Chapter 19

The sight in the hallway of her talking, crying, absolutely shocked him.

It took a moment for him to figure it out, then frozen horror shook his foundations. She was...crying...for him?

That hard?

He knew he'd hurt her.

But that bad?

He shut his eyes hard against the sight of his indomitable Tish, falling apart, it seemed.

Because of something he’d done?

The slash of pain mixed with his concussed remembrances and he fell back into a troubled sleep. And in that sleep he saw her in the darkened hallway, pleading a ghostly version of himself to please, please, please, not hurt her so bad.

* * *

She sat beside him in the dark, the moonlight having fled. Her hands tightened into fists and she found her jaws clamping together hard.

Inexplicably, he seemed worse since she'd come back.

She'd had her crying jag, wiped her face clean, blown her nose. Gone downstairs for a quick swig of wine from the bottle, brought up the precious water to give him when he woke. Sat there, watched him.

But he’d been better when she left.

And now he was hotter, though the room was icy cold. Tension jagged across the muscles of his face, and he winced. Started to move his head back and forth, jerking from one side to the other.

She pulled the phone out. Must Google. See what I can do. Call for help. He’d said no…but…

An abrupt ding sounded. She scrolled to the messages icon, clicked it.

-Get here by 2:30 bro. Do it. Or else.

She glanced at her watch. 1:45 a.m.

Well, whatever he was supposed to do, he obviously wasn't going to get it done.

But the dinging continued. She flicked off the sound, but not before it elicited a chilling groan from Eli, and a hoarse mutter. "Trouble."

She turned to him, smoothed the hair back from his brow. “There's something I need to know."

"No!" he spat, suddenly alive. "I can't tell you. No questions!"

He looked strained. She watched him for a minute, and he eased.

She turned her back on him once more, bent to the text. There was a new incoming.

-Or you’re dead. They'll kill you, Eli. Make the drop.

A cold sweat broke out on her forehead.

So he’d had every reason to be worried. To withhold this from her. To be deadly serious. Whatever he was involved with, it was bad.

But he was out. Sick. And she didn’t know anything about damn well anything.

It was up to her to deal with whatever this was, the best she could.

No one was coming to rescue them.

She grabbed a quick breath, sucked it in slowly, tried to settle herself. This was it. The moment.

She dove in. Thumbed a reply, heart hammering.

=Eli sick. I'm answering. A friend.

She waited with bated breath. Held the unit in trembling hand.

The text flashed back, bright.

-Who?

Like hell she was going to tell them.

She glanced at Eli's face again. Being involved in something illegal was the last thing she'd ever thought he'd do. It would answer a lot of questions though, check a lot of boxes. Sudden disappearance. Continued disappearance.

Though, she thought, there was a chance he was working on stuff as a good guy. Undercover.

Either way, she needed to protect them both now. She scrolled and saw the previous outgoing message from his cell to a 'Scores', sent just a few minutes ago, changing the timing of a 'delivery' to four from two-thirty.

So he had been in touch with the interested party.

The phone beeped again, muted, yet strident. Delivered the next text.

-Who r u?

And this time, the question seemed malevolent. Her fingers trembled, but she made a decision, knew she had to answer, give them more. Whoever it was.

-Girlfriend. Past.

-Where r u?

Her fingers shook. She couldn’t answer.

-Friend. Trust me.

Give them some truth, but shroud it, to protect them. Both of them.

-Old neighborhood.

-Quit crapping around. Where?

She gulped.

-Almost bought a house here.

She searched Eli's face, but he was still out, face tense.

Then the flash came, signaling another text.

-HOME AGAIN LANE?

Something welled up in her. Yes. Whoever it was knew Eli. Really knew him.

-Yes.

-HOLY HELL. TISH?

And suddenly, the earth righted. Maybe it was still on a definite tilt, but nowhere near as severe as before.

-Ian here.

-Ian??

She was exuberant, didn’t know what else to say. Just that.

And smiled at this one that flew to her quick, through cyberspace…

-He was nuts about you.

She answered with a smiley face, which seemed silly and inappropriate, but somehow, it was the best she could do.

And the rest of the discussion proceeded. She let him know Eli was sick, far too sick to go anywhere. No matter what was planned, no matter how serious it was, and she realized now, it was deadly serious.

But she wasn't entirely relaxed when he left to check on something, then after a few minutes, this one came through.

-Fake a text from him. Say he’ll be there at 4, as planned. Then get him there. No later than four, but tell him to wait for my OK before he shows. Something’s up. Don’t text me here. I’ll send you a new #. Tell him to wait for my text.

-Ok.

She was ready to click the phone off when another message came through.

-And oh, Tish? You always were the smart one.

She texted back quickly.

-Eli was the super geek.

-Yeah, I know. But money isn’t everything, and you always knew that.

That got to her. Others had accused her of loving the rich life too much, shook their heads when she’d married Christoff. When she’d left her dreams behind, the ones with the soldier.

Because he didn’t want me, she’d always thought. Because he didn’t love me.

As if reading her thoughts, the kid’s last, sweet communiqué reached out to her, from who knew how far away.

Yet in heart, he was oh so close. So damn close.

Little Ian. Dear Ian.

-You were always the one.

She barely had time to swallow, her throat had gotten that thick, as the final text came in…

-Over and out.

And that was that. A weird, sweet and totally eccentric reunion with Eli’s younger brother.

But now it was time to send that message. She held her breath, sent the text with her heart rioting, her fingers apparently turned to wood, but she did it.

And suddenly the fatigue of it all did her in. She didn’t know what would happen, or if they’d make it, be safe. But it was too much to worry about. She needed a break. Just a short one, but a break.

She lay her head down and fell into a troubled sleep.