She’d set the phone on the counter on speaker. The nurse continued. “How long has he had the erection?”
Kyle’s eyes about popped out of her head.
Completely unselfconscious, Granny said, “Just an hour. Is that right, Burt?”
“Is your grandfather on any heart medication or have a history of heart or blood pressure issues?”
“No, he’s as healthy as a horse,” Granny said in the same tone she had announced that he used to be a doctor.
“After four hours, go to the ER. In the meantime, see if he can resolve the issue with sexual intercourse or masturbation. He should also rest and drink plenty of water. You need to bring him in if it takes any longer. He could suffer permanent erectile dysfunction and it will begin to stress his heart.”
That sounded like a good solution to Gabby.
“I heard that it might explode after four hours,” said Kyle.
Why had Kyle heard anything about Viagra boners?
Breathing too heavy, tears burning at the backs of her eyes, Gabby rushed out of the kitchen to her room, which wasn’t even her room. She sat on the stupid futon and let the floodgates open. The tears streamed down her face. What had happened to her life? What had she done?
Everyone was in danger, and it was all her fault. She knew the risks. Darcy was murdered, and she had taken over her job. No matter how safe the EOD made it seem, she should have known better. She was the person who hugged the wall when walking up a stairwell. A person who couldn’t enjoy balconies. Peanut butter was basically arsenic in her mind. The one time she’d dismissed her caution, ignored her better instincts, she’d gotten burned.
Bubbles pushed his way into the room and hopped up next to her. The little dog licked the tears from her cheeks as she sobbed. His fur was still mangy from where she’d cut the duct tape out yesterday.
There was no one she could ask for help. She had never been so alone in her life.
“How am I going to get us out of this mess, Bubbles?”
Bubbles looked back with his tongue hanging out, and she realized he was begging. No one had even fed him dinner.
Friday night, Greene household
When she was a teenager, Gabby would cry herself to sleep in the middle of the day because she didn’t have anything to do but lean into the despair and wake hours after the sun had set—disoriented and hungover from sobbing over god-knows-what. It had been twenty years since she’d done that. In the foggy twilight of her wake-up, a moment of perspective hit. Just existing as a teen was comparable angst-wise to running from the mob and CIA while caring for children, grandparents, and getting divorced. Being fourteen with math homework, an unreciprocated crush, and a couple of bad zits was rough.
Just like after a healthy teenage crying jag, Gabby walked downstairs to find the TV on and everyone doing stuff like the world had only fallen apart for her. It was falling apart for them too, not that they knew it.
The kitchen was clean, and everything had been picked up. Kyle was sitting at the kitchen table with a notebook and pen. It looked like she was actually doing her homework.
It was as good now as it had been bad before. No one was screaming or fighting. Bubbles was in his dog bed chewing ona bone. Granny was packing lunches for tomorrow with Lucas. Guilt about her freak-out warred with total satisfaction. She was Mother of the Year. Sort of. Not really. Either way, it was peaceful for now, and Gabby knew enough not to tap the glass. Plus she needed to seek the advice of counsel. It was time to call on Justin.
She slipped on a sweater and her Crocs and stepped outside. The neighborhood was quiet, the sound of distant nighttime traffic as comforting and monotonous as ocean waves. While she had slept, it had rained, almost like she and Mother Nature had had the same idea. She breathed in deeply. There was nothing like the smell of wet asphalt. Wet dirt was probably okay too, but Gabby was a city girl. Smirnov’s goon gave her a nod and watched her walk next door. A single car passed by, splashing through a shallow puddle.
Justin’s house was an oasis of light, music filtering onto the street. When he opened the door, he took one look at her face, and he ushered her in. “Oh no. Who did it?”
At his loyalty, tears pricked at her eyes again. “It’s all my fault. I screwed up, Justin. Big-time.”
“Honey, you don’t know anything about screwing up until you try to do the splits in front of a crowd of a hundred people, sprain a groin muscle, and have to be carried off the stage on a stretcherafterthe paramedics cut you out of your Spanx in front of the still-rapt crowd.” They sat down in some comfy chairs. He flipped on a fireplace and yelled, “Hugh, it’s an emergency. Gabby is experiencing… some sort of disaster. Can you make cocktails?”
Hugh, who was the steady one in the relationship, slid his glasses up his nose and set his book down. He was a history professor at UCLA and fulfilled the stereotype. No one looked more like a history professor than Hugh.
“I can’t get drunk,” Gabby said. “A little something to loosen up would be fine, though.”
“Okay, spill. What happened? Is it Phil?”
“It’s everything.” She bit her lip. Where did she even start without discussing the EOD or the Russian Mafia?
She gave him a rundown on the things she could explain:
• Granny and Burt
