Page 182 of Pretty Poisoned

He pops some earbuds into his ears. "Just shut up and sit there in your shit pile."

I snort. That's actually kind of an accurate description of what I'm doing now, isn't it?

The plane takes off, and I lie back in my seat with my eyes closed, the abandoned and shamed queen of the shit pile,soothing the ache in my chest with the same lies over and over again.

Declan didn't leave me.

Luca isn't dead.

We'll be a family again.

I'll never be alone again.

But everything dies. Whether in bloodstains and ruin or from slow-burning lies.

That's what I think is happening to me.

And when the scene through the window changes to something so uniquely California, my home both so familiar and so foreign, and I know we must be close to LAX, a pilot walks down the aisle, stopping beside our row.

"Sir?" he says to my police escort.

He removes the earbuds from his ears. "It's Boyd," he says.

"Officer Boyd, we've been instructed to make you aware of…the situation on the ground. Do you want to…" He gestures for the man to come to the front of the plane. Boyd looks me up and down, my cuffed hands and feet in chains.

"Sure," he says, then adds. "Don't fucking try anything. I'll take you all the way out."

I give him a thumbs up. "Got it."

They move toward the front of the plane; Boyd stands so he can watch me, and I watch him, too. I see the concern on his face and wonder what the fuck thesituation on the groundcould possibly be.

"What's going on?" I ask him when he returns to his seat. Not that I expect him to answer.

"Just don't let it go to your head, kid," he says.

"Folks, we are beginning our final descent into Los Angeles International Airport,"the pilot says over the speaker."Local time is 4:33 PM, the weather on the ground is seventy-nine degrees and sunny. We should touch down in approximatelytwenty-two minutes. Please remain seated with your seatbelts fastened."

I lean against the window and sigh.

Once we land, we deboard the small plane on the tarmac outside and then are escorted into the airport by two armed security guards.

And once we're through the terminal, I'm surprised by two familiar faces.

"Mom? Dad?"

They must see the visible shock on my face. My mom replies, "Well, yeah. Who else do you think would have gotten you out of this mess?"

I guess I hadn't really thought about it—it hadn't occurred to me that someone would have needed to put the wheels into motion in order for this to happen. But I think maybe I was hoping…

I'll make some calls.

Maybe we can share a room with nice thick padded walls.

"Oh my god, you thought it was them, didn't you?" she laughs. "You are so delusional."

"Well, hopefully, they make pills for that," I say.

"I really hope so, Teagan," she says. "Let's keep moving. There's a transport out front to take you to Rancho San Flores."

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