The Perfect Escape (The Perfect Escape #1) - Suzanne Park Page 0,87
moment to run to Dad’s bedroom. I shut off the main power in the house. Within seconds, the emergency lights flicked on.
“Oh dear.” Jeeves’s voice echoed down the hallway from the kitchen.
I unlocked the doors by flipping a switch in the control panel in the master bedroom. With my luggage in tow, I stepped out onto the porch.
Poor Jeeves. He’d be rolling around and around the house until my dad came home, looking for me with a sandwich, fruit, and juice on his flip-down serving tray. Failing in his mission to keep me confined and fed, like a round-the-clock correctional officer.
I pulled open the iron gates, which had defaulted to an unlocked position. My heart raced as each one slammed closed behind me.
Waiting for the taxi I’d prearranged to the airport, my burner phone—the one I’d be getting rid of soon—buzzed with a message. Or rather, dozens of them, all from Nate. I scrolled through them all by the time the cab pulled into the top of the driveway.
Another message from Nate.
Last one, I swear. Thanks for the shirt
I responded with five words. Thanks for the cryptocoin
A long text from Raina: Your dad is calling here and texting me nonstop. Daddy Warbucks sounds legit worried and sad. Are you LEAVING leaving? Bish, you better send me your new contact info if you are
My hot tears fell on the screen. Why are you shudder-crying, Kate? You wanted this.
I shut off the phone forever.
Chapter Thirty-One
Nate
Subjecting myself to Lucy’s kindergarten share day was one of the worst decisions I’d ever made.
That included the time I bleached my hair with hydrogen peroxide the summer of seventh grade because I’d heard Annie liked blonds. After three hours of intense soaking, my jet-black hair turned orange. I actually had to dye it black again before school started and paid Jaxon twenty dollars to help me and to never, ever mention it again. Twenty dollars in hush money so he’d shut up about my “Prince Harry” hair. I did all that for Annie.
I tried to blink away my exhaustion as Lucy introduced me to her class.
She stood next to me. “This is Nate. He’s my older brother. He beat up a lot of dead people this weekend to win money.” She took a seat on the colorful mat in the front row directly in front of me.
Mrs. French gasped and dropped the glue sticks in her hand. One of the boys whispered, “Cool!”
Twenty sets of eager little eyes waited for more details.
I laughed and rubbed the back of my neck. “Um, good morning, everyone.”
For some reason I expected them to say back to me in singsongy unison, “Good morning, Nate,” but they stared back at me with blank looks. With that introduction, could you blame them?
One boy in head-to-toe Seahawks gear raised his hand and spoke without being called on. “Were they already dead, or did you kill them to win the money?”
I rubbed the back of my neck again. “Oh, they weren’t really people. They were zombies—”
“ZOMBIES?” The Seahawks boy cut me off. “I kill zombies in Minecraft.”
Two of the girls in the front screamed and hugged each other. Honestly, I couldn’t tell if they were playing scared or were really freaked out. Figured it was best to play it safe.
“Okay, everyone, calm down. The dead people weren’t real. It’s like, you know, the games you play on your iPad or pretend shows you watch on TV. The zombies weren’t alive.”
A little Korean boy blurted, “I’m only allowed to play chess and math games on the computer. And no screen time until I do my jujitsu lessons and finish all my reading.”
Oh, I totally connected with this kid. Pint-size Nate.
“What’s your name, big guy?”
“James Ejoon Cho.”
“Nice to meet you, James.”
The teacher cleared her throat. “Um, Nate, he goes by his full name.”
James Ejoon Cho asked, “Did you really beat up pretend dead guys for money?”