Tristan came back a few minutes later bearing breakfast, and Jian sat up with them while they ate, too.
Anjali ventured little touches and glances at Jian. His reciprocations were tired and slow, and the creases around his eyes seemed to be filled with sorrow.
The airplane’s engines howled around them, and the plane pierced the air and flew northeast. Beige and brown land slowly gave way to the green crumples of mountains below them.
After they finished, Tristan made up a bed for Anjali from one of the recliners next to Jian. When Anjali’s fingers stole over and touched Jian’s hand, he grabbed her and held on tight. His eyes were still shut.
While Tristan made Anjali’s bed, Colleen watched. He was trying to be a good host and was apologetic for getting them into this. He cringed when they thanked him, and remorse lent urgency to his quick attempts to tend to what they needed.
But it was more. There was a caring in his touch and his attention to trying to make things better. Tristan must’ve been a good older brother when he was a farm kid in Iowa. The way he tried to help, the way he knew what people needed without them asking, spoke of someone who’d taken care of kids and done it well.
After they were settled, Tristan returned to Colleen and fell into the seat beside her. “Do you want to take a nap? I can pop out another one of the reclining seats. We haven’t slept much for days, either.”
“I will soon. I’m pretty tired. I think I’ve been running on adrenaline. So, that was a thing we did, huh? We saved our friends from kidnappers. I mean, there were mercenaries, too. But this has been the craziest week I’ve ever had in my life. I don’t even know what to think about things anymore.”
“Yeah,” Tristan said, nodding tiredly and gazing out the porthole as if the clouds outside held answers. “I could use some sleep.”
He was less chipper than when he had been taking care of Jian and Anjali.
Maybe it was all starting to catch up with him.
Maybe there was something else.
“Is something going on?” she asked.
Tristan shrugged, and he kept looking out the window. “A lot has been going on.”
“It’s been crazy, huh? Between writing the Anonymity Plus program for me, and then writing the Anonymity Minus program for the Butorins, and then this whole mercenaries kerfuffle and breaking into the hotel, and breaking into GameShack, it’s been a hell of a week. I don’t even know how all of that happened.”
Tristan nodded, but he didn’t say anything.
“And now you have, what, six weeks until we have to get all of that GameShack stock? Is it six weeks or closer to five weeks now?”
Tristan clenched his jaw and continued to look out the window. He glanced at her and back at the plastic window and the clouds beyond, and then he sighed. “Neither.”
“Seven weeks?”
He didn’t answer.
“Or did you tell Mary Varvara Bell to go to Hell because she tried to get those mercenaries to kidnap me and Anjali and Jian?”
“No, but that will be a negotiating point.”
“Are you going to get out of it? Because that would be awesome.”
“I don’t think I can get out of it. Mary Varvara Bell moved up the deadline.”
“Oh, crap. I didn’t think there was any way we could do it in six weeks. What did she move it up to, four weeks?”
“Wednesday night, actually.”
Colleen gaped at him. “There is no way. There is absolutely no way. There is absolutely no way that can happen. Is she on drugs?”
“When we’re in New Jersey, I want you to take your stuff and get off the plane and leave. I’m going to set up a bank account in your name and fill it with money. I’ll give you however much you need to live for several years. I just need to know you’re safe. If you go on to Europe with Jian and Anjali and me, you won’t have a passport. I don’t know how you would get back to the States, or work, or make a life for yourself without a passport. I just need to know that you’re safe out there. I can open a bank account right now for you. You can apply to universities in the East. You won’t even need financial aid. I’ll give you enough to finish college and then some.”
Colleen grabbed his hand. “I’m not leaving you. Maybe we should just all stay in New Jersey.”
Tristan shook his head. “It would be best if you three split up and went somewhere you have family or people you know. It would be ideal if Jian and Anjali went back to Malaysia and India. But you, I don’t know where I can send you that you would be safe.”
“But you won’t be? What the hell is going on, Tristan? Just ask Mary Varvara Bell for more time. I mean, if she wants the stock that badly, surely she would wait another week or a few weeks.”
“I owe her too much.”
“But that’s a really good reason to keep you alive, if you owe her a bunch,” Colleen argued. “Dead people don’t pay their bills.”
“I think it’s past that. At this point, she might just want to cut her losses and take everything I own, and she probably wants to make sure other people don’t mess with her the way I have. She must think I’ve taken advantage of her, and she’s right. Also, she can go to court with that promissory note and legally take everything I have. It’ll deter people from taking advantage of her in the future.”
Colleen huddled backward a little bit. “You took advantage of her? Like, when she was drunk at a party or something?”
“Not like that. Never like that. I don’t do that. I mean businesswise. Not only did she call in the promissory note that I’m trying to fulfill, but I asked her for a favor, too. A huge favor.”
“I could’ve done you a favor, Tristan. Why the hell are you asking Mary Varvara Bell for favors?”
“When Jian and Anjali were kidnapped, I knew we needed mercenaries to get them back. We couldn’t call the police because the Phoenix police who met us at the plane when we arrived were on the take.”
“You have a whole lot of money,” Colleen said. “You could’ve just hired mercenaries. You didn’t have to go to her.”
He shook his head. “I might have money, but I don’t have the kinds of connections for something like this. I don’t know who to contact to hire mercenaries. If we needed an invitation to the Met Gala, I’d know who I could call to get that. If we wanted to meet the Queen of England, I know exactly who I would call to get an invitation to tea. But mercenaries? I had no idea where to start. So I started with the only person I know who might be involved in organized crime or who would be the type who hires mercenaries.”
“And you didn’t call your buddy, the Prince of Monaco?”
“Maxence owns a military. He doesn’t need mercenaries.”
“It’s okay. We can fix this. We can figure out how to pay her off. How much do you think you owe her now?”
“I’m supposed to write a program for her to disguise her phone number and where she’s calling from. Kind of a super-advanced virtual private network. But my major problem is that I need to get her the GameShack stock by the end of Wednesday. I was hoping I could put her off until Friday, not that it would make any difference at all.”
“This is crazy, Tristan.” Colleen slumped in her seat, made limp by the utter absurdity of what he was saying. “You didn’t know how you were going to get the stock in six weeks, let alone by Friday, let alone two days from now.”