I grab the bag, then the wooden beads on the inside knob. The postcard is still stuck in the bathroom mirror. I take that too, press it to my chest and close my eyes and feel it. Then I turn to leave, headed for the stairwell, trying to outrun the feeling like my face is caving in.
When I reach the lobby, the front desks are empty, but there’s a group of TEA agents running toward the first-floor hallway of Butler. I drop my bag behind the concierge desk and follow the scrum. They’re headed for the end of the hallway, and when I get there it’s hard to make out the voices, but I can see Cameo is standing a head above everyone, still in their robe and sweats, and they look furious. Their voice is loud and tight and they are slicing the air with the blade of their hand. I have never seen them like this.
“No, absolutely not. Reg, what is this?”
Drucker is standing there with a group of agents. It’s them against Reg and Cameo. The battle lines are drawn. Reg is red-faced, looking at Drucker.
“Look, I’m already sleeping in my office,” he tells her. “I am not throwing my staff out of their rooms so that someone can have a bed.”
“You can’t ask someone with a net worth of a billion dollars to sleep on a cot,” Drucker says. “I gave you the chance to find them a more appropriate accommodation and you did not. Since you won’t take your job seriously, I’ll have to do it.”
“That’s not how this works.”
“It is exactly how this works,” Drucker says. “At the end of the day this is a federal facility. And as the highest-ranking member of the federal government here, I’m in charge. Not you.”
Reg turns to the side and hails Allyn on his watch, and I step back into the alcove with the ice machine, figure if Allyn sees me here he’ll make me leave. But I’m bouncing on my toes, ready for a fight.
So now Drucker is giving away our rooms.
Allyn comes running up and Drucker immediately launches into a spiel about customer service and the needs of the guests and blah blah blah. Allyn takes this all in and turns to Reg and says, “Your staffers will get their rooms back as soon as this is over.”
That is not what I expected. And between the pressure of the day and the razor edge my brain is teetering on, I can’t even stop myself from stepping out of the alcove and yelling, “What the fuck.”
Everyone turns to look at me. Allyn actually rolls his eyes. “I told you…”
“Shut the fuck up, Allyn,” I say, so hard and so fast it actually works. Then I turn to Drucker. “You know what? I don’t care if you are a senator. You are a giant fucking asshole if you think some trust-fund motherfucker who never did a hard day’s work in his life deserves a room over the people who actually keep this place running. And putting them ahead in the line is one thing but actually throwing people out of their rooms? Fuck you and your entire bloodline and your pets if you have any.”
Drucker’s face reduces to a fine point and she is about to speak when Allyn steps between us, looks at a couple of the TEA agents, and says, “Take her to the lobby, right now. Wait for me.”
Everyone freezes.
Because he basically just said: Seize her.
Three agents—two burly men and a woman roughly my size but with veins in her arms chiseled from rock—close in on me. I could fight them off, and, given the narrow space I can get at least two of them on their asses. It’s the third that’d be dicey. But that’ll give Allyn more cause to make me leave, so I let them take my arms and lead me toward the front.
I glance back and catch a look on Allyn’s face like I think maybe he is sorry? I don’t care. It was fun to tell Drucker how I felt. My only real regret is I didn’t get to throw a boot at her like I did at Ruby earlier, because she almost definitely would not have dodged out of the way.
* * *
—
The agents say nothing as they lead me to the lobby, and then we stand by the coffee urn waiting for further instruction. I go to pour some, find the thing is empty.
Again. Always empty.
I push the entire contraption to the floor. The smash and clatter of it reverberates through the room and people jerk or dive for cover. A woman cries out from fear. Spent grounds spill across the floor and the space fills with the scent of coffee, which is oddly comforting. Not the most mature thing I’ve ever done, but it makes me feel like maybe someone will get their shit together and actually fill it back up.
There’s a shuffle behind me, and I turn to find Brandon carrying a mop and bucket. His forearm is bandaged tightly. He stares at me as he gets to work cleaning up the mess. For the first time in I don’t know how long, I feel an emotion other than anger or numbness. So it takes me a second to figure out what it is. This is a new sensation for me.
I realize what it is: shame.
“Brandon…”
He keeps his head down. Very purposely ignoring me. I try to say something else when there’s another voice behind me.
“What the hell is going on, January?” Allyn asks.
I turn and find him practically in my face. Almost as red as I made Drucker. She must have reamed him out. I can feel it radiating off him. I don’t give him a chance. “The Allyn I knew would never sell people out for a bunch of crybaby assholes,” I tell him. “There are few things in this life I can live by, and one of them is that you are a man of integrity. You always have been. And now I feel ashamed to know you. I feel ashamed to have called you a friend, to see you shit your spine out and hand it over to someone like that. And for what? Another little gold star in your file?” I shake my head at him. “You’re not the man I knew.”
“And you’re not the woman I knew,” Allyn says, his voice far quieter than mine, but much, much sharper. “Me, the people here, we’ve done nothing but reach out to you and try to help you and you have pushed us away, with prejudice. I know your loss was enormous, but you let it poison you.” His eyes mist up a little, someone else from deeper inside fighting through. “We tried. You did this to yourself.”
He turns to the goons. “The Jeep is waiting out front. Take her there now.” Back to me: “I’m sure the Moonlight will have whatever you need to get through the next few days. Charge it to the room.”
“Just like that?” I ask.
“This is for your own good.”
“Allyn, I am fine.” I try to hide the desperation in my voice, doing a poor job of it.
He shakes his head and turns away from me. I think because he doesn’t want to look me in the eye. The two TEA guys grab me by the arms and pull me toward the front of the lobby, to the sliding glass doors and the darkness beyond.
“Allyn, no,” I call over my shoulder.
Then I remember the cell in the security office. I’m supposed to end up in there. Grayson is supposed to shoot me still. Those things haven’t happened yet. Can I even leave right now? Or can the future be rewritten?
What if I leave and whatever connection I have to Mena is severed? And then I come back and can’t find her?