Jacob
“A beard too?”
I glare, first at Bernie, who is not in the least impressed with me, and then I swing the office chair around so I can glare at Raj, who is laughing even harder than she already was.
“Shouldn’t you be getting ready?” I suggest to her.
“I’m done. I’m ready to go. Besides, I wouldn’t miss this for the world.”
To demonstrate, she leans against the doorway and crosses her arms over her stomach.
My eyes return to my reflection in the mirror. The makeup Bernie caked on my face feels unnatural and itchy, but it looks pretty good. It seems to have smoothed out some of the scarring on my skin, it’s less obvious now.
“Let’s worry about your wig first,” Bernie announces.
She produces a roll of transparent tape and cuts off a length.
“This is two-sided and will keep the hair in place.”
“How did you learn how to do this?” Raj asks her.
“I spent the last twenty-five years of my career in the various burn units, and this—fitting wigs for burn victims—is something I learned to do on the side,” Bernie explains as she affixes the tape to my skin.
“Tell me there’s an easy way to get that stuff off,” I grumble.
“Yes, relax.” She holds up a small bottle. “It’s an alcohol-based solvent. Just dip a cotton ball and dab it along the hairline. You should be able to peel the hair back, tape and all.”
Next, she pulls the wig from a bag. It looks to be close to the hair color I used to have; a dark brown. It even looks wavy, like mine was.
Somewhere in the house a phone rings and Rajani pushes away from the doorpost.
“Shit. Left my phone in the kitchen,” she mumbles as she darts out of the room.
“Sit still,” Bernie admonishes me as I crane my neck to catch a last glimpse of Rajani.
Then she begins to fit on the hair, starting in the front, agonizingly careful, and therefore annoyingly slow. With the wig hanging in front of my face, I don’t see Raj coming in, but I can hear her, and she sounds annoyed.
“That was Kate. She says they’re a little ahead of schedule and she wanted to make sure I was decent this time.”
Bernie snickers. “Sounds like there’s a story there.”
“You could say that,” Raj answers at the same time as I say, “There isn’t.”
That only makes Bernie laugh out loud. “It’s gotta be a good story, then.”
“Anyway,” Raj steers away from the subject. “I just wanted to give you a heads-up, she says they’ll be here in twenty minutes or so.”
Obviously, I’d like to avoid them seeing me at this point.
“How long do you figure, Bernie? Just skip the whole beard idea.”
“If you can find a way to sit still, I can be done in less than ten minutes.”
“I won’t distract you, then,” Raj announces, and I hear her footsteps disappear down the hall.
True to her promise, it’s not that much later when Bernie swings my chair around in front of the mirror. I haven’t seen the face staring back at me in over fifteen years.
“Jesus,” I mutter. “You made me look like me.”
“I’m not sure what you mean,” Bernie responds, looking confused.
I realize she probably doesn’t, since she never knew the old me. There are no pictures in existence, other than a few grainy snapshots Hamish still has of our time overseas.
And now I have a dilemma.
I can try and duck out of here without Raj seeing me, but then I run the chance of her catching sight of me at Grandview, which could end in disaster.
My other option is using the next ten or however many minutes I have left before Mitch and Opal get here, to try and explain myself in that limited time frame.
Fuck. This is a lose-lose situation. Either way, she’s going to be upset, and feel betrayed, and likely never want to see me again.
“I have a favor to ask,” I address Bernie. “I need you to send Rajani in here, and run interference with Opal and Mitch when they get here. Keep them occupied until Raj comes out.”
Which may be sooner than I’d like.
As Bernie leaves to find Raj, I take another glance in the mirror. It’s amazing what the hair and a little makeup can do.
“What’s—”
Raj stops right inside the door, her eyes fixed on the mirror and my reflection.
“No…”
I surge out of the chair and grab hold of her arm, pulling the door shut before she can dart out.
“Rajani, let me explain.”
Her face is pale as she shakes her head.
“I can’t believe I didn’t see it. It’s so obvious now. How is this even possible? I don’t understand.”
“They lied to you. To me. Threatened you and the others would pay the price unless I complied.” I’m rambling, I know I am, but I can’t help myself. I feel pressured to make her understand. “So I did. I never resisted, thinking I was protecting you, and later… Later I convinced myself it was better you didn’t know the truth.”
“Better?” she scoffs, twisting out of my hold. “You decided it was better for me to live life with a hole in my heart? Is that what you’re telling me?”
I knew this wasn’t going to be easy, I just didn’t expect it to be quite this hard.
“I thought I’d be bringing back bad memories.” As much as that is true, it’s not the main reason I worked hard to keep my identity hidden to this day. “I also promised I’d come back for you and the girls, but when I finally was able to get there—thirty-nine months, two weeks, and four days later—you were already gone. That’s when I—”
I stop myself when I hear voices coming from the front of the house. Raj hears them too and darts past me out of the room. Not much I can do but watch her go.
All I can do is hope she’ll give me a chance to explain later. There’s so much more to unwrap. The fire—my failed attempt to eradicate the memories and the people responsible for them—my escape into the military, the attack, my recovery, and the dreams of vengeance.
I need to tell her how I finally tracked all three of them down, hoping to find them happily married, with families of their own. Instead, none of them seemed to have fulfilling lives, none of them had put down roots of any kind, and no one had formed any meaningful relationships.
That’s when I realized I might still be able to have a positive impact on their lives. That’s why I formed GEM. For these three women: Kate, Janey, and Rajani.
I’ve been trying to fulfill a promise.
Onyx
“Are you sure you’re okay?”
Kate twists in her seat to check me out in the back seat.
“I’m fine, I had a bit of a rough night.”
More like a rough morning, but I keep that to myself. I’m still processing it.
“Why don’t you close your eyes? Get some rest,” she suggests. “It’ll be a couple of hours on the road.”
“Maybe I will.”
I doubt I’ll get any sleep, but I’ll have plenty of time to sort my thoughts and feelings. Both are all over the place right now.
Part of me wants to deny this is even possible, but another part feels like it shouldn’t be a surprise. There are things that make a lot more sense now—like my almost instant draw to him—but there is still so much I’m unclear on.
What I do know, and with absolute certainty, is I’m angry. Probably for more than one reason. I’ve wasted twenty-four years basically pining for this man, I feel betrayed, and I’m hurt, to list a few.
And yet, there were some things he mentioned that made me sad too. Like threats made to him, they sound identical to the threats issued to me. The younger girls would suffer unless I complied. I heard that more than once. Or when he suggested he was counting the days until he could return, only to find us gone. That definitely struck a chord.
Thirty-nine months, two weeks, and four days. Over three-and-a-half years later. By that time, I would’ve been on my own for a couple of years already, and living in North Carolina. I was working every shift I could get at the restaurant to pay for college, which I’d just started.
That was the same year Transition House burned down, and Kendrick, Sladky, and Wheeler were reported to have perished.
I inevitably wonder who might’ve been responsible for that fire.
My bet is on Nathan Ramos.
But mostly I’m trying to figure out where he may have spent those almost four years.
I have to remember he was just as traumatized and abused as we all were. Seared in my mind is the apology in his eyes when we were forced to have sex, and moments later his shock and pain when Wheeler mounted him from behind. Even while Nathan was being violated, he was trying to protect me. He pleaded with me to look in his eyes, holding me there, just him and me, detached from what was happening to our bodies.
Even years later, whenever nightmares would revive that bad memory, or one of the many others, it would be the memory of those eyes that brought me comfort.
What boggles my mind is that those eyes were not a dead giveaway. I guess the possibility never even occurred to me since Nathan was dead. I’d lived with that reality for too long, and he looks nothing like the boy I remember.
At some point I must’ve fallen asleep because when I open my eyes, Kate is hanging over the back of her seat, shaking my shoulder.
“We’re here.”
I sit up and glance out the window, noting we’re stopped in front of the Marriott’s main entrance. I’ve slept for hours.
“Fluff your hair,” Kate instructs me. “And you have a little…” she gestures to the corner of my mouth.
I quickly wipe and fluff, hoist my fake Chanel backpack over my shoulder, and climb out of the vehicle while Mitch holds the door open.
“I’ve got the bags,” he assures me.
Kate walks slightly in front of me, as we enter the lobby and head straight for the front desk. By the time I’ve checked in, Mitch has joined us with the bags. When we get to the suite, he drops the luggage inside before heading back out. He plans to keep an eye out on who comes in and out of the hotel, while Kate keeps me company.
We have a couple of hours to kill before I need to get ready for the party, so we end up finding a movie on TV for distraction, and ordering room service. The movie can’t hold my attention, but I force myself to eat something, knowing it’ll be even harder to get something down tonight.
When my phone rings two hours later, I know it’s him before I even look at my screen.
“I’ll just take this in the bedroom,” I tell Kate.
“Hamish?”
I nod. I’m not sure what to call him anymore.
“Who is Jacob?” I ask him the moment I answer the call.
He doesn’t hesitate, “My middle name.”
“And Branch?”
“The English translation of Ramos.”
All very logical and painfully obvious, if you know what you’re looking for. I get this weird feeling in the pit of my stomach at the sound of his voice. Even that sounds so familiar now. Deeper, a little more mature, but now I know it belongs to Nathan, I can actually hear it.
“What am I supposed to call you? I don’t even know.”
“Sweetheart, I don’t give a rat’s ass. Whatever feels most natural to you right now.”
Shit. That’s a really good answer, and it actually helps me clarify something for myself.
“Jacob it is.”
Because Nathan may not be dead but he’s gone, in his place is a grown and fully formed man. When it comes down to it, the same is true for me; I’m not the person I was then. I’ve evolved, grown, strengthened.
It suddenly gives me some insight into what Jacob’s objective with GEM may be. Why he got all of us involved, why he assigned this particular case to me.
Jacob is trying to give us our power back.
“Good by me,” he accepts, before getting to the purpose of his call. “I wanted to let you know I should be at Grandview in about half an hour. We just stopped for some gas.”
Knowing what I know only ratchets up my concern for him. What if Wheeler recognizes him? But I guess the same is true for me, probably more so because I haven’t changed as drastically as Jacob has.
“Be careful,” I urge him, despite not wanting to admit I care that much.
I know it’s stupid, probably immature, since he already knows better, but I feel I’ve been through the wringer, and hanging on to my anger for a bit keeps me alert.
“You too. Your safety comes first. Any sign of trouble and you give the signal. If you find any evidence he’s still exploiting kids, document it, and alert us so we can get Matt and his team in there. And, Rajani? Remember he can’t hurt you anymore.”
“I know that.”
“I’ve got to go, but one last thing,” he adds. “Lee just sent me a message; Olson is out on bail.”
“Figures.”
If anything, that news makes me even more determined. It’s about time someone puts a stop to these people.
For good.