Celeste pointed down a hallway to their right, past the Gucci store, to the “C” concourse. “This way.”
Jess’s phone buzzed in her hand. She looked at it right away, thinking it was her father, but it was a message from Giovanni: “If you stay in Italy for any reason, feel free to come back.” Even in her deepening frustration, she managed a small grin.
“I’m sure Ben’s on his way,” Celeste said as they walked down the concourse, passing gate C1. “Your father and I may have—”
Jess’s phone rang. She checked the screen. “It’s him.” She pushed the answer button. “Dad, where are you?”
Ben Rollins cringed. He knew his daughter wasn’t going to like this. “I’m on the next flight, right behind you. I’m sorry honey, but normalizing the data is taking longer than we thought. We need certainty before we make an announcement.”
He put one hand over the receiver. “How much time, Roger? What do you think, another hour?”
Sitting in the growing nest of papers on Ben’s hotel bed, Roger nodded. “Maybe two, tops. You can be out of here by noon.”
Ben took his hand off the receiver. “Sweetheart, I’m leaving in an hour, two maximum.
“But you said that last night,” Jess complained on the other end.
“I know I did, but I promise. I’ll be right behind you.” He pulled up a list of flights on his laptop screen. “There’s a direct flight on United at 3 p.m. I can catch. I’m booking it now.”
No response.
“Jessica, honey, please, promise me you're getting on that plane.”
“Okay,” came the quiet reply.
“Good. Listen, if I want to finish this, I need to go. Love you, and give your mother a kiss for me.”
Another pause. “Love you, too.”
Ben took a deep breath and hung up.
“By the way, your boxes arrived.” Roger pointed in the corner of the room. “Just got here.”
Ben looked at them. Mrs. Brown might be an old horse, but she was reliable. “Roger, we need to get this done—”
The door to his room opened. He hadn’t given anyone else a key. “We don’t need any room service…”
But it wasn’t a maid. It was one of the sunglass-wearing security goons from the top floor. “Dr. Ben Rollins, I need you to come with me.”
“What?” Ben slapped his laptop closed. “I’m not going anywhere, I need to finish—”
“This is not a request,” the big man said in a flat voice, his accent vaguely Swiss. Another man appeared behind him.
Jess stared at the phone in her hand. She hadn’t put up much of a fight, but then there was no winning an argument with her father. Not when he set his mind to something.
“What did he say?” Celeste asked.
They’d arrived at C23, and the waiting area was jammed. An American Airlines Boeing 777 sat hunched on the tarmac in front of the gate.
“He’s not coming.”
“At all?” Celeste frowned.
“On the next flight,” Jess corrected. “He said he’d be on the United flight at 3 p.m.” She put her phone back in her pocket and looked up at the ceiling. Black signs with orange letters indicated directions, “Trasiti - Transfers,” said one, and next to it, “Uscita - Way Out - Roma.” She stared at the sign. Roma. Rome. Way out.
A three-chime tone played over the public address system. “American Airlines flight 1465 now pre-boarding,” announced the flight steward at the check-in desk. “Families and anyone needing assistance can now—”
“That gives us a little more girl time, no?” Celeste said with a smile. “Come on, we can watch a romantic movie, have a few glasses of wine. It’ll be fun.”
“Yeah, sure.”
Jess closed her eyes. She opened them to see a young family pressing through the crowd, the mother and father loaded down with bags; the father held his little girl’s hand, the mother held her tiny son in one arm. The two children batted at each other, the girl smacking the little boy with an inflatable dolphin. The boy erupted into tears.
“Susanna,” scolded the mother, “if you can’t play nice, there’s going to be quiet time.”
Jess watched them disappear past the check-in and down the gangway. Again the image of two children playing in a field of snow flitted through her mind. The tears seemed to come by themselves, running down Jess’s face. She gritted her teeth, tried to hold it back, but she couldn’t. She sobbed, bending over, stepping to the row of seats behind her and sitting. People around her backed away.
“Baby, what’s wrong?” Celeste knelt beside her. “Are you hurt?”
“It’s my fault,” Jess gasped between sobs. “Everything is my fault.”
“What’s your fault? Do you mean what happened with Ricardo?”
“No.” Jess clenched her jaw. Tears streamed down her cheeks. “You and Dad splitting up, all of it.”