She knows I love her. What more needs to be said? Someday, hopefully soon, I’ll get in contact again.
Meeting the rest of the guys in the front hallway, I can’t help but wonder what will happen to all their stuff, to the house. There isn’t enough time to get rid of all the evidence.
But is there anything close to evidence here, actually?
RJ knows how to clean any of his stuff. Trips’ entire business is in his head and a small black notebook that he carries with him on poker nights. Jansen takes things, but he’s always been freakishly careful about leaving evidence around. Having learned about his cousin, it makes sense. Walker’s collection isprobably the most damning—his set up for ID forging is bad if you know what you’re looking at. But as an art major, even that can be explained away as some project commenting on government and identity. You know, tricky art stuff.
“Wait, what about the cat?” I ask, three sets of eyes looking at me with different degrees of question and surprise.
Walker’s the first to respond. “Shit. We didn’t think about the cat.”
“We can’t bring it with us,” Trips announces.
“But we can’t leave it here to die of thirst,” I say. “It’s Jansen’s mom’s cat.”
“That Evie took,” Walker says.
“On accident.”
RJ closes his eyes, his lips tight. “Who has a duffel bag?”
Trips curses and marches up the stairs, RJ following. Two minutes later, they’re at the bottom of the stairs with two duffel bags, one of which is yowling, Trips’ arms covered in red scratches.
RJ sets down the cat, pulling a dark green stocking hat from his pocket and tugging it onto his head. “Any computers? Phones? Smart watches? Earbuds? Speakers? Anything with the word ‘smart’ in its name?”
We all shake our heads.
“Anything that’s obviously evidence left here?”
Again, we shake our heads.
He nods, taking his phone from his pocket. “Once I start this program, in less than ten minutes, every piece of technology in this house will be reset to factory presets, all links to us wiped. Then we’re ghosts. We’ll leave two by two, five minutes apart. The goal will be to lose any tails, then circle back on foot to the rendezvous. Anybody not there by midnight will be left behind. Walker, you’ll go with Trips. He’s a better fighter, but he’s down one hand, so if there’s trouble, you might have to step in. Clara,you’ll come with me. Leave the lights on. We want it to look like Jay is still here, so they don’t think we’re running.”
Adrenaline surges, and while I hope RJ and I are the first wave, instead he ushers Trips and Walker toward the back door. Walker stops, kissing me hard. “See you there, princess.”
I manage a shaky smile for him.
Trips just stares, his face a mask of anger, nothing soft showing through. Back to the man I met this fall who hated me and the world I came from. Or maybe he just hated the world in general.
“Be smart. RJ’s going to need you,” he grumbles.
I nod, not sure what he means, then the two of them are gone, the door to the kitchen swinging behind them.
Uncertain what to do to kill the time, the cat still mumbling at our feet, I go to the kitchen, packing up a baggie of fresh cookies Walker must have made while he was waiting for us to get back, and then fill up my water bottle, shoving some apples and a half a block of cheese in my coat pockets. RJ just watches me panic-stashing food like some misanthropic squirrel, letting me push granola bars into his pockets, adding one Mountain Dew, one kombucha, and a baggie of tea before I run out of empty pockets.
Trips and I can get coffee anywhere, cheap and easy.
Running out of food to gather and stash, I grip the counter, my breath ragged.
“They’ll be okay,” RJ says, guessing at what I’m freaking out about. And while I’m worried about the others, that’s not what has me such a mess.
“Your family, RJ. Jansen and Walker, even Trips. So many people. And we’ll just be gone.”
He wraps himself around me from behind, pressing his cheek to mine. “They’ll be fine, Clara. We’ll be fine. We’re keeping them safe, keeping ourselves safe, and anyone we care about would want that for us.”
“But—”
“No buts, not right now, Clara. We need to get safe, then we can worry about the rest. I—” He chokes a bit, and I realize I’ve pushed him to think about what he’s trying to avoid, making this harder for him than I would ever want to. “I can’t worry about the rest right now.”
