Shooting Scars (The Artists Trilogy #2)

Shooting Scars (The Artists Trilogy #2) Page 43

In the end, he was here. Just like he said he’d be.

My mind fluttered over to Javier and the day ahead of me. I believed that Javier would never put me in any danger that I couldn’t get myself out of but now I was starting to second guess things. How bad was his need for revenge this time around?

And he knew … he knew this whole time what had happened to Camden, that he was on the run, and he’d never told me. I guess he knew if he had, I would’ve run away, I would’ve found some way to escape. With Camden on the run, Javier had no way of getting to him, of hurting him. I wouldn’t have been coerced into this whole fucking mess.

He had wanted me to kill my parents. It was a ridiculous notion and I could only figure that it was his way of trying to settle things with the people who hurt me. Maybe that’s why he was doing it to Travis too. Though romantics would argue that was a sign of true love, it sat wrong inside of me, like food that wouldn’t digest. Because as nearly noble as it seemed, why get me to do it?

I sighed and rubbed my hands on my face. I didn’t know what the fuck I was going to do. Last night, seeing Camden in my room, I was ready to run to him, leave with him and Gus and try to make a break for it. I’m glad that we didn’t. Javier’s men would have shot them on sight. I don’t know what his plans for me would have been. Perhaps, knowing Camden was really gone this time, I would have broken completely.

I was being yanked in different directions and it was tearing me up inside. I never fell back in love with Javier, my body spoke a different language than that, but he still tricked me. He still made me believe in the lies. How deep did his feelings for me go? I knew they never went all the way to the roots, I’d told myself that, but some tiny part of me hoped for his redemption, that I somehow held the key to his soul.

Perhaps that was exactly what my ego wanted to hear. Like it wanted to hear Camden tell me I was good. I didn’t think I was going to get that either.

He was different, too. His body shot, his heart blown out by what I had done. Last night I was so sure he was going to hold me close to him and make me feel the safety he was promising, I thought he was going to give me the protection I’d associated with him. Instead, he stared at me like I was a burden to him. A lost little girl he’d come after to bail out and now was stuck with the task. Camden was also a man of his word, and for better or worse, I knew he’d be there for me till the end – even if he didn’t want to be. That’s the thought that really stung, that dug deep, that he’d be there for me out of deep-seated devotion, a sense of obligation, not because he really wanted to be. I was afraid he’d start to resent me.

He slowly opened his eyes and tried to move. He stopped, groaning pitifully, face scrunched up in anguish.

“Do you want some Tylenol?” I asked.

He grunted and shook his head slightly. “No, I have some better shit than that. I just hate how happy it makes me feel.”

I swallowed. “Maybe I should take some then.”

He tilted his head, eyes on me. “Sometimes it’s better to deal with the pain than mask it. It always comes back.”

His lips were begging me to meet them with mine. Another spear of shame and regret rocked through me. I got up, went to the sink, and got him a glass of water.

When I came back he was sitting up looking like he was in incredible pain.

“Is it your back?”

He nodded, took the glass of water from me. He fished two pills out of his pocket and finished the water. He wiped his mouth and exhaled. “Unfortunately, I won’t be able to deal with this pain. Not today. Not when we have to figure out what to do.”

I went over to the window and peeked through it. No wonder the air felt so heavy today. The sun was gone. Those dark clouds I had seen hovering over the sea for so long had finally rolled in and smothered us with a low, claustrophobic ceiling.

“What do you think I should do?” I asked, my eyes now searching the courtyard for anyone patrolling it. It was quiet, dead as anything, all the guests still asleep in their rooms or having their morning coffees and shaking their heads at the one day the weather decided to be a bitch. Well, it was still hurricane season. They should have known better. We all should have known better.

“I know I have to lay low here until you go,” he said. He laughed and I turned to look at him. His eyes looked glazed, a lazy smile on his lips.

“Good shit?” I asked, taking a seat beside him on the bed.

He nodded, still smiling. Oh god, his dimples. I wanted him to keep taking these drugs, over and over again, so I could see them, so he could be happy and not hate me. I wanted him oblivious and loving me. I wanted my image in his eyes to be pure and good and untainted.

He sighed, leaning back against the headboard. “Ellie, I have something for you.”

I waited while he went into his pocket and pulled out a small box that looked like a tin for tiny mints. He put it in my hand and told me to open it, his words slurring slowly.

“Shouldn’t we do this when you’re not high?” I asked.

“It’s pretty self-explanatory.” He waved at it.

I shrugged and opened the tin. It was a tiny red dot of plastic, no bigger than the end of a pencil.

“What is this? Wireless mic?”

He shook his head. “One more guess.”

“A tracking device?”

He smiled again and my heart jumped. “Bingo. Put that on the underside of your necklace.”

I looked down at the razor blade and lifted it up.

“I’ll help you in a few,” he said.

“I’ve got it,” I said, taking the dot out of the tin, sticking it to the back of the necklace. From Javier’s mic the other day, to the tracking device, I’d turned into a walking instrument. I guess it was better than being a walking weapon.

Camden fished out his cell from his pocket and waved it at me. “I’m not really sure how but as soon as I bring it to him, Gus has you in the system so we can start tracking your every move.”

“What was the original plan?”

He shrugged his one shoulder, head rolling to the side. “We didn’t know. We weren’t sure if you’d come with us, if you’d want to leave. If you’d even come back from Travis. We could only hope.”

“And what do you hope?”

He straightened his head and gave me a steady gaze. “I hope we can all be here together.”

I looked at my hands, wringing them together. “I have to go with Travis tonight.”

He swallowed hard. “So you’ll go with Travis. And then you’ll escape.”

I raised my brow. “How?”

“Well, you said you’ll be going out for dinner. We’ll be tracking you. We’ll know where you are. You go to the bathroom window or through the kitchen or however you can figure it and we’ll be there waiting for you. We’ll find you. And we’ll all leave together.”

I shook my head roughly. “No. He’s got people everywhere.”

“I know. We saw them. But he’s got his people looking out for him. They won’t be watching you. Once you’re there with him, they won’t have a reason to. You’re just an American tourist to him, one hot piece of ass. He’s going to work on impressing you and you’re going to be impressed then he’ll have no reason to worry why you’re taking so long in the bathroom.”

The way he was telling me what I had to do was familiar. But this time, it was comforting because I knew he had my best interests in mind. I knew I could trust him one hundred percent, because I’d left him in the dust in Palm Valley and he was here with me now. This could work. I could get out of all of this.

“I just …” he began and trailed off.

“What?”

“I just hope that once we leave, that you can leave it for good.”

I gulped. “You think I’d return to this place?”

“Not this place. Not this city. The place inside you. The place where killing Travis still sounds like a good idea. I know you want him dead, Ellie, and there’s nothing wrong with that. But once we leave, we have to let it go. Everything and everyone.”

I know he meant Javier by that. I nodded. “I will do that. I will leave.”

“You will, but does that mean you can?”

Outside thunder rumbled ominously.

He exhaled loudly. “Looks like a storm is coming. You better get ready for your day. You never know when Enrico will stop by with a new message.”

“You better get back in the closet then,” I said.

“If only my father could hear that,” he said, attempting a joke. His brow furrowed in pain and I had to wonder how he was dealing with everything. Not only me or his gunshot wound but Sophia turning on him and being wanted by the police. His father had to know too, the man Camden could never be good enough for. My poor, poor Camden. He’d taken enough.

He got up and used the washroom quickly, had a banana and went back in the closet. I got ready and waited, waited long enough so that when there finally was a knock at my door, I was ready for it.

It was Enrico. I opened the door and a gust of electric air came in.

“Just checking in on you,” Enrico said. “Any problems last night?”

“No, I went to bed. Looks like a storm is coming.”

“There’s a category one hurricane off the coast. Nothing to worry about, just no sun tanning today.”

I smiled politely and stared at him until he cleared his throat.

“The other reason I am here is that Javier has a message for you.”

My gut twisted.

“What is it?”

“He wants to meet here at this café at 11AM today.” He handed me a business card.

“Is this a good idea?”

“That is not for me to say. Have a good day, Miss Willis. I will have the cab waiting for you out front a half hour prior.”

Enrico turned and walked away. I knew Camden was in the closet, catching all of that. At least then he could finally come out after I left, assuming that Javier’s men would be trailing after me. Then he could activate the tracking device and I would have his protection.

I got ready for the day, feeling slightly self-conscious with Camden there, hiding out of sight. I put on a simple strapless maxi dress and fluffed out my hair with my fingers, doing a quick sweep of makeup.

At twenty after ten, I grabbed my purse and left the room, whispering, “See you later,” to Camden, hoping he had heard me. Hoping that I would see him later. I had no idea what Javier had planned for me now. Everything was turned on its head.

The café wasn’t a long cab ride from the market, and I got there early. I didn’t see Javier anywhere. I sat down at one of the tables inside, the threatening clouds producing wind that whipped scattered loose napkins around on the streets like white tumbleweeds.

I waited there for an hour at my table, finally indulging in a crêpe and some fruit, when the waiter slipped me a note. It said “mujeres baño andale” in unknown cursive handwriting, perhaps the waiter’s.

I looked up at the waiter but he was already walking past and delivering food to someone else. I got up and made my way through the café to the woman’s bathroom, trying to stay cool. Suddenly I was very afraid.