“She betrayed my trust,” I reply.
Tracey cocks a brow. “But not by cheating on you?”
“No.”
“And you’re sure whatever she did is an absolutely unforgivable offense?”
“It has to be,” I say. “I don’t have the privilege of showing any weakness.”
Tracey nods thoughtfully. “And you would consider forgiveness to be a weakness.”
“Yes.”
I tip back my glass and send the rest of its contents splashing down my throat. Tracey begins to pour me another.
“I would say the opposite,” she says, sliding the glass over to me. “Personally, I’ve never been good at relationships. I’m a selfish person, and it has always been much easier for me to give up on a person rather than to accept their faults, so to me, the idea of working through problems, seeing the other person’s side, and learning to forgive them…Well, I would say that all takes a lot of strength. Cutting ties and trying to banish them from your mind is the much easier, weaker thing to do.”
I’m not sure what to make of Tracey’s candor. She doesn’t know the nuances of mine and Alexis’ fraught relationship. She doesn’t know what Alexis did.
Still, somehow what she says makes sense in a way. I always thought pushing Alexis away was a show of strength. I never thought that anyone might view the action any other way.
“I think I’ve had enough,” I say, pushing up from the bar.
I don’t know whether I mean that I’ve had enough to drink or enough of this uncomfortable advice, but either way, I leave the full glass on the bar top. Tracey’s smile wavers. She thinks she has offended me. I leave her a generous tip to communicate that she has nothing to worry about.
I leave the club via one of the back doors that leads into the parking lot. The cement is bathed in the orange glow of a single streetlamp, leaving a ring of impenetrable darkness beyond. I spot the town car a dozen or so yards away and set one foot carefully in front of the other. I am a little unsteady on my feet, so throw all my concentration into making it to the car without tripping over myself.
A man materializes from the shadows to my right. He is heavily tattooed, with a four-leafed clover stamped proudly on his neck to designate him as Irish Mafia. I don’t know whether he is here to pass a message or to kill me, but I don’t give him the chance to do either. I whip my gun out from my shoulder holster and put a bullet in his skull.
At least, I mean to. My aim is sloppy from the drink, and the bullet slices through his neck instead. He falls to the ground, choking on the blood gushing from his carotid artery.
David has hopped out of the car at this point and is standing with his gun drawn. “You okay?”
I walk past the dying man, shrug, and get into the back of the car. “Take me home.”
8
Alexis
It is raining outside. Thick, fat drops that pelt the pavement like bullets. It patters against the window, hypnotizing me as I stare out into the gray, my cup of coffee going cold in my hands. Harry is sitting on the rug in front of me, moving the rolling pin from his kitchen play set back and forth through the thick shag. There are two guards lurking somewhere in the apartment, but it feels quiet and empty. Just me, Harry, and the endless rain.
I set my coffee down, stretch out on the sofa, and look up at the camera in the corner. The red light blinks, and I wonder if Gabriel is in his office watching us right now.
“Is it raining there too?” I wonder aloud.
There is no answer, of course. Just the steady blinking of the red light.
It feels good to talk to Gabriel through the camera, even though it’s unlikely he’s actually listening. He is probably way too busy with whatever Mafia drama is going on this week. Between the Cartel and the Irish, it seems like he has his hands full.
“I hope you’re not too busy to have men out looking for Clara,” I say, voicing my thoughts to the camera. “Whatever has gone on between us, Clara doesn’t deserve to be dragged into this.”
The light blinks. Harry reaches over and grabs my little finger.
“Momma,” he says. “Pancake.”
He hands me an imaginary pancake, and I take it from him, pretending to chew enthusiastically.
“Thank you, Harry. It’s delicious.”
When we lived in the mansion, Harry used to love watching the chef, Victoria, cook. He clearly doesn’t understand that one doesn’t make pancakes with a rolling pin, but it’s cute.
Harry giggles and rolls out some more pancakes.
I look back up at the camera, and I swear I can feel our eyes connect through all the lenses and wires and screens. Gabriel is out there somewhere.
Maybe that’s silly. But so is the fact that I’m still chewing on an imaginary pancake.
“I didn’t know what the Cartel was holding over you,” I say. “If I knew that writing that article would cost you your freedom, I would have never done it. How can you hate me for something I had no knowledge of?”
I swing my legs to the floor, keeping my eyes on the camera the whole time. “If you’d—”
“Momma,” Harry cuts me off, pulling my pant leg.
I look down, and he stabs the wooden spoon in my direction.
“Try,” he demands.
“You’re just like your father,” I mutter under my breath, taking the spoon from him. I pretend to sip whatever it is he’s pretending to cook, and I smile wide. “Tastes delicious, baby. Maybe a little more salt?”
I hand the spoon back, and Harry goes right back to stirring, his tongue stuck to the side of his mouth in concentration.
My eyes meet Gabriel’s through the camera again. At least, I think they do.
I get up, walking toward it. “If you’d confided in me like I asked you to, none of this would have happened. You could have told me about the Cartel and what they were holding over you, and we could have done something about it together.”
Tears prick at my eyes, and I grit my teeth to keep my lips from pulling into a pathetic frown. It’s the baby hormones, I reason. Just the baby hormones.
But don’t I have more than enough to cry about right now without the baby hormones? I’m locked in a tower for my own safety because there are people out there who want to kill my son and me. The man I love hates my guts. My best friend is missing, possibly dead.
The first tear spills down my cheek, and now it’s raining inside as well. I sniff and glare at the camera, my hand coming to rest over my belly and the barely perceptible bump instinctively.
“I need your help, Gabriel. Clara is in danger, and you are the only one who can help her right now. So please, help me. You owe me that much at least.” I set my jaw. “Do you want to be the one to explain to Harry and our unborn baby what happened to Mommy’s best friend? You do remember that we’re having a baby, right? Because I’ve heard nothing from you about it. Not a peep. It’s like you don’t want to acknowledge it for some reason, like you’re—” I hiccup, fighting back sobs. “Like you’re planning to deny the poor thing’s existence.”
I break down at that—at the thought of our baby growing up without its father’s love. Is he planning on leaving Harry behind too? Are we all to be discarded like yesterday’s trash because of that article?