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Chapter Thirty-One
Grace
Had my in-laws paid the ransom?And if so, where was Charles?Why hadn’t they found him?Who’d taken him in the first place?
These were answers to questions that no one wanted to touch.It matters, and it matters a lot, but for now, I have more pressing issues.At least according to my roommate.“Dr.Branson is going to perform your procedure.I think you might have maybe three days… if you’re lucky.”
“They’ll find Charles before then.The doctor has no grounds.”
She laughs a heady laugh.It sounds like nails on a chalkboard.“Except that he thinks he’s helping.And, plus, he has to keep you from talking.”
I hate her because she’s right.And also because she might be the closest thing I have to an actual friend.Certainly, none of the ones I thought I had have visited me in here.Not even Denise.Not my neighbor Darcy, the one whose daughter I kept at my house nearly half the time.Not Alice.And certainly not my mother-in-law, who was once so sure that I was the perfect woman to marry her son.“Don’t get sentimental,” Elizabeth says.“It won’t help you.”
“What’s the plan?When do we leave?”
“Two days,” she says.“On my birthday.”
She stands and paces the small space.I’ve come to hate this room.No one tells you what it’s like to live in such close quarters.To stare at the same four walls.No one tells you what happens when there’s nothing left to do.Desperate for something, you fidget with your hands.You keep putting them on your face to steady yourself, but when you stop, you find that you've been gnawing away at your fingernails.“What then?”
“I have some money buried out past Marble Falls.”She looks at me to make sure I’m following.“You know where that’s at?”
“I think so.”
“Good,” she says.“I’m going to draw you a map.Just in case.”
“Just in case what?”
“Just in case I get held up.”
I watch as she walks over to the door and peers out the small window.“You’ll need it to get me out.”
“Out of where?”
“Out of jail.Out of here.Wherever.Just in case.You need to be prepared for all scenarios, Grace.”
I wonder if this is something Charles should have told me.
“We have to take Joy.”
“Are you stupid?”She rolls her eyes.“Here I am putting everything on the line…letting you in on my biggest secret and you come at me with this?”
“We can’t just leave her here.”
“Sure we can.”She crosses the room and sits down on my bed, leveling with me the way I used to do with Eleanor when I wanted to get my point across.“Joy can’t survive out there, Grace.She has no one.And we can’t have someone, no matter how much we care about that person, slowing us down.”
“Right.Okay,” I say, and it’s perhaps the first time I understand why or ratherhowCharles could have left Phillip and me behind.Ifhe left us behind.
“Anyway, about my birthday.We’re going to have a celebration of sorts.”
“Like a party?”
“Exactly.”She grins proudly.“A real blowout.”
Her eyes dart around the room.“I’ll need the pills you have stashed to add with my own.This is how it’s going to work…are you listening?”
“I’m listening.”
“I’ve told Dr.B that you and I are planning something special for him.If you catch my drift.”
