by Dee Garcia
“Xander you can't sleep in the ca—”
“Eden,” he gritted out, “open the fucking car. I'm not sleeping in here.”
Elsie bowed her head and excused herself from the awkward situation she found herself in, slipping out of the room between Xander and the doorway in a hurry. In my abashed state, I stood stock still, staring Xander down as he did the very same to me, the rage within him palpable and unrelenting.
“Open. The car.” His voice was deathly quiet.
I shook my head. “No. Don't be stupid. Take the bed.”
“Open. The. Car.”
“No, Xander, please. Just take the±”
“Open the fucking car!” he roared, and I flinched in response, uncharacteristically so.
After a defeated beat, I fished out the keys from the back pocket of my jeans and tossed them to him, not even thinking that he might run off and leave me stranded in Jersey until they were halfway through the air. He caught them effortlessly and was out of sight before I could blink him away, leaving me to my racing thoughts and wounded heart in the serene surroundings of what was supposed to be our room. I didn't even bother going after him, though. If I knew him like I thought I did, he wasn't going to flee. I didn't have the energy to chase after him either, face planting onto the bed in heap where sleep couldn't evade me for long.
The following morning, I woke alone, warm rays of the sun splashing in through the bay window that faced the bed. A beautiful view of the beach laid just on the other side, small waves crashing against the shoreline every few minutes or so. Sitting up in a cloud of white sheets, I stretched my arms above my head and let out a deep breath I hadn’t known I was holding. Trepidation instantly consumed me, weighing down my limbs, muscles in different areas of my body aching from the constant tension over the last twelve hours. Through the fog of exhaustion, I swung my legs over the edge of the bed and grabbed a towel from the closet, hoping a hot shower would somewhat relax me and clear my head, and most importantly, prepare me for what I knew was bound to be a long day ahead.
Twenty minutes later, I was on my way downstairs, feeling no less stressed about finding Xander and having some sort of interaction that didn’t include him wanting to tear me apart. I waved awkwardly to Elsie behind the desk and shuffled out the front door, taking the porch steps two at a time until my feet hit the paved walkway that led to the driveway. Inhaling a whiff of the salty water close by, I noted the car was empty. I also noted Xander’s bag was thrown in the backseat and the doors were locked, meaning he couldn't have wandered off too far.
Following the trail of footsteps that went up a dune on the side of the house, I found the man I was looking for perched on a beach chair in the sand. He was shirtless, his tan, muscular back on full display. He’d changed out of his jeans into a pair of black basketball shorts and from my vantage point, I could make out the cell phone pressed to his ear. He looked so deflated, as exhausted as I felt, and every fiber of my being screamed for me to comfort him, to ease the pain and the rage away, but I knew the last thing he’d want was even a smidge of sympathy from me.
With quiet steps, I trudged down the sand, Xander’s voice becoming louder the closer I inched toward him. I couldn’t make out what he was saying, and I wasn’t the type to eavesdrop on someone’s privacy, but I couldn’t stop myself from moving forward.
“I don’t know, Mama, I really don’t,” I heard him say, and my heart immediately plummeted to my stomach.
Rushing behind the lifeguard shack that acted as a barrier between us both, I pressed myself up against the rough wood and listened intently to the conversation happening not ten feet away from me.
“I told you, Ma. I’m helping a friend… Yes, that one.”
I clasped a hand over my mouth in time to muffle my gasp.
What the hell? He told his mom about me?
“I can’t tell you,” he said softly, prompting me to peek around the corner.
He was leaned over on his knees, his head bowed low, looking all the more stressed than he had when I first saw him from over the dune.
“I know, Mama, but I can’t, I just can’t. I don’t know when I’ll be back, but I promise it’ll be soon. Just take it easy, please.”
Tears welled in my eyes at the thought of what he was feeling, at what his mother was feeling. I’d dragged him away from his life, his job, his family, all because I’d lied. If I just would’ve been honest with Daddy, Xander wouldn’t have to be here right now. I could’ve gone after LeRoux alone, as I’d planned all along. But no, I was a selfish bitch; clearly a stupid one too, who hadn’t learned that lying was never the solution to anything in life, no matter how great or small.
“I’ll check in every day, okay?” he said, his voice wavering ever so slightly.
The grief-stricken sound lanced straight to my heart, cracking it all the more, though I wasn’t sure that was even possible. Tears I’d been determined to subdue trickled down my cheeks at the same moment Xander appeared at my side.
“So, you’re an eavesdropper too?” he growled, his hand clenching into a fist at his side.
I shook my head frantically, wiping the streams pouring down my face. “No, I was just coming to find you, and when I saw you were on the phone, I thought I’d wait until you were—”
“You couldn’t have waited inside?” he snapped.
“I-I mean I guess I could’ve, I was just—”
“You were just thinking it was okay to wait here. Well let me make myself clear to you, Eden. You don’t have to come looking for me. In fact, I don’t want you to come looking for me. So, go along your way and do whatever it is you need to do. I’ll be here, worrying about my ill mother, who by the way, is currently going out of her fucking mind because I up and left the Bronx for reasons I can’t explain to her.”
I felt like I couldn’t breathe as I watched him walk back toward the house with purposeful strides. His words, his tone, everything about the situation was like a knife to the gut, dozens of feelings flooding to the surface and none of which I knew how to handle.
“Xander!” I blurted out, staggering a few steps in the sand behind him.
He stilled and turned his head, peering at me from over his shoulder.
“I’m sorry,” I said, my voice hushed, ashamed.
“You should be,” he gritted out. “An ill woman might die because of you.”
And with that, he took off for the house once more, leaving me to wallow in the shadows of his dust. Fresh tears flowed anew and I collapsed into the sand, wondering what the hell I was going to do and how—if at all possible—there was any way to salvage some sort of relationship with the man who'd swiftly gone from lover to enemy.
LeRoux finally called. Almost three days later.
I'm sure you can imagine that wasn't blowing over well with Xander. The seventy-two hours leading up to the call was plain fucking brutal. Not a look was spared my way, not a breath, nothing. I felt so small, so wounded, when really, I had no right to feel that way at all. I’d done it to myself, hence why I tried not to get in his way. It wasn’t the easiest of tasks, though, when we were confined to the same space until Frenchie decided he wanted to spare us a bone and finally get on with the show.
Xander had gone out, again, when the burner phone started buzzing on the nightstand. I wasn’t afraid of him but there was something about him I just couldn’t shake, and the seemingly genuine pleasantries he threw my way didn’t help ease that edginess either, his voice a poisonous venom dripping in my ear. He rattled on for a bit and I'd expected a briefing of sorts, as I usually did with Daddy, but all the Frenchman gave me was the name, or names I should say, of those who had supposedly wronged him, the address in which I could find them, and a message to pass along before I robbed them of their lives. Personally, the last bit was pointless, but I kept that observation to myself.
Danny Tao and his business partner, Kim Nguyen, were the first marks on my interminable list for LeRoux. They owned a meat market about fo
ur hours south from the city and had apparently borrowed quite a bit of money from Gaspard, which obviously had yet to be returned. To say I wasn’t the least bit amped for what awaited me was an understatement. I had a knot in my stomach the size of Texas that no pep talk could dwindle down. Xander’s perpetual silence made it that much more difficult too, especially in the car where quarters were cramped and I could feel myself yearning for him that much more.
That hunger, that sheer need, was not at all a two-way street though. Xander wanted nothing to do with me. He might not have said it out loud but he didn’t need to. I just knew. Actions spoke louder than words, and his actions were louder than a blaring alarm.
“Stay in the car,” I said, reversing into a narrow alleyway between two old-fashioned red brick buildings.
Xander scoffed beside me and whipped off his seatbelt. “The hell I am. I’m going wi—”
“No, you’re not.” I slipped off my seatbelt too. “The less you know, the better. You’re already furious enough with me as it is. I don’t need you witnessing what’s about to go down in there.”
“Which would be?” he snapped.
“Nothing you should be involved in. Just stay here. I’ll be just a few minutes.”
Xander’s irate stare was utterly palpable from the miniscule amount of space separating us and I'd say I was surprised, but I wasn't. I’d lost count of how many times I'd felt him glaring at me with nothing but pure hatred since we left Manhattan. Without a glance in his direction or another word spoken, I jetted out of the car and turned onto the sidewalk off the alley toward Tao’s market. A slight chill rolled by, ricocheting a nauseating shiver down my spine that unleashed a veil of goosebumps over my skin and made my weapons suddenly feel like fifty pound bricks pressed into the small of my back. Each step closer to the market pumped my heart faster and faster, a light sheen of sweat clinging to my forehead as evidence of the uncertainty I felt eating at me from the inside out. I couldn't remember ever feeling this nervous for a mission, but then again, I'd never been used as a pawn by the enemy either.
The “Closed” sign was the first thing that greeted me when I made it to Tao’s, just two blocks away from where I’d parked. Through the dirty windows, I could see him and a woman, who I presumed was Kim, behind the counter slicing different meats. With their attention fully centered on the task at hand, I found the door to still be unlocked and pushed my way inside, the chime above the door dinging upon my entrance. Two pairs of dark slanted eyes darted to where I stood inside the shop.
“We closed, ma’am,” Danny said, his Korean accent heavy around the words.
I flashed him a crooked smile. “Yeah, I know. You Danny Tao?”
He nodded, and I didn't miss the way his grip tightened around the massive knife in his hand.
Wrong move, Mr. Tao.
Chuckling softly in amusement, I turned my head to the woman. “You Kim Nguyen?”
She, too, nodded and the gulp she swallowed could've been visible down the street.
“I have a message from Gaspard LeRoux for you both.”
They gasped in unison but stood stock still, their eyes wide in panic.
“He said he hopes your families are well aware of your arrangement because as of this moment, not only have they inherited your debt, it's been doubled too.”
“Why would they inherit it?” Danny asked nervously.
“Because debts can't be paid six feet under,” I said.
With their horrified expressions trained firmly on my face, I whipped out both handguns from the small of my back, pointing one in each direction, and before they could move even an inch, I pulled the triggers and landed one bullet to each of their heads. Their knives clattered to the ground and when their bodies collapsed along with them, all that remained was two crimson splatters adorning the grungy white walls.
I stood there for several moments with my heart lodged in my throat, breathing through the sickening wave of disgust that threatened to tear me apart. I'd just killed two people. Two people who owed nothing to my father, who I knew nothing about, whose families probably had not an inkling as to what their now deceased relatives had been up to… And because of me, they'd likely be dead in the weeks to come too. If I'd ever denied the fact that I was a monster, there was no way in hell I could deny it now.
On shaky legs, I hauled ass out of Tao’s market and pulled out the burner phone from my back pocket, dialing the sole number programmed into the contacts. Three rings later, that despicable French accent dripped into my ear.
“Mademoiselle.”
“It’s done,” I said, passing storefronts and empty restaurants in a hurry on the way back to the car.
“Les deux?” His query sounded more surprised than anything else.
“Yes, both.”
“And the message? You passed that along as well, oui?”
“Yes. Everything. It’s done. Now give me the name and location of who’s next so I can get on the move.”
Gaspard chuckled darkly. “So eager, petit.”
“I’m far from eager, LeRoux,” I growled. “I’m impatient, I’m angry. Give me the information so I can be on my way.”
“How is it you Americans say? Patience is a virtue, non?”
Screeching to a halt just before the alleyway, I huffed so profoundly I was sure the ground beneath my feet would shake. “That’s the saying, yes, and quite honestly, it’s irrelevant. Do you want me to finish the job or not?”
“Oui, of course, but I am not a man to push around, Miss Scarsi. I will provide you with the information you seek in due time. Until then, why don’t you make yourself all the more useful and clean up your mess?”
“I’m not cleaning up shit. I don’t clean up after myself for my father and I’m most certainly not cleaning up after myself for you. I suggest you get some of your guys out to Tao’s before the sun comes up, and if you expect me to check off anyone else on your list, I suggest you forward me their info within forty-eight hours. I am not the woman to push around, Mr. LeRoux, and my bloodline is a testament to that.”
Ending the call in my enraged state, I shoved the phone back into my pocket and trailed down the alleyway to where Xander and the GranTurismo waited in the shadows. I could feel his eyes on me long before I slipped into the driver's seat and pulled on my seatbelt.
“Took you long enough,” he muttered beside me, his line of sight now fixated out the window.
“Yeah, well, shit happens,” I muttered back, turning onto the main road.
“Are we free to go now, or rather, can I go home now?”
“No, Xander, you cannot go home now.”
“Then when, Eden? I don’t exactly care to spend the next month with you or however long you plan to hold me hostage.”
“I’m not holding you hostage.” The words rumbled in my chest.
“No?” he snarled. “Then why am I here?”
“You already know why...I’m not repeating myself.”
“Of course you're not, because liars seem to have a hard time spouting the truth.”
Silence.
After my brief conversation with LeRoux, I wanted nothing more than to explode, to counter Xander’s judgement and fight back with everything I had… But I couldn't...because he was right.
I was a liar.
A liar, a murderer, a disgusting, worthless woman who deserved an eternity in hell. I'd known I was going there since the day I checked off my first mark, but now, now I knew I was going to rot there, plagued by the demons of those whose lives I'd taken without mercy. If there'd ever been even a speck of hope in which to redeem myself, I just ensured it was so far from reach, I'd never be able to grasp it ever again.
By day fourteen of bouncing around from town to town with Eden, holed up in a hotel room or the car for hours upon hours, I was at my wits end. Mama’s calls grew more desperate every day, shattering my heart a little more at the sound of her cries, and I'd about had enough of the same clueless answer every time I asked w
hen I could go home. It was clear Eden was nowhere near completing her tasks for this so-called Frenchman, and at this point, I wasn't sure I'd ever make it home at all. Not the most optimistic of attitudes, but when so many factors remained uncertain, I'd be stupid to think otherwise.
By day twenty-one of the hostage situation, or whatever the hell you want to call it, I'd managed to put a temporary hold on all my bills and worked out an agreement with my landlord. He didn’t need my rent to sustain his family and was gracious enough to grant me a ninety-day pass. If I hadn’t returned in those ninety days, though, he’d have to lock my belongings in a storage unit and rent the place out to someone else. I agreed, obviously, because what other choice did I have? The one thing I didn’t have to fret over through this whole debacle was not closing the shop. With Zak having graduated high school, he was able and willing to run it from open to close every day with the help of a friend, who I was paying with what I would've earned had I been working myself.
By the thirty-day mark, I’d started up a new routine that kept me away from Eden when we weren’t on the move. Every hotel we took shelter in had a pool and a gym, so I alternated my time between swimming laps and lifting weights. The constant exercise helped me not only to control my anger, but also to keep me active rather than wasting away in a room. I hadn’t been so bulky since my early twenties, and I couldn’t say it wasn’t satisfying to see Eden’s eyes bulge from their sockets whenever I took my shirt off.
On day thirty-five, we arrived in Delaware. Needless to say, I was irked beyond belief. Every time Eden completed another task, we drove further and further away from home, and each time I found myself wondering the exact same thing.
Why?
Why was this Frenchman leading us around on a wild goose chase through the East Coast? Why did he need Eden’s help? What did she have the ability to do that, apparently, he could not? I didn’t dare to ask any of these questions, mostly because I had no desire to speak to Eden, but also because I wasn’t sure I really wanted to know what was happening every time Eden left me alone in the car. I had an unnerving inkling as to what it may be, but I forced myself to swallow down my curiosity and stay in the car as instructed, since Eden refused to leave me in the hotels alone, regardless of their security.
