However, I do not find myself grieving this man or the life we could’ve had. Because as everyone trades tales and drinks, I realize I am not missing anything. While I do wish Hunter were here, everything I want is in front of me. A woman I love, who loves me. My brother whose bond is unbreakable. A friend who pushes me to be greater than I am by believing the best in me. A guardian who risked her life to give me a place in this world.And…my mother, who gave me life, and, by extension, these people I care about.
Maybe I will find who I am along the way, but I know I am myself at this table.
Turned so inward to introspect, I don’t notice Finley swaggering up to us until she plunks a fat set of car keys in the center of our table. “Won a car.”
Lucy balks. “You did what?”
“I won a car. Those guys are like, massively bad at poker. Got one of them to bet his car. He lost.” Finley grins so wide I think her lips are going to break off her face. Behind her, an angry man mutters to other men at the card table, shaking his head sadly. “It’ll be a tight fit, but I think we could drive the rest of the way.”
I close my eyes to picture the maps on Roxana’s table. The one of New Jersey forms in my mind. Normally, I could turn on my watch and gather intel, but I’ve been trained to know how to navigate without it. “There aren’t any official checkpoints between here and the tunnel. The remaining highway checkpoints are farther north. I…think she’s probably right. So long as we don’t get tagged by air, we should be clear to start in the morning.”
Delilah peers behind Finley. “That man does not look happy.”
“You wouldn’t be happy either if you went all in on four aces, only to find out your girl here had a straight flush.” Finley grabs someone’s drink from the table and downs it. She takes a chair, spins it, and sits backward on it in between Lucy and Cassie. “What an idiot. Anyway, what are we talking about? Ooh, have we traded scar stories? I’ve got a bunch with great fights attached to them.”
Maybe it’s the alcohol, maybe it’s the warmth of Lucy’s body pressed into mine, or maybe it’s the comfort of this ragtag group of friends inside this cozy bar…but I don’t tune out Finley’sstories as she rolls up her sleeve to show off a weird scar from what she described as an “armadillo fight.” In fact, I enjoy them. I even laugh once.
It must be the alcohol.
26
Forty miles of Captain Finley’s games and tall tales later—I’m sure it was the alcohol. We retired to our rooms that night, reward car and all, and Lucy and I undressed and held each other to sleep. Despite our fervor for one another, we were too exhausted to do much of anything except sleep. Can’t complain about falling asleep and waking up next to the most beautiful woman in the world, but now we’re in this ridiculous car and Finley apparently cannot stand the sound of silence and must fill it any way she knows how—chatting, inquisitions of her companions, singing bawdy songs, or doing a particularly inane humming.
The car Finley won is a wagon of sorts, with enough seats for everyone but it is as cramped as she described. Mason drives and Delilah sits in the passenger seat. Lucy, Cassie, and I sit in the middle row, squished together. Roxana and Finley sit in the rear, facing the back windshield. Many of the seat belts do not work, so we place our lives in Mason’s capable hands.
Out of our window passes by more unremarkable factories and flat land, but it isn’t long before we see the harbingers ofNew York City: grand skyscrapers that have stood the test of time.
Lucy rests her forehead on the glass and digs her thumbnail into her pants. The tense gesture does not pass me by, and I take that hand and smother it between my own. “It is still your home.”
She doesn’t answer for a long while but lets the city grow taller as we near the entrance to the tunnel. I can’t begin to imagine what’s going on in her head, seeing the place she grew up in from afar, detached from it but also hopelessly tethered. “No, it isn’t my home. It was a place I lived.”
“And that’s different?”
Lucy regards me with her eyes soft and slightly watery. “Home is where your heart is at rest. My heart was never in the city. My heart is with you. My home is wherever you are.”
Too touched to respond, I lean my head on her shoulder and hope that it speaks for me in reply. It’s quite a lovely moment, only to be ruined by Finley pretending to barf in the back seat.
Roxana smacks her in the leg. “Finley, be nice.”
“Ugh, you know, it isn’t fair to play favorites. We just met her.”
Roxana peers at me over the seat and I turn slightly to look at her. With a single nod from me, she understands. “So, you know how we discussed that I used to be with the Order? And how I was betrayed and my husband killed?”
Finley squints in suspicion. “Yes?”
“Well…around that time, I gave birth. That baby was left in the care of the Order, and I never saw her again. Until recently.”
While Finley apparently doesn’t get it, Cassie slowly turns to me. Very quickly she looks between Roxana and me, as if trying to match the resemblances between us, or figure out how she didn’t see it before. “Holy shit. No freaking way.”
“Cassandra, language,” Delilah chides from the front seat.
“Wait, Mini Boss is your long-lost daughter?” Finley finally catches up and chuckles. “Well, that explains the shared no-fun factor—it’s genetic. But I’m with Blondie Junior—holy shit.”
Again, Delilah speaks up. “Shea, language.”
“Sorry. I’m learning I’m not an only child.”
Beside her, Roxana chuckles and nudges her with an open palm. “Shea, I would have perished trying to raise you.”
