***
I didn’t have any idea where to go when I left the hotel, so I told the driver to take me to the airport. With nothing else to do, I bought a standby ticket on a ten-thirty flight to New York City then wandered around for a while. I felt numb, my mind empty. I watched people hurrying to their gates. I saw an old woman hit a jackpot on a slot machine. I picked up the binky of a mother who hadn’t realized the baby had dropped it.
Around nine, I got up the strength to call Norma. “I’m coming home.”
“Do you need money for a ticket?” She was brilliant like that, to not ask. To just understand what I needed.
I’d tell her all of it. Later. Not on the phone. “Nope. I already got it.”
“I bet that cost a pretty penny. Text me the flight information, and I’ll have Reynold meet you. I’ll have Boyd order dinner in for all of us at our place. I’m sure Ben and Eric will join us once they’re done apartment hunting.”
Reynold. I knew in an instant what that meant, the hair on the back of my neck rising. “Dad didn’t show up?”
“Nope. Whether he got high and forgot he’d set it up or he sensed a trap, I don’t know. There’s a warrant out for his arrest, but not much anyone can do now without any leads.”
Dad was still out, then. Guilt peeked through the numbness. Guilt for being a problem in the first place. Guilt for coming home and making Norma have to worry. She probably wished I would stay away until he was caught. If she knew JC had offered government security—a secret I would never share—I wondered if she’d wish I’d disappeared with him. It wouldn’t surprise me. She was that kind of protector.
Staying with JC hadn’t been my choice, though, and I didn’t regret the one I’d made. Even if it meant I had to face my demons head on.
I could do it. I was ready.
“Dad isn’t going to get to me,” I said, only a little more boldly than I felt. I gave myself points for that—feeling brave at all where he was concerned was not easy for me.
“I know. I won’t let him.” She paused. “Come home.”
I’d never heard her say sweeter words.
After I hung up, I found a restroom that wasn’t overly crowded. I took the last stall and locked it. Fully clothed, I sat on the toilet and drew my feet up, tucking my knees under my chin.
And I sobbed.
Epilogue
Norma didn’t take her eyes off her phone as she quietly scolded me. “Sit still, would you? You’re bouncing is giving me the jitters.”
“Then sit somewhere else.” We’d only checked in with Hudson Pierce’s secretary two minutes ago, and she’d told us we’d be seen soon. Norma could deal with my twitching for that long.
She put a hand on my knee, stilling it. “Are you nervous or something?”
“No. I’m anxious in general.” It was my latest go-to emotion. Not very comforting but nearly always appropriate.
“And grumpy,” Norma muttered under her breath.
I scowled. It wasn’t like I didn’t have reason. My father still hadn’t been apprehended and I wasn’t sleeping well. I’d been staying in a room at the Gramercy Park Hotel since I’d returned from Vegas a week before because Norma thought it was safer. She’d wanted to hire a fulltime bodyguard, but I refused to be watched and followed twenty-four/seven. It wasn’t like Dad had money or resources. He couldn’t hire someone to find me if he couldn’t find me himself. I just had to not be any of the places that he might look for me on his own. Our apartment. The Eighty-Eighth Floor. So now I was staying in a hotel and looking for a new job.
My entire life was disrupted. Norma was lucky I was only grumpy.
Then there was JC.
I missed him. I’d been used to only seeing him once a week, but knowing I wouldn’t see him anytime soon made me miss him in a way that made my bones and my teeth ache. With the pain and the distance, I’d begun to have doubts, the regret I vowed not to have, sweeping in like high tide. Maybe I should have gone with him. Maybe it didn’t matter that I didn’t really know him. I’d come home only to go into hiding anyway. Wouldn’t I have much rather been hiding with him?
The whole thing left me sullen and surly.
I felt bad about taking it out on Norma, though. Hudson had her working on a project that was taking more of her time than usual, and on top of that, she was dealing with all the bullshit regarding me.
I made an effort to be friendlier. “Have you gotten word on when our apartments will be ready?”
“Just did,” she said, closing an email on her phone. “Beginning of next week.”
“And it doesn’t have my name anywhere on the lease?”
“Nope. It’s all under Eric’s name.”
Eric and Ben moving into the city had made things easier. Unbelievably, they’d found a building that had two apartments available, side-by-side. It was a secured building, and with money from Norma, they’d been able to put a down payment on both of them, stating that they planned to remodel into one in the future. Maybe they would one day, but for now, they would be living in one and I in the other. Well, they would be as soon as they arranged the actual move. It would be a month or so, I suspected.
While the circumstances were not the best, I was actually looking forward to having a place of my own. I’d never lived by myself, and at thirty, I figured it was probably about time. And I’d be next door to my brother. It was perfect and probably the only way things could have worked out that wouldn’t have made Norma feel bad for pushing me out.
I had a feeling she still felt bad, and admittedly, I hadn’t done much to change that. I’d been too preoccupied with wallowing. God, I was such a shitty sister. I opened my mouth to give her a thank you, at least, when Hudson walked out of his office.
“Norma, I apologize for making you wait. I was on the phone.” He saw my sister every day so I wasn’t surprised that their greeting wasn’t more formal. To me, he held out his hand. “You must be Gwen.”
“I am.” I took his hand. It was warm and firm. The kind of shake that I expected a man of power to have. “It’s nice to finally meet you in person, Mr. Pierce. Norma has told me so much about you.”
I swear I felt her kick me even though she only did it in her mind.
“It’s Hudson. And likewise. Come on in.” He ushered us into his office and gestured for us to take a seat at the armchairs facing his desk while he shut the door. It was a large office—he had a complete sitting area along with his work area. Floor-to-ceiling windows were his walls. I couldn’t help but remember the last time I’d been pressed against windows like that. Naked, panting while JC had showed me how good it could feel to be so exposed.