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“It could be someone else,” he offers, accelerating into the passing lane. “I’m sure there are several people who’d like to take me out.”
“I didn’t tell him about you. I didn’t say I was with anyone.”
“Like I said. This could all be for me, not you, in which case you’d be better off if I dropped you—”
“Holy crap, Jameson, you’re not dropping meoffanywhere. Don’t say that again.”
There’s a pause, like he might argue.
“Okay.”
The more Jameson drives, the calmer he is. It’s not like the night he took me. That night, he was tense. Something else was bothering him. It wasn’t the fact of the crime at all.
It was his parents. He was thinking about his parents, and his family.
I steal a glance at him and it hits me, all at once, that Jameson doesn’t get arrested by mistake. He’s calm because this is the kind of situation that makes him feel most in control. I’d bet the entire Supreme Court that every time he’s been taken into custody, it’s because he’s allowed the cops to do it.
Okay.
Okay.
We take the tunnel back to Manhattan. Jameson drives less than a mile before he takes a sharp right and pulls into a parking garage.
“You’re parking?”
“That’s step one.”
He parks on the fourth floor. Step two is to collect Snowball and take the stairwell down to the street. Jameson puts a hand on my arm and keeps me close to his side while we walk.
Five blocks later, Jameson leads the way into the shadiest parking garage I’ve ever seen. Three flights of crumbling cement stairs later, he stops at a tan four-door and sticks his hand under the wheel well.
“Keys,” he announces.
We get in and go.
There’s another parking garage after that, and then a public lot. The final vehicle is a neat blue SUV. Snowball safely buckled in the back, we drive north.
I have a headache.
Miles of city roll by on either side of us and disappear. Then Manhattan’s in the rearview mirror.
“Where are we going?”
Jameson looks over at me, his eyes skimming my face with something like concern. “The cabin.”
“Won’t they find us there immediately? The cops came for you.”
He shakes his head. “I told them it was a rental. It’s not in my name.”
“Oh my God. Did you steal the cabin?”
Jameson rolls his eyes. “I didn’t steal the cabin, Lily. I bought it under a holding company.”
“You would have some anonymous hideout, wouldn’t you? You’re not just a kidnapper. You’re a criminal mastermind.”
“Former kidnapper. You wanted to vacation with me. And I’m not a mastermind. I’m just a regular criminal with an expanded skill set.” He passes a white car with an old man behind the wheel and an old lady in the passenger seat. “Are you still pissed?”
“I don’t know what I am.”
