The Girl She Used to Be (11 page)

“Keep your head down,” Sean says. He pulls onto the road and the SUV is swaying in every direction, fishtailing from one lane
to another, and the wheels are squealing like they’re begging for mercy.

The Germans had nothing to do with this vehicle whatsoever.

I pop my head up to say something and Sean smashes it back down like he’s playing Whac-A-Mole. “I said stay down!”

I’m not sure what bothers me more: that Jonathan, for better or for worse, is going to get the wrong impression about why
I am not there when he returns to the Audi, or that I’m lying on the dirty floor of a Ford Explorer with my head resting on
a pillow of empty Big Gulp containers.

After a few minutes—and once the Explorer has stabilized—I pull myself up from the floor and sprawl across the backseat.

“Are you okay?” Sean asks. He does not bother to look at me in the rearview mirror.

“This is getting pretty freaking old.”

“Look, I’m sorry for what happened back at the motel, but we’ve been following your trail since you left. The motel manager
saw you get into a car with someone who was not me. We had people looking for a red convertible Audi in multiple states and
we got a tip when your car spun out on I-95. Another marshal, Deputy Cooper, is two cars behind us and we’re going to take
you to—”

“Are you married?”

Now
he looks in the rearview. “What?”

“Are you married, Sean?” If Jonathan lied to me again,
he’ll
be the one who needs a guardian angel.

He looks down, then back at the road. He says, weakly, “I… was married.”

I yawn. “Divorce?”

“No. My wife, she… she died of breast cancer at a very young age.”

Don’t I feel like a jerk.

I try to change the subject. Sort of. “But you’re wearing a wedding band.”

“Well, I’m still married to her.” He catches my eye in the rearview for a few seconds. “There will only ever be one Mrs. Douglas,
if you know what I mean. My heart is hers, will always be hers, and I wear the ring to… well, partly to remember her
and partly to send the message to other women that I’m not available.”

I raise an eyebrow. I’m not sure whether to be moved by his sentimentality or annoyed at his arrogance.

I go with the arrogance. “Need to beat ’em off with a club, Seanster?”

“We’re going to rendezvous up here in a few minutes with the other deputy.”

Sean is all business, but I’ll tell you I do not feel like an appreciated customer. Fifteen minutes earlier I was finishing
four-star Italian food, drinking good wine and fresh-ground espresso. Now that I’m back in the government’s care, I am relegated
to a plastic backseat and taking orders from a guy making fifty-three grand per annum.

Thanks to Jonathan, salary has now become a hot-button issue for me.

“I need to know everything that happened,” he says.

“He had veal chops and I had the beef carpaccio.”

Sean does not laugh.

“You and
who
?”

Now I’m confused. “What do you mean? You don’t know who I was with?”

Sean mutters under his breath about cars in his way, drives like we’re leaving the scene of our own crime. “The car is registered
to an Anthony J. Bovaro, which tells me plenty. What I want to know is who was driving and where they were taking you. Are
you hurt?”

Sean swerves around a U-Haul and skates back into the fast lane. “Not yet.” I sit up. Even though Sean thinks there’s a threat,
I know the reality. “And there was no
they
. It was just one guy driving.”

“Did he tell you his name?”

I catch a glimpse of myself in the rearview, and if I didn’t know better I’d think someone had supplanted the real me with
an abused, punked-out, and less-seductive Keira Knightley. “His name, uh… I don’t think he told me his name. I mean,
if he did, I don’t remember.”

“How did he apprehend you? Did he have a weapon?”

I smile a little but do not let Sean see. I rub my hand over my sweater and realize how surprisingly powerful textiles can
be. “No, he didn’t have a weapon.”

“Did you know he was part of the Bovaro family?”

“Um, sort of.”

“Did he try to hurt you?”

“No.”

“Did he threaten you in any way?”

I start to daydream and my answers are less responsive. “No, he didn’t.”

Sean stares at me in the mirror for a few seconds and the car suddenly tugs backward; Sean moved his foot off the gas.

“Wait a minute,” he says, “did you go
willingly
?”

I blink a few times and let his question hang in the air. His tone is understood; the feds are not going to allow me to stay
in the program if I’m screwing around with security. I’m probably already on some watch list for scamming them, for letting
my underlying fears and daily languor push me over the edge and in search of a new locale and a new persona.

But if I start to dabble with the folks from whom the feds are protecting me? Things will not be pretty.

I tug at my sweater, hoping it will fall apart and give me a living metaphor to use as a basis for decision, but just like
the man who purchased it, the weave is die-hard.

The choice might seem obvious, but the vague truth quickly surfaces: Jonathan is one single man—one single man who wants to
deliver me to the door of his murderous family—and Sean is a law enforcement officer with the physical backing—and budget—of
the Justice Department. No matter how I feel in Jonathan’s presence, no matter how strong and intense his mysterious pull
is, he could never outweigh the power of the feds.

I take a deep breath and whisper my lie: “I don’t know, I just… I’m very confused right now. I’m very tired.” The
tired
thing almost always shuts them down.

Sean guns it again. Deputy Cooper pulls up next to us as we move into the right lane in order to exit. I watch him for a moment.
He puts a cheeseburger to his mouth and, as he bites, a big glob of ketchup and mustard falls to his chest. He doesn’t notice.

I’m not sure what bothers me more: that it took them this long to catch up or that Deputy Cooper managed to find time to hit
the Golden Arches before heading into pursuit.

I pinch the bridge of my nose and repeat, “I’m very tired.”

“I understand,” Sean says. “Well, just relax. You’re safe now.”

That’s what they all say.

W
E PULL INTO THE PARKING LOT OF THE MARYLAND STATE POLICE Barracks on the northeast side of Baltimore. I can tell we’re on
the northeast side by the smell. I once drove through this area, the little twist of land connecting the Back River to the
Middle River, and I was never able to rid my clothes of the smog-tinged pungency. Sean and Deputy Cooper park side by side,
then they both get out, leaving me in the back like a little kid in a car seat.

They talk for a moment, hands in motion as they speak, then they lean on their vehicles and start laughing.

I’m not sure I see the humor.

They both return to their respective SUVs and start the engines. It appears they had no intention of getting the state police
involved; I guess they figured no criminal would knowingly enter a police station parking lot. Aren’t they clever.

Sean pulls out and Deputy Cooper goes in a different direction.

“It’s just going to be you and me?” I ask.

“For now.”

“Isn’t that against policy? Shouldn’t there always be two deputies transporting me?”

“Afraid I’m going to take advantage of you?”

I smirk. “Not as long as that inch-width wedding band is on your finger.”

He points down the road. “We’re going to head west and get you out in the country.”

“Ingenious.” I’m already bored.

The wheels spin and the signs and trees fly by, and now that we’re on I-70, the subdivisions are spaced farther and farther
apart, and then—
nothing
. Nothing but farmland and cows and old brick or clapboard farmhouses.

I take off my sweater and carefully fold it. I try to open my window but, as usual, it’s locked. “Can I get a little fresh
air, Sean?” He glances at me in the rearview. “It’s a warm afternoon. I just want to take in some of this great country atmosphere.”

Sean checks all around the car and reluctantly unlocks the windows. I press the button and balmy, clean air swirls about the
cabin. I close my eyes and breathe it in, but it’s not enough. I slide over in the seat and rest my head on the edge of the
door and let the wind rush through my short hair. I pretend I am still with Jonathan and the top is down and he is taking
me somewhere safe.

As much as I want the daydream to last the evening, the sound of Sean’s beeping phone and whatever else is making noise on
the dashboard reminds me that I am not safe and not about to experience pleasure of any sort. Hours earlier I’d felt like
I was living—no matter how close to dying I actually was—for the first time. Jonathan gave me a glimpse of the sweetness of
being free and I realize now that I may need to harbor that memory for the rest of my life.

Though I have been on this earth for twenty-six years, the last twenty have been one long string of boredom knotted by a few
moments of unimaginable terror. I have never traveled overseas. I have never stayed up late partying with my friends. I have
never been able to study at a university because of the risk that I would be whisked off at a moment’s notice and lose all
the years of education I’d worked so diligently to achieve. I have not worked my way up the corporate ladder just to have
it pulled from beneath me on my way to another small town where a job as a shop clerk was waiting for me. I have never, for
one moment, understood what it was like to create or design or build something long lasting.

But today I got to eat fine food with a good-looking, strong man, and for the first time the boredom and fear made way for
a new emotion,
delight
, to enter the picture. As much as I want to experience it again, I know I can’t.

I open my eyes and glance out the window and I see a sign that reads
MIDDLETOWN EXIT ONLY
.

I don’t know where we’re going next, but I already hate it there.

Before I realize it, we’re in the parking lot of yet another convenience store, some local-yokel variety with half the sign’s
lights burned out so the name is a jumble of consonants; the quality of quick-mart seems to be paralleling my life. Sean spins
his head around and asks me if I need to hit the rest room. I don’t, but I know I should try because I’ve learned from my
past mistakes.

Sean escorts me to the bathroom, makes sure it is empty and safe and window free. He waits outside as I force myself to pee.
I wish I could count on one hand how many deputy marshals have stood by a rest room door and listened to me urinate, but I’m
sad to say it’s in the dozens.

“You want anything?” Sean mumbles through the door. I hear him picking up cellophane-wrapped objects.

I stare at myself in the mirror and I look like a middle-aged woman. My skin is pale and worn, and my hair is frizzy from
the chemicals of color. I wash my hands and take handfuls of water and run it through my hair, an exercise in futility.

“Nothing for me, thanks.”

I exit the bathroom and go to Sean’s side, not because I need or want his protection but because he won’t let me go anywhere
without him anyway. He puts his hand on the small of my back, in the same spot Jonathan had—but not in the same way. I stand
next to him as we wait in line as if I were his daughter. I stare at the floor the entire time.

When we return to the Explorer, I get in the back and slump down. To my surprise, Sean gets in the back with me. I wonder
if he really
is
considering taking advantage of me or if he just enjoys our little backseat visits. He smiles at me and chucks a pack of
Hostess Orange CupCakes into my lap. It’s sort of chivalrous, I suppose, his remembering my affinity for this particular junk
food, but his offering, having come just a few minutes after I said I didn’t want anything, has him shifting slightly from
arrogant to bumptious. As for his intentions? I do some simple math. Add the cupcakes to my hideous reflection in the rest
room and the answer, obviously, is that Sean simply likes our backseat visits.

He offers me a bottle of Aquafina. I’ve known Sean for less than two days and he’s already become predictable and dull. There
are only so many times you can win a girl with trans fatty acids and distilled water.

I daydream, for a moment, of cannolis.

Sean opens up a bag of Nacho Cheese Doritos, grabs a massive handful, and shoves them in his mouth. He crunches so loudly
it actually hurts my ears.

I say, “You know those things are loaded full of MSG?” He shrugs. “Or do you eat them to fend off the ladies? Because believe
me, after a bag of those, your breath will be a far greater defense than your wedding ba—”

“Tell me the truth,” he interrupts, “have you been duping WITSEC into relocating you because you’re bored or scared?” He pauses,
then adds, “Or because you want to live off the subsistence checks?”