➵ Chapter 52-1

Bleak skies overlooked the airstrip, strong gusts of wind propelling me forward as I strode toward the beaming man in a crisp white uniform that waited for us on the steps of the plane that would take us away. Away to someplace far from my city. The thought made my stomach twist, made me think of the trouble my departure would cause. Jace turned to look at me when he realized I'd fallen behind. "The police could come after you," I said, even though I knew I had to get on that plane. The thought had run through my head again and again on the way there. "They'll say you helped me run. They could go after your family." He came back, taking my bag and slinging it over the same arm his own bag hung from. Both bumped against his leg as the wind continued to blow, its eerie whistle loud in my ears. "Come on. We'll figure it out later." I nodded, letting him take my hand and lead me onto his family's plane. The man took the bags he held and stepped inside after we did. White leather seats lined the large interior on both sides, spotless windows lined up behind them. A TV was perched up at the front, the black screen showing only our reflections as I looked around. It was luxurious, of course, but I was too accustomed to having money to truly appreciate it the way another person would've. In another life, I might have been in awe. But I'd been on private planes dozens of times, even inherited one from the Coopers. The pilot came out to greet Jace and even smiled at me, entirely unalarmed to be harboring a known fugitive. He shook my hand before disappearing into the cockpit. We were in the air in a matter of minutes. There was a sealed bottle of rum on the table between the seats. Picking it up, I twisted off the cap and tipped it back, taking the biggest sip I could. When I held it out to Jace, he shook his head. It tasted fantastic, the alcohol hitting me fast and sudden. Only then did I realize how long it had been since I had a drink. Though there was worry in Jace's eyes, he didn't stop me. My relationship with drinking was an unstable one - on again and off again. When I was eighteen, I nearly drank myself to death. Poor Isaac had found me in the wine cellar in my own vomit. It had been anything but glamorous, and I was grateful that I didn't remember much of it. The one thing that I had never been able to forget though was the look on his face when he picked me up, the horrible panicked cries for help that had followed before I slumped into unconsciousness. When I woke in the hospital, there was an ugly scar on my hand from falling on the shattered glass from the bottle and a sobbing Lilith. For a short time after that, I didn't drink for a few months. When I did start again, I was more careful than I had been before, but I never really did regain any memory of whether or not I meant to do any permanent damage to myself that night. Though I loved denying it, I knew it wasn't quite sane to be so attracted to situations that risked my life. Maybe I didn't know what I was doing in that cellar. Maybe I wanted to see how much I could take. Or maybe the awful truth was that I didn't want to take any more of anything, that I had just wanted it all to stop. Isaac's screams echoed in my head until I set the bottle down. Laying down in my empty seat, I stared up the ceiling for a while. All I heard was the hum of the plane and the scratch on pencil on paper. The drinking, to my dismay, had done nothing to calm my rattled nerves. It rarely did. My thoughts were entirely fixated on the Coopers and everything I had done to try and make them despise me. Nothing had really worked. They'd been too kind. Too caring. All I had done in the end was cause them pain without a purpose. Instead of reaching for more of the drink to scramble my melancholic state, I looked over at Jace. Jace's phone was on the table with the bottles of alcohol, none of which he had touched. He was drawing in his sketchbook, looking up at me every couple moments. His hands still had a faint blue tinge from his pastels. They were rarely ever completely spotless, I'd noticed. Whatever medium he was using - whether it be pencil or acrylics or ink or charcoal - the slightest bit of it would manage to stick to his skin no matter how much he washed them. Where my hands dripped with blood, his would drip paint. Where my hands were marred by injury, his were stained by pastels. He caught me looking. "What? What is it?" "Let me draw you," I said. He handed me the pencil with a smile, waiting patiently until I was finished. Biting my lip, my sloppy, drunken hands moved across the paper, the image in my head coming to life, though it obviously was incomparable to anything he could create. I handed him the book back with pride, watching his lips twitch. "Wow. Talented. This is the best stick figure I've seen since primary school." I grinned. "Look, I gave you a little camera!" "That's a camera? I thought it was just a box." I pointed to the picture again, growing frustrated with his utter lack of vision. He was an artist. How could he be overlooking something so blatantly obvious? "It's a Polaroid. I wrote it on there." "You have horrific penmanship." He tried keeping a straight face, tapping the thing on top of his head. "Is that... whipped cream?" My lip curled. It was a hat, but there was no way I was going to tell him that. "No. It's a little poop." "Are you trying to tell me something?" "Yes. You're a poopyhead." "You're absolutely-" "-pissed," I finished, deadly serious. The accusation wasn't going to get any argument from me. I was entirely conscious of my current state. The word brought a strange wave of deja-vu, but this time it wouldn't end with me getting knocked out in a filthy frat bathroom. "That means drunk, you know." I grabbed the bottle again. "Of course I know. I'm the one who taught it to you." "Why," I began, taking another sip, "do British people have such silly words for things? Snogging and pissed and knackered. Why, Jace?" "Robin-" "You're so beautiful," I sighed, gazing up at him. "It's okay if you say silly words." "You're really drunk." "I realize that," I said. "And quite frankly, I don't give a-" "Lia," Jace interrupted, gently pulling the bottle out from my grasp. "I think that's enough. You should lay down. We're almost there." "The turbulence is making me nauseous." "Are you going to be sick?" Not sure myself, I laid down and shut my eyes, waiting for the queasiness to pass. The plane soon began to descend and I remained still, my fists clenched. I'm never going to drink ever again, I told myself even though I knew that wasn't true. I would probably drink myself to sleep later. "Mr. Acardi," the pilot's voice came overhead, as bright as it had been when he'd greeted us. "Welcome to Cuba." ➵ I didn't see much of the hotel. Or any of it really. I had refused to open my eyes since we'd gotten off the plane and when Jace resorted to carrying me, I hid my face in his shirt. I could still feel the sun searing through my eyelids, worsening the alcohol-induced headache I'd brought upon myself. It was taking a startling amount of energy not to vomit all over him. Jace was telling me whenever we had made it someplace else - when he got us off the airstrip and into a cab, when we were out the vehicle and outside the hotel. Even inside, it was bright. Voices all around us chattered, greeting Jace and offering to take us up to the suite. The sound of conversation made my head want to burst. "We're in the suite," he whispered to me a couple moments after I felt him exit the elevator. The room was far dimmer than it was in the hall, much easier on my throbbing head. The soft sheets of the bed he let me down on smelled faintly of citrus. Rolling over, I buried my face in the pillow and sighed. I didn't care to see what the room looked like - all I wanted was to sleep. "How drunk is she?" a voice asked from across the room. "Very. Let her nap. We need to wait for the Circle anyway. Keep an eye on her until I get back. And don't allow her within a foot of the minibar." "Don't go," I mumbled into my pillow. Turning over to make eye contact with him would require far too much energy. "I'll be right back. I have to maintain my business alibi, don't I? As far as anybody else is aware, I'm here to meet with some CEO on behalf of my father. Stay out of trouble, love." "Too drunk for trouble." That was a blatant lie. If anything, I ended up in a lot more trouble when I was drunk than when I was sober. "Right now. Too drunk right now." I wasn't sure when it was that my consciousness faded, but when I came around, I rolled over to the sight of a burly redhead tapping away on his laptop, sitting next to me on the bed. It felt as if it had been ages since I'd last seen him. "How long was I asleep?"