Once over the threshold, I dial the lights up to the brightest level, shut myself inside, and lean against the heavy wooden door. Despite the urgent timeline I’m on, and the fact that the entrance to this tower requires a password that only Kayden, Marabella, and I know, I find myself uneasily scanning the spacious room. My attention lands first on the giant bed we didn’t bother making this morning, my stomach knotting with the possibility that one day I might not be here to share it with him. Shaking off such thoughts, I force my attention to the fireplace on the wall opposite where I stand, then to the big-screen TV above the heavy dresser directly in front of the bed. Then, finally, to the bathroom door to the right that refuses to be dismissed.
Really, truly, I sense no danger, but that eerie sensation refuses to let me be anything but cautious, and I curse myself for leaving my gun downstairs. Nevertheless, I’m capable of protecting myself and I walk to the bathroom, the lights coming on as I touch one of the shiny white tiles, to find it empty. Completing my search, I dash down the white tiled path between the giant oval tub to the row of cabinets with double sinks to my right and flip on the light to the closet. No one is there but me, of course, but for just a few moments I pause in the doorway, my gaze catching on the rows of Kayden’s clothes on the right side, and then the small row of clothes to the left, which are mine and a part of a new beginning. You choose who you are now and later, Kayden had said, just like we choose what we are together. Words I’d like to live by, but are they really true? Can I reject any reality the past tries to force upon me and us?
My gaze lands on the mirror in front of me, and my reflection blinks into view. What was I thinking? I don’t have to wait and see who this woman is. I know her, and I don’t want to be any other version of her but the one I am here and now with Kayden. I’ve even come to like my now dark brown hair, when I’ve often craved my natural red shade. I need to tell him all of this, and I will. I’ll scream it loud and clear if I have to, but right now I need to search the security feed. Fully intending to leave, I start to turn, but my gaze lands on the mirror again, and I am suddenly, abruptly even, transported to another time, to the point that I sway and lean on the closet door. Images race through my mind, my lashes lowering with the force with which they are thrust upon me.
I stand in the closet, his closet, staring at myself in the full-length mirror, trying to see what he will see when I go downstairs. No. Trying to control what he will see. I’m dressed in an elegant cream pantsuit, my red hair draping my shoulders, the strap of a Chanel purse resting across my chest and at my hip. I see my familiar image, but not a woman I know or understand. Not the woman my father trained to be strong and fierce. Because that woman would not have allowed herself to be tied to a bed last night. And when she was released, she would have forcefully fled. My lashes lower and I inhale, sitting down on a bench in the corner against the wall, beside a row of fancy shoes Garner bought for me yesterday. I could leave, but where would I go? I still have no passport. I still have no money. And the more I’ve thought about this, the greater the odds of me randomly falling into the middle of whatever this is, it just doesn’t make sense. I’m hiding with a monster, but that monster is necessary to my survival.
Inhaling again, I force myself to turn on my heel and march out of the closet, and never stop walking. I exit the bathroom into the bedroom and make the mistake of looking at the bed where I’d been tied up last night, swallowing the disgrace and anger I feel, the dread at knowing he’s about to touch me again. I keep moving, and I exit into the hallway and start the walk down the windowless, red-carpeted stairwell. I’m just about to round a corner when I hear Neuville’s voice speaking in French, followed by another familiar voice I know to be Bastile, his personal bodyguard. I freeze on the word collier, or in English, necklace, icy cold reality hitting me. That monster I’m hiding with is the same one I’m hiding from.
“I searched her hotel room again top to bottom,” Bastile says, speaking in the French I pretend not to know. “There is no necklace. How do you want to proceed?”
“Search the property she brought with her when we’re at lunch today.”
“I’ve searched her property.”
“Do it again,” Neuville snaps.
“And if I don’t find it?”
He won’t find it, I think. I made sure of it.
“A man is dead and we got rid of the body for her. As far as she knows, we’re hiding her from the murderer and the police. She’ll give me the necklace.”
Nothing he can do to me will make me give him that necklace. But somehow, some way, I have to figure out what makes it so sought after, and decide what to do with it.
“And if she doesn’t? At what point do I torture her into talking and get rid of her?”
“You don’t. I’ve decided to keep her.”
I jolt back to the present, sucking in air, disoriented by my equally sudden return to reality. I’m still here and I’m still alone, but Neuville’s words are now living and breathing here as well: I’ve decided to keep her.