Plausibility

Chapter 7

Where the fuck was Valdez with Aquilla? Did they have them? Did he stick to the plan and get her out of there? Julius had been waiting for almost four hours. He ditched his cellphone, far into the ocean, not wanting to be traced. He had no way to find out. He couldn’t go back to the house. He knew they had it guarded tighter than Fort Knox. He was starting to panic. He couldn’t live without her, especially now that his father had gone down for him. He distracted the sons of bitches so Julius could escape. He almost turned back when he had heard the gun shot. Maybe he wasn’t dead. Maybe he was just injured. Where the fuck was Valdez?

He should have gone with her. The thought of them having her and interrogating her about something she had no clue about, made him sick to his stomach. Would they hurt her when she wouldn’t talk? She couldn’t fucking talk she didn’t even know anything. They made sure of that. Would they rough her up, thinking she was lying? Julius paced back and forth, wearing a path in the dark woods. How long was he going to wait before he had to get out of there? They were hunting him, he knew they were, he wouldn’t be able to hide out here much longer before they would find him. Nothing could make him feel as bad as this, he had shot men point blank in the forehead, and that was still not even comparable. This was the hardest thing he had ever done in his life. He was leaving her. It was going to be daylight soon, there was no other choice. After rationing with himself, he decided it was best that he left. There was no time left he had to get off the island. He couldn’t come for her if he was in prison or wound up dead. He would come for her, he would fucking find her, one way or another.

He unburied the boat and started the engine, heading toward Anguilla Island. He couldn’t even turn back and look at Jamelia Lei. Julius kept his eyes focused on the black water. He was fucking leaving her there to fend for herself. If he ever saw Valdez again, his life would be in his hands.

Aquilla sat up sometime during the night. She didn’t even remember falling asleep. The room was dark except for a golden light illuminating from a small lamp in the corner. She wanted to run her fingers through her tangled hair and stretch. She couldn’t, her hands were still confined behind her back. She saw Agent Seri sitting in a chair with her elbows on her knees, staring at her. Agent Dick Face was in a recliner sound asleep.

“I need to go to the bathroom,” Quill requested.

Seri got up and pulled her from the sofa, leading her to the bathroom right outside the door. She didn’t ask for backup from Agent Malone. Aquilla was sure she could head-butt her. She was seriously thinking about her move when Seri tightened her grip on her arm. “Don’t even think about it,” she warned.

“Are you going to take these stupid handcuffs off so I can get my pants down?” she asked once they were alone in the bathroom. Seri left the door open. Aquilla was sure she wanted her partner to be able to hear if she screamed for help. She smirked at Aquilla and moved in front of her.

“Not a chance in hell,” she replied, unbuttoning her shorts with a sneer.

Aquilla smirked right back. “What’s the matter, Seri? Having a little hint of nostalgia?”

Seri didn’t falter. She kept her cold stare on Aquilla’s eyes and slid down her shorts and panties.

Aquilla peed with Seri staring at her with a cold glare and crossed arms. Aquilla unabashedly opened her knees. “You gonna wipe my pussy for me too?”

Seri didn’t stammer a bit. She tore off a couple sheets of toilet paper and wiped her with her eyes boring into Aquilla’s. As they had a stare down, neither one of them blinked, Aquilla knew who had the upper hand. It sure as hell wasn’t her.

Aquilla looked down the long, dark hall as they made their way back to the room. She wondered where her father was, hoping that he wasn’t still lying on the cold tiled floor. Had she known she was never going to see him again, she would have hugged him and told him that she loved him before she left that morning. She didn’t feel sad. She felt angry. She was pissed. They were going to move, Julius and her were going to be together in Spain. This stupid bitch had ruined everything.

“Are you a lesbian?” she asked, looking behind her shoulder. She wasn’t sure why she asked. She was just trying to focus her attention on something else.

“Keep walking,” Seri replied with a snort. She wasn’t going to answer, Aquilla betted that she was.

She didn’t go back to sleep, instead, she stayed sitting up on the sofa as Seri sat in the chair close to her, still trying to figure her out. The sun was up, illuminating the marble floor with a bright, graceful light.

“How long have you been investigating us?” Aquilla asked.

“If I answer, will you answer a question for me?”

Aquilla shrugged her shoulders and nodded. She may as well. It wasn’t like she was going to release her hands and let her go anyway.

“Nine, very long months. Do you remember coming here?”

“Yes, it was only four years ago,” she replied. She knew that wasn’t what she was asking, but that’s how she asked it, so that’s how Aquilla answered it. She snickered.

“Do you remember coming to live with Mr. Chavez?”

“No, I have been with him since I was born, I guess.”

“Do you know where he got you?”

“Not for sure. I imagine I belonged to a chattel. He probably knew he could give me a better life or something, he never talked about it.”

“Did you ever ask?”

“A handful of times, he would never talk about it, he derailed it every time I brought it up.”

“You never asked? I mean, surely you could tell that you weren’t his flesh and blood.”

She hesitated while she thought about it. “He told me that my mother was an American. That is where I got my light skin and blonde hair.”

She saw the look of disappointment on Seri’s face when Agent Malone sat up, rubbing his face with his hands. Aquilla was talking, and he was going to ruin it. He did, Aquilla was done. She had nothing to say to her or him. She was having a hard enough time trying to figure out what the fuck was going on herself.

“Will you please take these handcuffs off?” she begged. She couldn’t take it anymore, her hands had been bound behind her back for at least twelve hours. Her shoulders hurt, her wrists hurt, and she had to keep adjusting her hands to keep the two bones from digging into each other.

“Is there coffee here?” Agent Malone asked, looking at Aquilla.

“I don’t know, I would imagine there is. I’ve never made it, we have servants. Where are they?” she asked, wondering where Hila and the other help had gone.

“We sent them away, they couldn’t answer any of our questions either.”

“That’s because they didn’t know anything. Nobody knew what was talked about in that office.”

“Yeah, and our undercover agent couldn’t seem to get in there either,” he said, giving Seri a look for not being able to achieve a major goal. “I’m going to find coffee.”

Seri pulled her to her feet with keys in hand. “I’m a black belt,” she assured Aquilla, turning her away from her.

“So am I,” Aquilla retorted, looking over her shoulder.

“I just won the national title for the LZZ Championship,” she bragged.

“So did I,” Aquilla smirked, rubbing her freed wrists and turning to face her.

Seri snickered. She knew as well as Aquilla did, she had no idea what the hell that was. She did, however, believe that she could very well be a black belt. She did kick the shit out of her men…handcuffed.

“Have you always been intimate with Julius?” she asked as they both sat.

“No, actually, you fucked him before I did.”

She was harsh. Nothing Aquilla said seemed to affect her. She was tough. Aquilla pictured herself the same if she were in her shoes; Seri was tough and held power. She could tell that she did. She wondered how she got into her profession. Since she was a F.B.I. agent, it was obvious she was older than her chattel application said she was.

“How old are you?” Aquilla asked.

“Twenty-six,” she answered. If she was going to keep Aquilla talking, she knew that she had to answer her questions. She was beautiful, and she really didn’t look like she was over the 22 year age limit to be a chattel.

Her cellphone rang, Aquilla was again intrigued by her demeanor, “Agent Strokes,” she answered. Aquilla smiled inside. Agent Strokes, she said to herself. She would use that the next time she pissed her off. Seri strokes her tongue, she chanted in her mind.

“Give me five minutes and then come in,” she ordered.

Aquilla locked eyes with her. “Will you cooperate and let us do an electronic fingerprint?”

“Why? You’re not going to find anything. I’ve never been fingerprinted, I’ve never been in trouble.”

“It’s just procedure.”

“Am I in trouble?” Aquilla asked. She wouldn’t know what she would be in trouble for. She really hadn’t done anything. She wasn’t involved in what Julius and her father had done in anyway.

“I’m not sure yet. You haven’t been very cooperative; you did send three of my agents to the hospital.”

“I wasn’t wired to lie down without a fight. Are you like the head agent or something?”

“Agent Malone and I are in charge. We’ve both been on this case for way too long, I’m ready to put it to rest,” she explained, looking exhausted and more than ready for it to be over with.

“But it’s not going to be over until you find Julius, is it?” Aquilla asked. The thought of him in prison, killed her, he would never make it. They would put him on death row for murder the first week. She knew they weren’t going to give up finding him. She also knew that Julius was an expert at hiding out. He had power, people, and money. Even if they were to seize all of her father’s money and assets, they had money in other names and places, she was sure of it.

“Yes, we want Julius,” she assured her.

“You let him fuck you,” Aquilla stated. Was that part of her job? Did her peers know about that? She knew for a fact she enjoyed the hell out of it. She got off too, that was a fact obviously she was there when it happened, she witnessed it. She shrugged her shoulders nonchalantly as she leaned against the table and crossed her ankles. “I’ve done many things to get what I was after.” She stopped talking about it and changed the subject quickly when Agent Malone entered carrying coffee. The other agent came in with two more, and another one followed carrying the portable fingerprint scanner.

Aquilla laughed when he wouldn’t hand her the cup of coffee to her. He set it on the table. The stupid fuck was afraid of her. She took the coffee and sipped it with all eyes on her. They looked at her like some sort of psychopath, waiting for her to go crazy wild on one or all of them.

“I’m Darren, can I scan your fingerprints now?” the balding man holding the portable scanner asked.

“You’re not touching me. Seri can do it,” Aquilla offered, being difficult.

“I told you, it’s Sarah,” she stated, taking the scanner from the man.

Aquilla stayed standing, offering her middle finger first. “I like Seri better. Sarah sounds like a crybaby pussy. I think Seri sounds more like a badass.”

Seri smiled, replacing her middle finger with her index finger. Aquilla let her scan all ten of her fingers, picked up her coffee, and sat back on the sofa. The balding man, Darren, took the scanner and plugged it into the laptop on the table. She wasn’t worried. They weren’t going to find shit. She had never even been close to a police officer or a Goddamned Fed. This was so fucked up. If she ever ran into Valdez again, she would cut his nuts off and stuff them in his mouth for leaving her.

Another female came in with a box of doughnuts. Aquilla hadn’t realized how hungry she was until she saw the food. She hadn’t eaten anything since her ice cream cone treat, which turned out to not be such a treat after all. The sugary pastry was something odd, she wasn’t sure about it, she never really ate stuff like that. Red meat was something else she had never eaten red meat before. Her father didn’t allow it. They had seafood, vegetables, and fresh fruits. Fruit was their delicacy. He didn’t even have a good reason for it. When he had been a young man, he ate a burger and fries at some restaurant. She couldn’t remember where, but he got food poisoning and refused to eat red meat from that day on. Of course, he controlled what the cooks prepared, rearing Julius and her to eat what he dictated.

She did eat pizza once with her friends. She was sick the whole night, afraid to tell her father what she had eaten. She guessed her system just wasn’t used to the processed food.

She nibbled on the doughnut, but didn’t care much for it. It was so sweet and made her feel sick almost immediately. Seri didn’t eat hers either. She noticed her take two bites and place it back in the box. She wasn’t surprised. She didn’t get that body from eating doughnuts.

“Agent Strokes,” Darren alarmingly called from behind the laptop. Aquilla studied his face. He looked pale, his eyes were wide, and he looked as though someone had just hit him in the chest with a ball bat, knocking the wind right out of him. He grasped the top of his shirt in a clinched fist.

Aquilla watched Seri walk behind him with the same expression as she read whatever the fuck he had found.

“Fuck!” Seri muttered, barely perceptible.

What the hell was going on? Aquilla wanted to get up and look for herself. She couldn’t move. She was in a frozen state. Something was happening. This couldn’t possibly get anymore fucked up than it already was, could it?

“Quill, come here,” Seri requested.

Aquilla cautiously got up and walked to the table, while Agent Malone pulled a chair out for her to sit. She unquestionably needed to sit after that gunshot wound to the head.

Nothing could have prepared her for what she saw in front of her. This was something that she couldn’t have imagined in her wildest dreams. This wasn’t real, it couldn’t be. She looked over her shoulder to Seri. Seri squeezed her arm in a comforting fashion.

Aquilla looked back to the same picture that Seri had shown her from the newspaper clipping. It was her. She knew it was her, but that wasn’t her name. Shelby Rae Rimmer. Who the hell was that? She quickly scanned the article.

Aquilla was going to be sick, and not from the doughnut. She was kidnapped? Why? Why would her father take her away from her family? She felt like she couldn’t breathe, like the air had just been sucked from the room.

“I want to go to my room,” she said, staring blankly at the screen.

“Um, I don’t think so,” Agent Dick Face replied.

“Come on, I’ll go with you,” Seri offered. Aquilla knew they weren’t going to let her go alone. She wasn’t sure why. Where was she going to go?

Seri followed her to her room. She lay across her bed, trying to wrap her mind around what she had just learned. She didn’t understand it. What the hell was going on? He kidnapped her? Why?

Seri sat on the padded bench by the window. She didn’t try to talk to Aquilla and sat in silence, texting on her phone. Aquilla was sure she was texting Agent Malone. She lay there for at least an hour in muteness. She wasn’t sure what she was even thinking, if anything at all. It was all unfathomable. She had a mother, a father and a sister.

“Fuck,” Seri quietly said. She snapped her eyes up to Aquilla. She hadn’t meant to say that out loud.

“What?” Aquilla asked, sitting up.

“Nothing, Quill, just try to relax. We’ll figure this out.” Sarah felt absolutely horrible for the girl. She couldn’t imagine what she was going through. This was her ninth drug case. Every time she stopped the drug lords from being able to disburse drugs to the street was liberating. There was nothing liberating about this case.

“Tell me, Seri,” Aquilla demanded.

Seri stood and ran her fingers through her hair. “You’re only seventeen, Quill.”

“No, I’m not, I turned 18 almost four months ago.”

“Aquilla turned 18. You’re not Aquilla. You are Shelby Rimmer and you just turned 17 a couple of weeks ago. Fuck,” Seri said again.

Aquilla looked at her puzzled. “You just told me that I was 17 and you’re the one freaking the fuck out. What the hell, Seri?”

Seri frantically danced around the floor. “Quill, if you just turned 17 that means you were only 16 when I was here.”

“Yeah…So?” she asked, still not understanding what her problem was.

“Come on Quill, don’t make me spell it out for you.”

Aquilla got it. Had the situation been different, she would have found it funny. Hell, it was still funny. “Oh, so you’re worried about licking my pussy when I was only 16?” she boldly asked.

“Will you stop saying that? I feel bad enough. I would have never touched you had I known. Fuck.”

“Seri, calm down, I wasn’t going to tell anyone.”

“You don’t understand, Quill, I could lose my job for this.”

“Seri! I’m not going to fucking tell anyone. I wouldn’t want anyone to know I licked your skank ass shit either.”

“Yeah, until you get pissed off at me again, and I don’t have skank shit.”

“You might not think that my family is very honorable, but when a Chavez gives his word, its gospel. I’m not going to say anything,” she promised.

“You’re not a Chavez, Quill.”

“What’s going to happen to me?” Aquilla asked. She was scared. She was scared shitless. She wanted Julius.

Seri smiled and walked over to her bed. She sat beside her and pulled her hair from the front to her back. “Agent Malone is in the process of having your parents informed.”

Her head snapped back to Seri. She wasn’t going there. How could she expect her to do that after all these years?

“I’m not going there. You can’t make me go there. I’ve never even been to the United States,” she stated, forgetting the fact that she had been born and taken from there.

“Quill, you will be turned over to your parents,” she stated, matter of factly.

“Why would he do that, Seri?” Aquilla asked, even though she knew she didn’t know the answer. She wasn’t really even asking. She was just thinking out loud. Her father took her from her mother. Why?

Seri stroked her hair. She didn’t reply. She had no idea what to say to her.

Aquilla abruptly turned to her, “I need to see the newspaper again,” she coaxed. She couldn’t say Shelby Rimmer. She was fucking Aquilla. Shelby Rimmer sounded too morbid.

“Why?” Seri asked puzzled.

“I need to see something, please,” she begged.

“Let me see your laptop,” Seri requested, nodding toward her purple laptop on the nightstand.

“You can’t get to it from mine. My father didn’t let me search the internet, everything is blocked,” she explained, understanding now why she was never allowed to surf the web.

“Let me see, I’m pretty good at this stuff,” she requested, reaching for the laptop on Quill’s side.

Aquilla wasn’t lying. Romano was a smart man. She couldn’t get it to do anything he didn’t want it to do.

Seri dialed a number and requested her laptop be brought up. Aquilla smiled as much as she could at the time. She told whoever she was talking to, not to worry about it and to bring her laptop. Aquilla assumed it was Agent Malone.

Agent Dick Face entered her room without knocking. She wanted to knock him out. Seri took the laptop from him; he stayed, crossing his arms to see what they were up to.

“You can go now,” she assured him.

“No, I’m good,” he stated, not moving.

“Do you mind?” Seri asked Aquilla.

“Yeah, I kind of do. I can’t stand that fucker,” Aquilla boldly replied with a daggered look right at him.

“Leave us, Malone,” Seri demanded.

“What is your problem?” he asked.

“Get out, Malone,” she repeated. He dropped his arms and reluctantly left them alone.

“Pull up the article,” Aquilla barked.

Aquilla studied the editorial. Seri studied Aquilla, trying to figure out what was going through her screwed up mind.

“Can you see this paper from that day? Not just the abduction, like other news?

“Yeah, but why? What do you want to know?”

“I just need to see something, please?” she begged.

Seri turned the laptop. “What date?”

“Start from the 25th first.”

Seri looked at her puzzled. What the hell was she doing?

Aquilla scanned through the newspaper, focusing on only the news. She didn’t care about the election, or the road being closed for six months due to a new bridge being built. She needed to see the news. Nothing, nothing at all for the 25th.

“How do I go to the next day?” She wanted to know.

“Right here,” Seri pointed to the dropdown tab.

Nothing there either.

The 27th, the day Aquilla was taken showed nothing either. Wait, what was this?

Seri noticed the hesitation when she started to flip to the next page. Why did she care about some police chase? It was New York. There was always something going on.

“Look at this,” Aquilla pointed reading through the article.

Seri scanned the article. Her heart sped to an unhealthy beat. What the fuck?

“Well, fuck a duck,” Seri stated. “You should be my partner.”

“He took me the same day his daughter was killed.” Aquilla wasn’t really talking to Seri. She was just trying to put the pieces together. “He used her passport to get me out of the country,” she also stated, staring in awe at the article. How long did they stay in the states before he smuggled her out?

Seri was speechless; she had been working this case for almost a year and didn’t know any of this. Why the hell didn’t she think to do that? Oh yeah, because she wasn’t looking for a missing girl. She was looking for a drug lord. Still, she should have done more research. This was going to make her look bad. This fucking teenager just showed her right the fuck up.

“Julius knew,” Aquilla quietly and unbelievably stated. “He’s seven years older than me, he would remember this.”

Seri lovingly rubbed circles on her back. She could not imagine what this girl was going through not in a million years.

“My whole life has been a lie. I’ve always known that I didn’t belong to this family, but I thought I was taken from a bad situation. I had a family,” she said, talking more to herself again. How could her father literally rip a small child from her mother’s arms? She couldn’t imagine what her family had gone through. “Julius knew, he had to,” She repeated the fact.

“Are you in love with him, Quill?”

“I told you to stop calling me Quill,” she snapped, roughly circling her shoulder to make her stop touching her.

“And I told you to stop calling me Seri,” she stated. “Besides, I like Quill. Quill is the strongest part of a bird’s feather. A bird couldn’t fly without a strong quill.”

“It’s also the part of the bird plucked from its body to make an ink pen,” she reminded her of the cruel fact.

Seri stood and pulled her dark blue FBI t-shirt from her pants. She turned around and showed Quill the tattoo of a quill along her lower back. It was a beautifully detailed quill with the words ‘Vengeance’ coming from the tip. The feathers were very well articulated and flowed like it had caught a gust of wind, Aquilla loved it.

“Damn, you are a tough bitch,” she decided. Seri smiled down at her and tucked her shirt back inside her pants. “How did you make it through the application process with that?” Aquilla couldn’t imagine Julius letting her in with a tattoo.

“If that other guy Latium would have done the inspection, I’m sure I wouldn’t have. However, Julius liked it.”

“Did you fuck him more than that one time?” Aquilla wanted to know, for whatever reason. Seri smiled a crooked smile and sat across the room on the bench. Aquilla knew she had without any words, her body language was enough to answer the question.

“What’s going to happen to me Seri?” She asked.

“You’re going to go home to your family, they love you, Quill. You’re going to be fine, and if not, you can just kick some ass. You’re pretty good at it,” she teased, trying to lighten her trepidation.

“I’m not going to be called Shelby. That’s a really stupid name,” she assured her.

Seri snickered a little, looking down at the new text message.

“Are you getting anywhere with her?”

“She doesn’t know anything. I’m sure of it. She’s not going to be any help in locating Julius,” Seri texted back. “But this girl is fucking amazing, I’ll tell you about it later.”

“Bullshit, she knows something. What about family? Where did they visit? Friends of the family? Give me something, Goddamnit!!!”

“Just order us some food and let me deal with Quill.”

“Bring her downstairs.”

“No, we’ll never get anywhere by doing that, she can’t stand you.”

“What? Are you like her best friend or something now…. SERI?”

“Fuck you! Get us some food.”

Aquilla continued to read as much as she could on Seri’s laptop. They read the articles of the unknown family all the way up until December 17th, and then nothing. The family was forgotten, probably sitting in some box in some storeroom. She was reading the updates of her disappearance when Agent Malone came in with two Styrofoam containers of food. Aquilla could smell the grease as soon as he entered, gross.

“What the fuck is she doing? Get her off of there,” Malone demanded, seeing Aquilla on the laptop.

“She’s not hurting anything, leave her alone. It’s about her life and she has a right to know.”

Seri took the food and nodded for him to leave. She could tell that Aquilla didn’t want him there.

“Galveston wants you to call him as soon as possible.”

“Fine, but did you tell him that we know nothing?”

“It’s not about that.”

“What’s it about?”

“Just call him. I will stay with the girl.”

“The girl has a name,” Aquilla smartly reminded him.

“Yes, Shelby, we Know.”

Aquilla was off the bed in a split second. She wasn’t fucking Shelby.

Seri jumped between them, screaming at Malone. “Put the fucking gun away, you stupid fucking idiot!” She couldn’t believe he pulled his gun on her.

“She needs a fucking straight jacket, I wouldn’t trust her for a second,” Malone said, replacing his gun.

“That’s very smart of you Agent Dick Face. If I were you, I wouldn’t close my eyes tonight, especially if you’re planning on sleeping in MY house,” Aquilla warned, with a vengeful glare and gritted teeth.

“Quill!” Seri scolded. “Get out Malone.”

“She can’t threaten me like that.”

“GET OUT!” Seri screamed.

“You need to chill out on the temper,” Seri said, handing her the container of food.

“It’s not a temper, more like the Chavez way of saying don’t fuck with me,” Aquilla replied, taking the food.

Seri wanted to remind her that she wasn’t a Chavez. She didn’t, she didn’t need to. Aquilla knew that fact, she was just having a hard time accepting it. Recapping that wasn’t going to help one bit.

“What a stupid idiot,” Seri said out loud when she opened her food with the cheeseburger and fries.

“You don’t like cheeseburgers?” Aquilla asked.

“I don’t eat red meat, Agent Dick Face knows that.”

Aquilla laughed at her using her nick name for Malone. “I don’t either.”

“What do you like? We’ll order our own damn food,” Seri decided, pulling up some local restaurants on her phone.

“Do you like seafood? There’s a little seafood bar not far from here. They deliver, Julius and I used to order from there when my father was out of town.”

Seri smiled a warm smile at her. She loved the man that kidnapped her. There was no question about it. “Seafood’s good. What should I order?”

“The lobster and crawfish platter is good,” Aquilla offered.

The seafood was good. Agent Dick Face brought it up and took their unwanted red meat away. He’d eat it. He wasn’t biased.

“Quill, you have to go downstairs with me so that I can call my boss,” Seri explained, cleaning up their trash.

“I kind of wanted to take a shower. I’m not going anywhere, Seri. Where would I go?”

“I don’t trust you.”

“You can trust me. You’re partner’s the one that shouldn’t turn his back on me.”

“You stop that. I’ll just go out into the hall and call while you shower.”

Aquilla took her clothes and walked to the bathroom while Seri walked out to the hall.

“Hey, Galveston. It’s Seri, I mean Sarah.”

“Forget your name?”

“No, this girl calls me Seri. What’s up?”

“You’re going home with her.”

“What do you mean I’m going home with her? To New York?”

“No, actually, her parents no longer live in New York. They divorced two years after Shelby was taken. Her father still lives there. She is going home to her mother, who lives in Connecticut.”

“Why the hell am I going home with her? Shouldn’t she be with her family without an intruder?”

“From what Malone has told me, she trusts you. He thinks Julius is going to come for her.”

“He’s not going to venture into the states,” she assured him. How the hell would he even do that? He was on a high wanted list. He wouldn’t make it out of the airport. The guy isn’t stupid.

“I still think the girl knows something. I want you with her until further notice.”

“How long?”

“I don’t know that. I’m trying to get Monica to go to Connecticut too. Keep me posted on any information you obtain from her.”

“She doesn’t know anything.”

“I beg to differ, keep me posted.”

“Do her parents know yet?”

“I’ve got two agents on the road as we speak. The mother will know very soon.”

Seri was still on the phone when Aquilla walked out of the bathroom. She quietly opened her door to see Seri sitting on the top step down the long hallway. She turned back to her purple computer debating on whether or not to chance it. She only needed a minute. What did she have to lose? She had to try.

She quickly grabbed the laptop and tiptoed to the room next door. Aquilla felt a rush of emotions when she entered Julius’s room. She could smell his cologne. There was a white shirt hanging over the chair, like he would be back at any moment. Julius wasn’t coming back for her. He would have done it by now.

She took a deep breath and opened his closet. She exchanged her purple laptop for his on the top shelf. She smiled, thinking how pissed he was when he had gotten the same purple laptop as her. Romano had ordered them both and had forgotten to change the color on his. She took his buttoned up shirt from the chair and slid it on and quickly walked back to her room.

She was sitting on her bed brushing out her hair when Seri returned.

“You need to pack some things, Quill,” she explained in a sad tone. She hated to be the one to do this to her. She was taking her from the only home she knew, and although Romano and Julius were the bad guys, Aquilla loved them. They were her family, the only family she’d ever known.

“I don’t want to go to New York, Seri. Can’t I just go to your house?”

Seri smiled. “You’re not going to New York. Your mother lives in Connecticut now.”

“Connecticut?”

“Yes. Your father still lives in New York, but your mother is a second grade school teacher in Connecticut.”

“Where do you live?”

“New York is where I live when I am home.”

“Take me there,” Aquilla begged.

“I can’t take you to my house, Quill. You need to go home to your mother she has waited a very long time for this.”

Aquilla took a long deep breath. “Will you go with me?”

Seri smiled. “Yes, I’m going to stay with you for a bit.”

“You are!?!”

Seri didn’t have the heart to tell her it wasn’t by her choice. She needed a friend, somebody that understood her, not that that somebody was her, but she would try.