Page 3 of A Captive Situation

Great. Lovely. They knew each other.

The doors slid open. People were spilling out.

Now I was scowling, and I stood up. Lifting up my arm, I grabbed the same pole he was holding on to. “I’m fine. No. I do not need medical assistan—”

I cut myself off because he wasn’t looking at me anymore. His eyes were trained over my shoulder.

People were coming in, filling up the emptied spots, but suddenly a woman screamed. A guy shouted, and the scowling guy yelled right next to my ear, “Marcus Easter,stop!”

He cursed under his breath and shoved past me.

I got whiplash. He moved so fast. Twisting around, I saw a guy run off the train and toward the stairs. Scowling Hot Guy was fast behind him.

They were soon gone from eyesight, and I frowned. That was all ... I didn’t even know what that was.

Miguel was sitting up, yawning.

I asked him, “Does that happen a lot here?”

He snorted before giving me a lopsided grin, scratching his head. “Nah. That’s just Shorty. I wonder what he did this time.”

I sat down, a little dazed. The train started again, and I groaned.

That’d been my stop.

Chapter Two

Sawyer

“Sawyer. Sweetie. I’m concerned. Why are you still in New York City? It’s been another week. I understand that you wanted a change of scenery because of the wedding that hap—but, honey, when are you coming back?”

Never.

That was my automatic response, but I had to stop myself from sharing that. My mom would go ballistic, and I knew she was already worried about me. To give her credit, she had reason. In the two weeks being here, I’d alternated between being a zombie or a tourist, but mostly I was trying to get the courage to see Graham.

Technically, he was family, so it wasn’t like I was some random person on the street searching him out, but therewasthat weirdness in the family. I didn’t understand the rift between his mom and the rest of the sisters.

My mom and my two aunts were so close. Phyllis, Bess, and Clara.

Phyllis was my mom. Bess and Clara never had children and I didn’t have siblings, so the four of us were tight. Maude was their fourth and youngest sister, and she had three children. I’d met her girls a few times, but it wasn’t enough. I wanted to be closer toallof my cousins.

I wanted to fix it. This was a heartbreak that I could fix. At least, that’s where I was funneling most of my energy right now. The tourist bucket list was happening, but I kept finding myself needing to fixsomethingin my life.

Family issues, you’re up to bat.

Also, the certainty that I wassohaving a midlife crisis had risen to 65 percent. That was the only thing that made sense because as my mom was talking, I knew. I just knew.

I wasn’t going back.

I gulped as those words went through my mind, but it was the truth.

Oh my goodness.

“Did you get in touch with Graham? His mother called to complain that you called her a few times asking about him, where he works. I believe he’s on that picture app, Instacart or something? He works at Exhibit, that’s some fancy architecture business. He’s an architect. You’d think that’d be something your aunt would be boasting about. You’ll have to keep me informed, let me know how Graham is. But I blame my sister. Maude’s never encouraged her kids to have relationships with the rest of us. I don’t know what her problem is.”

I didn’t think there was any big secret to why I hadn’t met Graham. I was certain it had to do with our mothers and aunts, but whatever it was, it was going to get dealt with.

She kept grumbling, saying the same narrative she always did when she started ranting about the one sister that wasn’t close to the other three. Maude was always the odd sister on the outside. That’s how it’d been all my life.

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