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“The picture doesn’t look like me at all.” I showed him the driver’s license. He glanced at the confident stranger and back up at me.
“Yeah, it does.”
“I mean, the hair and whatever, but she looks—”
His eyes met mine. “Exactly like you.” He handed me a phone. “Here you go. New sim card. New number. It will work in London; but if you go in the EU, you’ll need something new.”
“Can I call my sister?”
“You can try the house,” he said, and I punched in the number as he gave it to me. I pressed the phone to my ear and my fingers to my lips and prayed. Please, please let my sister—
“Hello?”
I closed my eyes with a sob. “Zilla?”
“Holy shit, Pops. I mean—holy shit. Where the fuck are you?”
Ronan touched my arm and shook his head.
“I . . . I can’t tell you. But I’ll be there tonight.”
“Here? At this fucking house?”
“Yes.”
“Oh, thank God! Oh, thank fucking God! Do you know what’s going on? Like . . . at all?”
“No. I mean, a little. I’ll explain what I can when I get there.”
“Has she seen anyone around?” Ronan asked. “Anything strange.”
“Ronan wants to know if there’s been anything strange there?”
“Other than everything? It’s like I’m living in a very swanky, very posh jail. With gourmet food and a steam shower.”
“That doesn’t sound too bad.” So much for my bad apartment in a sky rise vision.
“It’s weird, Poppy.”
“Everything is weird right now. But I’ll see you in a few hours.”
Ronan gestured that it was time to cut the call short and I said my goodbyes and hung up, pressing the hard plastic to my lips.
I felt him looking at me. Maybe he wanted to say something. Comfort me. The guy from the last few days at the cottage would have done that. Would have tried, anyway. But that guy was gone.
“Get me on the damn bus,” I said, turning away to wipe my eyes.
Saying nothing, he started the car and we drove away from the grocery store. “Are you hungry?” he asked. “The train’s an hour ride—”
“I’m fine.”
More silence.
“You have money in the bank account.” He reached into his pocket and pulled out a thick stack of cash. The kind you only ever saw in movies. “Here’s another five grand.”
“Five grand?” I cried. “Where do I put all of this? I don’t have a purse.”
“We’ll get you something near the bus. Put it all in the envelope for now.”
Five grand and a bunch of fake IDs. I’d never been so criminal in my life. “When are you going back to the States?”
“I have a flight tonight.”
“Isn’t that dangerous? Booking a flight—”
“I’m flying in a private jet. No one knows I’m coming.”
“Private jets, secret houses, money like this? You are rich, aren’t you?”
“Being a very bad monster pays very well, Poppy.”
He smiled at me and it was like getting punched in the chest. “Will . . . will I ever see you again?”
He turned the wheel, pulling us alongside the curb. The bus depot was ahead.
“If we see each other again, Poppy, it’s because something has gone wrong in my plan. So, I sincerely hope this is the last you see of me.”
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
Poppy
I couldn’t sincerely hope that, but I nodded because there was nothing to say.
He reached forward, his fingers touching my cheek, and I flinched away. “Don’t make it worse,” I whispered.
He nodded as if he understood and then he got out of the car. It took me a second to put everything in my envelope and then I followed too. He stood ahead of me on the sidewalk, waiting for me. Beside him was a shop with backpacks on a rack outside the door. In the window were coats, another thing I needed. I wondered if I might find some underwear too.
“I’m going to stop in here,” I said. “I’ll be a few minutes.”
“All right,” he said and jerked his thumb back at the depot. “I’ll get you a ticket.”
He walked away and I sucked in a deep shuddery breath.
The future, Poppy, I reminded myself. Think of the future. Zilla. School.
I opened the door, and behind all the racks of coats and backpacks and purses, a woman said, “Be with you in a moment,” in a singsong voice. I couldn’t see her because the store was stuffed full. I had to push sideways between coats and sweaters. There was a whole section of kids’ bathing suits and beach umbrellas and towels.
“Do you have any women’s underwear?” I asked, stepping deeper into the store, nearly knocking over a display of sunglasses.
The woman didn’t answer.
She must be in the store room or something, I thought, and pulled out a deep green sweatshirt with a hood and big pockets in the front. I also grabbed a black backpack and a smaller purse.
I crouched down and kind of duck walked between two stuffed coat racks. Lo and behold, there were some very sad packages of women’s underwear. I grabbed a three pack of black bikinis and a sports bra that looked like it might fit.
