The Ritz Carlton Penthouse, 2:47 AM
I wasn’t supposed to be awake, but grown-ups always think kids sleep harder than we do. Especially when scary things are happening.
Aunt Bianca—I guess I should call her Bianca now, since she’s not really my aunt and definitely not my mom—was in the bathroom talking on her phone. She thought the water running would cover her voice, but the door wasn’t closed all the way.
“…forty-six hours left,” she was saying. “No, I don’t care if it’s impossible. That’s their problem, not mine.”
I pulled the hotel blanket up to my chin and tried to make sense of everything that had happened tonight. One minute I was asleep in my own bed, and the next minute Bianca was shaking me awake, telling me we were going on a surprise adventure to see my “real mommy.”
At first, I was excited. I’d been thinking about the woman in the fancy office ever since Daddy took me there. She had my eyes, and when she looked at me, something felt… familiar. Like a song you can’t remember the words to but your heart knows the melody.
But this didn’t feel like an adventure anymore. It felt like something else.
“The building plans are perfect,” Bianca continued, her voice getting meaner. “She’ll never see it coming. Neither will he.”
Building plans? I sat up a little, trying to hear better.
“Of course I have an exit strategy. I’m not an idiot. Once I have what’s mine, they can all burn for all I care.”
My stomach got that twisty feeling it gets when I know something bad is about to happen. Like right before Mom—before Bianca—told me that Daddy had to go away on a long business trip, except he never came back the same.
The water stopped running, and I quickly closed my eyes and tried to breathe like I was sleeping. Bianca came out of the bathroom and I felt her looking at me for a long time. Then she walked to the big window and started talking on her phone again, quieter this time.
“She’s asleep. Good—I need her alert tomorrow for the final call.” A pause. “No, she doesn’t suspect anything. She still thinks I’m trying to reunite her with Mommy.”
My heart started beating really fast. Final call? What did that mean?
“Make sure the charges are placed exactly where I marked on the blueprints. If the building comes down wrong, the whole plan fails.”
