The Rules for Breaking (18 page)

He looks down at the watch again, like he’s seeing it for the first time. “No shit. Can you prove it? If you can, it’s worth a lot. If not, I’ll give you ten bucks.”

“Ten bucks,” Ethan spits out. “Ten bucks?”

We have no proof of where we got it. And ten bucks isn’t going to do anything for us.

“Have you seen any pictures of a girl hanging out of the third-floor window of Ursuline?” I ask.

“You mean that tour company that’s saying they have proof of a sighting and flashing pictures around to anybody walking around the Quarter?”

“That’s me! I’m the one in the picture!”

The man says, “Girlie, I don’t think that picture is real. That’s somebody getting a little crazy with the Photoshop. If that’s all you got, my offer is ten bucks.”

“Wait,” Teeny says. She lifts up the edge of her sweatshirt and I see the packet of letters hidden there. Francesca’s letters. “If we have proof of where it came from, how much can we get?”

The pawnbroker steps up onto something because he’s grown at least a foot and leans toward the plastic barrier. “Whatcha got there?”

Teeny holds them up but away from the metal tray. “Letters between Francesca DuBois and a boy named Henry. The same Henry written on the back of this picture.” Teeny unties the ribbon from around her neck and holds it and the envelopes up in front of the thick window. “Francesca was a girl from France who lived on the third floor of Ursuline and she writes all about it here.”

His eyes get huge. “Let me see ’em,” he says.

Teeny shakes her head. “No. That girl in the picture is my sister. We have been in a room on the third floor of Ursuline for several days. You make me a deal first then you get them. You’re not the only one who will give us money for this.”

I’m in awe of her right now. Ethan is, too. I know how much she treasures that picture and the letters. The distraction of reading them is probably the only thing that got her through our captivity.

Teeny and the pawnbroker haggle back and forth, but he finally gives in to Teeny’s demands. When a small stack of hundred dollar bills slide through the tray, I want to cry.

The pawnbroker scurries to some hidden back room with his newly acquired treasures before we finish pulling the bills from the tray.

We step out of the shop and I pull Teeny in close. “I’m sorry you had to give it all up. I know how much it meant to you.”

She shrugs and says, “Francesca was trapped. She wouldn’t have wanted us to be trapped, too. Do you think she died of that sickness he was talking about?

I hug her tighter. “No, I think Henry showed up and took her back to England. And they had ten kids and lived to be ninety-two.”

She giggles.

Ethan shoves the money in his pocket and we’re on the move again. “Okay, this is what we’ll do. We’ll grab a cheap room for the night where we can shower, sleep, and decide what to do next. At least we’ll get off the street.”

“Food. Let’s get food, too,” Teeny adds.

“Anything you want, since you saved the day.”

Twenty minutes later, we’ve got a piping hot pizza, a bag full of touristy T-shirts and sweatpants, and we’re making our way to our room.

Rules for disappearing
by Witness Protection prisoner #18A7R04M:

If you have to get a job, do not make friends there. Don’t ask your coworkers about their boyfriend, girlfriend, dog, cat, latest fad diet, thoughts on global warming or anything else remotely personal….

New rule by Anna Boyd:

Make as many friends as you can. If you get in a bind and need help, at least there will be someone willing to come when you call.

shuts the bathroom door and starts the water for a shower. Ethan and I look anywhere but at each other. It’s awkward. And totally awful.

“Do you want to talk about it?” I ask.

He’s pacing the room, taking bites of pizza. We let him shower first since it would be his first since the island, and now he’s padding around in a Saints T-shirt and sweatpants, with fat wet curls. He looks adorable.

“I’m not sure I’m ready to talk about it. I’m still so pissed at Tyler. And Thomas. It’s making me insane.” He throws me a look I can’t read. “Let’s figure out what we’re going to do and we’ll figure out the other…part later.”

I swallow hard and try not to cry. “Okay, who do we call? No police. No parents. What are you thinking?”

“I don’t know….”

“Do you think Thomas has someone in Arkansas, watching them? How would he know what they’re doing?” I ask as I use my fingers to brush through the tangles from my wet hair. “Definitely no local police. What do you think about calling the police from a different city? What about Sheriff Pippin?”

“I thought about him, but I’m afraid to call him. He’s pretty tight with Agent Williams—what if he calls him even if we tell him not to? He would automatically believe that Agent Williams is a good guy and I’m not sure that’s true.”

I think about Agent Williams and his part in this. “I don’t think he’s a bad guy. I think whatever he did, if he did anything, was because Thomas had Noah.”

“Still doesn’t mean we want Sheriff Pippin calling him and telling him where we are.”

I pull the comforter off the bed and throw it on the floor. Teeny and I saw a show on TV once that did a story on really disgusting things found on hotel bedding and I can’t look at that faded paisley blanket without imagining what it looks like under one of those creepy lights. I climb on the bed and sit cross-legged on the scratchy sheets, but don’t feel like these are any cleaner.

Ethan throws the pizza crust in the trash and continues the pacing. “What part do we think Agent Williams played in this? You said Thomas took Noah away; where do you think he took him? I don’t think Agent Williams is on our side until he has his grandson back.”

“Me, either.”

“Are we sure Agent Hammond is the mole?”

“When I was crawling around the ceiling, I looked down into Thomas’s room right after I left yours. Tyler was in there, too. Tyler asked Thomas i
f
Hammond was down here yet and Thomas said no, but it was okay because he didn’t need him until tomorrow.”

Ethan comes and sits on the edge of the bed, far enough away from me as he could get and still be on the bed. “We need to get out of New Orleans. Quick. We can figure out what to do later, but I think the most important thing is to get as far away from here as possible.”

“So how do we do that? And where do we go?”

And he’s back up, wearing a path across the thin brown carpet from one wall to the other. “We can’t go back to Natchitoches right now. We could go to Pearl’s camp, but the suits know about that place. I could call Will. Or Ben. I doubt Thomas is watching them. I get that he’s connected, but he can’t have an unlimited supply of people helping him. They could come get us and I could get word to Fred about our parents stuck on that island. Ben’s got family in Texas, an aunt I met a few years ago.”

Fred is Ethan’s aunt Pearl’s boyfriend she doesn’t think anyone knows about. And Will would come in a heartbeat, but the thought o
f
Mateo harming him or Ben, just because of us, is frightening.

“You don’t think someone will be watching them?” I ask. I mean, where does it end? Are they watching Catherine, too?

Ethan leans against the window, resting his forehead against the glass. “I have no idea, Anna.” He sounds defeated.

I get off the bed and walk to where he is. I stand behind him, trying to decide if I’m brave enough to touch him. I hesitate a moment more then wrap my arms around him.

He tenses but doesn’t pull away.

“Let’s call Will. I hate this, too, but we’re in over our heads. At least it will get us out of town and maybe we can go to the police in another town. Tell them everything.”

“And then what? We’ll still have that contract on us.”

“We’ll figure it out as we go.” Resting my chin on his shoulder, I turn to kiss the side of his neck. “And I’m so sorry, Ethan. I really am. I should have told you everything I knew the second I had the chance.”

He leans back against me and hope soars through my body. “I’m just so angry about all of this, Anna. And I hated that I found out what your relationship was from
him
. And I didn’t understand why you would hide that from me. It just caught me so off guard. I really think I would have killed him if you didn’t stop me.”

Ethan slowly turns me around and backs me against the wall. He pins me there with his hips against mine and our hands locked together above my head. I can feel him pressed against me from my toes to my shoulders and up my arms.

“I was so jealous. The thought of that son of a bitch touching you makes me want to rip his head off. I’m sorry I was such an ass.”

He leans his head in and we’re kissing. The kind of kissing that we haven’t done since that day in the hammock. His hands let go of mine and sift through my hair. I move against him, snaking my hands under his shirt, and wish we were anywhere but here.

His mouth moves to my neck and then to my ear where he whispers, “The water’s stopped.”

“Huh?” I answer between kisses.

“Teeny. She’ll be out any minute.”

I know this looks bad but I don’t want to stop. It isn’t until we hear the doorknob turn that Ethan backs away, and I almost fall to the ground.

“I’m done,” Teeny says, looking between the two of us. “Were y’all making out?”

Oh, good Lord.

“I think I’ll take another shower,” Ethan says as he all but sprints to the bathroom.

“But you already took one,” Teeny says just as he closes the door. “He must feel really dirty.”

I crawl back on the bed and try not to let Teeny see me blush.

Morning comes after a restless night. There is only one bed in the room, a double, so Teeny started out between us, but ended upside down across us. I think she was the only one who got any sleep.

We’ve decided not to call from the room. If phones are being traced, whoever is looking knows where we are, but there’s no need to lead them to our exact location.

The French Quarter is very different in the light of day. The streets are clean, mostly, and lots of shops and cafés are open for business. It’s surprising to see so many art galleries sandwiched between touristy T-shirt shops. There was a huge discussion between the three of us before we left about whether leaving the room was stupid or not. But since we didn’t want to call from the room, we didn’t have much of a choice. We walk to the riverfront, passing by St. Louis Cathedral, in search of a public phone. We look for the man with the cross tattoos the entire time. After a few blocks, we find the first set of phone booths.

Ethan cashes in five dollars for quarters, drops a handful in the slot, then dials Will’s number.

“Hey, it’s me but don’t say my name out loud. Are you alone?”

Teeny points to the building with a green-and-white–striped awning across the street where there are a line of people.

“Can we eat there? It looked good when we passed by.”

“We’ll see.” I’m trying to hear what Ethan is saying and be on the lookout, but a group of street musicians crank up not ten feet from us. I can’t even hear myself think.

Ethan gets off the phone and pulls us down the block.

“Will’s coming. Leaving immediately and bringing some cash. He’s stopping by Pearl’s and telling her about what’s happening in Arkansas. Fred is an ex-marine, so hopefully he can handle whatever is happening over there. We’ll figure out where to go when Will gets here.”

“I don’t feel good,” Teeny says.

“She’s hungry. Let’s walk over there.” I point to the restaurant she showed me a few minutes ago and we get in line. Turning to Teeny, I say, “We’ll get this to go and head back to the room. I don’t like being out on the street.”

The line moves slowly. It looks like they serve those same powdery fried donuts I’ve had in Natchitoches and my mouth starts watering.

The restaurant itself is open-air and packed. I can’t help but laugh when I see the group of girls from last night. They’re wearing the same clothes and look really hungover. The bride still has the veil on but all the condoms are gone.

“Did you tell Will where we’re staying?”

“No, I want to be able to watch him when he gets here, make sure no one is following him. We came down here last fall for a Saints game and hung out in this bar on Bourbon. I told him to meet me there. I’ll get there early while you and Teeny hang out in the room. When I know it’s safe, we’ll come pick y’all up.”

I’m just about to argue with him that we shouldn’t be separated when my eyes fall on someone familiar. Just a passing blur at first but when I spot him again, I know it’s him the second I see his face. He’s dressed like a tourist, shorts and a T-shirt, but that short haircut and perpetual scowl is unmistakable. It’s Agent Hammond and he sees me, too.