Page 8 of Queen of Nothing

Leaning back on her elbow, she’s forgotten about the map, and now rubs her hand around her stomach.

“I can’t eat anymore of this stuff,” she sighs.

My gaze cuts to the paper bags strewn about the dresser. Grease stains the white paper.

We ate all the fast food when we first got in, but the stale stench is pungent in the room.

The coffee cups still have some dregs left in them. They will start to smell soon if we don’t throw them out.

I straighten up and toss the towel onto the floor.

Serena shifts her weight off her elbow and drops onto the mattress.

Still cupping her suspiciously flat stomach, she thinks aloud, “We’ll get some sleep, then take the last train into the city just before midnight.”

“Then what?”

“We sell what we can. And maybe we can make the first flight out.”

The first flight out could go anywhere.

We have no direction just yet. More of a ‘first out’ situation while we’re still in Europe.

The plan was to get out of the UK, then Europe. Then make our way to Serena’s secret contact, the shield witch she’s told me nothing about.

Not like a lot of conversation has happened on the flights or the trains or the taxis, not with so many people around us.

And in the motels, we sleep mostly.

I give a nod, unenthused.

Unloading the bulk of our jewellery in one city is the better idea. It makes it harder for our families to track us once we’re off the continent.

If we hold onto the jewels and pawn them as we go, then we just leave a trail for them to follow.

I drape myself over the bed, cheek pressing into the lumpy pillow.

A frown starts to burrow into my face.

I focus my sight on the single black hair that tickles my nose—sprouting from the pillow.

I make an ick sound at the back of my throat, then pluck the hair off the pillow.

I hope it’s cat hair.

I let it drift down to the carpet.

For a long while, Serena stares up at the ceiling. She hasn’t said a whole lot since we left on the boat, and I’ve said even less.

I don’t want to talk.

There’s too much hurt in me.

She’s responsible for some of it.

The betrayal of luring me into a runaway scheme just to tell me after the fact that she’s pregnant, when I’m literally stuck on a boat with her?

It’s as serpentine as one can get.