7

Oscar’s fingertips tap a familiar beat against the plastic diner table. He refuses eye contact with the waitress but instead follows each of our drinks from her tray to the cheap cardboard coaster she rests them on. The waitress narrows her eyes, suspicion in her expression. Clearly the added stature did nothing for Oscar’s conning skills.

To cover his nervous behavior, I flash the waitress a grin. “Beautiful women frighten him.”

Pink creeps up the neck of my “cousin,” helping the lie. The waitress relaxes her shoulders and seems at ease taking our orders. The second she’s out of sight, it’s clear Oscar’s ready to spit out some big secret, but he seems to second-guess himself, his gaze bouncing between Dominic and me. “So, Freddy…how long you two been an item?”

“We’re not—” Dominic starts.

I pinch his knee from under the table, and he stiffens beside me. “What he means is that as far as his family is concerned, we aren’t a thing. They don’t approve of girls like me.”

A boyish smile erupts on Oscar’s face, sending a surprising pang of homesickness through my gut.

“Well. Can’t really blame them for that. I’ve seen you in action, Eleanor.” He offers Dominic a sympathetic look. “Be afraid, man. Very afraid.”

This is too much. Seeing Oscar again. Giving Dominic DeLuca, of all people, a window into my past. I need to be done with the formalities.

“Okay, Oscar, spill.” I lean back in the booth and fold my arms over my chest. “What are you doing here? And where is the crew I know you brought along?”

He holds his hands up in surrender. “No crew, I swear to God, Ellie.”

I read his body language. Truth.

“It’s your daddy.” He stares down at his thumbs resting on the table in front of him. “He’s in junky mode. Bad.”

“Drugs or booze?” Dominic asks smoothly, like he finally feels comfortable with the conversation topic.

I shake my head. “Neither.”

“Gambling?”

Confused by Dominic’s questions, Oscar’s forehead wrinkles. “This job he’s working on? It’s not… We haven’t done nothing like this before. There’s risk and then there’s risk. There’s greed and then there’s greed, you know?”

Yeah, I know. My jaw clenches, holding back those words. But I do know. That kind of greed apparently makes you forget that your wife is in prison. Anger at my dad and his ability to move on clouds my own guilt over what happened to my mom. I’m the one who cut a deal with the FBI. I’m the one who played informant, knowing they would trap at least one of my family members.

I tear open three packets of sugar and dump them into my coffee. “Oscar, if you came looking for me so I could talk my dad out of whatever scheme he’s trying to pull, you wasted your time. He never listens to me. I’m taking a sabbatical from that.”

Not completely untrue. The sabbatical anyway.

Oscar’s face falls. I replay how excited he’d seemed to see me in the school parking lot, and I almost feel guilty for stomping on whatever hope he’d had left. Things must be really bad with my family.

“Sure,” he says quickly. “’Course you got your own life, and your daddy’s a grown man. He’s the best in the biz, no doubt about that. It’ll work out fine.”

Lie. If I hadn’t already caught the fib in his tone, I’d have seen it through the tensing of his right pinkie finger.

I debate asking him more about this big job, but Dominic’s presence combined with the fact that I refuse to get sucked back into my family’s world stops me. Harper would kill me, especially after everything Aidan’s done for me. And what would I tell Miles? I shudder at the thought, remembering how he’d looked at me right after I told him the truth—disgust, disappointment. I unroll the paper napkin and extract a spoon to stir my tea. There is something I need to know. “Are they asking about me?”

His eyebrows shoot up. “You’re kidding, right? ’Course they’re asking about you. But your daddy always says the same thing when someone asks where you went. ‘Let her be. Every great con tries their hand at going solo.’ It’s part of nature or natural selection or whatever.”

If the waitress wasn’t heading this way, carrying our food, I would have sworn out loud. Dominic isn’t an idiot, but for some reason I was hoping the word “con” would remain a silent presence here.

“Sure miss having you around,” Oscar says, likely just to make conversation while plates of food are set in front of us. “Think you might come home for a visit anytime soon?”

Not a chance. Assuming I even know where “home” is at the moment, which I don’t. “Maybe? If I get bored around here.”

He seems pleased with this. Or maybe with the giant double bacon cheeseburger resting in front of him. But instead of diving in and taking a bite, he slides out of the booth and stands. “I’m gonna wash up before I dig in, if you don’t mind?”

I shake my head and watch him walk toward the back of the diner. Dominic is surely about to spew questions at me, but I hold a finger to my lips, shushing him. I feel under the table until my fingers land on a tiny piece of plastic stuck with a weak adhesive to the underside of the table. That little sneak. I wiggle the listening device until it’s unattached and pull it to my lap, looking for an off switch.

“So…” I say to Dominic. “How are the onion rings? I should have ordered those instead. My fries are soggy.”

I glance up from the device long enough to see Dominic’s challenging look. He’s likely reached his limit of playing along. But after several seconds of hesitation, he slides his plate closer to mine. “Here, have some.”

My fingernails dig into the plastic, prying the casing open. “Can you pass the ketchup?”

“Sure.” He sets the bottle in front of me with a loud clunk.

The outer case finally pops open. I turn off the device and quickly put it back together, then stick it to the table again. My hands are suspiciously emerging from beneath the table as Oscar strides back toward us, but I reach for the ketchup bottle, hoping he doesn’t notice.

Oscar devotes most of his attention to his burger while Dominic and I both watch him and pretend to eat. I force down a couple of onion rings over the next twenty minutes, and soon we’re paying the bill and heading for the exit.

Outside, Dominic treats our goodbye as a private family moment and leaves us to wait in his car.

“I really do miss you at home,” Oscar repeats. He glances across the diner parking lot at Dominic’s car and then turns back to me. “Guess this is goodbye?”

All these feelings I can’t quite identify swirl around inside my head. I don’t want this. I don’t want to be back in Oscar’s world, yet the nostalgia is undeniable, even for me, and I’m awesome at denial.

“You didn’t forget your bug from under the table, did you?” I ask, and am rewarded instantly with his trademark grin. “Might want to up your game, get a little more creative than planting it under the table. Everyone looks there.”

“Nothing gets past you, Ellie. Haven’t changed a bit.” His smile fades slowly and he’s wearing a super-serious look. “New York City. That’s where we’re headed. In case you change your mind about visiting.”

My poker face is in place, but inside I’m mulling that over. New York City? My family drifts all over the place. It’s what we do, but never as far north as New York City. We tend to fit in better and gain trust easier in the South.

“You’re thinking it, I know you are,” Oscar insists. “We got no business in a place like New York City. And this job—your daddy is so far in over his head, and no one will tell him. That was your mama’s job. And yours.”

“I told you already that he never listens—”

“But you could try?” Oscar pleads.

“Why? So I can get thrown in jail like my mom?” Cold wind hits me square in the face. I tug my zipper up to my chin. “If you were smart, you’d walk away, too, before he gets you in trouble.”

There’s that disappointment again. He didn’t like my answer. He expects more from me. He expects me to care. Well, I can’t. I won’t. Not anymore. I have Harper and Aidan. I have Miles. I don’t need them anymore. None of them.

Except my mom.

God, I need to shut that voice down. Kill it permanently.

“Well, that’s that, then.” He tugs keys from his pocket and gives me a nod, no giant bear hug like earlier. “Take care of yourself, Eleanor.”

“You too,” I mumble, genuinely meaning it. Wishing I didn’t.

He heads toward a gray truck, and I cross the lot and slide into the passenger seat of Dominic’s SUV. Dominic puts the car in drive and pulls out of the parking spot. I keep my eyes on the side mirror, watching for the gray truck. “We can’t go home.”

He glances sideways at me. “Why not?”

Before answering him, I punch in a quick text to Miles.

ME: Need to talk asap. Kind of an emergency.

“Get on the interstate, head west,” I order, holding my phone like a lifeline. Please be available and okay, Miles. “We’ll pass a few exits and then get a hotel room somewhere cheap.”

“Seriously?” Dominic asks. “This is crazy. Let’s just go to my house. I don’t care if he knows where I live. The dude seems harmless.”

Oscar may have found me tonight, but I’m nearly positive he doesn’t know where I live. Or who I live with. Harper left our family under some controversial conditions, and her name became taboo. If my dad knew I lived with her, he’d come pluck me from Virginia himself.

“Oscar is harmless,” I agree. “But the rest of my family isn’t.”