Hope for the Best

by Vanessa Lafleur

  Three loud cracks pounded in her ears. Nick’s breathing sped up so she tightened her grip on his hand once again. “It’s okay, we’re safe,” she repeated over and over again, unsure of whether she even believed her own words. She felt certain that the men would walk right over to their hiding place and demand the pendant, but after minutes of silence she opened her eyes. The four men had disappeared and Galloway lay crumpled and lifeless where he had stood only minutes earlier.

  Chapter 41

  “They’re gone,” she whispered.

  “Are you sure?” Nick asked with his eyes squeezed shut.

  “I’m sure.”

  He opened his eyes and looked out across the blacktop. “Is he . . .?”

  “Yeah,” Lareina answered, trying not to look too closely. “I have to get out of here.”

  “But I don’t understand what just happened. What are these pendants? Do they know that I have one too? Are there other people who are going to come after us to get them?” His words hurtled through the space between them in rhythm with her heartbeat.

  Building dread tasted stale in her mouth and bitter hostility burned in her chest, flooding over her, taking control of her thoughts, words, actions. She started to sit up, then changed her mind and ducked down again. “I don’t know, but I’m done. This is your friend’s mess, not mine.” She couldn’t breathe, her chest ached, and Nick’s questions throbbed in her head. She crawled out from under the bridge, considered standing, but couldn’t find the courage. Using her elbows, she propelled herself forward, ignoring her shaky muscles and the wet grass that soaked her clothes. Then she remembered Nick’s accusations: you’re a thief, you’re a liar, we don’t really know anything about her.

  “Hey, wait.” Loud rustling in the grass behind her indicated his irritating nearness. “Where are you going?”

  She stopped and turned so quickly that Nick almost ran into her. A screen of grass waved between them. She didn’t want to be alone; some part of her wanted to trust him. She could forgive him, promise to change, try to understand his perspective, but she had already done all of those things once. More than once.

  “I can’t do it anymore.” She gasped for air. “Just leave me alone.” She waved a hand at him the way she would shoo a fly.

  “But what about Aaron and going back to Nebraska?” He sounded just confused enough to be pathetic.

  “I’ll take care of Aaron. He won’t be able to escape when you trade him to The Defiance for an apple.” Tears blurred her vision. She turned away and started crawling again.

  The image of Galloway begging for his life swam across the inside of her eyelids. Her villain had his own enemies, but they weren’t her friends. They wanted the same thing, and she knew they wouldn’t stop searching. Had they believed him? Did they really think a seventeen-year-old girl named Lareina had continually evaded a detective and carried a seemingly valueless piece of jewelry across Texas?

  A wall rose out of the grass to meet her, to slow her progress, to block her path. The trap was bigger than she had ever understood. Escaping Galloway had been difficult enough. She couldn’t outmaneuver an entire network of people, a worldwide search tightening around her by the minute. Tears swerved down her cheek and her lungs burned with every breath. Giving into exhaustion, she sat up and rested her head against cool bricks. Disoriented, she looked for a familiar landmark. Crumbling buildings surrounded her. Spindly trees fought through the grass that threatened to engulf everything. What had this place been? She reached up to push hair out of her eyes, but her hands shook so much it took three tries to accomplish anything.

  “Lareina, are you okay?” Nick’s voice trembled. His face hovered close to hers, but she kept her forehead pressed against the wall so he wouldn’t see her tears. She opened her mouth to answer him, but no words came out. Then his arms were around her, protecting her, comforting her.

  “It’s okay,” she whispered over and over until she realized she was the one sobbing. “I don’t want to do this anymore.”

  “You don’t have to. We’re going home,” Nick promised.

  She pulled away, but he held her tighter. “You didn’t believe me. You listened to Galloway, a stranger . . . Your friend Ava lied to me . . . she’s the reason . . .” Closing her eyes, she buried her face against his shoulder. She didn’t have the energy to argue or move.

  “He told me Ava was alive.” Nick sniffled. “I wanted that to be true.”

  Taking a deep breath to get her voice under control, she looked up at her friend. Tears ran along the contours of his nose.

  “I messed up,” he choked, “and I’m sorry. It’s not enough but I’m sorry.”

  She wiped her own tears away with the sleeve of her jacket. Nick had an infuriating way of making her feel sorry for him when he didn’t deserve it.

  “You came back.”

  He held the palms of his hands flat against the top of his head. A smile formed then vanished. “I only got in your way. You were right when we first met. I don’t know what I’m doing.”

  A piece of tarp, caught in some trees, snapped in a gust of wind and they both froze, expecting men in gray suits to materialize, but no one appeared. Pulling the pendant out of his pocket, he pressed it into her hand. She looked down at it, so familiar yet strange against her dirt-smeared skin.

  “You keep that one and I’ll keep mine. There’s no reason for them to have both when they catch me.” Nick spoke to his shoes. She said nothing.

  He stood and took a few backward steps away from her. Then he froze, watching her where she sat, half hidden in the wind-ruffled grass. “I meant to tell you—I like your haircut.” He smiled and so did she. Then he turned and step-by-step, the fog erased his presence.

  Squeezing the pendant so tight her knuckles burned, she watched his back moving away from her. She brushed her bangs out of her eyes as he became a shadow then an outline. He had betrayed her in the worst way possible. He had abandoned her like everyone else . . . but he had come back and stood up to Galloway. Despite three months of Nick hurting her feelings with his judgments and Lareina insulting his pride, they’d made it to this point. Through the desperation at Oak Creek, bailing off trains, and even traveling in different directions, they’d always found each other. Watching his outline fade against the horizon stung like pins in her lungs, stealing her breath away again.

  “Nick, wait,” she shouted, pulling herself to her feet.

  He stopped, a blurry blob in a colorless world. She waded forward through waist-deep grass, marking her progress as his features came into focus: blue jeans, blue jacket, blond hair, thin nose, hands in his pockets, face drawn in misery, eyes shining with hope.

  Stopping in front of him, she smiled, and held out her hand. “Hey, my name is Lareina. I don’t have a last name, but I do have this mysterious pendant.”

  Nick grinned, breathed, understood. He took her hand and squeezed it. “Nice to meet you Lareina. I’m Nick Ziel. I’m trying to get home, to Nebraska. Where are you headed?” A raindrop landed on her sleeve, and she watched it slide toward her wrist. “I’m going to Nebraska too.”

  He wiped rain from his forehead. “I can’t believe it, everyone else I’ve talked to has told me I’m going in the wrong direction.”

  “Because it’s cold and boring with no civilization?” she said without cracking a smile. He laughed and soon she joined him despite the cold rain. For a second, joy rose through the bleak mist that tottered between rain and fog. Laughter drowned out the fighting, hunger, loss, and despair. Then some loud pops followed by lower echoes of the originals shattered the silence. Jumping closer to Nick, she imagined Aaron alone and frightened in the hotel room. Smoke rose into the sky in a thick black plume.

  “We should get back to Aaron.” Without waiting for a response, she marched forward, lifting her knees, and propelling herself toward the city as fast as she could without getting tangled in the grass. Nick appeared beside her, breathing heavily with the burst of effort it took to catch
up. Their eyes met, reflections of the same worry, and they started to run.

  A light breeze sliced through thick fog. Buildings, bridges, and cars became visible once again. Bronze light filtered through the remaining clouds, giving the city an eerie glow. A pale sun fragmented in shattered glass and glittered across every shimmering surface.

  Following Nick, she sprinted over deserted sidewalks. They rushed into the hotel, ignoring clusters of people in the lobby who stared at them. Relief at discovering the building still standing mixed with worry about Aaron’s condition. She rushed to the elevator and Nick stepped up beside her, panting, hands on his head, elbows pointing out. She pressed a large button calling the elevator, then stared at the silver doors, waiting for them to slide apart. They didn’t move. She pressed the button again, listened. Nothing. Lareina pounded the heel of her hand against the little glowing green arrow before Nick caught her arm. With his hand gently gripping her elbow, she watched the doors slide apart in a whoosh of air. Together they stepped inside and Nick pressed the right buttons.

  “So, what’s the plan?” he asked as the elevator rumbled up the shaft.

  “We’re getting on a train to Nebraska one way or another,” she said with a determination so strong she surprised even herself.

  “But all I have are two tickets in the wrong direction,” he reminded her.

  The elevator dinged and the doors slid open. She stared at the light blue wall of the hallway. “I promised not to lie to you anymore, so here’s the truth. We’re not buying any tickets.”

  The doors started to slide back together. Nick stepped onto the threshold, sending them back into hiding. “You mean you’re going to steal them.” His smile sank into a frown, head into his shoulders, hopes into the elevator shaft. “Lareina, stealing, lying, stowing away . . . it’s going to get you in trouble or worse. I don’t want you to end up like me at Oak Creek.”

  She looked over at the disapproval on his face, but she noticed something new. A gentleness remained in his eyes, not accusing but pleading.

  “I’ll be careful,” she promised. “But we have to get Aaron out of here.”

  Nick nodded, but his smile didn’t reappear. He stepped off the elevator and she followed him into the hallway of one hundred white doors. What kinds of lives did the people staying behind those doors lead? Most of them probably weren’t pretending to be someone else. More than likely they weren’t afraid to greet people on the street in case they were recognized from a wanted poster. In all likelihood they didn’t steal all of their food and break into houses when they needed clean laundry.

  Before opening the door to room 814, Nick stopped and turned to her. “I understand that we don’t have another choice. I trust you.”

  He pushed the door open and disappeared into the room. She wanted to say something comforting, but she knew neither of them would feel safe until they were aboard a moving train. Maybe they wouldn’t be safe anywhere, but leaving Dallas might buy them a few more days, and that was all they ever seemed to have anyway.

  Chapter 42

  Twenty-four. Twenty-five. Lareina counted the cars of a train chugging by, picking up speed on its way out of Dallas. Workers had spent the previous hour loading the last fifteen cars with boxes and bags of goods. With The Defiance taking over Dallas, people flocked to the train station. Crowds bustled everywhere. Everyone wanted a ticket, but few could afford them. People pushed through the crowd, pulling suitcases and wagons or pushing wheelbarrows and strollers of their hurriedly packed possessions. Men and women begged for money; children shrieked in their mother’s arms.

  “Out of the way, clear a path to the ticket booth,” one man shouted. No one moved, and he made slow progress pushing through the shoulder to shoulder crowd.

  “I want to go home,” a little girl whined.

  “I want to ride the train,” her brother exclaimed excitedly.

  “Everyone move in an orderly fashion. One line to the tickets and one line to board.” A man in a long black coat spoke through a megaphone, attempting to bring about some kind of order, but no one listened.

  About the time the final cars were being loaded, passengers had arrived and piled into the first ten cars. Those cars were guarded with the heaviest surveillance. Two guards waited at each entry point, taking tickets before anyone entered, and turning away or sometimes dragging away anyone trying to board without a ticket.

  Lareina had her eyes on the freight cars. From what she had observed, two guards walked up and down the length of those cars and shooed people away to prevent theft of the cargo. But during that time workers, dressed in plain clothes, bustled in and out of the cars, carrying boxes and often asking the guards questions regarding the placement of goods.

  Now the track was empty, awaiting the arrival and loading of the next train to Nebraska. She didn’t know what the train would carry, but considering that its departure was scheduled for eleven o’clock and it was nine, she figured it should have been there already. I should be looking at it right in front of me, she thought. Her head ached and she rubbed her forehead. Trains sometimes come behind schedule. As long as they keep running, everything will be okay.

  “Are you going to eat something?” Nick asked, interrupting her plans.

  She looked over at the boys beside her. They nibbled at bread and cheese Nick had purchased with the ten dollars he made from selling the gun. Sitting against the side of the ticket booth in shadowy darkness kept them clear of the bustle but gave them an unobstructed view of the constant train traffic.

  “I’m not that hungry,” she replied and turned back to the empty tracks.

  “You should eat before we get on the train. It’s going to be a long trip,” Aaron suggested. He seemed a little stronger and more optimistic than the night before. Maybe all the rest helped, she thought. But his leg was still infected and he needed medical care.

  Nodding, she reached over for a chunk of cheese and crumbled it absentmindedly between her fingers. “The train should be here by now. What if it doesn’t come?”

  “It’ll be here.” Nick didn’t sound so sure.

  “I think I can hear it coming right now.” Aaron looked down the tracks, eyes bright.

  They both turned to him. Please don’t start hallucinating, Lareina thought. That’s the last thing I need right now.

  “I don’t hear anything.” She tried to smile. “Maybe it was some other noise.”

  “Shhh. Just listen,” Aaron insisted.

  Although it seemed a hopeless task, they stopped talking and strained to hear the urgent warning of a train approaching. Silence. She could hear nothing but silence. What am I supposed to say to Aaron? A muffled whistle sounded off in the distance, no louder than someone playing a flute down the block. At first she thought she was only hearing what she wanted to until the whistle blared again, louder and closer.

  Nick nudged her arm with his elbow. “I hear it. It’s real, Lareina.”

  “I hear it too.” She smiled.

  “See, I’m not completely useless,” Aaron joked.

  All three of them kept their eyes on the tracks until a train chugged into the station and stopped with a hiss. Doors opened and people spilled onto the platform, talking, laughing, and disappearing into a thinning crowd around the ticket booth. Workers swarmed around the train, checking it for mechanical problems and carrying boxes up ramps and into freight cars at the back. This will be my last chance to get us out of here, she thought.

  The night remained warm and calm with a bright moon to illuminate everything below. Clear, perfect weather in early winter. Hadn’t she wished for those conditions thousands of times over the past months? Finally her wish had come true, but it wasn’t ideal for a night of undercover operations.

  Timing is always off, she thought as she walked parallel to the train, far enough away to avoid the crowd.

  Peering around the ticket booth, she observed stacks of brown boxes waiting to be loaded. Luckily the people who loaded boxes in and out of the
train didn’t wear uniforms. Most of them wore jeans, sweatshirts, and tennis shoes. It provided the perfect opportunity for the chaos that she planned to use to her advantage.

  She had tasked Nick with sneaking Aaron onto the train. Wanting them as close to the train as possible, she sent them down the tracks to hide behind another small building. They would still have about one hundred yards of wide-open space to cross to reach the boxcar they had chosen.

  “How are you going to get on the train?” Nick had asked her.

  “I don’t know yet,” she had told him. “I might not, but I’ll meet you in Maibe as soon as I can.”

  He shook his head when he heard they might be separated. She thought he might argue or refuse to go through with the plan. Instead, he swallowed hard and said, “Be careful, and I’ll take care of Aaron.”

  “Everything will be okay,” she had replied, and she believed it. The plan would work now that they all trusted each other. They were truly in it together, working for a common goal. She wouldn’t let anyone hurt her family. Before leaving she leaned in and kissed Nick on the cheek, then walked away quickly.

  Holding onto that memory, she left the safety of darkness and strolled into the well-lit area of stockpiled boxes. She knew if any part of her plan failed, she probably wouldn’t see Nick or Aaron ever again. Yet she moved forward. The faster she completed the mission, the faster they would all be safe. With as much confidence as she could muster, she walked right up to the loading area only to be overwhelmed by the massive number of boxes. She stopped and stared up at the pile.

  “Hey there, no dawdling. We have to get all of this on the train in the next twenty minutes,” a stern but not unkind voice ordered.

  Quickly, she turned to see a woman, not much older than herself, standing next to her with a clipboard. “I’m sorry.”