Hold Me Like a Breath (34 page)

“I understand.” Eavesdropping had taught me there were similar restrictions on the Landlow Estate. Cabbies were paid well to have no knowledge of my address or those of the clinics. These were accessible only via private cars—ones the Family arranged. Last time I'd checked, the estate's address produced a 404 error on direction websites and appeared as an empty field on map apps. “Thank you.”

He tried to talk me out of it for the rest of the drive and didn't
even pull over when we arrived, just paused on the highway and pointed to a dark cross street down a slope. “I hope you know what you're doing.”

“Me too.”

I shut the door, and he was gone. His headlights disappeared, making me aware of how much darker things felt without their glow—how much colder the air was now that the sun was beyond the mountains and with the rain seeping through my clothing.

And how very, very alone I was.

I skidded and slid down the steep canyon road. Mud clung to the bottom of my jeans and water soaked into the fabric, making them stiff and heavy. My bangs were pasted to my forehead, getting in my eyes, making poor visibility worse. I lost count of my falls. The rain increased, from drizzle to downpour, steady and soaking. And this time there wasn't a government security agent lurking to sell me an umbrella.

The walk was hellish in ways that made me think Dante was right—hell was a place of cold and shivering instead of burning hot. I held my breath each time I placed a foot. The rain was too loud to hear anything but thunder, but I imagined wild animals, mudslides, trigger-happy security guards. Did I need to worry about flash floods? Those happened in canyons, right?

I didn't notice the wall at first because the stucco blended in with the scrub brush and the rain was confining my visibility to barely beyond my feet. But there was a wall. Tall, topped with elaborate iron points that looked both fanciful and sharp. It gave me something to follow, and if I stretched my arm to its limit, I could keep my fingertips on its surface while keeping my feet on the edge of the road.

There was no reaction as I approached the gate. I'd expected lights to flick on, or a guard to step out.

The Zhus couldn't be this lax. Father never would've allowed someone to come right up to his gate, stick a sandaled foot on the crest where the two halves met, and haul herself up.

But then again, Father had been guarded and murdered by someone he considered a friend.

The thought made me slip. I hit the mud with bone-jarring intensity and wanted to stay there. Quit. Shut my eyes and give up. Instead I thought of all the impossible adrenaline stories I'd heard: mothers pulling cars off trapped children, people surviving a week in earthquake rubble or lost in the wilderness.

All I needed to do was climb a fence.

I tried again. My hands were wet, the skin wrinkled and soft. They slid across the metal at the top of the gates, snagging on imperfections in the paint and welding, splitting with small cuts that bled and tinged the rain on my hands the color of weak tea. I hooked one arm under the top bar and one arm over, pushed up on the tip of my toes and swung one foot up—stretching until its arch just barely cleared the top of the gate. I was grateful to
be wearing long pants, for the slight protection jeans provided against the press of metal down the inside of my leg.

Except the crest was only affixed to one side of the gate—it was just the difference of the width of the bars, but that was significant enough. My foot couldn't catch on it as I slid down the opposite side. And I'd over compensated for the balance shift, underprepared for momentum and the slipperiness of metal. Been startled by a blast of lightning.

It was less of a slide, more of a fall. My body clanged against the gate; the motion dislodged my hands so I fell heavily to the ground.

I lay wheezing on the cold. Wet pebbles that made up the driveway. Damning the Zhu security and starting to agonize—not only that I wouldn't physically be able to deliver the message, but that I was already too late.

The hail started as I lay there. Pinpricks of cold on my face, neck. I rolled over and pressed up onto hands and knees. I crawled a foot or two before managing to get up on my feet. Realizing much too late my purse had slipped off my shoulder as I'd fallen and landed on the far side of the gate. Carter doll, my letters, my notebook—all out of reach. And once the leather of my bag was saturated, the paper wouldn't last long. I'd lose all the memories written on those pages—and what if I couldn't remember them again?

I wanted to stay there, lean my face against the gate, and cry.

My nose began to bleed again; another liquid hurt in a world of wet pain. At least the blood was warm as it ran down my chin;
the rest of me was so, so cold. So cold that when I finally reached the sanctuary of the porch, my fingers wouldn't clench into a fist so I could knock on the dark wood door of the Spanish mission–style mansion.

But this wasn't necessary because simultaneously the rain stopped and Mr. Zhu's security finally noticed me.

My arm and a shoulder. This is what the man chose to grab. But he grabbed them from behind, so all I could see was his mammoth shadow, twisting and storming along the walls of the porch.

I cried out in pain, called, “Wait, please. I need to see Mr. Zhu,” but he didn't talk or loosen his fingertips. He was dragging me backward.

“You don't understand. I need to talk to him!” I kicked at the door, the windows, trying to make as much noise as possible. “Mr. Zhu! ZHU!”

The guard picked me up, my legs flailing against empty air, making brief contact with the door, and then I was back off the porch.

The front door opened. “What is this?” asked a man in a beige bathrobe. He'd clearly been preparing for bed. The wire frames of his glasses were balanced perfectly on his nose, the sash on
his robe was belted in a straight line, cinching in his impressive girth.

“Sir, Mr. Zhu, I have to talk to you. You're in danger.”

“The only danger I'm in is having my sleep interrupted by teenage intruders. Find out what she's doing here, then get rid of her.”

The grip on my arm tightened. Bruises layered over bruises over bruises.

“Please,” I protested. To the man attached to the meaty grip I said, “You're hurting me.”

“Let go of her!” At first it was just his voice. Then footsteps too, flying down a set of stairs I couldn't see. And then he was there. Coming through the door. On the porch. He still stole my breath. He still made my lips twitch into a smile, even though this time both reactions were accompanied by a twist in my stomach and a clenching of my heart.

The grip on my arm loosened slightly as the man waited for direction.

“You know this girl?” asked Mr. Zhu.

“Yes. I think so. Her voice—” Char blinked at me from behind glasses I'd never seen before, and I realized that drenched, mud-splattered, and half-drowned, I barely looked like the smiling girl he'd kissed good-bye in New York. “Bring her in here.”

Mr. Zhu nodded his consent, stepping back inside. The guard didn't put me down, which was for the best, since I wasn't sure I could stand on my own. Char stayed at the door, so close I could have leaned over to kiss him as I was carried past.

I didn't.

He didn't lean down either. After shutting the door behind us, he went to stand at the bottom of a lavish staircase that curved down a stucco wall set with pointed windows. I dripped onto an oriental rug, catching my first glimpse of the man behind me in the mirror across the foyer. I looked like a doll in his grip. Or a puppet. Someone he could make dance in pain. He caught me watching him, caught my fearful expression, and grinned. He was the Zhus' version of Al Ward. I shivered.

Mr. Zhu cleared his throat and steepled his fingers beneath his many chins. “Ming, explain yourself. How exactly do you know this girl, and what is she doing on our property?”

“From New York.” Char removed his glasses and rubbed his eyes, put them back on and blinked as if he didn't trust his vision. I was drinking in the sight of him: worn T-shirt, low-slung, gray-and-black-pinstriped pajama pants, bare feet, those glasses. Healthy. Safe.

He curled his fingers around the post of the ornate banister. I hoped it was to prevent himself from coming to me. I hoped he still wanted to.

“Who is she?” his father demanded.

“Maeve. A friend.”

“I'm not.” I tugged against the man's grip. His touch made my skin crawl, worse now that Char was in the room. I wanted
his
hand on my arm, in embrace, in support. I turned toward his father. “I'm Penelope Landlow.”

“How dare you?” Mr. Zhu stepped directly in front of me,
blocking my view of his son. His eyes blazed with anger, and his palm twitched like he might slap me. “Penelope Landlow is dead.”

“No. She's not …
I'm
not. It was a mistake. One of our nurses was killed—everyone thought it was me.”

“Next time you try a con, do a little more research—even if Penelope Landlow had survived the attack, she would never survive life outside her bubble. The girl was an invalid, basically a minute away from dying under normal circumstances.” He gripped my chin and turned my face away from Char so I was looking at him. “Her parents' and brother's deaths were a tragedy, but for Penelope, it was probably a mercy.”

The words were like darts, finding the most sensitive parts of me to pierce. I sucked in a breath, and the ache went even deeper. Is this what other people thought of me? Is this what Char had thought of me? Right now, aching from head to toe, it felt like it might be true.

Mr. Zhu took a handkerchief from his pocket and wiped his fingers. He threw it down on a side table and turned to leave the foyer, raising a hand in dismissal and saying, “Take her away.”

“Wait.” Char finally took that last step down. He reached toward his father, not quite putting his hand on his shoulder. “Father, wait.”

“What is it, Ming? What possible reason do you have for extending this interruption?”

“Father, I know this girl.”

“We've established that. You believe her to be a friend from New York. Unsurprisingly, you were deceived by a pretty-faced
con woman who was probably pumping you for information the whole time. In the morning you and I will be having a discussion to determine the full of extent of the security breach you've created.”

“No.” We said it in sync—our eyes meeting for an instant then fleeing before we could broadcast or read what the other was feeling.

“One of these days your ineptitude is going to destroy us, Ming.”

“If you think she might be a risk, keep her overnight and we'll figure out what she knows in the morning.” His words might be strategic, but his voice was desperate.

“Surely you don't intend to send the girl out now? Even if the rain stopped, it's got to be a mess out there. Flash floods and downed trees and who knows what else.” It was a new voice, a new presence on the scene. She was beautiful—I could see where Char had inherited his grace and smile and dancing eyes. His height was all his father's, because this woman was tiny, shorter than me. And wrapped in an exquisitely embroidered red silk robe with coordinating slippers. “No one will be able to get back up to the main roads until the storm passes.”

“Stay out of this, Mei.”

“She's just a child; she looks exhausted. Kun, put her down.” He set me on my feet. I wobbled, and her hands steadied me. “Are you okay? Ming, bring me a chair.”

“She's no
child
.” Her husband's words were saturated with scorn. “She's a spy of some sort. Or intended to be.”

“That may be true tomorrow, but tonight she is our guest.”
She helped me sit on the brocade chair Char dragged over. He hesitated for a second, then backed away.

“My mother, Abigail Landlow, always spoke so fondly of you,” I whispered. “Thank you.”

She nodded thoughtfully. “I'll see about making you up a room. You look like you could use some rest.”

“No, not sleep. There's going to be an attack. My Family is—”

“She's broken into the estate to deliver threats,” Mr. Zhu said. “And you think she should be treated as a guest?”

“For goodness' sake, the girl is nearly dead on her feet. She probably doesn't know what she's saying.”

“That's right!” said Char, looking instantly more alert. “She's diabetic—I bet this whole thing is a hypoglycemic episode. She's disoriented, talking nonsense—”

“Stop. I'm not diabetic. I've never been—it was just … an easy lie.”

He flinched, fell silent.

“She admits to being a liar; I've heard enough,” said Mr. Zhu.

“Not this! They're coming!”

“Hush now,” said Mrs. Zhu. “There's nothing you have to say that can't wait a couple hours.”

“It can't wait,” I mumbled at the same time Mr. Zhu said, “There's nothing she has to tell me.”

Char just stared at me—still too far away. Much too far, and it was a distance of more than just the marble between our feet, it was a distance defined by our mutual deceptions and agendas.

Finally his father chided him. “Why are you acting like
you've never seen a female before? Either make yourself useful or go to bed.”

“He can help me make up a guest room,” said his mother. “Why don't you rest a moment while I get you some dry clothing? Rain during the summer is unusual; it's unfortunate you got caught in it. I'll send someone with tea. Unless you want a shower?”

I shook my head. Showering would require standing. I could barely sit upright. Char and his mother left and it was only me, Mr. Zhu, and that silent hulk of a man, Kun.

“I'm not lying.” I paused to gulp the pungent tea that had been delivered. Even with the warm cup in my hand and hot liquid coursing down my throat, I couldn't stop shaking.