I slip over to a square pillar that holds up the ceiling over the pumps.
Aleksio comes around to where I am, sunglasses propped up on his head. They may as well be down for all that I can read his eyes. “Going somewhere?”
I back up. Hit the pillar.
“What is it, Kitten?” he asks.
“I told you not to call me that.”
He tilts his head. “I’ll call you what I want.”
“I want an update on Dad,” I say.
“I want to know what you’re thinking.”
Anger flares in my chest. He can’t even give me an update on Dad? “You want to know what I’m thinking? I’m thinking that you turned out to be a real bastard, Aleksio. It’s sad.”
There’s a hint of humor on his face as he searches my eyes.
“Am I amusing you?”
“I wouldn’t say you amuse me, Mira.”
I can’t help but feel like he’s looking right through me, reading my secrets like the pages of a magazine. I flatten myself against the cement pillar, wanting, needing to escape his gaze.
“What, then?” I ask.
“You have to ask? That blog shit? Mira Mira? Are you fucking kidding me?”
I plant a finger on his chest. “Step back.”
He grabs my finger. “You’re not in charge.”
“Ow.”
He tightens his grip. He bends it.
I get the feeling he’s testing himself, seeing how far he’ll go. I want to tell him he won’t do it, that this isn’t him. But what if it is? “Don’t,” I whisper.
“Don’t what?”
“I’ll scream for help.”
“You could do that,” he says. “You could probably make a run for it here. I don’t know what kind of runner you are these days. Not fast enough to get away from me, but you could make trouble if you got the right person on your side, couldn’t you?”
My pulse races as he lets go of my finger and matches his palm to mine, knits his fingers into mine.
So strangely intimate. Like lovers. “Are you thinking about it, Mira?”
Yes.
“You could even get the cops involved and tell them the story. They hold you while they call around. The feds get involved at that point.”
There’s a shadow of a smile in his eyes as he examines our clasped hands. Our hands knit together are a perversion of what we are.
It shouldn’t feel exciting.
“But you can’t be sure which cops are mine, can you?” he says. “And you gotta think, how concerned are the authorities going to be about some bastard attacking enemy number one’s family? A lot of them would be team bastard.”
My heart sinks. Of course he’s right. The cops who aren’t on Dad’s payroll would probably be amused. They’d help—in the way that cops “help” when they’d rather not help.
I have to get away. Save myself.
A man and a woman come out of the gas station with giant sodas. They smile, and Aleksio breaks out a beautiful smile that’s like the sun. He’s breathtaking.
It shakes me to see it, but I suppose it shouldn’t surprise me. People were always galvanized by him, even back when he was nine. He was never the star runner or the star ball player or anything, but the kids always wanted to be on his team.
These two coming out of the gas station don’t even see me. They would never notice I’m here against my will; all they see is an impossibly beautiful man in a suit at a gas station in the middle of nowhere.
“They look like a nice couple,” he says softly, pressing the back of my hand to the rough concrete pillar. “How much would it suck if things got hot? If all of these nice people die because you got stupid?”
I hate how intensely aware of him I am. I feel him all around me—on my skin. But he’s acting like a predator—of course I’d be aware of him. The prey is always aware of the predator.
Another car pulls up. A capable-looking man wearing a T-shirt with a firefighter insignia gets out. That’s close to a cop. Sort of.
I gasp as Aleksio cups my right cheek, staring into my eyes.
“You’re not playing fair,” I say.
“Really? That’s your complaint here? I’m not playing fair?”
“One of them.” His hand on my cheek feels electric.
He studies my eyes. He thinks I’m fucking with him. “And you don’t want to try anything. Not with this guy, either. He’d get involved, and it wouldn’t go well for anyone.”
I regard my old friend with a steady gaze. Like I don’t care. Like I’m not scared. “Seriously, Aleksio, you can’t just kidnap the most powerful man in Chicago. And his daughter.”
He smiles. Kidnapping us is exactly what he’s done, of course. His smile creates a sparkly sensation that goes clear to my core. It’s messed up that I think he’s hot. I push him, and he steps back, smiling like we’re just playing.
There’s a clunk over by the car. Gas gun settling back in its place. The clang of the little door to the gas tank.
“Aleksio.” Viktor.
The other guy, Tito, comes out with a white plastic bag.
Aleksio takes my hand and leads me to the car like a lover, opening the door for me, so chivalrous. Unless you feel how tightly he grips. “Ladies first.”
I get in.
We take off, and Aleksio grabs the bag. He passes around waters and candy. He gives me a bottle, a small baggie of English toffee, and panties.
I hold the stuff, stunned.
“Sorry, Kitten. Made in China was the best designer label they had.”
He thinks I’m surprised by the panties, but it’s the chocolate-covered toffee that gets me. English toffee is my favorite. Always has been. It’s a treat I never let myself have these days, because if I start eating it, I’ll never stop.
Did he remember?
He turns to stare out at the cornfields. “Go ahead.”
“Thanks,” I say. The panties are the cheap synthetic three-for-the-price-of-one kind attached by a plastic thingy that goes through a cardboard square. I yank them apart and put one of the pairs on, shimmying them up under my skirt. I feel the heat of his gaze on my skin.
I look over. I catch him watching and a wave of lust goes through me. I tell myself he’s a monster now. I tell myself he shouldn’t turn me on.
He’s everything I was trying to get away from.
With a bored expression, he tears into his Snickers bar.
I pick at the string on the toffee. It’s the kind of candy you’d find in the sad little “fancy” section of a rural gas station. “Why’d you pick this?” I ask.
“What?”
“You had him buy me English toffee.”
“Beggars can’t be choosers.”
Did he remember or not? I break off a corner, chew it indifferently. I need to get my mind around the fact that I’m in actual danger. I need to be smart. To get away.
I ask a few times where we’re going, what we’re doing, but Aleksio only talks when he feels like it. He’s back to surly silence.
People change, and sometimes they lose their fucking soul, he said. Maybe that’s the best he can do, warn me who he is now.
We drive through Chicago, through areas my father controls—or controlled. I’m not really sure about his status now.