“I’m keeping the apartment,” I tell Maren while she sits on the suitcase to help me zip it.
“Smart. In case?—”
“In case it doesn’t work out. In case they fire me. In case I need somewhere to run.” The word slips out before I can catch it.Run.Notreturn.Notcome back to.Run.
Maren immediately picks up on it.
“Ellie. Do you feel safe about this?”
The thorny vines that have wrapped around my pulsing hope tighten.
“I feel like it’s the best option I have.”
“That’s not what I asked.”
I fold a sweater. Then unfold it.
“The house is... intense,” I try to explain. “The security, the staff, the… everything. It’s not like any job I’ve ever had. It feels more like entering a system. Like once you’re inside, the system runs you.”
“And?”
“And I need the system to run me right now, Mare. Because I’m not doing a great job of running myself.”
She’s quiet. She finishes zipping the suitcase with a final, decisive tug, and then she stands and puts her hands on my shoulders.
“Call me every day.”
“I’ll do my best.”
“And if anything feels even remotely wrong, Ellie — you call me, and you leave. I don’t care if you’re in the middle of a lesson. I don’t care if it’s three in the morning. Call me.”
“I promise.”
“And take this.” She reaches into her coat pocket and pulls out a fold of bills. Cash. I see the denominations — twenties, fifties. There’s at least three hundred dollars.
“Maren—”
“Emergency fund. Hide it somewhere they can’t find it. Not in your wallet, not in your purse. In a shoe, in a book, in the lining of your coat. Money you can grab if you need to leave fast.”
She’s not being dramatic. Maren Lavelle is the most level-headed person I’ve ever known. She doesn’t do dramatic. She doesprepared.
“You think I’ll need to leave fast?”
“I think you’re moving into a stranger’s house in a gated compound with armed security, and you don’t know why a man who makes that kind of money needs that kind of protection, and I think you should have exit money that nobody knows about.”
She holds out the cash like it’s the only option.
So, I do the polite thing and take it, folding it into the inner pocket of the suitcase.
“Thank you,” I whisper, tears welling.
“You got this, El.”
We hug, and she holds on to me longer than usual.
8
ELLIE
