Page 26 of Lost in the Moonlight

“What does that mean?” I choked out.

Mom shifted on the stool uncomfortably before saying, “Deputy Marshal James doesn’t think it means anything. She insists they’re watching Aaron and that he’s still in Chicago. There’s been no murmurs of him looking for us. She thinks his hands are full enough with the RICO case pending against him and his buddies that he doesn’t have time to even think about you, let alone look for you.”

The Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations case had developed from the evidence the police had collected after Dad’s murder. My identification of Danny and Roci had led to search warrants uncovering other crimes. The RICO case was part of the reason Aaron had worked so hard to get my testimony, and the warrant granted because of it, tossed out. I’d been the linchpin, and if I’d been taken out of the picture, itwould have unraveled all the government’s cases. The Viceroys might have gotten away free and clear.

Mom read my fear just as I’d read her seriousness. She reached across the island and squeezed my hand. “There’s nothing for us to worry about. They haven’t come after us once since we left Chicago. And even if they tried, they can’t find us. The Marshals haven’t lost a single witness in their protection who were following their protocols. We’ve never deviated from them.”

We let that settle between us. And it was comforting. If we did as we were told, if we stayed under the radar, the Viceroys couldn’t find us.

“Maybe I should find someone else to go with the kids this weekend,” Mom said.

“What? No!” I pushed aside my fear. “It’s the state championships! The kids are counting on you. You’ve all worked hard for this. Like you said, there’s nothing for us to worry about. Go. Have fun. Revel in all your coaching paying off.”

She still hesitated. I walked around the counter and hugged her.

“We’re okay. I’m okay. Really. If I get freaked, I can call Deputy Marshal James, and if I need anything else, I’ll just call Hector. He’d do anything to make you happy.”

Her lips turned upward, and her eyes sparkled at my words. Her reaction made every tight muscle inside my body loosen.

“He’d do anything foryou,” she said, patting my cheek. “Now, go get some sleep. Otherwise, you’ll be a zombie by the time your alarm goes off.”

I tugged her hand into mine, squeezing it. “I love you, Mom.”

“Love you too.”

? ? ?

After I’d changed into my pajamas, I climbed into bed and fought the urge to search for the news about Roci and the rest of the Viceroys on the internet. I pushed the worry and fear as far away as I could. I chanted the mantra,We’re safe and they can’t find us, over and over again until, like always, I almost believed it.

I picked up my journal and opened it to the dog-eared page with the list of joyous experiences I wanted to have before any signs of FFI exhibited themselves and ended my life. I ran a finger down the words I’d first scribbled on the flight home from Chicago after the trial, happy to see so many already marked off. They weren’t huge things, like going on a baking competition show, because those large events could never happen within the bounds of witness protection, but they were small and doable and simple. Everyday kinds of joys.

An X sat next tofind a passion,go to culinary school, andsing karaoke with a strangeralong with a dozen others. My finger stalled on the line that read,Ensure Mom finds love again. I was so close to checking that box I could almost taste the sweetness of it.

The next line down had me trembling as I pulled the metallic-pink pen off the spiral and drew a heart in the box next to,Flirt with someone who made my stomach whoosh.

The day may have started with a scare, but it had also been full of tantalizingly beautiful moments with Lincoln. I relived the heart-stopping smile he’d given me in the car after we’d dashed through the rain, and the thrill that had coursed over me when he’d said flirting was a delightful dance with those intense blue eyes boring into me. I wished I had a photograph of every moment so I’d never lose any of them the way moments withDad were fading. I wished I knew more about Lincoln and what had happened in his life that had shadows clinging to him.

It felt deeper than just whatever had hit the news recently about him and Felicity Bradshaw. Something about him proposing and then taking it back? Leaving her to foot a huge resort bill? I couldn’t recall the details. I looked over at my phone, almost as tempted to search for him as I’d been to search the Viceroys.

But I didn’t. Not only because simply thinking about Lincoln was dangerous but because I didn’t want to see him through someone else’s tainted eyes. I knew the truth from what I’d witnessed today. He was a brave, confident man who’d stood up to protect a random stranger. So what if he was a bit bossy and broody—who cared? And in truth, in some secret part of me, I’d liked the way he’d demanded I do as he said. I wasn’t sure exactly what that said about me.

I slid my finger down to the very last line on the page:Experience the love my parents had.

I’d written that one with a shaky hand, barely able to admit that hope, that wish, to myself because there was so much standing in the way of it. Not only the inability to tell the person you loved about your past for fear that somehow, in a moment of anger, they’d out you, but also because I’d have to ask them to take a leap of faith with me.

Look at what had happened with Chad. Unable to use FFI as the real reason, I’d told him I had a brain tumor that might someday turn deadly, and he’d bowed out before we’d even begun. He’d said it was just too heavy for him. Too much for a college fling. And that had hurt even more because I’d thought we were on the track to something more. True love. Forever after.

It wasn’t his fault. How could he have known all the pieces of my past and future had me wishing for fairy-tale endings at twenty years old? It hadn’t been fair to him.

The danger for me now was in thinking, for even one brief second, that the sparks and whoosh I’d felt today around Lincoln could lead to marking off that last box.

Just the idea of the twenty-nine-year-old president of the United States’ son wanting any kind of relationship with some twenty-three-year-old nobody was ridiculous. I wasn’t completely naïve. I’d seen the heat in his eyes when he’d looked at me, and I’d heard the sensual tone that had felt like a caress as he’d flirted his way out my door. But even if, by some magical miracle, those feelings could have possibly turned into something more, my witness-protection situation made it impossible to pursue.

I had to remain invisible. A nobody. A baker in a café no one really registered. And Lincoln was very much in the public eye. In fact, I was surprised it hadn’t been all over the media that he’d moved to Cherry Bay. Sooner or later, the paparazzi would track him down here. He’d be in the headlines again, especially with his dad’s election heating up.

I let out a soft sigh, put the journal down, shut off the light, and sank down under the covers.

If Lincoln showed up at all in the morning, I’d let him walk me to work for a couple of mornings—for both our sakes. So he could sleep, and so I didn’t jump at every shadow. There’d be no need for him to walk me home when it was daylight, when there were plenty of people to help me if Poco did show up, but also plenty of people who might see us together. I couldn’t afford for someone to take a picture of the president’s son with me at his side and having them blast it all over the internet. But no onewould see us in the dead of the night. I rarely saw anyone on the street when I walked to work.

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