Chapter 34
My mind went blank. "What?"
The sadness in Nathan's eyes was starting to diminish, becoming quickly replaced with something more determined. A sense of purpose. A distraction. "Run away with me, Jess. If I play my cards correctly, we can leave tonight."
My tongue refused to work properly. "But..." How could I possibly decline something such a request? What he was demanding was so ridiculous, so utterly insane, and yet – I replayed my earlier words and fought the urge to strangle myself.
I promised I'd do anything for him. He wasn't being unreasonable, so much as he was holding me accountable to my own words.
You've made your bed. Now lie in it.
After a heavy beat of silence, I heaved a great sigh. My next words were painful to get out. "Nate..." I bit my lip. "You know that's impossible. I can't."
"What do you mean you can't?" he cried, suddenly jumping from his sitting position and kneeling so he was at level with me. His sweaty fingers desperately gripped by palms.
"Please, Jess. I'm going to have to do this, with or without you. And you said you'd do anything." He lowered his voice, gently running his lips along mine. "You want to help me, right? Then this is the only way." I let out an unsteady breath.
His kisses continued, growing more and more convincing. "I love you, Jess. And you love me too, don't you?"
"Of course I do. You know I do," I croaked, before clearing my throat and attempting to put a tiny bit of distance between us. Nathan couldn't know the effect he had on me. It was far too much power for him to have. And yet, the idea of running away from all our responsibilities was utterly ludicrous – especially considering the situation we were both currently under.
I spoke with slightly more conviction this time. "We can't just run away, Nate. That—" I shook my head, "—that would be stupid."
He let out a short, humorless laugh. "Stupid? There is nothing stupid about what I'm planning."
I hesitated. His eyes were now frantic and pleading, boring into my soul and almost willing me to join this new reckless cause.
"What exactly are you planning on doing?" I asked tentatively. On the surface, it seemed as if this newfangled plan had been the result of needing to take decisive action – of setting the course towards righting his father's wrongs. But perhaps the idea of running away had occurred to him long before Vera's story and before his father's surprise appearance.
I remembered when I'd last seen that look in his eyes. That spark of excitement and possibility – brewing as he'd held his brand new passport up to the light.
"You've been thinking about this for a while, haven't you?" I asked him.
Dry amusement washed over his face, but only very briefly. "Angel, you never cease to amaze me. Sometimes I think you know me better than I know myself – of course I have. I've hardly slept because of it." His demeanor then became deadly serious. I almost retreated out of fear. "You could almost time Alfred's monthly visits to a stopwatch. That fucker is up to something. Whatever he's doing in Sin City can't be good – and I only have to prove that he's up to something despicable in order to have him locked up for good. That's all it would take to bring him down."
"So... you want to follow your father to Vegas?" I simplified, processing his words.
Without warning, Nathan stood up, pacing around his recently cleaned room like an angry, adolescent tiger.
"He's hiding something," he continued, low and silent. I could see the wheels churning inside his head. "I don't buy his bullshit – the whole reclaiming our family wealth? Complete shit. He's there for another reason – and I need to know what it could be. Whether it's to gamble the money back, or if it's something to do with Aurora – or something else completely."
"But why now?" my voice wavered slightly.
He glanced at me darkly. "Because I've had enough of that fucker. I don't care if he's my father – I'd rather I didn't have one if it meant being rid of such a complete vermin of a human being. I want to track him down, find out what he's up to, and expose him for what he truly is. Or worse."
I stayed silent for a moment, gazing at him carefully. "How long have you been planning this, exactly?"
He scoffed. "Too long. I've even thought of how I could find him, how I would execute it all. Everything my mother's revealed to me today only strengthens my resolve. She's hurting, angel. She's been hurting every single day of her life because of that asshole, and I could put a stop to all of it. It would only take a couple of days – just you and me. We'll hunt him down. We'll expose him together."
"Nathan, I promise you – I understand how you're feeling right now," I tried to rationalize. "But please consider our situation here. We still have a job to do here. We have a long way to go until we find Robbie and Jenny. Shouldn't that be our main priority until then? And besides – if you hunt Alfred down, and manage to expose him for what he is, how could you possibly to get rid of him? What would the next course of action be?"
He stopped his pacing and squarely met my gaze. His eyes were now still and eerily calm. Conveying his meaning without words. Filling me with dread. The message there was unmistakable.
If I ever find him, I'll kill him.
"Nathan," I gasped, appalled. "No! He's your father."
So quickly that I would have missed it had I blinked, he was crouched down in front of me again. He gripped my arms tightly, almost painfully, and the crazed look on his face chilled me to the bone. "There's something you need to see. Follow me."
I swallowed and tried to be calm, both for me and for Nathan. I couldn't read too much into his irrational line of thinking. He simply wasn't thinking straight – at all. And I needed him to see that.
He sprung back up to his feet and pulled me along with him, using his firm grip to lead me back out of his bedroom and through a series of turns along the lengthy hallway. This house was a maze. Turn after turn led to more doorways, until finally Nathan stopped. In front of us was a quiet little reading nook beside a window sill – there was a bookshelf and some potted plants, along with chairs and beanbags.
Directly opposite this nook was an ordinary, nondescript door.
Nathan lifted a nearby pot plant and grabbed a key from where it was hidden. "Alfred keeps his office locked at all times – under no circumstances is anyone ever allowed to enter. Fortunately for us, Alfred is both an asshole and an idiot. Which means James has had to steal his office key from him, and I have thus stolen this key from James."
He swiftly unlocked the door, leading me towards blackness. Towards a strange humming sound. Dubiously, I followed him inside.
Then a light-switch was flicked on – the scene which illuminated around me was of a very ordinary office space. Rows and rows of filing cabinets, stacked to the ceiling, towered over the both of us. The only desk in the room was stacked with abandoned files and papers, reaching nearly to my chin.
The strangest thing about the room were the fluorescent fish tanks mounted against the wall. All of which were fully functioning, filtering and humming along – except they housed no sea life whatsoever. They were entirely empty.
Nathan began rummaging through the files amongst the desk. I tried my hand at helping him, running my fingers across the aged pages which had been stacked and forgotten over the years. A layer of dust coated my fingertips – involuntarily, I sneezed.
"Bless you," was Nathan's distracted response. "I've searched this place high and low so many times, I can hardly count them. These documents contain the financial thumbprint of the Ericson business – and by extension, all the Ericson money. Old money. Every time I'm in here, I can't help but feel like I'm teetering towards a really big find. Maybe something that proves Aurora's been fucking my father and extorting him for cash, as Peter believes. Or maybe something that points to where all our money is going."
"What's with all the fish tanks?" I finally asked. "I find it so odd that they're all functioning, but don't have any fish in them whatsoever. This room feels like a sad aquarium."
He gave me a wry look, before making his way around the space and turning off the tanks individually. "Alfred's one sneaky fuck. The humming of all the tank filters helps mask the sound." One by one, his face was no longer illuminated by the fluorescent glow of the fish tanks.
Then I paused and waited. "The sound of what?" Still hearing nothing of importance – only the same faint humming sound from before.
Nathan then unlocked a nearby filling cabinet, opening it to reveal that it hadn't been a cabinet at all. Instead, housed inside was a very small, still functional refrigerator. Glowing faintly to indicate that it was still working. A very strange addition to the already mysterious office set-up.
"When I was ten years old," Nathan began, "Alfred decided that he'd take me on one of his joy rides. He sped along Alistair's busiest freeway at seventy miles per hour, and on the opposite side of the road. Completely fucked out of his mind. I had been in the passenger side of the car – and of course he crashed it instantly. Wrapped himself around a pole and nearly killed me. He gifted me several broken bones and a concussion. Alfred's fractured knee never fully recovered. But that little stint instigated what would become his very long-standing affair with an opioid addiction."
When he opened the small fridge, I gasped at the contents which waited inside. Alfred essentially possessed a small pharmacy – amphetamines and narcotics of every kind, in pill, powder and liquid form. I walked over and leaned in for a thorough look, becoming more and more disturbed by what I found. Fentanyl, codeine, alprazolam, ketamine, morphine, and something called sodium amytal.
"A barbiturate? What is that?" I wondered out loud. I had been so consumed in uncovering Alfred's pharmaceutical contents that I failed to notice Nathan as he speedily examined various cabinet files for pertinent information.
"A very potent depressant. Some people call it truth serum," was his grim answer. His mouth was pressed into a thin line.
I closed the door of the fridge hesitantly, quietly noting that while Alfred had an extensive stash of drugs, his stash had also been pretty depleted. Which means he had recently ransacked his stores– probably during his most recent visit. Nathan must've known about this side to his father for a long time. Perhaps he knew from a very early age. I felt horrified at the thought.
The full extent of Alfred's depravity was suddenly made very clear to me. In order to have fully functioned with a long-term opioid addiction, he would've had to successfully pull the wool over the heads of everyone from his wife and children, to his board of directors and employees. For years. That was no easy feat to achieve. Alfred must have been an exceptional liar – a gifted manipulator of people and of the world he governed.
"Here it is – I found his ledger," Nathan grinned, flicking through the pages of a slim black book. "His flight leaves for Vegas tonight. It's not too late for us to follow after him."
I groaned. "How could we possibly track down one man in such a huge city?"
"I have ways of getting around that," he explained cryptically. "But we have to act fast. We need to leave in a few hours at best."
"A few hours?" I cried. My head was reeling. "Nathan, be reasonable here. What about Peter and Angelica? We can't possibly abandon them now."
Nathan moved towards me, closing the distance between us and pleading with his eyes. Needing me to see sense, to convince me as completely as he's convinced myself. "I'll hand over Noah's phone to James – he can continue the search for us. We'll be back before they even notice we're gone." He grabbed hold of my head in between his palms. "I'm doing this, angel. There's no other option for me. I need to do this for my sake – to see him for what he truly is, and to get rid of him once and for all. The investigation will be here when we get back. We can do this together, right now. You and me, always."
"Nate, this is too crazy—"
"Shh," he hushed. The rest of my words were swallowed by his lips. They were hungry and searching – nothing like they were last night, when they had been tender and giving and warm. This reckless, utterly irresponsible boy. And yet... my body decided to betray me. Instead of pushing him away, I only pulled him closer.
A sudden sense of déjà vu – I'd been in this position before.
He took my breath away in every sense of the word. The kiss grew deeper and deeper; until I was certain that our mouths were permanently molded as one. Blood pounded furiously along my veins, and my brain reeled from the lack of oxygen.
"Jesabel." His teeth bit into the curve of my lower lip, and I raked my nails down the length of his spine in response. He was a puppeteer, manipulating my reactions with the flick of his wrists. "Say yes for me. Please."
"No," I groaned, fisting his hair, refusing to submit in this game of wills he was playing. I couldn't let him win. Absolutely not.
But Nathan loved winning.
"Say it, Angel," he growled, angry and passionate. His lips made a hot, furious trail across my jaw and down my neck, and I could feel all rational thought leaving me. I panted for air, trying to recover the amount of oxygen I had lost.
When I felt his tongue trace the line of my collarbone, I lost all sense of control.
To hell with it.
It was then I realized that I was fighting a lost cause. No matter how many times I said no, he would never give up. This was his all or nothing. His fight or flight. And even if he chose to follow his father without me...
I would change my mind, and follow him anyway. Because saying no would mean being apart, and I couldn't stand any form of distance between us.
Every other possible option was a dead end for me.
That's what love did to you.
"Yes. Okay," I murmured, unable to look away from him. The air between us was thick and virtually non-existent, our faces so close together that he breathed in the same air I breathed out.
"Okay?" he whispered, grinning and trying to control his breathing. Victorious. His fingers were gripping my waist so tightly, I was sure there would be bruises there tomorrow.
I nodded, hating the small movement, running through all possible consequences in my mind. "Under one condition."
"Anything – anything at all," he responded.
I had been lying before – though only slightly. Out from the corner of my eye, I'd been watching Nathan stalk around the room, skimming through folders and documents and taking only what was important. His hands had reached into a hidden drawer, out of plain sight and beneath the seemingly innocuous desk. While Nathan thought I'd been inspecting Alfred's heady cocktail of drugs, he had pulled out a small, compact gun from the compartment and tucked it away into his pocket.
My hands were reaching into that back pocket now, pulling the firearm from its not-so-hidden location. Nathan had the grace to look abashed. I wasted no time – pointing the gun at a safe distance, unlocking the magazine and removing the remaining bullets seamlessly as Nathan watched on with deep surprise.
"How do you know how to work a gun?" he asked.
I'd seen my father do it a hundred times. I gave him a loaded look. "You see these?" I motioned to the magazine and single bullet in my hand. "These are staying with me. In case you get any funny ideas. Looks like we won't be making it past airport security any time soon."
His smile grew impossibly wider. "It's fine – we won't fly commercial. I'll make some calls. We'll take the jet."
I groaned in disgust. God almighty, the Ericsons have a private fucking jet. I closed my eyes and weighed our options. I thought of the huge burden that this would put on the investigation. Peter's wrath. My mother's wrath. Robbie and Jenny's cold case, slowly growing colder. Our upcoming exams. So many people, so many factors which would be affected by this decision.
All for the sake of hunting down the monster underneath Nathan's bed.
I opened my eyes. This time, my resolve was firmly in place. We were really doing this. Nathan's blinding smile could have electrically powered the whole of New York City. I couldn't help myself – I grinned back up at him, despite my conflicting internal reality.
There was something I had to do before I go.
"Before we do anything else, could you drop me off by my house first?"
*
The house was empty when I arrived. No confrontation necessary in order to get in or get out through the door.
Thank goodness.
I packed my belongings quickly, feeling the uneasy feeling in my stomach as it grew more and more pronounced with every article of clothing I stuffed into my bag. This wasn't a good idea at all, and I knew it.
But I couldn't see any other option. Nathan was a stubborn son of a madman.
In a flash of a second, Alfred's terrifying outline reappeared in mind's eye. The blinding silver hair. Those dark blue eyes that looked like they had been to Hell and had overstayed their welcome. And for reasons I couldn't explain, I took the gun and its magazine from my coat pocket and stuffed it into the very bottom of my bag. I repressed a deep shudder.
At least I was now pitiably armed against the worst possible scenario. After a second thought, I also obtained the army knife from my desk – gifted by Angelica – and threw it in with the rest of the bag's contents.
I made my way to the small kitchen which had housed me in my youth, and reached for the yellow note pad on the counter. The thought of what my mother's reaction at my departure made me cringe, but I squared my shoulders and wrote something down anyway:
Mom,
I'm going away for a while. With Nathan. Please don't try to find me. I haven't run away from home – which means I'm definitely going to return.
I'm sorry for being such a bitch about you and Glen. It was none of my business. I'm also sorry that it took me this long to apologize to you.
And I'm sorry that my apology came from a pathetic little note. This should have been done in person.
Don't freak out and call the cops. I'll be back soon. I just don't know when.
I hesitated, before shutting my eyes and writing down the next words without looking at them.
I know I don't say this enough, but I love you. Thank you for protecting me all these years. Thank you for being my only friend in this world,
Jess
I left the note by the counter. Shouldering my bag and walking towards the front door one final time, I took a deep breath and steeled myself. Trying in vain to imagine what was about to come. Trying to picture the outcome of what I was about to do, and all the possible repercussions of what would be our dumbest and most compulsive move to date. I replayed endless possibilities over and over in my head, even as I opened the passenger side of Nathan's car and buckled myself in.
Yet my mind kept coming up blank.