He leaned forward. “Let’s go.” He swung a leg over the gear shift lever into the driver’s side foot well, the thin wool of his trousers stretching at the seams. “Get out.”
Bree opened the door and sucked in the fresh air as though she’d spent hours in the car. When she stepped out, the concrete under her feet felt reassuringly firm. She hid the sigh that escaped her lungs. Instead of murdering her in the isolated garage, this lunatic was going to march her back inside. To the front desk. Where she could get help. As the fear melted, confidence took its place. I got this.
The elevator pinged and liberated a crowd of people who milled for a few moments in the garage entrance then dispersed in various directions toward their cars. No one passed near them. She locked the car behind her and dropped the keys into her pocket.
She felt a push on her shoulder. “Knife’s right here.” A finger poked her belly. “I’m ready to use it.” His hand grabbed hers. She resisted the urge to pull away and instead clasped it, trying to transmit calm.
They strode through the lobby, Bree setting a brisk pace, keeping her head held high while her eyes swept the faces of passersby, trying to catch someone’s gaze. But the goal of the casino, she realized, wasn’t to have strangers mix with one another. It was to consume the attention of every human being inside. “Look at me. Look over here.” That was the call transmitted by the glitter, the pulsing sounds, the flashy colors, the low ceilings, the provocatively dressed attendants. The longer you focused on the inside, the more money you were likely to spend. It was not the environment where a thin homeless man walking hand-in-hand with a plump, well-dressed woman garnered much attention. Stranger things than this, obviously, happened in Vegas.
At the entrance to the lobby, Bree paused. She saw Mal and his family clustered near the front, about thirty yards from the front desk. But in the middle of the room, between the Patels and the desk stood a four-foot-high circular marble vase, out of which billowed an assortment of tropical flora.
“Move it. The desk’s over there.” The man tugged her arm. Bree lagged. She dragged her feet and stumbled. He grabbed her under the elbow so tightly that she winced in pain.
“Watch your fucking step.” He mumbled just loud enough for her to hear.
The eye-catching centerpiece appeared on her right and obscured her view of Mal. She shifted her gaze and riveted her eyes on the desk clerks, the uniformed attendants bouncing behind the counter like so many ping-pong balls in a lottery machine. She practiced what she would say. Thirty feet left to go. Her fingers tightened into fists. Twenty. She tensed her body, ready to rip away and run. Ten. She stared so hard at the face of the clerk nearest them that she was surprised the clerk didn’t look up in wonder. Two feet from the desk her assailant stopped, his fingers still digging into her arm. He moved his other hand in front of him. She caught the flash of the knife in his palm.
They waited. The clerks ignored them. Guests standing in the snaking line to their right, waiting to check in, gave them dirty looks. Bree shifted her gaze to a woman attendant. Then a different man. She never before in her life been so studiously ignored. She felt like screaming but repressed the urge. The same inner voice admonished, as always, Don’t make a scene.
But for once, the ridiculousness of the command appalled her. The enormity of her foolishness washed over her in such a sudden and staggering wave that she closed her eyes and would have fallen if her assailant hadn’t maintained his grip on her arm. Her head drooped.
Mal, she realized, was right. She did want to make people happy at any cost. A lunatic homeless person was threatening her life with a knife. And she thought she had the situation under control. Who am I kidding?
The shriek that bubbled up from deep in her chest pierced the sedate lobby babble like a dagger. She twisted her arm free and fled, shouting at the top of her voice. “He has a knife. He’s trying to kill me.” People stared. She ignored them, hurtling toward the interior of the hotel, shoving astonished tourists out of her way. Her heels clattered on the marble. Behind her she heard footsteps and yelling. She didn’t turn but bolted though the crowd, ignoring angry gestures as she bumped and stumbled against the tide.
At a four-way junction she turned right, keeping close to the wall, dragging her hand along the golden wallpaper for balance. The carpet beneath muffled the echoes of her footfall and slowed her sprint to a jog. The noise behind her faded. A blue suited man stepped in front of her, arms spread. She didn’t have the strength to avoid him. He took one step back and caught her, holding her erect with his hands firmly on her shoulders.
“Whoa, there, ma’am.” He flashed a badge by briefly opening his jacket. “Hotel security. I’m here to help.”
Bree turned around. Unconcerned multitudes streamed by them. At nearby tables, dealers shuffled decks of cards. In the distance, slot machines played tinny music.
The security guard put his arm gently on her back. “Just got the message. That was quite a shock you had in the lobby. But everything’s fine now.”
She shook her head and burst into tears.
***
No one spoke during the twenty-minute drive to the airport. Potential icebreakers drifted through Bree’s mind like a flotilla of Navy ships, but she sank each one with a shake of her head. Mal’s family was preoccupied. No time for small talk. Catching their flight was a touch and go endeavor due to the time lost at the hotel after Bree’s recent incident. If the day wasn’t going to end in total disaster, she’d have to get them to the departure terminal quickly and in one piece. Her hands gripped the wheel and her foot urged the accelerator to the floor. The car hurtled down the fast lane at eighty miles an hour, keeping easy pace with fellow vehicles on the highway. The day before, Faye’s insistence that they arrive at the airport three hours early felt ridiculous. It meant they would leave the hotel earlier than most people with the same flight time got out of bed. But that all changed. First there was Bree’s interrogation by hotel security, then the quick interview with the police, and finally a cursory inspection of the rental car, the entire set of procedures taking close to two hours.
Bree didn’t press charges against the homeless man. Her attacker was, she thought, mentally ill. As soon as she was out of danger, she should have grabbed the first people she saw and had them call the police. Instead, she collapsed under pressure. Now there was a deranged man running around the streets of Las Vegas. The police officer’s reassurance that, in Vegas, he wasn’t the only one didn’t help. If she had acted appropriately, he could have been in custody and gotten the psychiatric help he needed.
Throughout the two hours at the hotel, Bree’s appeals for Mal’s family to take a cab or Uber to the airport fell on deaf ears. Mal said he wouldn’t leave her. The sisters refused to be ripped from the action. Soumil gently interceded on Bree’s behalf with both the hotel staff and the police. And Faye was intractable. She jumped feet first into the martyr role and dug in her heels. “We couldn’t possibly leave you here by yourself. It wouldn’t be Christian.” She clasped her hands over her purse. “Don’t give a moment’s thought to our catching our flight.” She dabbed her eyes with a tissue. “We will pay for that extra day of parking. My physical therapy appointment for this afternoon can be rescheduled. And if Soumil runs out of medication, I’m certain nothing will happen. They must have a drug store here somewhere.”
When the SUV finally rounded a corner and the white box-like structures of McCarran International Airport’s departure terminals appeared in front of them, Bree released a breath that she felt like she had been holding since they left the hotel. She peered at the clock on the dash. “You’ve got almost forty-five minutes. I’m sure you’ll make it.” She jerked the car to a stop and swung open her door. By the time she reached the back, Mal was already unloading the luggage, flinging bags to the pavement where they toppled over one another.
“Take it easy.” Bree reached in to help him.
“Don’t tell him to take it easy. This is no time for
slacking off.” Faye looked at her watch as her daughters righted the cases and extended the carrying handles. “We only have twenty minutes.” She glared at Bree with the fury of one whose martyrdom was about to be exposed as a sham.
She would have been happier if we’d missed the flight, Bree thought. She helped Mal hoist the final suitcase to the ground and slammed the door. “You have plenty of time.”
Faye swung on her. “What do you know about airport travel?”
Soumil’s fingers drummed on the handle of his bag. “Come on, Faye. Let’s go.”
“No.” The last vestiges of martyrdom dropped from Faye’s face. Underneath seethed a complex visage of anxiety, resentment, and fear.
“Mom,” Mal called from the sidewalk. “You’re making us even later.”
But Faye stared at Bree with parted lips, as if she were holding back an explosion through sheer willpower.
Bree returned her future mother-in-law’s gaze. It occurred to her that she beheld a woman who felt utterly out of control. It was as though the entire long weekend had been building up to this one instant, when Faye would let Bree have it for all the small ways Bree vied for dominance and won. Bree braced herself, wishing the attack could have come when she had more inner resources to muster, but feeling secure in her ability to weather Faye’s rage. It’s not the first time. It won’t be the last. She put her hands on her hips and forced a smile.
Faye glared at Bree. “It’s a sin to be dishonest.” She threw a brief glance at her family, assembled around the cluster of luggage, then scrutinized her daughter-in-law to-be. “You, Bree, made us late. If you had flown with us in the first place, you never would have ended up with a rental car.” She folded her hands and stared up at the sky. “When will you stop avoiding the truth? The Lord in his infinite wisdom has a reason for everything.”
An inexplicable coldness gripped Bree’s stomach. She shifted her feet and dropped her gaze. She didn’t know what was coming, but she knew she wasn’t going to like it.
Faye continued in full cry, her eyes closed, her folded hands shaking with force as she pressed them together and raised them above her head. “It’s not flying that killed your parents. Why won’t you understand? They had to die. The Lord willed it. That airplane had to crash.”
“Faye!” Soumil jumped from the curb and yanked his wife’s arm. “That’s more than enough.”
Faye, spent, allowed herself to be propelled toward the terminal. Her daughters followed, casting worried glances over their shoulders at Bree. In a few moments, Mal stood alone on the traffic island, arms limp at his side, gaping at Bree. “She didn’t…”
Bree lifted her head. “Mean that?” She pulled on her blouse. “She’s right, you know. I can’t avoid accidents by not flying. That’s not why I don’t. It’s because I never want to feel what my parents felt in their last moments. I know it seems crazy.” She gave Mal a sad smile. “But it’s my way of keeping them alive.”
Mal stepped off the curb, his arms outstretched. Bree gestured for him to go back. She pressed her lips together, shook her head, and climbed into the car. Mal waved. She flicked her blinker and looked in the side view mirror for a gap in the passing traffic. A black Mercedes pulled up behind her and flashed its lights. She merged into the gap left for her and wove around the cars discharging passengers, following signs for the exit.
Chapter 18
Bree drove without noticing her surroundings. The part of her brain in charge of maneuvering the vehicle through the remaining city traffic and onto Route 15 could manage its tasks alone. She watched other cars without seeing them. Manipulated the accelerator without feeling it. Her mind slipped backward in time, to the crisp October day she stayed late at school for band practice. She remembered everything about that early evening. The last cicadas buzzed in the trees near the football field, their drone competing with the tubas and saxophones. The cold metal of her flute cooled her hands as she stood with the other ninth graders watching the older students practice. Shouts floated from football players occupying the other half of the field. Her fingers tapped the keys in time to the music, soundlessly rehearsing her part.
Those minutes were seared into her brain the way Stephanie’s grandparents remembered what they were doing when Kennedy was shot. Or the way older friends remembered where they were on 9/11. It was in all other ways a normal evening. Band practice adhered rigidly to the same routine. The sky was clear, a deep blue that, with the approaching twilight, had begun to darken. She remembered jumping at the thunk the massive overhead electric spotlights made as they turned on. The sound of her friends laughing rang clear in the refreshing air.
At first, she didn’t notice the teacher sprinting across the parking lot. Later she remembered it was her favorite teacher, the kind woman who taught ninth grade biology, who created acronyms to help students remember enzymes and didn’t blush when the boys made jokes about reptilian reproduction. But when she first looked, she simply saw a teacher, someone who could run onto the field and interrupt practice with impunity. She gave the teacher one glance and continued talking with her friends.
Time only began to slow when the band director pointed to the ninth graders and conversation on the sidelines hushed. Bree leaned over to Stephanie and wondered what they had done, whether it was good or bad. So often, it seemed, Bree couldn’t tell the difference when it came to band practice. When she thought she was on key, the director frequently yelled she was off. When her flute seemed straight, it was slanted down. When her feet felt in step with the others in her line, she would be called out for walking too quickly. Yet it was all worth it. Because the exhilaration of the music, the power of striding with the group, the unified spirit, and the roaring applause at game time diminished every misstep and embarrassment. She loved band with a passion. If she could choose to be anywhere on earth, she would be at home with her parents. But her second choice was band.
When the adults singled her out, she saw disaster in their faces. She remembered the clasp of the biology teacher’s hand on her bare arm. The cold of the woman’s fingers transmitting an uneasiness to Bree’s heart. Later, she couldn’t remember what they said. But she remembered not being able to breathe. She fell onto the grass, clutching at the cool blades. Adults bent over her. But the only face Bree ever remembered clearly was Stephanie’s.
The memories before and after that razor-sharp turning point in her life differed in their quality. The scenes from before scrolled through her mind like a video, clear, uninterrupted, and smooth. The scenes from afterward were fuzzy, disjointed, and jarring. She remembered a shivering that wouldn’t stop no matter how many blankets they piled on her. Bright lights of cars as someone drove her to Stephanie’s house. Kacey’s bedroom with its bunk beds, where they laid her. The phone calls to Mexico that ended with cries and screaming so loud Bree was never sure whether they came from the phone line or whether she heard them from across the continent.
Why did they go to Mexico? That question obsessed her for years after the event. That morning, her mother, dressed in a mauve suit, her long black hair carefully brushed back over her round shoulders, called it a quick business trip.
“You won’t even know we’re gone.” Her necklace bumped Bree’s chin, as it always did, when she leaned down to kiss her daughter. And Bree joked, as she always did, about the small diamonds that rested on the intersecting platinum hearts scratching her skin. Her mother kissed her again, just to see Bree laugh one more time, and rattled her keychain at her husband, who was just entering the bright kitchen with its yellow curtains and deep blue tile backsplash.
“We’ll be home before you get home from band practice.” Her father lifted her off the ground, hugging her tightly to his ample chest and rubbing his beard against her cheek. She complained that she was too old to be lifted off the ground. “Someday you won’t be so eager to grow up.” He flashed his wide grin, looped his arm through his wife’s, and stepped through the back door, letting the screen slam behind him. Bre
e didn’t watch them drive away. She was preoccupied with something she could not remember later. What could have been worth not seeing her parents faces one last time? She cursed herself for her selfishness. But she cursed Mexico, the country that had murdered her parents, more.
The subsequent tumultuous battle to enable her to stay in the United States took place without her active participation. Her only living relatives resided in the one country Bree couldn’t imagine ever visiting, to say nothing of living. But she was too weakened by her grief and shaken by anger to draw a line in the sand and refuse to go. In the end, Stephanie’s parents did it for her. Stephanie’s father, an attorney, negotiated the arrangement that eventually involved formally adopting Bree into his family.
From the outside, nothing much changed. She missed some weeks of school. She moved a few blocks. She dropped out of band for a while. People whispered about her in the hallways. Some friends—never Stephanie—avoided her. And for the remainder of ninth grade, no teacher ever yelled at her, not even the band director when she was so out of step that the tuba player tripped on her heels and nearly dropped his three-thousand-dollar instrument.
She remembered ninth grade as the year of silence. Silence in her heart. Silence at school. Silent wishes. She begged her parents to come visit her at night when she was sleeping. But for more than a year they never did. She willed herself to have a fatal accident and join them wherever they were. But instead, over time, she found herself having moments in which she laughed, or even forgot about them for hours at a time. She wished she could find someone who would understand her heart without her having to disclose its dark secrets and deep wounds. Stephanie tried, but the person who came closest was Ryder. It was as though that shining football star, the high school hero who lived in a stratosphere she couldn’t touch, saw through a window in her soul everyone else ignored. He knew when she needed quiet companionship and when she needed jokes, when to sit next to her in the cafeteria and when simply to catch her eye in the hall. He buoyed her even when she couldn’t tell she was drowning.
Wild Card (Wild At Heart Series Book 3) Page 18
