Café to regroup and figure out what to do next. I booked a flight back to Philadelphia for tomorrow night and was about to call for a ride off the island when…” I pause and turn a shy look on Julia. “I met her.”

She softens beneath my adoring, apologetic gaze. Her fingers twitch as if they want to reach for me. “I was going to grab a hotel room on the mainland by the airport, but Adrian was nice enough to let me crash at his house tonight. I’ll be out of your hair by tomorrow afternoon. They won’t look for me until I miss my shift tomorrow night.”

“No rush,” Mama H says, casting a discreet look at her children. Is she warning them? “You’re welcome to stay indefinitely. In fact, we insist.”

I swallow a mix of fear and relief at the subtle command. It’s a common reaction when I walk into the traps I set for myself.

“Thanks. I would, but I can’t risk them coming after me. Plus, I’m pretty broke. I need to get back to Philly and try to find another job.”

A chilling smile cracks her stony fa?ade. “What if I have a solution for both problems?”

I shift my weight beneath her heavy stare. “What do you mean?”

“You said they don’t know you quit?”

I shake my head.

“We will pay you a lot of money not to.”

Shit. Didn’t see that coming.

But I should have.

I’m rarely caught off-guard, and an ember of panic simmers in my stomach at what else I might be missing. My survival depends on being one step ahead of every person and every situation.

“I don’t understand,” I say, equal parts concerned and curious.

But I do understand, and now that I’ve caught up, I’m already recalculating my strategy.

“We will pay you a lot of money to go back,” she says.

“How much?”

“Probably more than you’ve ever seen at once.”

Unlikely.

Mama H doesn’t offer many details after that, just asks me to consider returning to my post and do more digging on the illegal activities going on in the McArthur resorts. She appeals to my avarice with an attractive sum of ten thousand dollars up front and another five per week. She appeals to my conscience with the call to “do the right thing” and get evidence we can show the authorities.

I take the bait in earnest, offering wide eyes at the “huge” payout and a reluctant sigh at the effective guilt trip. “You can’t just run away and let them get away with it, right? A month max ,” she assures me. They’ll protect me and have me back to safety in no time.

I could laugh at the echo of the same speech I heard just twenty-four hours ago from their enemies. Merrick probably will laugh when I fill him in tonight. Listening to them talk about “doing the right thing” and “involving the authorities” was almost as funny, but I kept a straight face like the pro that I am.

By the time Mama H dismisses me, my head is buzzing with the low hum of another instinctive alarm I have to ignore.

Fight or flight? Such a joke. I’ve never had a choice. It’s always been fight . Always crime and punishment. Predator or prey.

Until a gnarled hand reached into your abyss and tried to pull you out.

“It’s not supposed to be like this, son. You’re not wired for this life.”

But he was too late.

Once I’m outside the room, I press my ear to the closed door and listen for hints of their private conversation inside. I can’t make out much until someone cracks the door at the very end.

“You need to find out what he’s hiding and why,” Mama H calls to the person. “He knows more than he’s saying. I smell it.”

“About the McArthurs’ operation?” Julia asks.

“Maybe. Maybe something bigger. He’s playing weak and gullible but I’m not buying it. There’s nothing weak about that boy.” After a pause, she clears her throat. “And if honey doesn’t get the job done, you know what to do.”

Mama H’s threat is still echoing through my head when Julia finds me waiting in the stairwell.

She says almost nothing as she leads me to her car and informs me she’ll be taking me back to her place instead of Adrian’s. I’m even more grateful I was able to orchestrate a meeting with Merrick before all of this. I’ll have to figure out a way to get back to Adrian’s property and my McArthur phone by 2 AM, however.

Since our reunion on the stairs, Julia hasn’t stopped blasting me with heated looks. Her body seems magnetized to mine, constantly finding excuses to make contact. As usual with her, I’m having trouble distinguishing what’s real and what’s not, but the part without question?

I like it. Too much.

Even now, I find my gaze drifting to the bare skin below her cut-off shorts, mesmerized by the way her sleek thigh muscles move with each press of the gas or brake pedal. Bikini straps jut from the neckline of her halter top in a seductive hint I can’t shake from my vivid imagination no matter how hard I try.

“I know that was a lot to take at once,” she says as we pull into a sandy alley.

I stare out the window, pretending to think while I absorb every detail of my surroundings.

Julia’s house.

Another location to memorize and file away. Blood surges hot at the prospect of what she has planned for us tonight. She’s been mentally stripping me all evening, so there’s a very real possibility I’ll never make it back to Adrian’s home and will have to risk a call to Merrick on my dummy phone.

“I want to help, I’m just not sure I can do what your mom wants,” I say. “I’m not a spy. I don’t…” I clench my fist on my knee. “What if they find out?”

She pulls beneath a carport beside a small cottage-like home that’s surprisingly modest for the heir to the Hartford throne.

Turning to me, she takes my hand and smooths out my tight fist. “They won’t. We’ll be guiding you the whole way. Exactly what to do and say.”

“How? Once I go back to Palmetto Acres I won’t even see you. I’ll be on my own.”

She shakes her head, a smile cresting on her lips. “No. After you left the meeting we came up with a plan. You’re going to stay with me. Your cover is that we’re dating, which is why you’ll be living in Undertow, even though you’re working in Palmetto Acres. If they question you, you can even use this as an excuse for why you left today and spent the night in Undertow.”

So my new cover is my original cover. I feel the rumble of the universe’s snort-laugh.

I’m being asked by both sides to accomplish the same goal by the same means.

“If honey doesn’t get the job done, you know what to do.”

And the same threats.

“Trust me, it’s not unusual for Palmetto employees to fraternize with the locals. They all hang out here on their downtime,” she continues when I don’t respond. “No one would question it.”

From my research, I know she’s right. With its exclusive access to the mainland, Undertow is the logistical hub of the island. It has the marina, the main road, the pier, the restaurants, stores, and other tourist traps.

Palmetto Acres may be the attractive veneer of the private island, but Undertow is the heartbeat.

It wasn’t hard to figure out why these families hate each other. They have a parasitic relationship where they both need their rival to survive. Undertow’s existence revolves around the tourists lured by the famous Palmetto Grande resort. But nothing and no one can access the acclaimed vacation paradise without passing through Undertow, i.e. paying the toll that’s looking more and more like a cost way beyond some token fee . I still don’t know what that is, which is part of my mission.

Something is funding this family beyond the slew of small businesses, and there’s no doubt in my mind it’s as sinister as the sins on the other side of the island.

Julia leans in, making it impossible to focus on anything but her fresh, floral scent and soft lips.

“We just have to play the part,” she whispers, her gaze locking on mine. “Can you do that, Shaw? Can you pretend to want me?”

Pretend to want her? The harder thing would be pretending not to.

Her fingers lace with mine, squeezing gently as she studies the knot of our hands. Whose idea was this setup? I’m not entirely convinced it was Mama H’s.

“You promise I won’t get hurt?” I say, meeting her gaze.

Her dark blue eyes search mine. “I promise,” she lies.

But she doesn’t know she’s lying. She doesn’t know I’m going to get hurt.

I always do. Because Gramps was wrong. I am wired for this life.

I’m wired to be a victim of it.

Permanence can’t exist in a world with its chest heaving,

failing to resurrect the lifeless limbs that once set innocence in motion.

Heart pumping and unbroken.

As long as it will be until forever comes crashing down from the heavens to lay to waste our dreams of something real,

something beyond ourselves,

your words will sing a refrain against the chaos of my mind that will last until eternity gives its final bow.

Carefully sorted yet entirely unfiltered, each syllable striking me perfectly, raptured by the beautiful ignorance behind the hope that guides your speech.

-JD August 12, Part 2