Chapter 2 DON'T WANT TO BE ALONE

AURORA'S POV

The cab pulls to the corner, and I wait for it to stop completely before opening the back door and climbing in.

"Where to?" The cabby asks.

"Brooklyn," I say, as the man takes off from the curb and heads towards home. Although in my line of work, there never really is such a place.

Trying to think of the one place I know that can get me the farthest away from here, I scroll through my contacts and land on a name of a good friend I haven't talked to in a while. Hitting her number before thinking clearly, I wait as the phone rings and pray she isn't busy for the holidays.

I don't want to be alone. Lord knows I've spent one too many holidays alone with no family over the years praying for a miracle that never seems to come.

There is only one or two left in my small circle I call friends, and Lord knows they are already busy, like they should be, with family and closer friends to call their own that they ought to be spending their time with.

I close my eyes as it sets in and still stings I'm not one of them after all these years. When the phone rings a third time my heart sinks. I really have no one else to call.

Luckily, my job with the bureau just ended and I was granted a couple weeks vacation before my next assignment. Hence the vacation I was supposed to take with the prick that I just left moments ago after dousing him in red wine.

I chuckle at the memory of the look on his face and know his shocked expression will never get old.God, it was totally fucking worth it.

In the last six years, I have lived numerous places since leaving the West Coast. All except Florida. Rumor has it that is where my next assignment takes me, and hell if I can't wait to soak up the sun and kick back on the beach with a rum drink of some sort in my hand.

I hold the phone a little tighter as island dreams take me far away when I look out the window of the cab and take in the snow beginning to fall.

Just as I think the call is about to go to voicemail, she finally picks up and I notice I let out a sigh of relief as her voice fills the line.

"Aurora! Is that you?"

"Hey, Julie! What are you up to? God girl, it is good to hear your voice," I say, as the time its been since I've seen her sets in and the sound of a familiar friend pulls at the empty place now beginning to grow inside me.

After I was assigned to watch her in Nashville when the bureau needed to keep eyes on her ex, it was hard not to break and tell her the truth about my life when we became so close.

She was a once in a lifetime kind of friend I never expected to make on a job. But when you live your life one fake identity to the other, it's hard not to eventually need a close somebody.

Someone to make you feel less alone in a world you can't help but walk alone through, especially when that someone is as kind as Julie Regens.

"I'm in Key West for the holidays," Julie says too eagerly, and I begin to sense all too well what may be coming next.

"The whole gang is here. Max , Jack, Hailey and Laura. God girl, it's been forever. How are you?"

I roll my eyes and think of what to say. How am I? Alone. Miserable. Depressed. Possibly suicidal. No, never that last one. But desperate! God, so damn desperate not to spend this holiday alone.

"Been better," I admit.

"Uh oh, what's wrong?" Julie asks, concern lacing her voice as she takes on a motherly tone.

"Nothing," I laugh nervously. "Can't a girl just call an old friend at the holidays to catch up?"

"You always were a shitty liar, Aurora," she laughs, calling me on my bullshit and making me remember why I knew I couldn't hide my secrets from her any longer those couple years ago.

Silence fills the line as we both wait each other out. Me? Well, I'm stubborn as hell and not about to break anytime soon to let her know the truth to my call. Her? I'm not so sure, but then she blurts out a saving grace and I know even if I don't tell her all she wants to know she's won anyway.

"Come to Key West!"

"What?" I laugh, totally trying to hide the fact that my master plan seems to be mysteriously working. Although I didn't expect her to be in Florida.

"A friend of ours has an apartment in town. Close to our rental. He isn't using it, and we had fewer people we thought we'd have follow us down here."

"Yeah right, I've got plans, I'm busy," I lie as her grunts of distrust and absolute disapproval fill the line.

"Besides, what makes you think I want to go to Key West?" I laugh, even though this is exactly the way I had wished this conversation would go.

As a matter of fact, it is perfect, seeing my next job takes me to Florida anyway.

"Do you have better plans for the holidays?" She laughs as I suddenly hear Greg, her husband in the background. She argues with whatever he said in a way only a teasing wife could, before I hear slight laughter and her hushed whispers as she hurriedly begins telling him to stop whatever has made her suddenly so giddy.

I smile to myself and quickly realize how much I miss them, even more than I thought I did. Silently, I sit as their laughter fills the line and I struggle with the truth.

Damn it if she couldn't always read me like a book. The one reason why maybe I did vanish without a trace knowing eventually she would see through my shit.

"Come on! Free place to stay. A loud nosy family for the holiday. What more could you ask for?" Julie laughs as the cab begins its drive across the Brooklyn bridge.

I look outside to the lights of the city and think about the man I just left behind at the restaurant. My eyes close as my mind wanders and I think about how I felt sitting across from him once he dropped the bomb on me he just did.

Now, here I am all alone and dreading the next two weeks worse than I have any other year I've been forced to live through them alone.

In a split second I find myself making a decision I never should have hesitated on to begin with. Especially since it was the reason I made the call in the first place.

"I'm in!" I say, which is immediately met with a loud excited shrill yell from my old friend.

I laugh as excitement fills me inside and tears prick the backs of my eyes knowing I won't be alone after all this year.

"I'll text you when I get home and to tell you what flight I book. Oh, and Julie! Tell your friend thanks. I'll see ya sometime tomorrow."