Waters of Lethe, Book 2

63. Chickens and Eggs

I watched Alex as he held my phone to his face, the light from the screen casting blue across his hard features, his concentrating eyes. The light outside was dimming, quickly welcoming the night. "I still can't believe it's going to be this easy. Something's going to go wrong," he told us as Jai's hand reached around me to get my phone from Alex so that he could look, too.

"Don't say that just yet," Jai warned. I stared ahead out of the windshield as we rode in the cab to the restaurant, the Saigon Bleu, all of us in the backseat. 

"Which part?" Alex asked Jai as he pulled the phone to him, scrolling down Arabella's Twitter account, reading the tweets that she had just posted to inform everyone that she was heading out with her lame family to eat.

Jai kept his eyes glued to the screen as he answered. "Both parts. You'll jinx us."

Our driver paid no attention to our rambling. We kept our conversation light, remembering not to mention that we were setting out to kidnap a fellow freak. Although Alex and Jai knew how to talk to keep it low key, I still wished they'd shut up until we were out of the small cab. They were both so sure of themselves, an annoying trait they had in common.

At the tail end of my thoughts, I caught Alex as he glanced at me, seeming to catch on to the reason for my hard gaze that stayed ahead of us and sometimes on the driver. "Wow," Alex said, tiredly, "I can't wait to meet up with our long lost friend. Can you?" he asked me, elbowing me in the side. I jumped, bumping into Jai on my right. He barely looked up. I was suddenly upset at the fact that I sat in between the two men. I'd have rather sat by the door, rather found something outside in the scenery to occupy my thoughts. "It feels like we haven't seen her in... how long?"

I threw a fake, annoyed smile his way. "Forever," I said through clenched teeth.

"The food better be good," Jai commented passively, laying the phone on the soft fabric of my tan pants. If anything, we still looked the part, as long as we didn't talk. My southern accent, Alex's northern accent, and Jai's hard tone didn't exactly fit in with the local tongue. I'd gotten us all to practice doing accents, only to burst out laughing. Fake accents went out the window as quickly as the idea flew into my brain.

We drove in silence for another five minutes through the city. I resisted the ever present urge to reach over and take Jai's hand, tried to forget the fact that I wanted him to tell me everything would be alright. I wanted him to tell me the next move, what we'd do after we got Arabella. Would we duck out tonight and leave Alex to deal with her himself or would we break it to him before we got on the plane?

I was brought out of my own thoughts again when I saw Jai pull out a phone that wasn't Scott-issued. I kept my eyes straight, knowing that we were coming up on our destination, and quick. What was he doing?

The driver laughed in a bright way as he stopped the car in traffic along business buildings, the Saigon Bleu nowhere in sight. "We are here!" he informed us, his accent like music. 

I turned to Jai, who had given the driver the address. Jai was ahead of Alex's and my questioning looks, handing money to the man. "But this isn't—"

"Thank you," Jai said with his winning smile, one that I hadn't seen in a while and that I was positive Alex never saw before. He opened his door and grabbed my arm, roughly pulling me out. When we were out on the street, while Alex was still making his way out, Jai gave me a look and squeezed my arm. I narrowed my eyes at him as his hand fell away.

"What's going on?" Alex asked. The driver threw the car in drive and zoomed away, allowing the flow of traffic to continue.

Jai's smile had faded. "The restaurant is two blocks ahead. I thought we could walk and go over our plan one more time, you know? Just to be on the same page."