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EMMA:Why did I think I could do this, Pheebs? I’m a basket case. All three kids are gonna need intensive, lifelong therapy because of me.
PHOEBE:Em, they lost their mother young and their father isBen. They were gonna need intensive therapy anyway.
PHOEBE:What’s the alternative anyway? Stay in New York and let Ben walk all over you or spend the next three years in court only to lose custody of those kids to that bastard in the end?
She’s not wrong and it does help to put things in perspective. It doesn’t stave off the panic but it makes my path forward clear.
Of courseI have to leave. There’s nothing left for us in New York City anymore. Whatever I did have, I lost.
No job.
No sister.
No Ruslan…
EMMA:I love you, Pheebs.
PHOEBE:Love you, too, badass.
I put my phone away and stare at the suitcases piled in the corner. Every time a shadow passes by the windows, a shiver runs down my spine.
I probably have a few days before Ben realizes that the kids and I are not coming back. In that short window of opportunity, I need to exchange the car for another so that he won’t be able to track the license plate number.
Before I know it, I’m on my feet, adrenaline pulsing through my body. I could pack up the car right now. We could leave this very night. Then the kids could sleep while I drive us out of New York and into another state. By tomorrow night, we could have a different car.
We could have a different life.
I spend the next hour hustling back and forth between the motel room and the Chevy. I load her up, praying that she’s got a couple of hours of heavy driving left in her. We’re only a three-hour drive from the Pennsylvania border. Putting New York behind us would be a huge emotional relief, if not necessarily a logistical one.
A car cruises past, its headlights blinding me for a moment. It strikes me as strange that it’s moving so slowly.
Strange or suspicious?
The car goes past. A dark car. Maybe blue, maybe black—I can’t tell in the darkness. It seems suspect. But then again, so am I.
I probably look shady as all hell, prowling the motel in the dead of night, clearly trying to make a quick getaway.
Just add this to the list of things to talk about in therapy.
By the time I’ve got the last of the bags packed up, I feel just a little bit steadier. Now, I just need to get the kids in the backseat and off we go.
I shut the trunk.Is that…?
I freeze, fear pooling in my stomach. There’s a tall silhouette standing not five feet from me.Oh, God, the keys. I left them on the roof of the car.
He raises his hand and the keys dangle from his fingers. “Looking for these?”
I know that voice.
I move around the car, my eyes going wide with disbelief when I see who’s standing there.
“Good evening, Ms. Carson,” Ruslan says casually. “Funny running into you here.”
6
RUSLAN
I can tell the moment she thinks about running from me.
