My thoughts (no matter how scattered) were the only possessions I had as I continued to wander the streets of Monte Carlo. I had no luggage, no blankets, no money to trade unwelcoming footpaths for sympathetic beds.
This was my penance for telling a man he’d earned my heart only to walk out the door without a goodbye. My empty stomach daren’t growl because it deserved to have no fuel. My arthritic bones daren’t complain because they brought such discomfort on themselves. And I definitely didn’t allow the piercing laments of my heart to earn a single tear from me.
This was my fault, and I would pay the price to prevent Elder from doing so.
For an entire twenty-four hours, I lived in limbo.
As the streets emptied of law-abiding holidaymakers and were replaced with alcohol-fermented partiers, I kept to the shadows and out of sight.
Security guards patrolled outside their nightclubs and the police presence increased—protecting the rich and famous from bad decisions and terrible consequences.
It was the longest night of my life. Not only because I had nowhere to sit down and rest, but because I never stopped moving to avoid the beady eyes of other night-walkers.
This part of town had no homeless, and the glitz and finery wore down a piece of me I didn’t know I harboured: a certain kind of hate for wealth.
I might’ve been brutalised, but my captivity had been in a beautiful mansion dripping with money. Then I’d been rescued and stowed on the Phantom where its very creation was all thanks to Elder’s underhanded dealings.
I loved my bedroom on the Phantom, but until tonight, when I finally earned some grit beneath my sandals and dirt upon my hands, I’d forgotten what it was like not to have everything.
To be surrounded by shop windows full of thousand-dollar dresses and not be able to afford them. To smell the scents of pricey dinners in exclusive restaurants and not be able to eat.
Yet again, something else had been stolen from me: the value of things. Not that I ever took my living on the Phantom and all its luxuries for granted, of course, but for once, it was nice to worry about normal things—things Tasmin used to constantly fret over while Pimlico had forgotten by being kept as a toy.
Things like hours passing and no way to tell the time. Concerns like itineraries and no way to get to where I needed to go. Problems like the mundaneness of life and being responsible for my own person.
My thoughts kept me distracted from my flat feet and sore back as dawn slowly approached and prettily made-up women turned to tipsy makeup-smeared consorts, and men went from handsome devils to morally-corrupted scoundrels.
Ducking out of the way of a domestic, and staying to the shadows to avoid the eyes of security guards, I poked at the open wound by leaving Elder. All night, I’d been a game of roulette as my mind spun the wheel and my choices between staying away and returning became the little white ball.
Sometimes, that ball landed on red. Red...the colour of love, of passion, of blood and rage and lust.
But sometimes, it landed on black. Black...the colour of desperation, of grief, of wrongness and hate and confusion and pain.
Neither gave me an answer I could live with.
Dawn crept to daybreak.
I looked at the horizon and saw how far I’d walked.
My heart hiccupped at the amount of distance I’d placed between Elder and me. My feet turned mutinous, wanting to go backward rather than forward.
All I wanted to do was kneel before him and promise I’d never again ask him to touch, kiss, or bed me. If that was the sacrifice for his friendship and protection, then so be it. I would pay it lifetimes over.
If I did that, I could be with him right now.
I could be sailing out to sea.
Safe.
Warm.
In love.
Who cared if he never touched or kissed me again?
He was safe.
And safe was worth so much more to me than romance.
Isn’t it?
I hated that my answer was no longer clear cut.
He’d spoiled me. He’d shown me that safety only came from trust, and trust had the unnerving ability to create affection, which morphed into lust and somehow blossomed into love.
You didn’t leave for you.
That reminder—that righteous thorn in my side—gave me strength.
I can do this.
For him.
Inhaling hard, I strode onward.
*
Late afternoon, and I still hadn’t left the limbo of heartache.
I hadn’t come up with a plan. I hadn’t done anything but mope.
The hungrier and more tired I became, the more the crowds caused cold sweat to trickle down my spine. Sunshine burned me as if I was an ant under a magnifying glass. Every pair of eyes was malevolent.
The streets slithered this way and that, deeper into chaos.
I had no idea where I was going. I had no clue how I would find money to return to England or how I would track down my mother.
With every step, I hunkered down a little more, curling around the emptiness inside.
However, as hunger pains took precedent, my mind stopped torturing me with images of Elder and focused on survival. I needed money. For food, shelter, and transport. I needed a passport to cross the borders. I needed a miracle to achieve such things.
Or the sticky fingers Elder had taught me to wield.
The thought of stealing wasn’t new. I’d deliberated all night, looking, despite myself, for easy opportunities. But now another day was here, and my throat was dry, and a headache pinched my eyes, and I finally had no choice. The luxury of being above such necessities had faded, and I sagged against a building, trying to stay out of the way of bustling pedestrians.
I didn’t want to loiter like a criminal, but I also couldn’t keep walking with no direction.
I needed to be smart.
It was time to steal.
Self-disgust filled me even as I settled in to study potential victims and find the rhythm of the city. I eyed laughing tourists and assessed sharp chinned businessmen. I did my best to recall everything Elder had taught me about pickpocketing.
My fingers fanned out by my sides, willing to pilfer a wallet or purse but still so unskilled at being unseen.
As much as I didn’t want to do this, I had two choices: steal enough to get home or put myself at the mercy of others. I would have to blindly trust that the police weren’t corrupt, good Samaritans weren’t evil, and whoever came next into my life wouldn’t abuse me.
No.
I couldn’t.
I was too fragile. My confidence still so new. I couldn’t turn to another and trust. I had one person I trusted, and I’d run from him. The second best was me, myself, and I.
And No One.
No One...damn.
The crippling in my chest was all thanks to Elder and his story about being called No One by his family.
My journal would forever be linked to him.
He’d ruined the only sanctuary I had.
I missed him more than I could stand.
What was he doing? Had he decided to hell with me and left? Had he stayed and tried to find me?
Where I stood deep in the city surrounded by buildings and strangers, I couldn’t see the ocean. I couldn’t see the Phantom or the balcony where we’d stood side by side and faced the storm out to sea.