Page 22 of Dancing With Lies

She’d flown back home that morning and had gone straight to bed. She slept for six hours and woke up to the news from Lincoln. Good, that kept the money out of her bank account and away from wandering eyes. She had a bank account in her fake name, after some help from an old friend to create her new identity, but she rarely used it. The account was a way to prove her identity, nothing more, when she applied for her driver’s license and to pay her car insurance.

She’d give Lincoln credit for being smart enough to realize she didn’t want the questions that would come from such a large deposit and for going through with his commitment. Now, that just meant she had to follow through with hers.

The idea of working for Lincoln bothered her in many ways. Yeah, they had history, but most of that history consisted of him and his friends teasing her for one reason or another. And then Lincoln had figured out she had a crush on his stepbrother, Liam, and that only made matters worse. Then there was that whole trauma-fest from the night her parents died.

Sprawling out on her couch, feeling overwhelmed with worry, defeat, and far too much stress, Roxie stared up at her ceiling, trying to find the energy to get dressed and go pick up her wayward boyfriend. That is, if he was still her boyfriend. He’d disappeared long before the police started looking for him. She put her hands over her eyes and groaned a long, loud sound of frustration.

“Holy fucking moly, what the hell am I going to do?” Not for the first time in her life, Roxie was in a tough spot with an overwhelming number of problems that seemed insurmountable.

She didn’t want to think about her past or the absolute worst days of her life, so she got up off the couch, dressed, picked up her bag and keys, and did the only thing she could do. She drove down to the police station to pick up Nathan.

“Hey, babe. I’m so sorry I disappeared on you.” He said as soon as he slid into the passenger seat. “I’m so glad you’re here, I’ve missed you.”

His hair was too long now, he looked exhausted, and his eyes kept shifting around like he was waiting for an attack, but he was there. He kissed her, but she pulled away quickly. She’d bailed him out because she was all he had, that didn’t mean she was completely, utterly stupid. Well, maybe she was, she decided as she pulled out of the police station lot, but she hadn’t completely gone over the edge.

“You hungry?” She asked, knowing she had nothing in the house he would eat.

“Yeah, let’s get something to eat.” He replied and sat back in the seat as though it was the first time he’d relaxed in weeks. Maybe even months.

That tugged at her heartstrings. She’d thought she’d loved him at one point. But he changed, not her.

As she pulled into the parking lot of a place adored by tourists and locals alike, Roxie’s thoughts started to spin. By the time they got out of the car, she was ready to confront him.

“Listen, Nathan, I need to know something. And I know I should probably wait, but I have to know. Did you burn down Elmo’s? And if you did, why?” She stood there in the afternoon sunshine, hands on hips covered in short denim shorts, a cropped black tank top displaying her toned abdomen.

“Babe.” He drawled in that southern twang that used to make her knees melt but now only made them lock up. He had a pleading tone in his voice that she ignored while she stared at him blankly. “Okay, look. Come here.”

He cupped her left elbow and pulled her to the back of her car, where they’d have more privacy. He looked around again with his constantly shifting eyes before he looked down at her. For a moment she saw the old Nathan, the one she wanted back so much.

“I needed the money, okay. I owned part of Elmo’s too, okay? I needed the insurance money.” He tried to lean in to kiss her neck, something he’d always done to distract her, but she pulled back and shook her head.

“Nope. Nuh-uh, you aren’t distracting me like that. Why didn’t you ask me for money? I’d have helped you out.” She knew it was probably because he’d have had to admit he had a problem, and he didn’t want to do that.

“Look, babe, you don’t have the kind of money I needed.” He started, but then his eyes darted to the entrance of the parking lot. The squeal of wheels against pavement made him nervous for some reason and Roxie looked around to see a gray van pull up with windows only in the front.

“Fuck,” Nathan whispered, but she heard him. “See ya, babe.”

“What?” Roxie started to ask but Nathan was already running.

A side door slid open on the van and Roxie saw a man squatting there, waiting. To pull Nathan inside.

“Nathan, what’s going on?” She called out, but Nathan didn’t look back. The man inside, a bald guy that Roxie didn’t recognize, glared at her as the van passed her, heading for Nathan. But he’d already made it out of the parking lot and was headed for a strip mall next to a row of houses.

What the actual fuck?

The door on the van closed as Roxie watched its driver reverse and head out of the parking lot. Should she call the cops? She wondered as she stood there, watching the whole thing take place. This was…insane.

Her stomach rumbled so she went into the restaurant, ordered some food, and then stayed in the parking lot to eat in case Nathan came back. This was all crazy and maybe she was in shock, she wasn’t sure, but she felt stupidly calm. Sure, she should be screaming, running after the man even, maybe even calling the cops, but there were two things wrong with that.

One, she wanted to avoid the cops as much as possible. They asked questions that might lead to more questions she didn’t want to answer about her own life. She’d avoided them since she left New York a decade ago, and she didn’t want to go to them now.

Second, Nathan had just been bailed out of jail. If she called to report this, they might see it as him running from justice. They’d declare him a fugitive or something and then she’d never get her money back. Besides, he wouldn’t screw her so completely, would he?

Was he really that far gone?

She crumpled up the garbage from her dinner and put it in the trash before she left the parking lot. She liked to keep order in her life and trash in her car would drive her crazy. That was the last thing she needed right now.

Worry ate at her as she drove home. Would Nathan be there? Would he not be there? Which would be worse?