“I didn’t think you’d make it!” he said as he headed over to him. He nodded once respectfully at the officer, who gave him a hesitant nod in return. “Thank you, sir. We’ve been waiting for a while. The pilot kept asking where you were.”
“There was trouble at the border,” Winter said, giving the officer a meaningful look. “Can we really fly out from here?”
Dameon nodded. “If we leave soon. Did you call Claire? I can’t reach her.”
“Cell towers are all jammed in Singapore.” He looked at his phone. “Might work here, though.”
At the approach of Dameon, the officer had seemed to relax in his stance a little. He lingered a moment longer, awkwardly, then finally decided that it would be a good time for him to take his leave. He tipped his hat at Winter.
“All right,” he said. “Stay safe, Mr. Winter.”
Winter gave him a bow of his head. “You too,” he said.
The officer looked at him one more time, then at the plane, then at the airfield. At last, he adjusted his hat and jogged back to his vehicle.
“You’re safe,” Dameon said, relief obvious in his voice. “I really thought we weren’t going to find you in all the chaos.”
Winter stepped toward him into a brief embrace. As he did, hewatched the police car continue down the road, kicking up a cloud of dust until it finally turned the corner and disappeared from sight. Again, he found himself looking around for any signs of Sydney’s arrival. No luck.
“If I’d gotten really desperate,” Winter said with a single laugh against Dameon’s shoulder, “I would’ve just stood in the middle of the street and called for help.”
Dameon laughed at that, too. But when Winter stepped back from their hug, Dameon’s eyes searched his, a new light of recognition in them.
“So we can follow the mob of fans?” he asked. “Or so that your other team could come get you?”
Winter stilled, brows furrowing in confusion. “What team?” he said.
Dameon put his hands in his pockets. “Winter, you know what I mean.”
His heart began to hammer. “I honestly don’t,” he replied. But he could see the truth reflected in the boy’s eyes, that uncanny ability to know everything about him, and in a flash, he knew that Dameon had figured him out.
Dameon gave him a sidelong look.
“Ashley Miller isn’t really Ashley Miller, is she?” he said. “And she’s not really here as your contracted bodyguard.”
Winter shook his head again. This had been a lesson from Sydney, too, that when under suspicion, he needed to stick to his story at all costs. “No, she is,” he said. “On both counts.” He looked back around the field. “And I really need her to be here right now. She’s supposed to arrive at the same time.”
“Winter.”
Dameon walked around until he faced him, so that Winter could look nowhere else but directly into his friend’s eyes. “Winter, before we started on this trip, Claire told me to watch out for you and report back to her.”
He blinked. “You’ve been tailing me?”
“Claire wanted me to stay close to you and make sure everything was okay… without telling you. She’s been suspicious for a while now. Your moods during this trip have been… concerning.” He shook his head. “I’m sorry for tailing you, but my gut also told me something was off.” His voice quieted. “I know you’re in danger, and I know it’s not just because of this lockdown. So what can you tell me?”
Winter met his gaze and knew that Dameon could see the lie in his eyes, that he had known for a long time, that it was impossible to deny this secret that hung between them. Dameon seemed to notice the recognition in his gaze, because he gave Winter the smallest of nods.
Remember your training.The reminder rushed through Winter’s mind and stabbed at his chest. When he spoke again, his voice was hoarse.
“There’s nothing to tell,” he said. “And I don’t appreciate you and Claire keeping things from me.”
Dameon studied him without a word. Then he nodded and said in a low voice, “Then let me tell you what I know,” he said. “This afternoon, after you headed out, I overheard a conversation at the hotel about you, from two men dressed in business suits. I thought I misheard them at first, because they weren’t talking about your concerts or why you were here. They were talking about your bodyguard. They called her Sydney.” He narrowed his eyes. “And they weren’t discussing her as your bodyguard, either.”
Two men in business suits.Winter stilled. “What were they discussing?”
“They were talking about how to get rid of her, how they needed to report back to an agency.”
Suddenly, the dread pooling in Winter’s stomach vanished, burned away by fear. He stared in silence at Dameon, who met his gaze with a somber nod.
