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Her expression turned panicked. ‘Don’t leave me.’

‘I won’t. I’m just going to the restroom.’

‘Mouse. Seriously.’

‘It’ll be fine,’ I said calmly.

Starbucks stores were predictable. There would be restrooms tucked away somewhere, probably next to a storeroom or break room. I found what I was looking for quickly, in a hallway running at a right angle to the main part of the cafe, next to two gender-neutral restrooms.

Another woman was waiting for the restroom, so I joined the line behind her, leaning against the wall to look around. TheSTAFF ONLYsign on the door at the end of the hallway most likely led to the break room, but opposite the last restroom was a fire exit.

And just as someone left the restroom and held the door open to let me use it next, a worker came in through the fire exit, giving me a glimpse of a smoking area behind and a long alleyway.

‘Thanks,’ I murmured as a girl my age held the door to the restroom for me.

We’d have to move carefully to not tip off blonde lady, but it was a route out that meant we didn’t have to walk past her. I had no idea where the alley would dump us out, and our opportunity to keep wandering leisurely around the city was dead in the water, but I couldn’t care about that now.

I washed my hands and went back to the table.

‘You took ages,’ Brooke grumbled as I slid back into my seat.

‘I found a way out.’

‘Are you sure?’ she asked, her eyes clearly telling me she was freaked out. ‘Are you absolutely sure about all of this, Mouse?’

I instinctively flinched hearing her call me Mouse, but I hadn’t mustered the courage to ask her to call me anything else.

‘Yes.’

Brooke glanced at me, then looked over at the blonde woman, then back at me.

‘Go to the restroom and wait for me in that hallway. I’ll be with you in a minute,’ I said.

‘Okay,’ she replied, blowing out a hard breath and pushing back from her seat to walk away.

I forced myself to count to a hundred, flicking through the pages of the paper and watching a group of girls my age order drinks. This wasn’t the time to start freaking out. I didn’t want Brooke to panic and draw attention to us, and I wanted her to think I actually had control of the situation, for once.

One last time, I chanced a look over at the blonde lady.

She looked up at me at the same time.

And I froze.

Her eyes met mine, and for a long second, my heart stopped beating. Just stopped dead in my chest.

Then she smirked at me, a tiny little twitch of her lips, and my heart went back to pounding racehorse-fast.

I had to move. The girls waiting for their orders made a good cover, so when they went to the end of the counter, I moved with them and didn’t look back to see if I was being followed.

Brooke was waiting for me, leaning against the wall and drinking her coffee.

‘It’s not alarmed,’ she said.

‘Good.’

‘Don’t run. We need to look like we’re supposed to be there.’

That was easy for her to say. She was smart and pretty and a good liar, so she could get away with stuff like this. I wasn’t any of those things, and I always got caught.