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We remained silent while the coffee brewed. I poured the hot drink and carried his cup over to him.
“Everything all right, Viola?” he asked, leaning in slightly to look into my face.
I wanted to scream at him to stop calling me that. He knew it wasn’t my real name. Even if he couldn’t use my old name, I wished he’d stop saying the fake one so often.
Instead, I forced a bright smile. “Yes, I’ve just been struggling to sleep lately. You know, so much going on in my head. Can’t seem to get it to switch off at night, especially ’cause I’m getting to bed late anyway because of the bar job.”
“And how’s that going? Anyone asking any unusual questions?”
I frowned. “No. Like what?”
“Just things you might not be able to answer.”
“Like my nine times table?” I sniped, sarcastic.
His eyebrows lifted. “You know what I mean.”
“No. No one has been asking me for anything other than another drink.”
I turned away and took a sip of the coffee I’d poured for myself. Considering my late finish at work, and only getting a couple of hours sleep before everything had gone nuts, I needed the caffeine.
“Any news yet on when I’m going to be called to testify?” I asked.
“Won’t be long now, I swear. Couple of weeks at the most, might even be less.”
“And how’s it all going?”
His lips pressed together into a thin line. “You know I can’t discuss it with you, Viola.”
I nodded. “Of course.”
I wanted him to go away, and not only because of the hit man and dead bodies I had hidden down in the cellar. Seeing the deputy brought back memories of home and of the day we’d had to leave to join Witness Protection.
Ironically, I’d been made to do what I had in order to prove my loyalty, but the result had been the exact opposite. Doing what I had had pushed me over the edge. I was determined to make sure that man could never hurt anyone again, and the only way I’d been able to do so was by going to the cops and telling them everything, and promising I would testify against him.
My sister had already hated me, understandably, but I thought the day we’d been taken into Witness Protection cemented her feelings for me. She hadn’t seen it coming. A knock came at the door, and I opened it to find a U.S. Marshal standing on the doorstep. He showed me a badge and said his name was Terrance and that we needed to go and pack some stuff in a bag right away. His arrival caught Nickie in the middle of getting ready for a date. She had exams to study for, had her friends, had the guy she’d been crushing on for the past month finally asking her out, and now she was being made to give up her whole life and just leave.
I’d been better prepared, of course. I’d known it was coming. I couldn’t warn her in case she said something to the wrong person, and then we’d both have been whacked. Even as we grabbed our belongings, I’d been waiting for a car to drive past and start shooting. Nicole had been crying and saying she didn’t want to leave, and I’d grabbed her and said if she wanted to live, she needed to go with me now. It wasn’t as though she could have stayed anyway—she was seventeen and would have no one to take care of her. She’d told me she hated me then, that I ruined everything, and I’d destroyed her life. I couldn’t argue with her; I probably had.
All around us, the rest of the street had just carried on like normal. Kids were playing on the sidewalk, someone else was walking their dog. As I ran out of our house and down the steps onto the street, the lady from next door lifted her hand and waved at me, as though it was the most normal thing in the world for us to be running out of the house with bags and two strange men accompanying us. The whole thing felt so surreal.
We’d piled into a van with two U.S. Marshals, and then I noticed a second vehicle behind us with another two Marshals inside. But it wasn’t until we started to pull out of the neighborhood where I’d lived my whole life that things really started to sink in. We could never go back. We’d never be able to see any of our old friends, or walk the streets we had when we were kids.
That night, we were taken to a motel. Nicole cried the whole time. I had a gun, one I’d managed to slip into my bag before we’d left. I didn’t sleep either that night. I just sat awake, my fingers around the gun, though one of the Marshals found it eventually and took it away I didn’t know if someone might have followed us at that point, and we’d be tracked down. A Marshal had been left to watch over us, and I could hear him on the phone to someone, complaining how he was on his own, and saying what did they expect him to do if shit blew up. I tried not to be frightened, but when a big guy like that was scared, I had to admit it worried me.
The next morning, we were taken to the clearinghouse, where we were given our new identities. Two weeks later, we were brought to our new home.
I was worried about finally getting the call that I would have to fly back to New York to testify. It made me nervous to think I would be leaving Nickie here by herself, though Deputy Kier said they would be keeping an eye on her and she’d be fine. Mostly, I was nervous about having to sit opposite him in court and spill everything I knew—all the money-laundering, and murders, and robberies. He would go down for a very long time, and I was happy to see that, but that didn’t take the nerves away.
“Everything okay, Viola?” Deputy Kier asked, using that damn name again.
I plastered a smile across my face once more. “Of course. Why wouldn’t it be?”
“As long as you’re not having second thoughts,” he said and took another sip of his coffee.
I shook my head. “Never. I want to see that son-of-a-bitch locked up for the rest of his life.”
