Take the Key and Lock Her Up (Embassy Row #3)(7)

“You okay, sweetie?” she asks me, tilting her head.

“Yes. Thank you.”

Dominic is still by the car. Alexei is looking under the hood.

“Who you got with you out there?” she asks.

“Uh …” I glance over my shoulder as if I can’t quite remember the answer. “My dad,” I lie. “And my brothers. We’re …”

Running.

Lost.

But not quite lost enough.

“Where’s your momma?” the woman asks.

I look down at a neat stack of knitted coasters, finger the stiff yarn.

“She died.”

You can’t fake the way my voice cracks, my fingers tremble. And finally the woman is convinced that I’m not lying.

“Oh, heck, sweetie. I’m sorry. Here. I’ll get you those rooms.”

She’s busy for a moment, typing on a computer that might be older than I am. Then she reaches in a drawer for two heavy metal keys attached to massive plastic tags. Rooms five and seven. Our home for the next twenty-four hours, if we’re lucky.

The woman runs one of the many credit cards the Scarred Man gave me. They all have different numbers, different names. I have no idea where they came from. They may be stolen or just attached to one of his many identities. It doesn’t matter as long as they’re clean and untraceable.

“What brings y’all to Fort Sill?”

For a second, I’m sure that I’ve misheard her. I hope that I’ve misheard her. But I haven’t. I know it in my gut. I should have seen it before now. I should have felt it like a magnetic pull, a steady, constant tug. There’s a flag on the wall that was knitted out of yarn that’s red, white, and blue. I see the map now, a pin over where Fort Sill sits in the southwest corner of Oklahoma. I should have noticed the tidy stacks of flyers like tourists always grab, announcing the local sights. Almost all of them have the words Fort Sill blazoned across the top.

Maybe this was why, deep down, I was so desperate to stop here.

Maybe this is why the Scarred Man was so desperate to stop me.

“Sweetie?” the woman says, bringing me back.

“We … we used to live here.”

I’d give anything for it to be a lie, but the woman brightens at my words. She glances through the window again. Dominic is still standing by the car, so broad and tall and strong.

“Oh. Was your dad a military man?”

I look out the window at the coming darkness. A cold seeps into my bones as I say, “Yes.”

The room is dim. Heavy, old-fashioned curtains cover clean windows, and only a little light creeps into the room from the bathroom. I’m part bat now: I can see in the dark, hear every drip of water from the leaky faucet, every buzz and hum from the bathroom lightbulb that is getting ready to blow. But, most of all, I hear Jamie.

His breath is deep but labored. Just lying in bed is hard work for him. He’s no longer the boy who could wake before the sun and run around the great walled city twice before breakfast. He’ll probably never be that boy again. But he’s alive, and that’s enough.

That has to be enough.

I lie atop the covers and watch him. When he shudders and mumbles something in his sleep, I get up and feel his pulse. Faint but still there. At least his fever seems to have broken. There’s no blood coming through his bandages and staining his white T-shirt. My brother is alive. For now. And I know it’s up to me to keep him that way.

But that’s just the start of the things I have to do.

The connecting door is slightly ajar. There’s silence on the other side. Dominic is in one bed, sleeping. But I know that with the slightest noise, even the smallest disturbance, he’ll bolt awake, alert and alarmed, so I move slowly to where Alexei sits in an overstuffed chair that’s pointed toward the window. The curtains are open just a crack, and the light from the parking lot slashes across his face, an eerie yellow glow. He’s supposed to be keeping watch, I know, but I don’t wake him. He needs his rest.

And I need the keys.

They’re on the tiny table between the two beds. I pick them up gently, close the door behind me when I go.

Outside, I pull on my cardigan, not looking back. I just keep walking to the Buick. Only Jamie’s voice can stop me.

“Don’t do it, Gracie.”

He’s not yelling, but the words are too loud in the still night air. Dominic or Alexei will hear him.

“Do what?” I ask, turning back.

Jamie gives a weary laugh. “Do you really think I don’t know where we are? We’re five miles away, Gracie. I’d know it blindfolded.”

He coughs then, doubles over. His color is better, but he is so far from well that I step toward him, half-afraid that I might need to catch him before he hits the ground.

Jamie holds out a hand, stopping me.

“I’m fine.”

He is so not fine.

“Go to bed, Jamie.”

“Okay.” My brother gives me a smile. “When you do.”

“I can’t sleep,” I say.

“Then neither can I.”

“Jamie, you’re …”

“You can say it, you know. I’m lucky to be alive. I’m not ashamed of that.”

He’s right, but that’s not the point.

“You need to rest, Jamie. You need to get better.”