The Great Escape: A Vintage Contemporary Romance

by Thea Harrison

“Probably,” she sighed. If Mike Carridine had trailed her for nine months, he wasn’t about to stop now, like he’d said. Dee felt a wave of pure frustration quiver through her. In all the country, in the entire wide world, she couldn’t shake one stubborn man off her trail. This was getting to be annoying.

  “Well, punkin, you just let me know if you see him comin’ and I’ll take care of him for ya,” he told her comfortingly. “A tiny little thing like you needs protection in this world, that’s what. Protection in this world. What was your name? Deborah?”

  “Dee!” she shouted, chuckling a little. It had been a risk, hitch-hiking like she had, but all the truck drivers she had met had been kindly, gruff men, and it had apparently been a risk well worth taking. By the end of the first hour, she and Chuck were fast friends, and by the end of the second, Dee knew the name of everyone in Chuck’s rather extensive family. She listened with fascination as he conducted cheerful conversations on the CB radio, using jargon she only half comprehended.

  “Hey, good buddy, I got me a pretty little yellow canary bird running away from a big bad cat, come back,” Chuck spoke into the receiver and, totally mystified, Dee listened for the reply.

  “What’s your big bad cat look like, little canary?” one of the truckers asked, and Chuck raised an eyebrow at Dee.

  “Oh!” she fumbled, as realisation hit that she was the topic of the conversation. “I—I don’t know. You mean my boy-friend’s car? It’s a dark green, I don’t know the make.”

  Chuck gave her a look that plainly expressed that he hadn’t expected any more from a woman, no matter how delightful she was, and Dee was hard put to it to keep from laughing as he went back to his conversation Soon all of the truckers in northern Ohio knew about her and that she was running away from her boy-friend, the Big Bad Cat. She squirmed a little at the freedom with which they all cheerfully discussed her problem, and devoutly hoped that Carridine didn’t have a CB in his car. If so, he would know her approximate direction and mode of travel before the day was out. She wished she had known what Chuck was about to say before he’d actually done it, but the damage was done now. There was no use moaning about it.

  After a while she began to get drowsy and she curled up in the seat, putting her tousled fair head on her knapsack and relaxing. She was more depressed than she had first realised. She would have to find a way to go back for some of her things. She slept.

  “Hey, wake up, punkin! Wake up! Boy, you sure did sleep a lot!” Chuck shouted at her, shaking her with one hand on her slim shoulder. Dee sat up groggily and knuckled her eyes before staring out. The daylight was beginning to fade and evening was setting in. Everything looked unfamiliar. “You gettin’ hungry?”

  She considered that. She hadn’t eaten anything since the day before. “Yes, I am. Where are we, Chuck?” The highway looked like a dark blue-grey ribbon in the fading light, and bright spots of yellow, red and blue from lit signs showed brilliantly as gas stations, restaurants and motels turned on their night signs. The surrounding countryside was fading from a dark green to a total black. “Good God! Did I sleep the entire day away?”

  “Just about! You fell asleep right around eleven, and it’s gettin’ pretty late right now! I stopped some time ago, but you were so dead you never noticed, and I didn’t have the heart to wake ya! We’re some distance just north of Cincinnati. I got me a favourite truck stop of mine an’ the boys, comin’ up in a few miles. Called up on the CB and there’s gonna be some friends of mine there, if you’re willin’ to eat then.”

  “Sounds good. I’m ravenous!” Dee told him enthusiastically. He grinned and nodded, patting his own stomach in agreement with her. Dee rummaged around and brought her hairbrush out to straighten some of her tangles while she looked out of the window. She felt very strange, sitting up so high in the cab of the huge truck. Everything seemed so different.

  After a little while, Chuck signalled and pulled off on to an exit ramp that swirled in a great spiral down, sending them back to the array of brightly lit buildings easily seen from the highway. He then expertly parked the monstrous vehicle and turned off the engine. Both of them jumped to the ground, Dee finding her legs stiff from staying in one position for so long. It was greatly refreshing to be able to walk about, and she sighed with pleasure as a cool wind blew gently against her cheek.

  “This way, punkin,” Chuck told her, gesturing to a rather dirty white, one-story building with a neon sign splashed on the roof. “I don’t know about you, but I need to use the little boys’ room.”

  Dee giggled at him and fell into step beside him, with her knapsack slung over one shoulder. He held open the door for her and followed behind, pointing out the way to the public restrooms. After she had used the facilities and had straightened her appearance, she went back out to be eyed curiously by several unknown men. Just as she was beginning to feel nervous about it, Chuck barrelled into the dining area and swept past her to start pumping hands all around. He then introduced her to everyone, including with their real names each one’s CB pseudonym, and she started to relax when she recognised a few of the men she had talked to that afternoon.

  They were all a cheerful, easygoing bunch, and Dee was treated like a fragile queen, which she loved, but she was under no illusions about some of the men. If she hadn’t been under Chuck’s protection and with several of his friends, she wouldn’t have liked to bet on her chances with some of the rougher-looking types. As it was, she was sandwiched in firmly between Chuck and one of his buddies, a younger fellow every bit as rough and gruff as Chuck, and if anyone happened to leer too long in her general direction, he was treated with a wide-eyed, warning stare from either of the two men.

  Supper was hot and hearty and conversation sharply decreased while everyone tucked into their supper. Dee had to smile several times during the course of her meal. Her presence really overthrew the natural flow of conversation for the men, she could see. Many times someone would start to make a ribald joke or a crude comment, and he would fall silent in the middle of the statement. Already her vocabulary picked up at the restaurant had been increased by several words and phrases, some of which she made a mental note to look up in the dictionary or ask someone about, if the dictionary happened to be too clean.

  Chuck insisted on buying her a dish of ice cream when everyone had coffee, so she tucked into that with enjoyment. She was just licking her spoon and contemplating her steaming cup of hot brew with pleasure when the glass door at the entrance swung open and a dark man walked quietly in. Dee glanced up casually, caught sight of the man and promptly dropped her spoon in consternation, though with no great surprise.

  Mike’s silent green gaze swept over the dining area and came to rest on her. She sighed as he gave her a short, perfunctory nod and immediately headed her way. Chuck glanced at her. “Hey, you gotta drink up your coffee before it gets too cold.” Really, she thought with amused exasperation, he’s worse than a fussy old grandmother! He saw the expression on her face and looked in the direction her eyes were trained. “Is that the boy-friend, punkin?”

  “I guess you could call him that,” she said tartly. He was sure sticking as close as a lover! If only that were the problem.

  Mike was silently passing occupied booths and Dee thought his very quietness was more menacing than all of the bluster in the world. His face looked hard and set, and his eyes glittered, sending off sparks of something volatile that Dee thought would be better left unexpressed.

  Sliding casually out of the booth, Chuck came out before Mike to block his way and was immediately joined by Fred. That husky fellow, for all his earlier good humour, was beginning to look pugnacious. Dee began to feel alarmed.

  “Hey there,” Chuck said heartily. “How ya doin’, old buddy? What do you need? If you’re wantin’ a meal to eat, there’s plenty of tables in the other direction.”

  Mike looked beyond him to Dee, his expression unreadable as he stared into her suddenly huge, apprehensive eyes. “I want to talk to the young l
ady over there,” he said quietly, in his pleasant low voice. He hadn’t even acknowledged the threat in Chuck’s overly hearty speech by so much as a blink of the eyes. All his attention was focussed on Dee’s face. He was as tenacious as a bulldog. Dee smelled the danger hanging like sulphur in the air and she silently swore, Damn him! Why didn’t he just leave? Why was he taking such a risk?

  “We-ell,” Chuck drawled slowly, “I don’t think the little lady wants to talk to you. She’s busy eatin’ her supper, and you just might give her indigestion. We wouldn’t want to do that, now, would we? She’s such a sweet little ol’ thing.” He took a step further and Fred touched shoulders with him as they blocked Dee’s view of Mike. The potential for physical violence was there, like explosive dynamite, and without being aware of her intention, Dee was standing in the booth to perch herself so that she could see Mike’s face. His green, implacable eyes sought hers. A nervous waitress shifted from one foot to the other, behind a counter.

  Dee tried to signal frantically to Mike with her eyes, jerking her head to the door in an attempt to get him to leave. He watched her silently, from under level brows, taking in the anxiety so obvious in her blue eyes, and then he deliberately walked forward.

  Both Fred and Chuck moved simultaneously, and one of Fred’s hands came out to knock at Mike’s shoulder to push him roughly back. But Mike wasn’t there, as he pivoted neatly on one foot, quick as a snake, to avoid the shove and parry with one of his own. In that brief moment, Dee realised as she watched Mike’s controlled speed that he could have taken care of both Fred and Chuck for all their bulk and strength, and won, if it hadn’t been for the fellows that came up behind him to grasp his arms and twist them tightly behind his back. Mike’s eyes came back to Dee’s as his back arched agonisingly and his head jerked up, nostrils flaring, and Chuck’s arm was swinging back for a blow when she galvanised into action.

  She launched from the back of the booth where she had been perched and moved so swiftly that she had a hold of Chuck’s clenched fist and was dragging on it with all her strength as she screamed, “Don’t hurt him!” Chuck’s eyes widened at this and he turned immediately into the gentle gruff man that she knew, putting his arm around her shaking shoulders and saying, “Why, little punkin, it’s gonna be all right. We’re just gonna make sure that he don’t give you any more scares, that’s all.”

  Dee was tired of being treated like a precious imbecile, and she snapped irritably, “And what do you think you’re doing to me, right now? Do you think this isn’t scaring me half to death? And who gives you the right, anyway?” Neither of them saw the gleam of satisfaction in Mike’s eyes, quickly veiled. “I can take care of myself! I know how to hit, too, if I need to, you know!”

  There were chuckles all around at this and somebody muttered, “The little canary’s turned out to be a tigress after all!” Chuck grinned amicably and stepped back, and the binding hands on Mike’s twisted arms fell away. He straightened slowly, intent on the two in front of him.

  “Why, punkin, you just go right ahead,” Chuck told her. “But just the same, I think you’d better have your conversation in here, so’s we can keep an eye on you.”

  Dee nodded shortly, her anger fading. “Thanks, Chuck,” she said, laying a hand lightly on his arm, and it was covered and squeezed gently.

  “Any time, punkin. I reckon you two need to work things out between you anyways.” He sat down and everyone generally relaxed, but she was extremely aware of his sharp eye on them while he sipped his coffee. Mike saw, too.

  Dee stared up at Mike, taking in his generally unruffled demeanour, and retorted, “You really are a clever one, Mike Carridine! Yes, I’ll have a cup of coffee with you! But don’t you start taking it for granted that I’m going to go anywhere with you!” This last was said with a quick shake of a finger under Mike’s nose, and she heard sniggers around her.

  “Come on,” he said, taking her gently by the arm and leading her away to a corner table, out of earshot from everyone else. She slid into a chair while he ordered coffee for the two of them, morosely studying the man across from her from under blonde, lowered brows.

  “How did you know I would react the way I did?” she asked abruptly. “It was a good guess.”

  He shrugged gracefully, hunching one shoulder and leaning his chin in one hand. “I’ve had to study your character all this time, to try to figure out what you would have done in different situations that had confronted you. I’ve talked to people from the University, and I think I have a generally good impression of everyone’s view of you. One thing you aren’t is bloodthirsty.”

  “Don’t push it too far,” she warned him darkly, and had to grin reluctantly when he laughed. Her blue eyes became contemplative, mocking. “So you think you know me that well, hmm?”

  “Quite the contrary,” she was told immediately. “I only know other people’s impression of you. I’m only now beginning to form some impressions of my own, having met you. The only thing I can say with certainty about you is that I’ve underestimated you time and time again. In fact,” and his gaze flickered over to where Chuck was sitting, “I’m beginning to think that the majority of people underestimate your potential, Dee.”

  She had to feel flattered in spite of herself, but was quick to change the subject since she considered the conversation rather irrelevant. “You have, I take it, a CB radio?”

  His gaze became mocking and one corner of his mouth quirked. “But of course. I’m the big bad cat, am I?”

  She snorted with derision. “He was on the radio and blabbing to everyone in the CB world before I could stop him. By the time I could sift through the jargon and understand what he was talking about, the damage was done.” She put up her hands and rubbed at her eyes tiredly. In spite of the sleep she had snatched in the truck, she felt tired from the upsets of the last two days. “How did you feel when you woke up?”

  “I had a headache,” he replied sourly, his expression wry. Dee noted absently that his nose looked as if it had been broken in a fight. He really was very handsome, she thought, and was mildly surprised that, aside from some exasperation, he didn’t appear to be angry. “And when I found the door locked on me and my tyres completely, utterly flat, I wanted to turn you over my knee and make your backside black and blue. But I’ve calmed down a bit.” He paused and then admitted ruefully, “I guess I had it coming to me, though, for ever letting my guard slip. So, now what?”

  “What, what?” she asked, and laughed. “I’m so tired!”

  “I know,” he said, and it was gentle, making her look at him in surprise. He was regarding her seriously. “What are you going to do, Dee? Are you going to come with me, or are you going to go with Chuck and his friends?”

  “And if I go with Chuck?” she asked, sending a lightning-swift, dagger-bright glance his way. He looked about as movable or as shakable as a brick wall.

  “Then I follow.” There was no hesitation.

  Her brows shot up. “It’s a good way to get hurt, you know.”

  “I know. I’ll risk it.” He didn’t, she thought angrily, look worried.

  Dee muttered tiredly, feeling dispirited, “Why don’t you go away?”

  He responded promptly, “Why don’t you go home? There’s a lot of people worried about you.”

  “Oh, hell!” she burst out, supremely angry, and his eyes flared before becoming shadowed. “Don’t spit that nonsense to me!” She leaned forward. “Are you trying to make me feel guilty in case you get hurt? I’m not responsible for your actions. If you follow me, then it’s on your head!”

  “I wouldn’t presume to make you feel responsible for my actions,” he said quietly. “I’m merely hoping to influence your decision. It worked just now. You couldn’t bear to see me get my face bashed in, could you?”

  She buried her face in her hands and tried to think. In spite of her brave and callous-sounding words, she knew she would feel guilty if he got hurt because of her. He was just doing his job.

&nbs
p; In favour of her leaving with him was the fact that she could still slip away, because there was a lot of ground to cover between here and home. And when she had appeased her own conscience by knowing he would not be hurt directly as a result from following her, then she would try again. Her shoulders slumped even more, dejectedly, since she knew he was watching her. “All right,” she whispered softly, “I’ll go with you.”

  Chapter Four

  After goodbyes had been said to Dee’s trucker friends, Mike ushered her out of the restaurant and into his car. She’d remembered correctly—it was a dark green, sleek-modeled sedan car, built for comfort and durability. She slid into the passenger side willingly enough and curled her legs underneath her, resting her head against the back of the seat. Mike soon got in on the driver’s side, and with one frowning glance at her tired face and exhausted demeanour, he leaned forward to switch on the ignition. Then he pulled into the curve that led on to the highway and they were heading south. Dee dozed in her seat while he drove into the night.

  He didn’t stay on the highway for long, however, and the change in the car’s rhythmic purr woke her up. She sat straight up and looked dazedly around her, pushing the tangled blonde hair off her forehead. Mike pulled into another travelling oasis and parked smoothly in front of a motel. He said quietly, “You look about ready to call it a night.”

  She merely nodded. He got out and came around to her side to open the door for her. As she hesitated, he told her, a thread of amusement running through his low voice, “Tired though you may be, I don’t think I’d trust you as far as I could throw you. If you wouldn’t mind, I’d like your company while I register for a room.”

  She grimaced and heard him laugh, and who could blame him? she thought. I wouldn’t trust myself either. Sliding out of her seat, she stuck her hands into her front pockets and joined him as he went into the motel’s office. Behind the counter was a scruffy little man with a drooping moustache. He was reading a dog-eared Western novel and looked up uninterestedly as they entered. Mike went forward and requested a double room for one night, and Dee flushed as the greasy little man’s eyes slid over her with an oily, insinuating look. But one glance at the set face of man in front of him quelled any remark he might have made, and he sullenly asked for the payment for the room. Mike gave him some bills, received a key, and then turned away from the counter, his dark face holding a fleeting look of disgust.