by Gloria Craw
“Perfect,” I said.
I paid for the globe and we moved on to the next shop. It happened to be an art dealer’s store. The overhead light was dim so that the lights pointing at the pieces stood out better. A saleswoman on the phone gave us a polite nod and motioned for us to have a look around.
At the far side of the store, handblown glass vases and bowls were arranged on pedestals. Light refracted off them in rainbows of color. Phoebe followed me over to them. “Which is your favorite?” she asked.
“That one,” I replied, pointing toward a yellow-gold vase. The neck of the vase had been stretched and bent, like the stem of a flower. “If I ever become wealthy, I’m going to get something just like it.”
It was a jolt to my system when I remembered what Theron said about me having an estate. Spending my dead relatives’ money seemed cold, though.
“Which is your favorite?” I asked.
“One of the paintings, actually. Come see.”
I tagged along behind her, enjoying the art we passed.
Thank you, Mr. Dawson at Fillmore High, for expanding my universe to include paintings and sculpture, I thought.
Phoebe stopped in front of the last painting on the wall. It was done in the impressionist style, so the lines weren’t clearly defined, but the effect was great. It made the scene seem brighter. The artist had painted a boy sitting on a hillside. His elbows were propped on his knees, and he was leaning forward with his chin on his hands. It gave me the impression he was deep in thought. From the long green grasses and wildflowers that carpeted the valley below him, it was probably late spring. Without seeing it anywhere in the painting, I knew the sun was bright overhead and that there was a breeze blowing.
“It’s amazing, isn’t it?” Phoebe asked.
“It really is,” I agreed.
Bending closer, I searched for the artist’s signature. “T. Falco” was scribbled in the corner.
Theron had painted it; he was better than good, he was genius.
I could have looked at the painting all day, but Phoebe sighed and said, “I guess the restaurant is open now. Jacob is probably waiting for us.”
He was sitting at a table in the center of the room. He raised a glass of water to his lips as we approached. I noticed that his hand trembled when he put it down. There were shadows under his eyes, too. He looked like a fox who didn’t feel well. I wondered if he was suffering the effects of Nikki’s drugs. The idea made me a little happy.
Leaning back in his chair, he ran a lazy hand across his chest and looked me up and down. He was revolting, but flirting with him might help me in the long run.
“You’re Ali,” he surmised. “I’ve seen you around, I think.”
I pulled a lock of hair over my shoulder as I sat down, keeping eye contact with him the entire time. “I think we had breakfast at the same place a few days ago,” I said, “and I was at your family’s dinner the other night.”
“Oh, that’s right. I remember now.”
“I didn’t stay long enough to introduce myself. I would have congratulated you.”
He waved a hand. “My mom turned our…marriage into the event of the evening, but she just wanted to liven up the party.”
“It didn’t work very well,” Phoebe muttered.
Jacob’s eyes focused in on her. “What was that?”
“Nobody really cares who’s married to whom,” she said. “Everyone is here for something more important.”
“Yeah,” he said. “I’m part of that, too.”
Phoebe rolled her eyes. “I know, and it scares the crap out of me.”
Her brother glared at her.
Hoping to prevent a sibling quarrel, I said, “Your wife is…pretty.”
Jacob waved dismissively once more. “I’m more interested in talking about you. Where are you from, Ali?”
“Arizona.”
“Never been there. I like trees and shade, not sun and sand.”
He asked about twenty more questions, each time telling me something about himself. If I read him right, he had an enormous ego. Something else I could take advantage of if I had to.
I laughed at his jokes and acted like I was charmed by the attention he paid me. It could have gone on forever, but thankfully he got a text. “Business,” he said after reading it. “I have to go. It’s been great talking to you, Ali.”
I only remembered the envelope when he got up to leave. After pulling it out of my pocket, I handed it to him. “Ah…this is sort of an apology for missing your big announcement the other night,” I said. “Will you make sure your wife sees it?”
I put the thought Give it to Nikki into his mind, hoping it would last long enough for him to actually get to her.
“Sure,” he replied.
“And that piece of work is my brother,” Phoebe said as he walked away. “He thinks he’s bound for greatness. Too bad he’s about as dumb as a box of rocks.”
“He seems okay to me,” I lied.
“It’s all an act. The one thing Jacob is good at is following directions. He hasn’t had a good original idea pass through his head since…well, since ever. I love him, but I don’t like him. He nailed a dead rat to my bedroom door once. He thought it was a great joke. It’s hard to like someone who does that kind of thing.”
Spencer and Katherine hadn’t been particularly concerned about Jacob. They should have been. Like Yvonne, he loved attention. He was in love with himself, too. The rat incident indicated he had a sadistic side. He had a lot in common with Sebastian.
Maybe he was the candidate Yvonne was trying to get appointed after all, but I still needed to confirm some stuff with Nikki. Then I’d return and report my findings.
While we ate, Uncle Thomas came by.
“Hi, girls,” he said.
“Has the baby come?” Phoebe asked.
“Yep. Nine pounds eight ounces. Healthy as a horse.”
“You have more time to ski, then,” I said to him.
The smile he gave me was bright but gradually faded. Maybe he was worried about his daughter. “Uh, I forgot my wallet upstairs,” he said. “I better get it. Food is not free.”
Phoebe kissed his cheek, and he left.
It was snowing when we caught the ski lift. There weren’t as many people out, so we had a lot of room to ourselves on the way down. More room meant more fun. I was excited to do another run, but my phone vibrated in my pocket.
“Where’s the restroom?” I asked Nikki. She pointed to a little building. “I’ll be right back,” I told her.
The moment the door closed behind me, I read the text Theron had sent.
The tracker has been at cabin M5 for the last half hour. Nikki might be there.
I’ll check it out, I returned.
Come straight back afterward. If you aren’t here in an hour, I’m coming after you.
Chapter Twenty-Six
I pulled a reproduction of the map I’d looked at out of my memory bank and confirmed that cabin M5 was within walking distance of the lodge.
“Sorry to do this,” I said to Phoebe, “but I’m not feeling good again. I just can’t seem to adjust to the altitude.”
She squeezed my arm. “No problem. Go home and get some rest. It looks like it’s going to start storming anyway. Text me later. Let me know how you’re feeling.”
“Okay,” I replied.
I went to my car to wait a while. I wanted to give Phoebe plenty of time to get inside. Then I’d double back toward the walking trail that would lead me to the cabin.
After getting in, I started the car’s engine and turned up the heat.
I felt like a terrible person. In addition to being riddled with guilt for what I’d said to Ian about the impossibility of us likenessing, I felt bad about what I’d done to Phoebe. I’d had a good reason for doing it, but I’d used her. She was loud, brash, and opinionated, but she was also genuine and concerned about me. I liked her, but I’d disappear after Saturday, and she’d never see me again. I hop
ed she’d never find out who I really was and what I’d been sent to the Ledges to do.
I waited about ten minutes and then started walking to cabin M5.
The air felt ten degrees colder than it had when I left the chairlift. The snow was coming down heavier, too. Phoebe’s prediction was right—it was going to storm. Wrapping my arms around myself, I moved faster.
I knocked at the cabin with Nikki’s weak vibration inside, but she wouldn’t answer. I tried three times before finally feeling for her mind and thoughtmaking her to come open it. Still, she only cracked it enough for me to see one of her eyes peering out at me.
“Who are you?” she asked, opening the door a little bit wider.
I expected some sign of recognition from her, but there was nothing. Just a blank look. “I’m a friend,” I replied. “Can I come in?”
She undid the chain on the door, and it glided open. I followed her into a dark room. All of the curtains were closed and the lights were off. It smelled bad, too, like vomit and sweat.
I assumed she was going to sit in one of the chairs, but she dropped to the floor like a rag doll and started rocking back and forth. I felt like I was in some low-budget horror movie where the heroine gets possessed.
So I could look her in the eyes, I sat on the floor as well.
Looking her hands over, I confirmed she was missing the middle and ring finger on the left one. I hadn’t seen it the night of the dinner because Jacob had been holding that hand.
“Nikki. Do you know who I am?” I asked.
“No,” she replied in a voice that cracked.
“My name is Alison. We went to school together in Las Vegas.”
She looked at me, but there was still no recognition in her gaze. Agitated, she started rocking faster.
“I’m here to help you,” I assured her.
She closed her eyes as though she didn’t want to hear me.
Desperate to get her attention, I pulled Alex’s snow globe out of the inner pocket of my parka. “This is for you,” I said, turning it so the little flakes would float in the water.
She watched until it settled.
I put the globe next to her and tried again. “Nikki, I’m Alison. From Las Vegas. I’m here to help you.”
The next time she looked at me, there was some life in her eyes. “Alison,” she repeated. “From Vegas. I want to go home.”
“I’m going to help you get home, but you have to help me first. I need to know why you’re with the Truss.”
“Jacob,” she replied simply.
“When did you meet him?”
She turned the globe so the snow would fall and shrugged. “He says I’m insurance.”
“Was it Jacob who took you away from Vegas?”
She sighed. “No.”
I was getting nowhere but I had to keep trying. “Who cut your fingers?” I asked as patiently as I could.
“He was so mad,” she muttered. “I killed his project.”
“One of Jacob’s projects?”
“No.”
She dropped the globe on the carpet like the small weight was too much for her to hold any longer. I picked it up and shook it for her. “I need to know who’s drugging you, Nikki. It’s important.”
“I have to have shots…every day… Maxwell says I have to have the shots.”
My heart thudded. I’d heard of a Maxwell, and if he was involved in the Ledges mess, we were really in trouble.
“Maxwell Truss told you that?” I asked to confirm.
She nodded.
“Where is he?”
“Here,” she replied. Then she looked up at me with the eyes of a child. “I want to go home now.”
That’s when I was sure the Nikki I’d hated, the girl who’d helped Sebastian find me and my family, was gone forever. I saw her in a new and very sad light. Even if we managed to get her away from the Truss, she would never be that girl again.
“I’m going to get you home,” I said. “Don’t tell anyone I came here today. If you tell, they’ll stop me from helping you. Do you understand?”
“Yes,” she replied.
I turned the key on the bottom of the globe so the music would play and put it next to her.
Tears welled in her eyes as she looked at it. “He’ll take it. He’ll take it away.”
“I’ll hide it for you,” I said, putting it in a drawer in the TV stand.
She went back to rocking, like she’d forgotten I was even there.
I let myself out just in time. Jacob’s vibration was coming my way. My heart pounded as I darted off the trail and waded through deeper snow. He passed me without looking.
Finally getting back to my car, I breathed a sigh of relief. I had news to report. It was bad…but it was news.
I’d made it about halfway to Theron’s cabin when the car’s wheels started to slip at regular intervals. I did my best to stay alert. But I couldn’t stop thinking about Maxwell.
He was Sebastian’s cousin and trusted assistant. The two of them had spent years working together. I assumed Maxwell was a true believer in his policies and ideas. Spencer and Katherine had tried to dig up information on him, but had come up empty-handed. With all the chaos after Sebastian died, I think they hoped he’d been killed or gone rogue and would never be heard from again.
If Maxwell was bidding to be appointed clan chief, and he got it, he’d never agree to work with the clans, and we’d end up in the same uncertain and dangerous position we’d been in for decades.
My tires squealed when the car lost traction. I managed to correct the slide and keep on the road, but the tires lost their grip again. The back end slipped around so I was heading down the hill sideways. I cranked the wheel to the other side. That didn’t help. The back end skidded once more and I was going backward.
Having zero control, I accepted that gravity was going to pull me off the road. I was either going to roll down the ravine on one side or slam into the trees on the other. Gritting my teeth and gripping the steering wheel, I voted for the trees. But destiny made it the ravine.
The car crashed through a snowdrift and flipped end-over-end. I’m pretty sure I lost consciousness, because I couldn’t remember actually coming to a stop. When I opened my eyes, I was hanging upside down from the seat belt surrounded by air bags and white powder.
Excruciating pain came from my shoulder. Needing to get the pressure off it, I unlatched the seat belt and fell.
Lying there freezing, bruised, bleeding, and probably with a dislocated shoulder, I tried to decide what to do next. Theron would be on his way up to get me soon, but it was snowing so heavily my tire tracks would likely be hidden.
Figuring movement was better than simply sitting there and getting hypothermia, I crawled one-handed out the shattered driver’s side window. After getting to my feet, I started walking. I didn’t look up at the hillside. Seeing how far I had to go would overwhelm me.
I stumbled a lot and fell once or twice but managed to make it to the top just as a set of headlights appeared from around a corner. I sat down in the middle of the road when I realized it was Theron.
He pulled up next to me and helped me into the Land Rover. Then he got back in and carefully turned us around.
“Theron,” I said in a weird haze. “I think my shoulder is dislocated.”
“I figured that by the way it’s hanging.”
“I talked to Nikki.”
“I really don’t care. Don’t say anything else until I get you home and warmed up.”
I was too tired to argue.
When we got inside the cabin, Theron made me sit on the table and angled my arm so he could put it back in the socket.
“This happened to me once,” he said. “I watched the doctor put it back in place. I’m pretty sure I can do it for you.”
“Pretty sure?” I whispered.
“Very sure,” he amended. “It’s going to hurt, but it will feel a lot better when I’m finished.”
I nodded and then sc
reamed as he pushed and maneuvered my arm back into the shoulder socket. I heard a pop when it slid back in place.
“Now it’s time for a shower,” he said. “I’ll turn the water on and bring you some clothes. You’re going to have to do the rest.”
“I can manage, but Theron…”
“What?”
“Spencer is going to kill me. I wrecked the car.”
“He won’t kill you,” Theron replied, “because I’m planning to kill him first.”
Chapter Twenty-Seven
I woke up to an ache in my shoulder, but it was nothing compared to how it had hurt before Theron fixed it. Turning the lamp on, I checked the time. It was nine o’clock. I hadn’t slept for that long. Gingerly, I moved the covers off me and got out of bed.
Looking down at myself, I groaned. I’d relented and was wearing the flannel pajama pants Theron had lent me. He’d made me wear the matching shirt, too. I looked like a giant blanket.
I grabbed a second pair of socks to put on over the ones I was already wearing, and padded my way down the hall in search of food.
Theron was sitting at the table holding the world’s smallest screwdriver. I watched as he turned it in the world’s tiniest…something I couldn’t identify.
“What are you making?” I asked.
Startled, he dropped the tool.
“How’s your shoulder feeling?” he asked.
“Sore, but I’ll live. What are you making?” I asked again.
“A button-cam to feed video of the Truss meeting to Spencer.”
“That’s good, because I have the feeling things are going to get ugly. Maxwell Truss is at the Ledges, and he’s the one who has been drugging Nikki.”
“Should I know who Maxwell Truss is?”
“He’s Sebastian’s cousin, and there’s little doubt that given the chance, he’ll run the clan exactly the same way his predecessor did.”
He got up. “This just keeps getting better and better,” he said.
“Where are you going?” I asked.
“To get your phone. You need to make a call.”
