06

I don’t think she’s going to acknowledge it―not because she’s dismissing what I said, but because if she thinks about it, she’ll feel it.

Jesus. How can I know that ?

She steps on the gas pedal, and this time, I brace myself. I’m ready for when the Jeep takes off in a deafening roar of thunder, the engine growling. The sound reverberates through the seat, buzzing against my legs. Between them.

Blood pumps through me.

Hysteria rises inside of me. A tidal wave.

The Yakuza shot up my living room. The oldest crime syndicate in Japan is chasing after the girl right next to me. I have no idea what her real name is. Or why they’re after her. Or where she’s from.

Where are we going ? I don’t even know.

This is crazy.

« We need to find a place, » I say. Numbly. « Somewhere that can break iron. Like―like a blacksmith. »

« We don’t have time, » Veah says, glancing at me as we speed past cars down the freeway. « They probably had other men watching us. Likely, they’re sending backup. We have precious time to lose them now. »

Without warning, she jerks the car into another lane. « Watch this, » she says.

In the rearview mirror, I see a black car do the same.

Shit. She’s right.

« We’re being followed, » I say, and she nods swiftly. « Where do we go ? »

« To the next gas station. » Her eyes meet mine in the rearview mirror. A gathering storm. « We ditch the car and steal another one. »

This is insane. But as long as we’re handcuffed, I have no choice.

Veah―is that even her real name ?―jerks the car into the right lane, scraping against the Ford behind us. Swearing―I hear swearing and the long, drawn-out horn of the car as the driver snarls.

« We can’t just go around damaging other people’s cars ! » I don’t know why I’m focusing on this. But I need to concentrate on something. Anything.

Veah shrugs, but I see the glint of her smirk, even with her eyes on the road.

« As a rule, people who drive a Ford Ram 4x4 are assholes. »

« That’s . . . a really specific generalization. »

But it works : for a moment, I’m not thinking of the Yakuza tailing our car or the people who want us―her―dead or the fact that I am now on the run from the Japanese Mafia because of some stupid handcuffs that I don’t even remember putting on.

I’m thinking of the way her lush lips curve, and the way her rain-gray eyes are hard and glittering, and the way a smile lingers on her mouth like an echo of amusement.

She’s beautiful. And I . . . should not be thinking of this right now.

A gas station slowly grows larger in the distance, and I don’t see the black car on our heels anymore. We lost them―at least temporarily.

Veah slams the car into a lamppost at the edge of the parking lot. The screech of our tire tracks is loud. Deafening.

Someone begins to yell, but Veah only urges me out of the car. Towards the nearest vehicle. A truck.

« Is this a good idea ? » I ask as she opens the door.

The door to the gas station opens. A large, heavyset man is fumbling with his wallet―counting his change. He looks up.

« Trust me, » she says, and she lifts me into the passenger seat. As though I weigh nothing.

I see the instant the realization floods the man. We’re stealing his truck.

His face turns purple. His mouth opens into a roar.

I don’t hear what he says, but I know it’s not good. Veah revvs the engine, and a thunderous growl tears through the truck.

« Could you drive a little . . . safe ? »

She glances at me. Amused. Then she guns the gas pedal, and we take off through the road with a billowing of dust in our wake.

When I was little, I used to rock Cassie back and forth in the closet of her bedroom. Nestled among her pink, hand-me-down clothing and her stuffed bears and books that I would read to her, it was almost cozy.

If it weren’t for the yelling, for the sound of fists crashing and my mother sobbing downstairs, it would have even been nice.

Instead, my hands covered Cassie’s ears. And when that didn’t work, when the tears leaked out anyway and the walls rattled, I would pick a book and read to her.

Where The Wild Things Are, I would whisper, and she would slowly stop crying.

It was times like those that I knew I needed to be the big sister. I had to take care of Cassie, if only so that hours later, our mother could knock on the closet door.

« Babies ? » she’d say. Even though I was eight and Cassie was four. I hated it―I hated her. « Are you alright ? »

Her face was always tearstained, and I would see what she couldn’t hide. The bruises on her jaw, the freshness of the red marks on her arms, shaped like fingers. And always, the small, circle-shaped burns. Cigarette scars, when he would press the end to her bare skin.

Despite all of it, she would smile and pluck Cassie out of my arms.

« Let’s go to sleep now, » she’d say. But I wanted to ask her why she let him do that to her. Why she withstood it.

Ever since our dad had died and she had married that bastard―and I knew that word, I had learned it from my friend Sophie at school―she had let him do all of those horrible things to her.

I knew they were bad. I knew it was wrong. But Mom told me I had to promise to keep it a secret, or me and Cassie would get taken away and they would put Cassie in a foster home all by herself.

Kay-Kay !

Suddenly, I can see her in front of me. Cassie’s four-year-old whimper. Her green eyes, welling with tears.

They’re fighting again.