“How?” I whispered.
Adrian lowered his phone.
“I don’t know yet.”
“You said your security team found out?”
He nodded.
“One of my people was coordinating with airport operations because we’re being taken out through a private exit. Someone contacted an employee asking whether a woman named Elena Walker was traveling with a little girl.”
My arms tightened instinctively around Lily.
She was still half asleep against me, warm and impossibly peaceful, one small hand tangled in the fabric of my sweater.
“Did they say who?”
“Not at first. The person claimed it was a family emergency. When airport staff refused to give information, he left a callback number.”
“And it belongs to Ethan.”
“Yes.”
I looked toward the windows.
Houston stretched beyond the glass in a patchwork of highways, warehouses, neighborhoods, and late-afternoon haze machen.
I had imagined landing here would feel like escape.
Instead, I suddenly felt as though the life I had fled had followed me through the clouds.
“I didn’t tell him,” I said.
Adrian studied me.
“Tell him what?”
“That I was coming here.”
“Who knew?”
“My cousin Marisol. My attorney. My mother, although she’s in Arizona.” I swallowed. “And the airline, obviously.”
“Anyone else?”
“No.”
The landing gear struck the runway.
Lily stirred.
I held her closer.
Adrian said nothing for several moments.
I appreciated that.
He didn’t tell me not to worry.
He didn’t promise that everything would be fine.
People said those things when they wanted to make themselves feel useful.
Finally he asked, “Do you feel unsafe around Ethan?”
The question was simple.
The answer wasn’t.
I looked down at Lily.
“Not exactly.”
Adrian waited.
