“How dare you bring me into this.” I say. “I had no idea what you were doing. And I’m going to tell the police everything you told me. I’m not going down for this shit.”
Nicholas’ face remains expressionless.
“Can you hear me?” I ask, grabbing his arm. “Are you even listening to me? You have money, you’ll be able to get out of this mess. But it’s all going to land on me and I’ve worked way too hard to lose everything.”
He can hear me, but he doesn’t look like he’s listening. I need to wake him up.
If he weren’t driving, I’d smack him.
“Everything is going to be fine,” he says.
“No, it’s not. They’re going to catch you.”
“Kathy won’t notice a thing because she still has a bracelet on her,” Nicholas says slowly, savoring every word. “It’s identical to the one that she thinks her husband gave her, dotted with Swarovski crystals and worth just under five hundred dollars. About the same amount of money that she thinks her husband spent on it.”
I stare at him, trying to process what he just said.
“You switched her bracelets?” I ask.
“Yes, and you assisted by providing the opportunity.”
“But how?” My mouth drops open.
I replay the events in my head.
I walk up to him with his drink.
Someone bumps into him.
He bumps into Kathy, who bumps into me.
The drink shatters onto the floor.
“You created the little bit of chaos that I needed to make the swap. It’s all a game.”
I scratch at the leather on the arm rest.
“Paul will only find out when he files for divorce and tries to take it from her. By then, he will assume that it was Kathy who is trying to pass Swarovski crystals off as real diamonds.”
I nod.
“None of this will ever come back to me,” Nicholas says. “Or you.”
I can’t resist the temptation to roll my eyes. That’s what men like him always say.
They believe they are impervious.
They believe that nothing can touch them.
And maybe they’re right.
Maybe nothing will happen to them because they’re too powerful. But there are others, the ones that help them, who will lose.
Others like me.
“You don’t trust me,” Nicholas says. It comes out as a statement rather than a question.
“Am I so obvious?” I ask sarcastically.
I cross my arms and stare out of the window.
A bird flies in the sky somewhere in the distance. The jealousy that I feel toward her right now is difficult to describe.
Nicholas doesn’t say a word.
Instead, he leaves me alone and lets me stew in my anger.
“You are not a stranger to this, Olive.”
“Is that why I’m here?”
The road looks familiar now and I know that we’re getting closer to his house. I’m regretting coming here again. I look down at my phone and wish that I had cell reception so that I could call Sydney.
“Sydney is staying at James’s,” Nicholas says, reading my mind. “You can call her when we get to my place.”
“I’m not staying with you. This was a terrible mistake.”
Nicholas turns down the music just a bit. “Do you want me to take you back to the airport?” he asks.
I take a deep breath.
Is that what I want? My thoughts all mash together, making it impossible to separate one from another.
“Yes, I do,” I say.
A part of me expects him to beg me to stay, but he doesn’t. Instead, he pulls over at the nearest turnaround and flips the signal that he’s turning back.
“You’re going to take me back now?” I gasp.
“That’s what you said you wanted.”
Our eyes meet.
I want him to plead for me to stay but his eyes remain cool and collected as before.
Not exactly dead, but completely free of expression.
The blinker makes a steady dinging sound.
As all other sounds disappear, it seems to get louder with each passing moment.
“Tell me to go,” Nicholas says, motioning toward the road back.
My jaw clenches up.
My nail makes a deep indentation in the leather.
I don’t want to go home, but I can’t bring myself to say it.
He is so infuriating.
Anyone else would pressure me to make my decision quickly. They would urge me to hurry up already, but Nicholas has infinite patience.
Sitting back in the driver’s seat, he stares straight ahead as the cars whiz by us in both directions.
“I’m really tired,” I finally cave. “I don’t want to go on another long flight.”
“Does that mean you’re staying?” he asks.
A dimple forms in the lower part of his cheek.
“Tonight, yes.”
“Good.” He steps on the gas.
4
When I wait for more…
You’re not a stranger to this. That’s what Nicholas said to me in the car. It was supposed to sound like a throwaway line when in reality it was anything but that.
I asked him if that’s why I’m here but he didn’t answer. He changed the topic to Sydney and he never went back to it.
But why?
How much does he know about me?
We don’t speak the rest of the way to his house. After parking the car, he shows me to the same cottage I stayed in before.
“Where is everyone?” I ask, looking around.
None of his staff are here now and the property feels almost deserted.
“They’re off work for two more days.”
I nod.
“We’ll just have to fend for ourselves.”
I nod again.
He smiles when he says that but it’s a bit different from his other smiles.
There’s a mischievousness in this one. A glint of hope, even.
I can feel his gaze on my body.
I know that he wants me.
I want him, too.
I’ve never felt this much desire for anyone before.
“Would you like to join me for a drink on the porch?” Nicholas says.
“Let me freshen up first and then I’ll join you.”
I use the bathroom and then look at myself in the mirror as I wash my hands. The woman looking back at me is tired but energized. There are few things in the world that are as exciting as taking something that doesn’t belong to you. My only regret about today is that I wasn’t in on the con.
I don’t know how much Nicholas knows about me but he seems to be the type to do his research.
I am not here by accident and it is not just his affection for his dead sister that got him to reach out to me.
I knew there had to be something more to this. The thing that I didn’t know was that anyone knew about my past.
“You used me,” I say when he hands me a martini.
I stare at the slice of lemon that he placed on the edge and my mouth waters.
“Everyone uses everyone,” he says, bringing his martini to his lips.
“Is this why you made me that offer?” I ask.
He stares out to the ocean. Somewhere around us, crickets and frogs start to sing their evening songs.