Miller, on the other hand, slipped into Stephanie's passenger seat the moment the car rolled to a stop in Zilla, and immediately Stephanie noticed. She took one look at her, and her face became filled with shock. "God! "Miller, you really did it," she exclaimed. "Your neck and jaw are covered in hickeys, and you smell like beer! If my mom finds out, you are so dead."
Miller took a deep breath, the reality of her situation pressing in on her. "Lend me your concealer and some money, and drop me at the thrift stall to get some clothes," she said, her voice filled with urgency.
Stephanie started the car again, pulling away from the curb with a frustrated sigh. "What happened to your money?" she asked.
"I paid the escort," Miller stated flatly.
Stephanie exclaimed in shock, her hands gripping the steering wheel tighter. "God, I really want to break your head right now." she said with a mixture of anger and disbelief. But even as she said it, she was already reaching into her purse sitting by her side. She tossed a tube of concealer and a debit card into Miller's lap. "Thanks, I owe you for this," Miller muttered with genuine gratitude.
Stephanie nodded negatively, a sharp, dismissive gesture. "Just fix yourself."
It took a whole twenty minutes for Miller to get rid of her old, beer-laden clothes and get into new, ordinary ones from the thrift stall. Then it took an extra ten minutes for Stephanie to drive them to their home, a modest house in a rowdy residential area of the city. To avoid suspicion, they executed their well-practiced routine: Stephanie stepped in first, creating a diversion. After a few calculated minutes, Miller slipped inside.
But just by the door, her escape was halted. A lady with a face burnt beyond recognition and chapped, wiry hair was seated in a worn armchair, slowly turning the pages of a magazine, Aunt Janet, Stephanie's mum and Miller's 'Savior' . "Good morning, Aunt Janet," Miller greeted, forcing her voice to be light and even then continued towards her room but just immediately Aunt Janet's cracked and raspy voice made Miller freeze where she was. "Where have you been?"
The question hung in the air, demanding an immediate and believable answer. "I went to get my skateboard's tire adjusted at the Skateboard Ranch," Miller replied immediately, the last-minute lie rolling off her tongue.
"And where is your skateboard?" Aunt Janet asked again, her head tilting slightly as she scanned Miller, a movement that was more threatening than curious.
"I... I dropped it there," Miller stammered, her mind racing. "I would go retrieve it at noon."
Aunt Janet turned fully then and looked at her deeply, her gaze seeming to see straight through the new clothes and the hastily applied concealer. "Recite your pledge," she commanded, her voice dropping to a deeper, eeriertone.
Miller's spine straightened automatically. The words, drilled into her over a decade, came out smoothly. "I pledge to always consult Aunt Janet before taking any drastic decision and to never disobey her rules, such as never to drink, to remain pure, and to never be caught in a scandal or reveal my exceptional skills to anyone. Because if it weren't for Aunt Janet, my savior, I would have died years ago."
Aunt Janet watched her for a long, silent moment after the recitation, then finally dismissed her with a slight, dismissive wave of her hand. Miller took a deep, shuddering breath in her head, the fear finally receding, and walked as calmly as she could to her room.
She was loyal, in fact very loyal, to Aunt Janet because the woman's claim was the undeniable truth: if it weren't for her, Miller would not have survived years ago. She was born into a middle-class family of six children in the countryside, and her family used to be very happy. Until one night, ten years ago, her father went crazy and suddenly murdered all five of her siblings. She had been lucky to escape, and in the snow that night Aunt Janet had found her, shivering and terrified. The woman had groomed her and trained her. She had two degrees in medicine, could use firearms excellently, and was a very skilled combatant. But for some reason Aunt Janet forbade her from using any of her qualifications and had always dictated most parts of her life, including dating, since that horrific night. And to this day, she still had no idea what eventually happened to her father or her mother, who had been tied up and helpless during the massacre. She had tried searching for any traces of them on the Net without her aunts knowledge but all efforts had been futile leaving her hopeless.
As she walked into her room and closed the door, she leaned against it, her heart still pounding. She still couldn't believe she had gotten so drunk and given her first time to an escort. If Aunt Janet ever found out, she would be dead. So she could only be thankful that Aunt Janet had suspected nothing. And with the thought that it was all just a one-night stand with an escort, a man she would never see again, she forcefully waved the entire incident off, pushing it into a dark corner of her mind. 'The escort had a nice body, though,' she thought as she walked to the bathroom.