Until the Day I Die(38)

Passion, lust, elation . . .

I feel off-balance—and super tired. This wave after wave of conflicting emotions is starting to drain me. So what do I do? Keep an eye on this guy because he may be connected with Jax? Or because his lips look perfect? I really have no idea. And right now either reason seems perfectly valid.

“So, the money?” he says. “For the classes.”

“Oh right. It’s, ah—” My mind has gone blank.

“Thirty-seven fifty,” he says. “Broken down into monthly installments, if you need to. You can Jax it to me directly, unless your mom would see it. Most kids can’t since their parents watch their expenses pretty closely their freshman year. If they’re on Jax, they’ll typically slide it through their food or a miscellaneous category, saying they hired a tutor or, I don’t know, paid up front for yoga classes or something. If they have enough credit cards, they’ll pay for their friends’ meals, gas, whatever and get the cash that way.”

“I still have some cash from graduation.” Although, I’m pretty sure it’s not enough.

He smiles. “I just need the first installment by next week. Maybe . . .” He angles his body toward me in such a way that I think, with some panic, that he might try to kiss me right here, right now. “Maybe we could hang out again. Get pizza or something.”

My phone buzzes against my hip, and instinctively I reach for it. My fingers close around a small card instead, a punch card from this ice cream place near home, Caldwell Creamery. Mint green with a hand-drawn four-leaf clover logo in one corner, edges soft from having once been run through the washer. Eleven of the twelve boxes have been punched out.

“What’s that?” Rhys asks.

I hold the card up to him. “It’s for an ice cream place my dad and I used to go to together. He gave it to me so my friend and I could get the free cone. I forgot about it.”

Specifically, Dad had given it to me in March, right before he died. Spring had come early. It was warm out, in the seventies already, with thick, hazy skies over blooming tulips and daffodils and determined birds. One Friday afternoon, after Daisy and I had been hanging around Jax for hours, Dad said we should go treat ourselves. We’d ended up going to the skate park to watch some guy Daisy had a crush on instead. I must’ve stuffed the card in my pants pocket.

And then my father died, and it rained for two weeks straight, the sun hiding behind the wall of white sky. The birds seemed to sense the season’s earlier false start and went quiet too. The world without my father was a desolate place. Who would go for ice cream?

Rhys interrupts my thoughts. “What’s your friend’s name?”

I’m staring at the card, willing myself not to cry. “Daisy. She goes to Georgia Tech. She’s majoring in materials engineering. Like polymers and metals and stuff.” Rhys is staring at me now, and I know I’m rambling. Acting prickly and difficult and weird. It makes me miss Daisy even more.

“I should go,” Rhys says.

My heart squeezes. I’ve probably run him off.

“I’ll text you later,” he says. “Good luck with your job.”

When he’s gone, my good sense finally, belatedly, kicks in. And starts lecturing me, Dad style.

I may want to see Rhys again, but it’s a bad idea. The guy’s researched me. He knows about Jax, even about my father’s death. Put that together with the fact that most people think I enjoy the life of a privileged princess, and I’m sure he sees me as a target. And then there’s that Caribbean/Canary Islands thing too. Maybe he’s in on whatever’s happening at Jax and with Mom. He may even be connected to the error messages.

Frustrated, I pull out my phone and text Daisy.

How’s everything going? I miss you.

I stare at the screen, willing an answer bubble to pop up. Or at least the dancing ellipses. Nothing. She’s probably out, having fun. It’s Friday night. With a heavy sigh, I check the latest email of screenshots. One of them shows the monthly balances. They’ve all gone back down to where they were this afternoon.

I blink, like I’m seeing things, and do a quick mental tabulation. That’s exactly $161,772.96 Ms. X moved in and out of her account in less than four hours.





22

ERIN

The banging on my door seems unnecessarily aggressive. But it achieves the intended result. Even before I crack open my eyes, my heart has shifted into high gear.

It’s still dark out; I can sense it even before I see it. And not just predawn dark—pitch-black, middle-of-the-night dark. I’m trying to remember what’s happening, and why the hell it’s happening so early in the morning, but I’ve got nothing. Other than the rush of gratitude that Grigore wouldn’t share that bottle of Veuve Clicquot with me. Bless that guy’s sweet Moldovan heart.

The knocking stops, there’s a beat, and the door slams open.

“Up and at ?em,” sings out a man’s voice. Without even thinking, I obey.

In the dark room, he looks about eight feet tall, a monster with shoulders as broad as a house. When he flips on the lamp, I see he’s tall, broad enough across the shoulders, but by no means a giant. He’s more like a surfer guy, in his early thirties, with long, sun-bleached hair pulled back in a curling ponytail and a faint scar bisecting one eyebrow. He’s dressed differently from the other staff too—in dirty shorts and a threadbare red-and-yellow Mexican Baja hoodie. A hippie-looking guy. Kind of cute, actually—but, of course, what else would I have expected?