“Time difference and a few glasses of wine,” Dexter said to the man, with a laugh.
His chuckle rang with mocked joviality through the air, yet his eyes spoke louder, demanding her obedience. Her heart accelerated—what was normally one beat became two, if not three. The increased blood flow lacked the required oxygen, making her lightheaded. Maybe if she’d taken the cocktail, this wouldn’t hurt as much.
“Mrs. Smithers,” the agent asked, “what’s your occupation?”
“M-my occupation?” That wasn’t a question she’d anticipated.
“Yes, ma’am.”
Dexter hadn’t prepared her for this query. “I’m a student…I was.”
Dexter wrapped his arm around her shoulders. “I suppose that now makes her a wife.”
The agent nodded, looking from one to the other. Finally, he asked, “Do either of you have anything to declare?”
Nat began to open her lips to declare her real name. But the agent hadn’t asked her name. Why?
He already knew it—the wrong one. He’d addressed her with it, and she’d answered.
Before her words formed, the agent stamped each passport and pushed the folders across the counter. When Dexter reached for their documentation, the agent nodded. “Enjoy your stay.” He turned toward the crowd. “Next.”
Next.
Next.
The word rang in Nat’s ears as Dexter escorted her into the crowd. A puppeteer was what he was—able to control her simply with pressure upon her back—pulling strings and moving levers. Passing through a large archway, they entered another cavernous room that reminded her of the train or bus stations in big US cities: Grand Central Station in New York, or perhaps Union Station in Chicago. Sounds echoed off the domed ceiling and tiled floor. Though attached to a modern airport, it felt as though they’d stepped into the country’s past, into history.
Silently, he led her to a bench where she sat, dejectedly doing as the puppet master commanded. The crowd and commotion faded into a mist of despondency. Voices and faces disappeared. Her hand went to her chest as her breathing labored. Could the mist be poisonous? Or was this debilitating pain physical? Wasn’t she too young for a heart attack?
Why wouldn’t her lungs fill?
The answer stared her in the face with eyes as cold as the ocean’s depths.
His plan was in motion. Stepping away from the booth was her final mistake, her opportunity to stop this—whatever it was—from happening. Her eyes went to the direction from which they’d come as her mind tried desperately to comprehend her dire situation.
Natalie blinked once and then again. Air slowly filled her lungs. Like a fading computer screen, the fog dissipated as the world came back into focus. There were people and noise. She turned toward her captor as he put his phone into the inside pocket of his jacket. If he’d spoken, she hadn’t heard.
“Did you call her…me?” Natalie asked.
He kissed the top of her head. “Nothing for you to worry about.”
“But my parents, will she text them?”
Natalie hadn’t been thrilled about the chateau, but now that it was gone, she wanted it. She couldn’t stop the tears as she imagined the scene: waking Christmas morning, the chateau beautifully festive for her mother loved decorations, her father’s deep laugh and mother’s approving gaze as they all sipped coffee around the tree. Other people may be there, but through it all, Nat could count on her immediate family. From the moment she arrived, her siblings, Nichol and Nate, would tease her about being the baby. She wasn’t just her parents’ baby, but theirs too. And now…
Tears blurred the noisy crowd.
Dexter stood and reached for her hand. The scene she’d created was gone. She was back in the hands of this…man.
“No tears, bug. Not yet. Save those for me.”
Icy chills scurried up her spine with the tiny feet of a million mice. Save her tears for him? What the hell? And then there was his nickname. She wasn’t a bug. The moniker grated her nerves, yet she needed to pick her battles, another of her mother’s sayings.
Outside, the wind whipped around them, blowing her hair and chilling her skin. A car was waiting. As they approached, Dexter spoke to a uniformed man in German—another thundering blow. Natalie couldn’t ask for help if she wanted to. While she was fluent in both French and English and knew enough Spanish to get by, speaking German was outside her capability.
Dexter opened the passenger side door and gallantly gestured for her to enter.
With her hand on the top of the door, her steps stuttered. She took one last look at the crowd, the bustling world around her, as the cool breeze prickled her moist eyes. Where was she going?
“Your coach awaits you for our magical adventure.”
There weren’t words capable of expressing her thoughts. Instead, with a deep sigh, she got into the car, settling into the cold seat. After Dexter positioned himself behind the wheel, he offered her a water bottle. She’d watched him buy it, watched his every move. She didn’t trust him, not one bit. If she weren’t so thirsty, she wouldn’t consider drinking what he offered, but she was.
Hesitantly, she opened the cap and sipped, barely enough to wet her parched lips.
With a huff, Dexter took the bottle from her hand, placed it to his lips, and took a long draw. His Adam’s apple bobbed as nearly a quarter of the liquid disappeared. Handing it back, he asked, “There, does that make you feel better?”
It did…until it didn’t.
He’d taken a drink from it with his lips—his mouth. The small sip she’d consumed percolated within her stomach. It was silly. She wasn’t the baby her family made her out to be. She was twenty years old, despite the falsified date on her bogus identifications. She knew what was coming. Drinking from the same bottle would be the least of her concerns or of their connection. Yet if she could fight, she would.
As if reading her mind, Dexter retrieved the water bottle and offered her another. “Here, this one is without my germs. Remember, bug, we’ll soon be sharing more than a bottle of water; there won’t be a place my lips won’t touch.”
“My luggage?” she asked, after taking a drink from the new bottle, trying to think of anything but his unappreciated and completely unnecessary verbal confirmation.
“Your layover was long enough. The other you will retrieve it. The real you doesn’t need it.”
She pulled her sweater tighter around her shoulders and tugged the cuffs over her fingers. Beyond the windows the sky was gray and over the ground was a dusting of snow. “I need my coat. It’s in my suitcase.”
Dexter hit a few buttons on the dashboard, bringing the heat to life, and then shimmied out of his sports jacket. “Here you go.”