A Blind Eye (7 page)

“Christian Morris,” he said with satisfaction, like now that I'd called him, his life was complete.

Betrayed by the caller ID. “Leave Scarlett alone,” I said, and hung up. As if that would do any good. Maybe I should've said
pretty please
. I stashed my phone back in my pocket. Idiots. Still, my hands were shaking.

I glanced toward the dressing room door and wished I hadn't. Some lady wearing a pair of jeans that were way too tight was admiring her reflection in the full-size mirror. I looked away quickly, only to find myself staring at a rack of what Scarlett would call
skivvies
. I lowered my eyes to the vacant chair beside me. There was a stack of magazines. I leafed through them—they were all women's stuff. I groaned and tossed them away.

How could it take so long? It's not like she was looking at herself in the mirror. Another lady approached the changing rooms with a stack of clothing. I almost smiled at her, just trying to be friendly. But I didn't. Strange kid hanging around outside the dressing room, watching the women come and go? Kinda creepy.

I rested my head in my hands and studied the orange-gold carpet. I spent the next forever trying to decide if the grayish stain between my feet looked more like a gun or a machete. Either one would've satisfied my growing desire to kill myself rather than sit here a minute longer.

Scarlett finally emerged from the dressing room wearing an outfit consisting of a long black sweater thing and new grungy jeans that hugged her legs all the way to her ankles. A long, thin belt with silver studs looped twice around her hips.

“Well? How'd I do?” she asked.

My mouth went dry. She'd managed to turn her punk look into something . . . hot. I mean, she was good looking before, but . . .

Collette cleared her throat.

Eyes up top, Morris
, I reminded myself. “You look very cool.”

“Thank you,” she said in a voice that implied she already knew she looked good.

Who taught her that
? I wanted to know. Colette in the changing room? Or her platonic roommate, Simon?

After getting some sweats for sleeping and a pair of useful shoes—black and gray plaid canvas slip-ons—we were ready to pay. I couldn't convince her to get a jacket.

“I like to wear yours.”

“Why?” I asked. “It drowns you.”

“I like the way it smells.”

Hopefully, that meant clean laundry smell. I actually couldn't remember when I washed it last, and it could've just as easily smelled like BO.

Colette rang up the clothes, and I paid with a wad of my dad's cash. I didn't want to use the credit card because I thought Connor could trace it. I'd ditched them in Hood River, and there was no way they could find me here. I wanted to keep it that way. For all they knew, we could be in Idaho.

Colette handed me our bags and finally—freedom. Whether Scarlett intended to or not, she had at last gotten revenge on me for leaving her on the highway.
Note to self: Do not take a girl shopping ever again.

Scarlett, on the other hand, smiled bigger than ever, so maybe it had been worth it. She walked with a bounce, but that could've been because I carried her combat boots in one of the bags hanging on my arm.

We passed the skating rink located in the center of the mall, and Scarlett stopped. “Feels cold. What's that sound?”

I started to explain but then figured, why not? “Scarlett, I'm taking you ice skating.”

Christian vs. Modern Art

The skating rink occupied the main courtyard of the bottom floor of the mall. A bridge, frosty blue to look like a walkway of ice, connected the two hallways on the second story above the center of the rink. Iron trestles crisscrossed the ceiling of the Lloyd Center, supporting arched panels of glass that gave the shoppers a view of the sky.

I stuffed Scarlett's bags of new clothes into a locker then got her fitted with a pair of worn white skates. I took a pair of black skates.

“Have you ever been skating before?” I asked, checking her laces one last time.

“Never.”

She clung to my arm with both hands while we inched our way onto the ice. I stood in place for a few minutes, letting her find her balance on the thin metal blades. She slid her feet back and forth then bent down and ran her hand along the ice. Her fingertips came up glistening from the cold surface.

“Ready to go?” I asked.

“Chocks away, I s'pose.” She laughed.

“Chocks away?”

“You know, off we go. Ready or not.”

“Yeah. Sure.”

I started off slowly, and she dragged along behind. I supported her entire weight with my arm until she got her feet under her. She caught on quickly, and soon we were skating around the rink at a smooth, easy pace, our blades clacking rhythmically on the ice.

She loved it, laughing and holding her free arm out at graceful angles—something that must come naturally to certain people because she didn't learn it from watching the Olympics. She kept her other arm padlocked around mine, still relying on me for the bulk of her balance. Her cheeks and the tip of her nose flushed pink from the cold, and she looked more alive than ever before.

My phone rang in my pocket, and I checked the ID. It was the unidentified caller who I'd now identified as Deepthroat. Why would he call? I maneuvered us to the side rail and answered.

“Christian?” he asked.

I didn't respond for several seconds. “Maybe,” I said and immediately regretted it. Why was I so stupid? He knew it was me. But I had no clue what to say. I'd never been involved in furtive phone calls before. Not even to find out who liked who. We took care of all that stuff with texting.

Still silence.

“Who is this?” I made an effort to sound tough.

“Give us the girl and no one will get hurt.”

His line was even more cliché than mine. And more untruthful. “You mean, no one except for Scarlett.”

Scarlett listened intently while I spoke. Her smile disappeared like it had been wiped off by the Zamboni. I leaned down so she could hear both sides of the conversation.

“What makes you think that?” Deepthroat asked.

Then it hit me. He was stalling to keep me on the line. Isn't that what they did to trace the location of a phone call? Could you trace a cellular or was that only a landline? Either way, the risk was too high. He'd never tell me anything anyway.

“Leave us alone,” I said again and hung up.

“What did they want?” Scarlett asked.

“I'm not sure. But I'm thinking they might have been trying to trace my phone. We'd better go.”

“Right.” She frowned and skated with me toward the exit, clunking her feet along like a child who didn't get more candy. We turned in our skates and put on our shoes then headed for the lockers. When I glanced back at the rink, I saw two men on the bridge above, searching the crowd.

One of them turned, and his eyes fell directly on me. The one I called Deepthroat.

I shoved Scarlett behind me. “They're here. Put up your hood.” How did they find us so fast? They must have known our general location before the phone call. Connor and Deepthroat split up, both sprinting for a different escalator.

I whipped my head around, looking for a place to hide. If we went back into the skate rental or across to the locker area, we'd be trapped. The elevator dinged behind us, and I grabbed Scarlett's hand and ran.

I pounded on the
door close
button. Two eons later, the elevator doors finally slid shut. But not before Connor saw us. He turned and headed back for the escalator, gesturing at Deepthroat to do the same.

When the doors opened on the second floor, I bolted for the nearest store, dragging Scarlett behind me. It was a large bookstore that took up the entire corner of the mall. We crouched down between a rack of magazines and shelves of giant coffee-table books.

“Did we lose them?” Her hand trembled as it clung to mine.

“I don't know.”

Again, I wondered at the darkness she lived in. I shut my eyes for a second, trying to see the world from her point of view. When my lids closed, the objects that existed before still filled in the negative space. I could picture the cases of books and the plush reading chairs across the aisle.

My phone rang again, and I opened my eyes. Now was not the time for a foray into the world of blindness. I yanked out my phone. Deepthroat. I punched the decline icon. He insulted my intelligence. Did they really think I'd answer it again? Or were they listening for a ring-tone? I flipped the switch to mute, and a second later, the phone vibrated. This time the number was different but still unrecognized.

“They keep calling, trying to find us.”

“Maybe that means we lost them,” she said.

I released my grip on Scarlett and stood up slowly, just until I could peek over the racks of periodicals. Deepthroat paced the wide hallway outside the store, peering off in the opposite direction. I couldn't locate Connor.

“They're waiting outside the store,” I whispered without turning around. “At least one is . . . not sure about the other.” I craned my neck to see around the edge of the dark walnut bookcases. Did they split up again?

Scarlett gasped.

I spun around. Connor had her. One hand covered her mouth and the other squeezed her waist.

“Oldest trick in the book,” he said. “Now, I'm taking the girl. You can let her go peacefully, or you can make a fuss and watch her die.”

I thought
I
had a skewed sense of reality because of too much screen time, but this guy was off the charts. Was he really going to slit her throat right here in the middle of Barnes and Noble? Between
Newsweek
and
Great Castles of Britain
?

Scarlett fought his iron grip, but for him, it must have been like holding a cute, squirming kitten.

Without a second thought, I reached down, picked up a coffee-table book, and rammed it into his face with all my strength. I aimed for his jaw, looking for payback, but I missed. The book struck him across the nose, and I heard a little crack. Even better. He released Scarlett and staggered back a few steps. I didn't think he'd expected resistance.

I glanced at the book in my hand and, for the first time in my life, gained an appreciation for modern art. I tossed the book on the ground, grabbed Scarlett, and practically carried her out of the store, dashing out the side entrance. I heard someone ask, “Are you okay?” I assumed she was speaking to Connor, but I didn't turn around to find out.

The tall man lurked by the front entrance, still trying to lure us into a false sense of security by pretending to watch the wrong way. We ran across the hall into a discount clothing store.

This time, I wasn't going to hide and wait. My car was parked in the garage around the corner and down the main hall. But we were so easy to spot. A tall kid running through the mall, towing a very petite girl with pink hair. Even with the hood on, the pink was like a signal flare.

We moved to the back of the store and ended up by the dressing rooms. Some poor mom had abandoned her stroller there and hauled her kid in with her to try on clothes. It was one of those big, four-wheel-drive–type strollers.

“I have an idea.” I yanked a blue casual dress shirt off a hanger and put it on over my T-shirt, tearing off the tags as discretely as possible. I tucked it in, hoping to look like a yuppie dad. I grabbed a baseball cap from another rack and jammed it on my head. I probably didn't need that. I had basically nondescript brown hair. I checked around to see if I'd been noticed, but the store was thankfully understaffed. Then I tiptoed over and wheeled away the stroller.

“Get in,” I told her.

Scarlett took a step back and bumped into a rack of men's jackets. The hangers clanged, and a few pieces of clothing fell to the floor. “In what?”

I hefted her into the stroller.

“A pram?”

“Yeah, whatever.” Even with her diminutive size, she was way too big. “Pull your legs up.” If she could curl up behind the backseat of my car for twenty minutes undetected, she could hide in a stroller. A baby blanket lay wadded up in the storage basket underneath. I draped it over her then pulled the hood thing forward to conceal her as much as possible.

It wasn't exactly stealing, just borrowing. I guess the shirt and hat maybe, but the mom would get her stroller back eventually—when security found it abandoned in the parking garage. I could come back and pay for the clothes later if I lost sleep about it.

I pushed the stroller quickly, but hopefully calmly, out of the store. No sign of the Dynamic Duo. I pulled out my phone and pretended to talk while I pushed my large toddler down the passageways of the Lloyd Center Mall.

Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Connor and Deepthroat exit a store near the one we'd just left. Connor had a wad of napkins on his nose from the bookstore coffee shop. I grinned.

“I think they're behind us,” I whispered to Scarlett. “But I'm not turning around to check.” My palms were sweaty, and my heart raced.

“Come on, slowcoach,” she said. “Get a wriggle on.”

If two guys hadn't been hunting us through the mall, I would've asked what that could possibly mean. But we didn't have time right then for a language lesson. We'd reached the exit to the parking garage, and I wheeled her out through the glass double doors and into the garage elevator. I'd parked the car down on the lower level. When the doors closed and we were alone, I pulled back the stroller cover.

“We made it. I can't believe it worked,” I said as my pulse began to stabilize.

“You know, I've never been in a pram before. It's kind of nice. I'll have to get me one.” She laughed. “A little scary though. I might need my nappy changed.” She chuckled at her little joke.