Victor’s fist? Allie thought. She wisely did not say it out loud.
“I told him no and he seemed to take it okay,” she said instead.
“Seemed to. Look, Allie, you’re really, really super na?ve. I sort of knew that but I guess I didn’t see how much. You need to get out of here. Like, now.”
“Now?” It came out as a screech, and Jasmine shushed her, glancing over her shoulder toward the bedroom. Alarm buzzed in Allie’s stomach, a sickeningly familiar feeling. Her constant companion. “I can’t go now. It’s night. I can’t go out there all alone at night! Where will I go? How am I supposed to take care of myself out there?”
“I think if I were you, I’d take my chances.”
“I could go back to New Beginnings, I guess. I couldn’t live there, though. Brick would kill me. But I could go back into the system and get them to put me someplace else. Anyplace else. Couldn’t I?”
“Yeah. You should. That’s what I would do. I mean, they’ll put you in juvie, but—”
“They’ll what? Why? Why would they put me in juvie?”
“Because you ran away. That’s what they do with runaways from the system. Trust me. I know.”
Allie took a moment to breathe. To stabilize the room as it appeared inside her tilting head.
“I’ll only stay till morning and then I’ll figure something out. I can’t leave now.” Silence. “What could happen to me if I don’t leave now?”
More silence.
“Victor only helps girls who play the game,” Jasmine said. “The ones who stay with him on purpose. That’s just how he operates. But some guys’re not like that.”
Allie gripped her own knees more tightly and waited for Jasmine to go on. She never did. Allie was left with no real understanding of Jasmine’s words. No way to apply them to her own situation.
Those other guys were not here, right? So why had they even come up in conversation? It sounded like Jasmine was saying Victor was better than most, but that hardly answered the question of why she had to clear out tonight.
Several minutes ticked by in an electrical silence. At least it felt electrical to Allie, whose nerves had reverted to their new normal: paranoid high alert.
“Why do you live like this?” she asked Jasmine after a time. “Why not stay at the group home?”
“Let’s not make this about me, okay? I came out here to tell you I’d leave tonight if it was me. Don’t tell Victor you’re going. Don’t get caught leaving. Leave everything he gave you and get as far away as you can as fast as you can. Now that I’ve said that, it’s up to you. I warned you. I did all I could.”
With that Jasmine rose and disappeared into the bedroom again, leaving Allie even more alone. If such a thing were possible.
Over the next three or four hours, Allie rose from the couch and headed for the door more than half a dozen times.
Once she even opened it.
The blackness of the city night forced her back again.
Which was worse? To walk out to Ventura Boulevard alone? Hitchhike somewhere? Or wait for a bus? To where? And did they even run at this hour? Allie had never taken a bus, and had no way to know. Then she realized she had no money for a bus, so it didn’t matter.
Or she could walk. With cars buzzing by, which they would, even in the middle of the night. What if one of them saw her all alone and stopped?
Allie took a step back inside and shut the door.
No one was even awake now. Maybe nothing would happen until morning. But by then she feared she might fall asleep. So something could happen before she even knew Victor was awake.
You don’t say no to him. You just don’t.
Allie sat on the couch again, her mind a frightening blank. A moment later it filled with an option. Her only one, really. She just hadn’t seen it before. She didn’t even feel as though she had reached out for it. It had just let itself in.
She would go out into this dark world, once again, with nothing but the clothes on her back. And she would find a place to hide. Someplace not far away. Maybe right in this neighborhood. She would crouch down behind someone’s hedge, or find a gardening shed. Or maybe there would be an all-night restaurant on the boulevard, and she could sit there in the company of someone—anyone—until dawn.
Yes. That was it.
She would clear this place, just barely, then secure a position until the dangerous night had moved on. And then . . . Allie had no idea. She had no plan for the morning, other than to turn herself in. Which she probably would. But she had to survive until that moment arrived.
Allie launched herself off the couch and tiptoed to the front door. She opened it carefully, silently, then stepped out into the overgrown yard. She heard a car door slam. It seemed to be parked between the spot where Allie stood and the gate she needed to reach. Maybe one of “the girls” coming home from “work”?
Would they tell Victor if they saw her leaving?
Allie dropped her head and bolted for the gate, all surging adrenaline and not much solid thinking. A second or two later a hand grabbed her wrist and wrenched her to a halt. A big hand.
Allie looked up. Her eyes had not adjusted to the darkness, and there was only just so much detail she could make out. But this was not one of the girls. This was a mountain of a man. The kind of man you see playing defensive football, or working as a bouncer in a club. And he had Allie in his grasp.
He twisted her arm around behind her back, turned her toward the house again, and marched her to the front door. He knocked loudly. Pounded, really. With the flat side of his fist.
Allie lost her ability to breathe. Her heart couldn’t decide whether to beat too much or too little. It hammered in her chest so hard she feared it might break, explode. Then it missed a beat or even two, leaving a sickening void in the middle of her body that felt like dying.
A terrifying pause. Then a light came on inside the house.
Victor opened the door, his face muddied by sleep. His hair looked disheveled, not perfectly slicked back, and he wore a haze of light beard. The light in the living room haloed him from behind. Allie couldn’t see the look in his eyes, but just his gaze in her direction made her heart skip beats again.
The big man who held Allie spoke in a deep bass.
“This the one you called about?”
“The very one,” Victor said. “Where’d you find her?”
“On her way out.”
Victor made tsk noises with his tongue. Three of them. It made Allie feel like a trapped animal. Like the prey of a wild cat who likes to play with his terrified catch before . . . Allie didn’t want to carry the analogy any further than that.
“You’ll have your hands full with this one,” Victor said.
“Makes no difference to my situation. I drive her up there, I hand her over. I don’t care. She won’t get away from me.”