You're Automatic.

I felt so relieved that Bill had finally told me the truth, and I was happier than I had been in years. What was it about this guy that made me feel so different, so much better than I was before I met him and the others? I didn't really care as long as I was with him. His presence made me feel safe and happy, and that was all that mattered to me.

"You know, Tom is going to be pissed." Bill looked at me from the corner of his eyes. He seemed a little worried, but he also gave off a bit of confidence. Knowing I chose him was probably what gave him that assurance.

I bit my lip and nodded. "Yeah, probably... But, if he really cares about me like you think he does, I think he'll just want me to be happy. And I think, eventually, he'll be okay with it." I chuckled nervously as I thought about possible outcomes for when we told Tom what had happened.

Bill nodded slowly with a slight shrug. "You know, you can stay in my room until things are sorted out; if you want to, that is. I'm only a couple floors up from Tomi." He cautiously eyed me again, "Because I understand if you don't want to be there to tell him." His voice told me he'd rather me be there with him but would do it alone if that was what I wanted.

I gave him a quick squeeze, "I want to stay with you, there's no questioning that. However, I will go with you to tell Tom. He should hear it from me, it's my decision." I nodded to myself, deciding that was probably the smartest thing to do even though I really just wanted to hide in Bill's room. "We should move my stuff out of his room first, though."

“Yeah, that's a good idea,” he agreed. We walked silently for a couples minutes. “Where is he anyway? I didn’t think he would let you leave his sight without him...”

“He went to go eat. I’m guessing Gustav and Georg went with him but I don’t know for sure. I didn't exactly try to find out.” I shrugged. That reminded me that I should’ve checked my phone since Tom had more likely than not sent me a text or called.

Bill looked at me curiously. ”Why didn’t you go with him?”

I bit my lip and shrugged. “I wasn’t hungry. And that was when I got your text. I wanted to see you more than I wanted to eat.” I stopped in front of a building, holding him tightly so he would have to stop too. “You know, I think we have time.” I looked at Bill with a half smile.

Bill laughed and shrugged, “I guess so.” We walked into the Starbucks, and I greeted the heated building happily.

After getting our drinks, we sat at a table. I decided then and there that it should be our thing, Starbucks. After all, if it weren’t for Starbucks, I would never have met Bill or Tom or Gustav or Georg. “Are you nervous about telling him?”

I looked up at Bill and thought about it. I was sure Tom would understand; besides, at least we would all know Bill was okay now. Of course, he would probably be mad about the situation. “I don’t know, actually. Of all the things I’m worried about with talking to him about it is that I could be hurting him.” I frowned.

Bill nodded. “Understandable. I wonder if we could get Georg and Gustav to back us up.” I stared at the plastic cup in his hands as he thought.

I tilted my head, “Who do you think they would be behind on this? I mean, I'm not going to assume they'd take sides, but Georg kinda seems like Tom's... 'second-in-command.' You know?"

Bill half smiled and chuckled. “You're not far from the truth, I guess. I don't know, though. He's probably be kind of on the fence about it since we're all so close. I definitely think Gustav would be on our side, though; he likes you.” He looked up at me with a smile.

I grinned. "I like him too." We finished our drinks in silence, thinking the situation over. We headed back to the hotel in a rush to both get my stuff before Tom got back and to be out of the cold that was beginning to become unbearable.

As we neared the hotel, we saw several police cars with their lights flashing lined up on the street. "Looks like they've come for the robber..." He gave me a squeeze as we walked into the hotel.

"Officer, that's her! She was the one he took!"

I blinked as, before I was in the building for two minutes, I was suddenly bombarded by police and news journalists. Questions were yelled at me and I only caught a few words from everyone. It was overwhelming and I just stood there, looking at them all like I imagined a baby deer would look at a pack wolves.

"Everyone, back off and leave her alone!" I looked over to find a heavy built police officer trying to push his way through the crowd. He looked at me for a minute before smiling apologetically, "You have a couple officers in your hotel room that need to talk to you. You can talk to them privately in there and we'll be on our way." He lead me and Bill toward the elevator and held people back as we climbed in.

"Well, shit. Now I think Tom's going to be really pissed," I muttered with a frown, pushing a hand through my hair. I sighed and leaned back against the wall as the elevator started it's journey. I couldn't imagine me vanishing then Tom having to deal with cops and paparazzi would be very pleasant, then add the icing on the cake by what Bill and I were going to tell him. I'd be lucky if Tom could look at me after the whole ordeal...

Bill rubbed my back silently until the doors opened and we walked out into the hallway. "It'll be okay. We'll take things one step at a time, and we can tell Tom after we've talked to the police." We walked up to the door and, just as I was about to slid my keycard through the reader, the door opened.

The officer looked at me, slightly startled. "Amanda Sanders?" He composed himself quickly when I nodded. He nodded once and looked at Bill for a second before looking back at me, "We were about to give up on waiting for you. We would like to ask you a few questions, please come in." He walked back into the suite.

I looked at Bill and he grasped my hand in his, giving it a reassuring squeeze before leading the way into the room. I could feel my heart pounding from the anxiety I was feeling, both from having to talk to the cops and from the inevitable with Tom.

"Amanda, there you are! Why didn't you text me back?" Tom looked relieved to see me, but his look quickly changed when he looked at Bill. He looked torn between relief and shock; then, when he noticed our hands clasped together, he looked furious.

"Have a seat, you two," the officer said before Tom had a chance to say anything, nodding to the couch as he sat in a chair and took a notepad out of his jacket to begin questioning me.