Four Seconds to Lose (Ten Tiny Breaths, #3)(11)

“Yeah, maybe.” Theater group . . . doesn’t quite live up to Tisch School of the Arts, where I was supposed to be enrolled this fall. After what happened, my stepdad made me defer for a year and shipped me off to Miami to “be safe.”

The reality is I’ll never get to go, and that burns me with disappointment. “Good, good.” There’s a long pause. “Obviously, you’ve received the package.”

“Yup.” Like clockwork. Every Monday morning at nine o’clock a small parcel arrives at the extended-stay hotel where I’m supposed to be living. Kyle—the cute twenty-six-year-old security guy who has a thing for me—holds onto it in exchange for a coffee and a fifteen-minute flirt session.

Each package has a new phone with a new number. A new phone each week means no legal wiretaps, which means no incriminating evidence.

And Sam is all about no incriminating evidence.

Of course, my explanation to Kyle doesn’t involve burner phones or why I might need them. Instead, I fabricated a lovely modern fairy tale—that my mom likes to send me care packages each week but they have to continue arriving at that address or my father, whom I’m now staying with, will go into a blind rage.

I had a hard time getting that lie out with ease. If Kyle’s attention were on my face and not my breasts, he might have caught on. Mom can’t send me care packages because she died ten years ago, due to rare complications during childbirth, along with my unborn half-brother. It’s a sad story, really. As a high school dropout and mother by fifteen, Vegas stripper by eighteen, Jamie Miller was sure her luck had turned when she caught the eye of the much older, wealthy New York businessman Sam Arnoni.

Or, as some know him, Big Sam.

I was six when they got married—after a whirlwind three-month affair. We moved out of our two-bedroom Vegas apartment and into his sprawling Long Island house. The day we moved, my mom sat me down and told me to listen to Sam. That if I was a good little girl for him, he’d give us a good life.

I was eight when she died, leaving me alone with my stepdad. He’s all I’ve had ever since. In truth, he didn’t have to keep me. No one would have faulted him for hunting down my real father—who didn’t want me—and dropping me off on his doorstep. I mean, why burden yourself? But he didn’t. As long as I was an obedient little mouse, Sam told me that we’d be together.

So I was. And, in return, he gave me everything I could possibly ever want.

Knowing what I know now, I would have preferred my estranged father’s doorstep.

“Good. I’m glad to hear that. I’ll top up your account tomorrow.”

“Great.” As much as I’ve begun to detest taking money from him, the more money he sends, the faster I can save.

The sooner my plan can come to fruition.

The sooner I can run from him.

“Well, I’ve got to get back to work.” Conversations with Sam never last more than a few minutes anymore. He’s a busy guy. “Check your email, will you?”

Those are the magic words. “Okay.” I know that my voice sounds strained and so I clear my throat to shake it loose. There’s no sounding doubtful with Sam. He needs to think that I’m fully onboard with this.

“Love you, little mouse.”

I swallow a painful knot. Maybe he does . . . in his own way. “Love you too.” No real names. No reference to Dad or Sam. That’s another rule, even with burner phones. Sam’s a paranoid guy. With good reason.

Closing my eyes as I hang up, I heave a deep breath. I knew it was coming. It’s been three weeks since the last one of these calls. With icy dread creeping through my body, I reach over and flip open my laptop.

Logging in to the Gmail account—the one I share with Sam—I click on the drafts to find the unsent message. That’s how Sam gives me his directives. No transmitted emails means no intercepting them. I stare at the message, containing the name and address of a café off Ocean Drive, along with a meet-up time for me and Jimmy, a hotel name, and a picture of the buyers—“Bob” and “Eddie.”

My mouth instantly dries as the wave of nausea hits me.

■ ■ ■

“Hey, Uncle Jimmy!” I force the fake smile wider as I wrap my arms around the burly man in his mid-fifties.

“Hello, my dear. It’s so good to see you,” he chuckles softly, crushing my body against his round belly. To any innocent bystander, Uncle Jimmy could pass for a vacationing Santa Claus. Sure, his hair is more gray than white and I have a hard time picturing Santa in a yellow Hawaiian shirt and Birkenstocks at any time of year, but he’s got that twinkle in his eyes and that easy, quiet laugh that puts you at ease.

Appearances can be deceptive.

Like me. Here I am, smiling and casually accepting an iced latte at a Miami café from a man who isn’t really my uncle. My naturally straight blond hair is now chestnut brown and wavy—thanks to a wig. My eyes are olive-green and adorned with heavy brown kohl eyeliner, hidden behind dark sunglasses. A tight sports bra disguises my well-endowed chest beneath a casual T-shirt, topping off my spandex capri pants and sneakers. An effective illusion of a young woman meeting up with her loving uncle for a coffee on a Thursday morning, during errands.

We participate in idle chitchat for fifteen minutes—he asks me about the college English program I’m not enrolled in and I tell him how fantastic it is. I ask him about Aunt Beth, who doesn’t exist, and he tells me that she’s loving her new white Honda Accord. Man, he’s good. So smooth. He and Sam have been “in business” for years. He lives in Manhattan but has a construction company down here, so he travels regularly. It’s a “kill two birds with one stone” scenario. Aside from Sam’s best friend, Dominic, Jimmy is the first “business” friend of Sam’s that I’ve met. Sam keeps me on a need-to-know basis, and I don’t need to know anything else besides what I’m doing for him. I don’t know if that is to protect me or minimize his own vulnerability, should I ever betray him. That I’m now working directly with Jimmy speaks volumes. He obviously trusts Jimmy as much as he trusts me. Sam has never been to Miami and when he kissed me goodbye, he said he’d see me in a year. I’m not allowed to fly home and he won’t be caught down here.