Tanya checks her watch and pulls a face. “Oh, sweetie, I would, but I’ve already got two extra kids in the house and you know what those Montgomery twins are like. They—”
“Please.” My voice cracks on the word, and I force myself to slow down, to calm down. “Please, Tanya. You’d really be helping me out.”
“Oh… I don’t know. It’s really not the greatest time, and I haven’t even started on dinner.”
“I’ll return the favor anytime. Any weekend night you want. You can go out with the girls.”
Still, she looks undecided, so I latch on to her arm, all five fingers locking on to her wrist. My upper body pitches forward, leaning into Tanya’s personal space for a change, getting right up in her face.
Help.
I mouth the word, and just in case, I dart my eyes in the direction of the man and his gun concealed behind the wall, clamping down hard on her wrist. Her face twists in pain, in confusion.
“Sweetie, are you okay?”
When I don’t respond, Tanya frowns, her gaze sinking to my lips. I carve them around the word again: Help.
Three breathless seconds pass while she holds my gaze, three seconds while my heart booms so hard in my temples I wonder if I’m having a stroke. Tanya pats my hand, peels my fingers one by one away from her arm and stares with wide eyes into mine. “Hey, Bax?” She yells it without turning her head.
My knees go slushy, my eyes wet with relief. She’s going to take Baxter out of harm’s way, which means if I survive this shit show, I will have a lifetime supply of flowers and Sancerre delivered to her doorstep. I will kiss her on those coral lips and bow down to worship her pedicured feet. I will take out a full-page ad in the AJC telling everyone in Atlanta and beyond how she saved Baxter’s life by whisking him out of the danger zone and carting him across the street to safety.
He pokes his head around the corner, the microphone in a fist. “Yeah?”
Tanya turns to him with a held-out hand. “I was thinking about pizza for dinner. How does that sound?”
Bax looks at me for confirmation, and I nod. Pizza is his favorite, and normally it wouldn’t take him long to decide. Now, though, he stands there, uncertain.
“What about my shoes?” He looks down at his bare feet, sticking out from the Batman pajamas.
“You don’t need ’em,” Tanya says, coaxing him with a smile. “I already told the kids we’re eating in.”
Baxter frowns, his gaze bouncing between us, and I pray he doesn’t say anything about the man hidden behind the wall. I pray he goes back to ignoring the man with the gun, to playacting like this is an ordinary afternoon, and we’re not being held captive in our own house. On the way down the driveway, he can tell Tanya all about the masked man, just not now. Not yet.
Baxter shrugs, tosses the mic to the couch. “I guess.”
Now that she’s caved, Tanya seems anxious to get across the road. She plucks Baxter’s hand from the air and drags him toward the door. “Okay, well, call us on your way home, and clean up that glass before somebody gets hurt.”
I try to think of what to say—Take care of my baby, wait, don’t go—but come up empty. Instead, I stare at their retreating backs, the way her shirt is gathered around her hips, how it’s snagged up on one side by something in her back pocket.
At the door, Baxter turns to wave, and I blow him a kiss.
“And thanks again for helping out with the auction, Jade. You and I are going to raise so much money for my sweet niece. I’ll see you when you get back.” She turns to holler over her shoulder, “Good luck at the dentist’s, Beatrix.”
And then, just like that, the door swishes shut, closing with a sharp click.
I take a shaky step into the living room, just far enough to watch Tanya lead my son down the hill, and tears sting my eyes, but I manage to hold my shit together because Baxter is safe and Beatrix is hidden and I can’t cry, not now. Not until Cam shows up with a big bag of money he trades for me and the kids, not until the cops kick down the door and slap some handcuffs on the maniac at the other end of the hall, not until after they rip off that mask and I know who’s under there and why he chose this house out of all the bigger, nicer ones on the street. Not until Cam and I have both kids safe in our arms, a Lasky family sandwich. Then, and only then, will I allow myself to cry.
From behind me comes a tightly controlled voice. “You’re going to pay for that.”
J A D E
5:46 p.m.