To the Ends of the Earth (Stripped 5)

“I’m not very good at hiding,” I whisper.

“And then they all noticed something else. The way you brought soup to the elderly woman next door even though you’re a single mother, with barely enough money to survive. How you fed the cats in the neighborhood until there was a damned—” He shakes his head, an abbreviated apology for swearing. “There was a buffet outside your back door. How you are always the first to give and the last person to take. Yes, you were the worst fucking—the worst at hiding, because you never stop helping. Even after what that monster did to you, you never stopped caring.”

Chapter Ten

I take refuge in the ordinary tasks I need to do—rolling up Delilah’s sleep things and then mine. Washing the peanut butter off her face and brushing her two teeth. It’s easier to focus on ordinary tasks than to think about what Luca said to me.

But his words are like a seed, and every moment that passes, it burrows a little deeper into the soil of my soul. There was water all along, a strange hope, a wistfulness that I could be something more than Sarah Elizabeth. That’s why I called myself Beth when I left Harmony Hills, but that’s just a name. Not a person.

I might be stronger than I thought. Might be memorable for more than just my long hair. At least Luca seems to think so—which is the most compelling realization of all. He sees me as more than my body.

Trucks are common in Alaska, with snow tires at this time of year. That’s what I’m expecting when I go outside. Instead I find a string of three sleek black SUVs, a man in a suit standing beside one of them. These aren’t limousines; these are their tougher, more protective cousins.

Inside the seats are covered in butter-soft beige leather, wood enamel along the door.

The pink car seat from my car, the one I left at the Last Stop, now sits in the middle of a wide back seat. Delilah clambers into her spot with relative ease, as if we normally use a car with low ambient lighting and a minifridge.

I buckle her in, feeling a little dazed. I think Luca might take one of the other SUVs—why do we need three of them? But he steps into the car after me, shutting us inside.

Absently I dig in my bag for a set of plastic rings, which Delilah prefers for car rides. She begins to teethe on them immediately, making delicate baby grunting sounds.

Luca sits in the forward seats, facing me, his expression

enigmatic.

“Where did these come from?” I finally ask, unable to stop myself.

“After what happened last night, I called in reinforcements. I couldn’t be sure whether those fuckers—those men would have relatives wanting revenge. I made sure we were covered for the ride to the airport.”

I can’t imagine the expense involved in getting these armed men, these glossy SUVs, out into the middle of nowhere. The newest car I’ve seen in weeks is a decade old, its back bumper torn off. This is a hard-scrabble place, which is a backward solace for me.

It’s always reminded me of home.

The relief I feel at being safe is greater, though. I can’t know what will happen next. Being bait for a man who’s been indoctrinated by a murderer and abuser is hardly a safe destination. But as long as Delilah is alive, I don’t care what happens to me.

Someone needs to take care of you, little bird. If you aren’t going to do it, then I sure as hell will.

Luca’s words come back to me in a rush of illicit pleasure. I can’t deny that I like the idea of him taking care of me. Isn’t that what he’s doing? Even though he scares me, he’s helping me protect Delilah. And he’s using me to complete his orders from Ivan Tabakov. It’s not a purely altruistic goal, nothing so special as love, but it’s something. More than I’ve had before.

He remains quiet on the drive to the airport, only occasionally taking a phone call. From his terse replies, he’s still coordinating our trip to Tanglewood.

“Is the plane ready?” he asks.

Someone answers on the other end, sounding brusque.

“I don’t fucking—I don’t care,” he says. “We’re taking off in an hour either way, and your other client can go and… Well, they can just deal with it.”

I have to smile at him, my throat a little tight, eyes too watery to be normal. It’s the same way I felt watching him at the kitchen-floor picnic, this fighter turned soft by one sweet little girl.

Then his earlier words register. The plane.

My stomach drops. “Luca. I don’t have a passport.”

I don’t have any form of identification at all. No driver’s license. No birth certificate. According to the US government, I don’t even exist. Harmony Hills didn’t exactly follow legal procedures when babies were born. The less interference from the government the better.

Actually Delilah doesn’t exist either. I sneaked out of the small women’s shelter where she was born in the small hours of the morning.

“You won’t need one,” he says.