Page 12

My father made sure it’s all clean, I remember him adding mockingly. The IRS did its best to take the money away, but they couldn’t. My father was very good at what he did.

He invested the money with a little advice from his friends (men who had the same dilemma he did, with unwanted blood ties to the mafia), and that’s how he came to be who he is now: someone who had enough money to rescue the people who had suffered at his father’s hands.

So more like an angel investor than a vigilante, but able to use guns when necessary?

I remember how my description back then had his lips curving into an almost-but-not-quite smile, and honestly…

That’s another thing that keeps me from saying those three words.

If this means something…

Then surely, I’d have gotten Ruel to smile by now.

* * *

My stomach keeps tying itself in knots for the rest of the day. My gut tells me something bad’s about to happen, but that’s as far as it goes. I find myself getting the first aid kit out, but I also find myself rehearsing all the protocols Ruel’s taught me, in case something bad happens when I’m alone on the yacht.

Something bad like, I don’t know, Konrad or my stepfather finding out where I am, and they want to abduct me again?

What if that does happen?

What if something happens to Ruel?

Or me?

And just like that, it becomes so painfully clear.

Life is too short for me to wait another day…when tomorrow is never guaranteed.

And so when he comes back, whenever that may be…

I’ll let him know.

Those three words.

I’ll tell him.

I love you.

I practice saying the words in my mind as I absently turn on the TV in the kitchen, and at first, I’m too busy testing the words out in different tones⁠—

I love you when you’re being flirty.

I love you when you’re being shy.

I love you when you’re being earnest.

And that’s why, I didn’t realize it right away, what the news reporter is saying. It’s only when the TV shows faces on the screen⁠—

Faces that have my own face losing color and the cup in my hand sliding to the polished floor, scalding-hot coffee sloshing over my hand, but I don’t even notice this because those faces…

Konrad.

Joel.

The faces that still give me nightmares and leave me screaming and sobbing on the inside when no one’s watching⁠—

They’re on the TV.