The Secret Life of Ceecee Wilkes Part 5

"There's a way you can help Andie," he said.

Surprised, she swallowed the words she'd been ready to say. He was not going to ask her to marry him. She wasn't sure if she was relieved or disappointed.

"How?" she asked.

He looked at her squarely for the first time since she got in the car. "I'm not sure how to tell you," he said, pressing his hands together. "I guess what I need to say first is that Marty and I have been working on a plan. But it's illegal." He watched her face for a reaction. "And it's dangerous," he added.

She clutched his arm. "What are you talking about?" She remembered the waitress, Bets, who told her Tim was a dangerous man, and she felt a quick, sharp fear that she could lose him. He could get arrested and locked away, the way Andie was.

"You don't have to say you'll do what I ask. Okay?" He covered her hand with his. "I mean, I love you, babe. I'm going to go on loving you whether you help me with this or not. Is that clear?"

"Yes," she said, "but-"

"Do you want me to tell you the plan or would you rather not know?"

"Well, I have to know what I'm saying yes or no to, don't I?"

"If I tell you, you have to swear that you won't breathe a word to anyone. Not Ronnie or anyone. So, if you might have a hard time doing that, please let me know now so I don't-"

"I won't tell anyone," she said. "I promise." They were planning to break Andie out of prison. What else could make him this jumpy and anxious? Maybe they'd ask her to drive the getaway car or something. If that was the only way to save Andie's life, could she do it? "Dangerous" was an understatement. "If she's on death row," she said, "won't it be nearly impossible to get her out?"

"What?" Tim looked confused. "Oh. No, that's not it, CeeCee." He let go of her and ran both hands through his hair. "You know we've tried every legal way to get her sentence reduced, right?" he asked.

"Yes," she said.

"Now, we have to play hardball. Listen to me." He took both her hands in his. "Marty and I are going to kidnap Governor Russell's wife."

"What?" She giggled. "Are you kidding?" She giggled. "Are you kidding?"

He looked away from her, not a hint of a smile on his face, and she knew he was not kidding at all. "I'm very serious," he said.

"Tim." She let go of his hand, reached up and turned his face toward hers. "This is crazy," she said. "This is like something Marty would come up with. Is this his idea?" She let go of his hand, reached up and turned his face toward hers. "This is crazy," she said. "This is like something Marty would come up with. Is this his idea?"

"Mine, actually," he said. "And it's not crazy. We've got it all worked out."

"I can't believe you'd even think think of doing something like this." of doing something like this."

"I won't tell you anything more about it, then," he said. "Just don't say anything to anyone."

"I told you I wouldn't. But I'm not following you at all. How will kidnapping the governor's wife help Andie?"

"We'll let her go when he commutes her sentence."

"Then you could end up in prison, too," she said.

"I won't."

"What if he won't do it?"

"I believe he will."

"But you-"

"Look." He raised his hands sharply in the air, suddenly angry. "It's going to work, okay? I He raised his hands sharply in the air, suddenly angry. "It's going to work, okay? I need need it to work. So please, cool it with the 'but this' and 'but that.' It doesn't help." it to work. So please, cool it with the 'but this' and 'but that.' It doesn't help."

It was the first time he'd ever raised his voice to her and she had to struggle to keep from crying. "I'm sorry," she whispered.

He pressed his palms against his eyes, his breathing harsh. "Shooting holes in a plan you know nothing about...it doesn't make it any easier on me, CeeCee."

She bit her lip, unsure what to say. When he dropped his hands from his face, his eyes were red and wet.

"It's my sister, sister, d.a.m.n it!" He pounded his fist on the steering wheel. "I have to help her." d.a.m.n it!" He pounded his fist on the steering wheel. "I have to help her."

"I know," she said, "and I know how much you love her." She leaned forward to embrace him, wanting to absorb some of his pain. "What exactly did you want me to do?" she asked.

"Don't worry about it. We can get somebody else to do it." He pulled a pack of cigarettes from the pocket of his jacket and lit one, drawing the smoke deep into his lungs. "There's this girl in SCAPE who'd probably-"

"Tell me what you wanted me to do," she repeated.

He sighed, rolling his head back and forth as though the conversation was making his neck ache. "It's like this," he said. "Some relatives of ours have a cabin on the Neuse River near New Bern. Do you know where that is?"

"Sort of," she said. "It's a couple of hours from here?"

"Right. They don't ever use it this time of year, so that's where we'll take the wife. Then Marty and I will stay in this other house in Jacksonville and communicate with Russell-the governor-from there. Once Russell says he'll do it, we'll go get the wife and return her to him. Unharmed," he added.

"You'll just leave the wife alone in the cabin? Won't she-" She caught herself. She was shooting holes again.

"That's where you'd come in," he said. "You...or the girl from SCAPE or whoever...you'd stay with her."

She tried to imagine herself, sixteen years old, trying to keep a grown woman under lock and key. "I don't think I could do it," she said.

"I know you don't think you could." He touched her cheek, and she was relieved that his anger had pa.s.sed. "You don't want to do it, and that's cool. You're just someone Marty and I knew we could trust. We need someone who'd make sure the wife stays safe and who'd take care of her. You're really good at that kind of thing. I don't know the girl from SCAPE all that well, but maybe she'll be good at it, too. You care about Andie and Marty and me, so it just made sense to ask you."

Guilt rested on her shoulders like a lead weight. He'd done so much for her. The girl from SCAPE, sure of her values and ready to fight for them, would be willing to help them when she didn't even know them.

"Tim." She leaned across the s.p.a.ce between their seats to put her arms around him, careful to avoid the cigarette. "I wish you wouldn't do this. It's too dangerous."

He let out a long sigh and she heard both frustration and disappointment in the sound. "It's the only choice we've got, CeeCee," he said, turning the key in the ignition. "And we're going to do it. With you or without you."

Chapter Seven.

The hospice counselor asked why I never cut your hair. I said it was your decision when to cut it. You've made good decisions from the time you were little. (With the exception of the time you flushed Teddy-Doodle down the toilet, remember that?) I think the important thing about making a decision is just to make it. Otherwise you can go nuts thinking about the pros and cons. It's like when I decided to come to Duke for the breast cancer study. It was a big decision, uprooting you from your friends and trying a new drug and everything. My mind was saying, "Don't do it!" but my heart said, "You've got to give it a try." Was it the right decision? I don't know. I'm dying, so I guess you could say it was the wrong one, but if I never did it I would probably be dying in New Jersey, wondering if I should have taken the risk. So, when it comes to making a decision, look at both sides, listen to your heart, then pick one and dive in.

In the coffee shop the following morning, she set Tim's plate of eggs and grits in front of him, then leaned over to whisper. "I'd like to talk to you and Marty about-" she shrugged "-you know."

Tim's eyebrows shot up. "Are you considering it?" he asked.

"I have a lot of questions."

"Sure you do." Tim touched her hand briefly. "Come over tonight. We'll get pizza and talk."

"With Marty," she said. "I need to know we all agree on the plan before I make a decision."

"I'll make sure he's there," Tim said. "And I'm sorry if I was hard on you last night."

Ronnie had been awake when CeeCee got home the night before. She wanted to know if Tim had proposed. CeeCee shook her head with a smile, having planned on the question. "I can't believe we thought that," she said, making light of it. "He wanted my advice on getting a gift for an aunt."

"Ew." Ronnie winced. "Are you disappointed?"

"Relieved," she said. "It's not time yet." But she was hardly relieved by Tim's actual proposal. It was a lame-brain idea, wasn't it? Or could it actually work? She stayed up much of the night thinking about his outrageous plan, making a list of her concerns and questions. She had to remember that Tim was one of the smartest people she'd ever known. He knew so much more than she did about how the world operated, especially when it came to politics and that sort of thing. He wouldn't do something so risky unless he was certain of the outcome.

Two pizzas were being delivered as she arrived at the mansion, but she doubted she'd be able to eat a single slice. She watched Tim pay with a twenty, telling the delivery boy to keep the change.

Marty was already seated at the head of the ma.s.sive dining-room table by the time she and Tim carried the pizzas into the room. Marty's straggly brown hair looked like it needed was.h.i.+ng, but he'd shaved for the occasion. His hands were folded on the table in front of him as if he were chairman of the board. "So," he said. "I hear you might help us out."

CeeCee sat down across the table from Tim. It was an incongruous scene, she thought. Formal dining room, crystal chandelier, heavy gold jacquard draperies that must have cost a fortune, eating pizza on paper plates, planning a kidnapping.

"I don't know," she said. "I still think it's a crazy idea."

Marty smiled his lunatic smile. "Sometimes you gotta bend the rules to get any action," he said.

"You said you had questions," Tim prompted her as he put a slice of pizza on her plate.

She reached into her jeans pocket and pulled out the list she'd made the night before, flattening the paper on the table.

"Won't the governor know it's the two of you doing this, since you've been working to help Andie all along?" she asked.

"Unless he's a complete a.s.shole, which is certainly possible, yes." Marty took a bite of pizza.

"So...then won't you get locked up after you let his wife go?"

"Only if they find us," Marty said, his mouth full.

She looked at Tim. "What does he mean?"

"We'll go underground," Tim said.

"You mean like...into hiding?"

"Yes," Tim said. He was watching her for a reaction. "We'll change our names. Change our looks a bit."

"Tim." She was incredulous. "Then how would I see you?" She was incredulous. "Then how would I see you?"

Tim set down his pizza and reached across the broad table to take her hand. "Saving my sister's life is the most important thing in the world to me right now," he said, "but I don't plan to lose you in the process." His eyes could melt her. "You'll know where I am. Just no one else will."

"Do you promise?"

He nodded.

"You'll know where we are if you can keep your mouth shut about it, that is," Marty added. There was a threatening quality to his voice that reminded CeeCee of her initial discomfort around him.

"Of course she will."

"But..." CeeCee was trying to see into the future. Her Her future. "Does that mean I'd always have to see you on the sly?" she asked. future. "Does that mean I'd always have to see you on the sly?" she asked.

"Not necessarily," Tim said. "If you come to wherever I end up, we can have a relations.h.i.+p out in the open. I just won't be Tim Gleason anymore."

"But I'm applying to Carolina, Carolina," she said. "I have to stay here."

"We should have you apply to a couple other schools, too, then," he said.

"You two lovebirds can talk about this later," Marty said. "Let go of each other so I can reach the pizza, okay?"

Tim let go of her hand and leaned back in his chair as Marty helped himself to another slice.

"There's one thing, though," Tim said. "A lot of people know that you and I are seeing each other. They'll ask you questions after I so-called disappear. disappear."

She hadn't thought of that.

"So whether you agree to help out or not, you and I have to fake a breakup, okay?"

"No." She felt like crying. She felt like crying.

"It's for your own protection, CeeCee," he said. "We don't want anyone to think you're in on it. And it will all be an act."

This was so complicated. She loved things the way they were. She loved seeing him in the coffee shop in the morning and spending her leisure time in the beautiful mansion. Whatever she decided, things would never be the same. Andie's fate hung like a shroud over the brothers and she knew Tim would never rest until he'd done everything he could to save her.

"Okay?" Tim asked, when she didn't respond.

"When do we have to act like we're breaking up?"

"Soon," he said. "This week sometime. Even Ronnie has to think we did."

She nodded. She looked down at the piece of paper on the table. "If I helped out," she said, "the governor's wife would be able to identify me."

"We'll work up a real good disguise for you," Marty said. "Get a blond wig. Or maybe a redhead." He looked at her long wavy mane of dark hair. "Will that hair fit under a wig? Maybe you need to cut it."

"No, man," Tim interjected. "She's not cutting her hair."