by Jillian Dodd
“B is here? I just talked to him yesterday and he didn’t tell me he was coming.” My eyes fill up with tears again as my heart feels warm and full.
I grab my mom’s hand. “When did he get here?”
“Late last night. He had a sandbox and a truckload of sand delivered this morning.”
“I told him she wanted to build sandy castles with him.” I yell out, “Gracie!”
Gracie turns toward the sound of her name, sees me, jumps up, does something similar to the Snoopy happy dance, and then runs straight to me. I bend down as she catapults herself into my arms.
“Happy birthday, Gracie!”
“Happy birthday to Kiki,” she says back.
Then all the girls come running over and gang tackle me into the grass. Covering me with hugs and kisses.
Gracie screams, “No! My Kiki!”
The other girls back off as a hand reaches out to help me up.
A deeply tanned hand attached to a thicker than usual arm.
I grasp his hand as he pulls me to my feet and into a hug.
“I can't believe you're here.”
He gives me a lopsided grin. “I brought sand.”
I look into his warm blue eyes. Eyes that engulf me with more emotions than the ocean could hold. Eyes that make me feel like I’m riding a wave.
The eyes of home . . .
Vincent is in the meeting with his board of directors. It’s going well. He presents them with graphs from his marketing department full of consumer statistics and explains how the buzz from the nation-wide search for the lead role both verifies the need for the remake and how well it will be received upon release. He asks for their financial support.
“Vincent, if I may,” one of the more vocal board members says. “Making movies isn’t what this company does. I don’t think it’s a good move for us strategically. Our capital is much better spent on doing what we do best.”
Vincent quickly angers but doesn’t allow it to show on his face. “This is my company. I built it and have made each of you a lot of money trusting my good instincts in regard to movie futures and movie commodities. You need to trust me.”
“While that’s true, we all have invested in that company and want to see it continue to succeed. What will your budget be for this movie?”
Vincent tells them.
“Exactly my point. If the movie failed, it could have disastrous effects on the company’s net worth.”
“Your job is to advise me, not question me,” Vincent states politely. He needs their support to make this happen.
“Could I have you for a moment, Mr. Sharpe?” his assistant asks, barging into the closed door meeting.
He gives her a glare, but smiles at the board and says politely, “If you will excuse me.” When he gets out into the hall, he’s livid. “What is it?”
“There’s this guy on the phone who has called like four times. He says he won’t take no for an answer and says he needs to speak to you urgently about your daughter. I told him you don’t have a daughter, but he keeps calling.”
“Give me the phone.” His heart starts racing as he snatches the cordless phone out of her hand. “Yes?”
“Your daughter just showed up in Vancouver.”
“Are you sure?”
“Positive. Private plane. Flew in from Salt Lake City under the name Keatyn Douglas. Our man on the ground at the airport also identified her from the photo.”
“When?” he asks, knowing his assistant is listening.
“About three hours ago.”
“What?! God dammit!” he says, going into a rage, hanging up and yelling at his assistant. “When I get an important call, I don’t care who I’m with. You notify me! I’m leaving. Call the airport, let them know I need a charter. I need to be wheels up within the hour!”
“But, sir. What about the board?”
“The board can go fuck themselves.”
. . . B and I stare at each other, ignoring most of what's going on around us.
When the music starts, he moves with me. Like he did that night at the Undertow. The night when I wished he’d kiss me. Now, I don't know what to wish for. B has changed. I've changed. We're not those two naive kids anymore. Vincent has changed us. I look at my sisters dancing with each other. The triplets are getting taller and are under constant surveillance. Mom and Tommy were nervous upon seeing me. My godfather, James, thought I was some sort of trap.
And I realize Vincent has changed us all.
I close my eyes and do something I haven't done for a while.
I make a wish.
“I wish we could have our old lives back,” I say quietly.
“I’ve been studying stalking cases,” B whispers in my ear. “I want to talk to you about it.”
“Not today, B. Don't ruin today with any other thoughts of him.”
Vincent is so rushed getting to the airport, he doesn’t have much time to plan, but since she got away in New York, he’s always prepared. He carries a cigar tube with a syringe inside his jacket pocket. He pats it reassuringly. It’s quick acting, and once she’s incapacitated there are numerous lies he can tell the pilots, the simplest being that she is an actress with severe flight anxiety—due to her father perishing in a plane crash when she was young—and has to be practically comatose to get back and forth between filming in Vancouver and her home in L.A.
He’s praying he doesn’t miss her, but it’s been months since she’s seen her family. She’ll be staying for awhile. Probably thinks he isn’t paying attention anymore. Or maybe, she knows he his. Maybe that’s why she boldly flew there. She wants him to come rescue her. She told him of her desire to make his movie with him. Circumstances are keeping them apart.
He calls his man on the ground. He couldn’t say much while his assistant was hovering over him, but he can now. “Give me a situation update,” he barks.
“Flew in on a charter. The plane is still at the airport, apparently waiting for her return. They have a flight plan filed to go back to Salt Lake later this evening.”
“I’ll be there in three hours. Where is she now?”
“At the house with her family.”
“Do you know why?”
“Yes, it’s one of Abby and Tommy’s daughter’s birthdays. They took a day off filming because of it, my source on set told me.”
“I’ll be there soon. Keep watch on the house. Can I assume you are armed?”
“Heavily, sir.”
“Excellent.”
During the flight to Vancouver, Vincent works through his head how it will go down. He knows from his man that the whore’s home is heavily guarded. If he has to, he’ll break in and kill everyone.
Actually, he smiles. He won’t kill everyone.
He’ll bring both the whore and her daughter home with him.
The ultimate punishment for her betrayal. She will watch him kill her husband. Her babies. Then she can watch as he has his way over and over with her daughter. Maybe he will violate both of them.
The thought arouses him, and he allows his mind to drift further.
. . . I’m walking up the stairway to board our plane when a black town car pulls up to a sleek jet that has just landed. A man gets off and starts down the stairs. “Oh my God.”
The man turns in my direction, locks eyes with me, and smiles.
Our eyes lock. She’s here, but already preparing to depart. When she kisses her middle finger and flips him off, he knows the vulgar gesture is just a ruse. Something to confuse those around her. What she does next pulls at his heart. She mouths, Come and get me.
He knows with certainty that is what she truly wants.
And he knows he must do exactly as she requests. He must come and get her. Their fates have been conjoined since the first moment they met on the beach. And he must not fail her.
He takes out his phone and makes a desperate call to a very important man. One he knows can have this airport shut down in seconds due to the power his mafia status
wields across the world.
“Cooper! It’s him. He’s just getting off that plane. They were right about me. I led him here. I shouldn’t have come!”
Cooper drags me into the plane and yells at the copilot, “We need to take off. Now!”
I somehow get out of Cooper’s grip and back to the door. I see Vincent is on his phone.
I wave at him to get his attention. Then I raise my middle finger to my lips, kiss it, and hold it out to him. Then I mouth, Come and get me. I don’t even care if it pisses him off.
I want him pissed. I want him to follow me.
I want him far away from my family.
Vincent bounds down the stairs and starts running toward me just as the door is shut and the stairs are rolled away.
I grab my phone, hit 911, and call Garrett.
“Is he there?”
“He’s at the airport in Vancouver.”
“Your locket says you’re at school.”
“I took it off. Doesn’t matter. He’s coming toward our plane. He left Miami. Must’ve heard I was here. Call the airport. Say it’s a national emergency or something. Just get us off the ground.”
“What’s your tail number?”
I run to the cockpit and ask the pilot as politely as I can, “Can you please give him our tail number?” I hand him my phone. Then I run and look out the window. Vincent is standing outside the plane, gesturing big with his hands, and screaming into his phone.
I think he’s trying to get them to roll the stairs back.
“Cooper?”
Cooper nods at me and grabs a black bag that he didn’t have on the way here. He unzips it quickly, pulls out a matte black gun, and hands it to me. “The safety is on. Click here to unlock it. Pull the trigger to shoot. There are fifteen bullets in the magazine. If something happens to me, shoot until you take him down. Do not stop shooting.”
He pulls two more guns out of the bag. A smaller one, which he shoves into the back of his pants and a larger one that he keeps in his hand. “God dammit. I knew I should have taken you to the gun range.”
The copilot walks back with my phone. “I gave it to him but all flights have been temporarily grounded.” Then he notices the guns in our hands and says, “What’s going on?”
“She's a federal witness,” Cooper quickly lies. He pushes the copilot's head down even with the window. “That guy out there is the mob's contract killer. We have to take off now. Because when he comes to kill her, he'll kill you too. Won’t think twice. Get us ungrounded. Now.” Cooper even pulls out a badge of some kind and flashes it at the copilot. “Move,” he says.
The copilot gets on the headset and speaks to the tower. “We’re requesting an emergency takeoff.”
“Emergency takeoff? You mean landing?” the tower replies.
“No. Take off.”
“Can’t right now.”
Cooper grabs the headset. “This is Cooper Steele, NSA. There is a possible terrorist suspect standing outside our plane. He just arrived from . . .”
“Miami,” I whisper, as Cooper says, “Miami.”
“A flight did just arrive from Miami,” the tower replies, sounding confused.
“Apprehend him and clear us for takeoff,” Cooper commands.
“I can apprehend him but I'm afraid I can't clear you for takeoff. Only the . . . what? Yes, sir. You are cleared for take off.”
Quickly, we are moving down the runway.
Vincent curses excessively into his phone as he watches her plane race down the runway. “I thought you said you could handle it?”
“I tried. I was overruled by the government. If you would have called me sooner, I could have had the plane disabled.”
Vincent pushes his anger down. “I appreciate your help in this matter.”
“Do you want me to have her kidnapped?”
“The men you recommend haven’t been able to find her.”
“Have you followed the money?”
“The money?”
“She had to pay for the flight somehow.”
“How do I do that?”
“You let me invest in your company.”
“So I can go to jail for money laundering?”
“Don’t kid yourself, Vincent. I have plenty of legitimate funds in the bank.”
“I couldn’t give you a seat on my board of directors, but I just met with them and regardless of the financial projections for my movie they have been hesitant. It’s not going to stop me, though. I have plenty of assets I can leverage.”
“And I happen to own a bank that would love to help you do just that if you’ll agree to take me on as a small investor.”
“Deal,” Vincent says.
“Excellent. I also know of a few others who would be willing to invest without representation. If you need more money, let us know. In the meantime, I’ll have a bank representative at your office within the week. And I will make a call to a very special accountant I know. His specialty is finding those who don’t want to be found. Everyone leaves a trail.”
Vincent hangs up. At least something good has come out of this day.
“Put your hands up!” he hears.
Vincent assesses the airport security men who have their weapons trained on him—and does as they ask.
What follows is a debacle. Men detain him, and he’s brought in a room for questioning.
Once the TSA realizes he’s in the movie industry and that he wasn’t even on the plane that arrived from Miami, they profusely apologize and let him go.
As our wheels leave the ground, Cooper’s phone rings.
“Fuck,” he says before he answers. “Yes. I know, sir. Right, but . . .” Sigh. “It's on me. Yes, I understand.”
He disconnects the call and shuts off his phone as we climb into the air.
Then he stands up, takes the gun out of my hand, and puts it back in the bag along with his.
“What the hell were you thinking? He didn't know you were in here until you called attention to yourself.”
“He was going to the house.” I picture Gracie sleeping in my arms and feel sick. “I couldn't let him.”
“He put something in one of your sister’s backpacks, didn’t he?”
“Yes.”
He runs his hand across his buzzed hair. “Garrett just fired me.”
“Bullshit,” I say.
“What do you mean?”
“I mean, bullshit. Although I appreciate everything he's done for me, and although he may think he is, Garrett is not the boss of me. He works for me.”
“It seems personal to him.”
“It's always been personal to you. And it just got more personal because you met my sisters.”
He nods.
“You were right, Cooper. About me being the weakest link in my security. I need you to teach me all the martial arts stuff you know. And how to shoot. You're not leaving school.” I roll my eyes and give him a grin. “The girls would all be grieving for days.”
After we level out, the co-pilot comes back. “We were just informed that our flight plan was changed. We’ll be landing at Santa Monica airport in a few hours.”
“Santa Monica?” I ask after the pilot goes back into the cockpit.
Cooper shakes his head. “That’s where Garrett is meeting us. He’ll be getting you back to school.”
I get up and pour us each two fingers of scotch.
I set the glass in front of him. “Drink.”
“I can't drink on the job.”
“Technically, you just got fired. Drink.”
When we land, Garrett pulls Cooper aside. They’re having a very animated conversation.
I walk in between them. “That’s enough, Garrett. There’s no reason to yell at him if you’ve fired him.”
“The hell there isn’t. I can’t believe the two of you pulled a stunt like this.”
“Garrett, calm down. Cooper planned everything out. He’s really smart and he did a really good job. You need to hire him back.”
“What? No.”
“Um, yes, Garrett. Otherwise you're fired.”
Garrett's head practically does a 360-degree spin. Almost like a horror movie.
“Are you fucking kidding me?” Garrett says, now completely pissed off.
“Garrett, you know I appreciate everything you've done for me, but I have to put my foot down on this, just like I did with Cooper. I need both of you working together to help keep me safe. My rehearsals just ended and Cooper is going to start teaching me martial arts.”
“And how to shoot,” Cooper says with a grin.
“Because even though school is pretty secure, I’m the weak link.”
“The weak link?”
“Tell him, Cooper.”
He does and then, finally, they shake hands.
Garrett gives me a hug, then dangles a set of car keys in front of us and says, “Drive from here to Vegas. Spend the night. Catch a charter there.”
Cooper and I get into the car and drive away from the airport.
“I don’t want to go to Vegas tonight.”
“We don’t have a choice.”
“Sure, we do. It’s past ten, we’re exhausted, and it’s over a four-hour drive. It’s not safe.”
“Where do you want to go then?”
“We’ll stay here in Santa Monica.”
“Vincent can check our flight plans.”
“If he does that, he’d go to Malibu. Shit. I wonder if he knows B was in Vancouver? Hang on. I need to call him.”
I push B’s number. “Hey, are you still in Vancouver?”
“Yeah, spending the night at your parents’ and then flying to my next tournament.”
“Where’s that?”
“Portugal. Then Hawaii for the Thanksgiving break. You doing anything? You could come.”
“I don’t think that would be very smart, B.”
“Yeah, I know. Wishful thinking.”
“Thanks again for spending Gracie’s birthday with her.”
