“Are you interested in buying a piece?” the waitresswent on. “He’d be the one you talk to. Then they’ll ring you up at the front.”
“Thanks,” Jesse told her. “We’re still browsing but—”
“Jesse, I don’t feel good,” I blurted, telling theentire, one hundred percent truth. “I think I’m going to be sick.”
His hand landed on my shoulder. “What’s wrong?” heasked, sincerely concerned.
I struggled to suck in a breath, to fill my lungs withthe oxygen they so badly needed. “I need to go home. I need to go home rightnow.”
“O-okay.” Jesse’s hand dropped around my waist,helping me forward. But it didn’t feel like help. It felt like an anchorslowing me down, holding me back from the escape that I desperately needed.
I wanted to push it off, push him away and just run.And run. And run. And never look back. I winced, feeling my fear like aphysical pain. Like a bullet wound in my gut, a knife in my back.
I was almost surprised when I didn’t fall down andstart bleeding out right here, right on the cool concrete floor.
“I’ll get you home, Caroline,” he murmured next to myhead. “Everything’s going to be okay.”
No, it wasn’t. Nothing was ever going to be okayagain.
“Right now,” I croaked. My legs felt like jelly and mymind was static-y and savage, wild with too many thoughts all clambering to beheard. This was the exact opposite reaction I should be having.
I was usually so cool under pressure, so collected. Iwas a goddamn genius when it came to getting out of sticky situations. Francescaand I had escaped theVolkovpakhanfor God’s sake.
But now? When I needed to be in control, my mostinventive? Now I was crumbling like a coward.
Fear was overpowering me, giving me away and if Ididn’t get my shit together in the very next second, everything was over.
All of it.
My new life. My sparkling future.
My daughter.
Finding strength buried somewhere deep down, I latchedonto it and inhaled another shaky breath.
You have a spine, I reminded myself. Use it.
“Caroline, seriously, you’re scaring me,” Jesse murmuredgently. “Are you going to be okay? Do I need to get help?”
“I’m okay.” And as I said the words, I decided theywould be true.
I would get out of this.
I would get Juliet out of this.
But then my past reached out from the dark tomb I’dburied it in and grabbed ahold of my present in a chokehold. All of the demonsI had been running from, hiding from, crashed into my safe haven present in afiery collision that jarred my body, mind and soul.
“Caro?” a voice called across the gallery.
We were still in the center of the restaurant, whitepartitions displaying art on every side of us, half hiding the other patrons,half isolating us out of sight from everybody else.
The familiar voice called again. “Caro, is that you?”It was deeper than I remembered, more cultured, more masculine. And yet itstill had that raspy edge to it that reminded me of my childhood and sneakingaround warehouses and stealing candy from gas stations.
“Is he talking to you?” Jesse asked, sounding trulyperplexed.
I stood up straighter. My face was white, drained ofall the blood and color and life I’d spent five years pouring into my body. NowI was a corpse, ready for judgment and punishment.
“I think so,” I told Jesse.
