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xxvi. Four Hands Bloody
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Blair had the faith of their operation in her hand. She punched her little sister's number in the keypad of the old phone and nervously handed it to the older girl, then ran her hands through her hair with a heavy breath.
It was Sarah's idea to contact Wheezie and get her to find out their father's plan regarding the gold, and Blair had reluctantly agreed, almost scared to get in contact with her little sister. It wasn't fright as much as it was embarrassment, and regret that she left her with the murdering men in their family. So she sat back, head buried in her hands, while Sarah waited for her to answer after dialing for the second time; Wheezie probably hung up thinking it was spam.
John B placed a hand on her shoulder, a meek attempt at reassurance, and she could feel the weight of it burn past her flesh. She wore a sleeveless-top, her shoulders bare, and she swore the tanner-than-usual, sweat-sticky flesh had bubbled, a warm sear, under his blistered fingers.
The seconds were longer than they were supposed to, almost as though they were back in a classroom with a teacher giving an endless lecture at the board. Suddenly, her brain wasn't registering anything anymore. Sarah was talking, a wide grin plastered on her face, but all Blair could hear was loud ringing that buzzed in the back of her brain and spread all the way to the bridge of her nose, which she pinched with shaky hands.
It was only when the reassuring shoulder pat from John B turned into a focused nudge that she snapped back from reality, only to find Sarah holding the phone towards her with a tearful smile, eyes glassed over. "Wheez wants to talk to you," she said. Blair slowly grabbed the phone from her hand.
"Wheezie?" she whispered.
A laugh echoed on the other line, and she could hear an undertone of sadness that broke her heart. "Blair!" she exclaimed. "I'm so glad you and Sarah are alive. I love you so much, Bee," Wheezie sniffled.
"I love you, too, sweetheart," Blair smiled, feeling an indescribably heavy weight roll of her shoulders. To know that her sister wasn't mad at her for leaving, for everything she put her through, gave her a certain sense of hope that, one day, everything could go back to normal.
"I heard Dad say he was gonna fly to Nassau for a meeting and I'm gonna find out when it is, okay?" Wheezie told her older sister. She was sitting on her bed, knees brought up to her chest, a wide grin plastered on her face, smushing her eyes and cheeks. Blair thanked her, bitting her bottom lip to try and stop herself from crying. "Did you tell JJ?" Wheezie suddenly asked. "That you're alive, I mean. Oh, you should've seen him, Bee, he was devastated. He misses you."
