Finding Allie

by Meli Raine

  “Compound?”

  “Where all the Atlas members live.”

  “Oh. And you don’t want to live there anymore?” I wonder why. How bad are things getting? Does Jeff have anything to do with this? A streak of fear zings through me.

  “Nah. Tired of my old man trying to tell me how to live my life. He wants me to start hauling big shipments across the border, too, and negotiating with the big guys. I don’t want that. I want to leave and go to L.A. Do stunts.” He grimaces. “Short of that, I just want to get away from the gang. Have some privacy. Some peace.”

  He pauses and opens the “shower” door. It’s just a three-foot by three-foot area closed off by wood for privacy. A big, black plastic bag with a hose and a sprayer at the end, like something out of a watering can, is attached, hanging down. The hose has a clamp in it. A bottle of shampoo and a bar of green soap are on a small piece of wood nailed into the wall.

  “It’s the Waldorf Astoria, all for you, Allie,” Chase jokes.

  I laugh. He laughs with me. It feels good.

  “Where’s the rest of your bathroom?” I ask.

  Chase and David share an eyeroll.

  “Oh,” I say, a little embarrassed. I guess in the desert you just...go.

  “We, er...Chase has one,” David explains, pointing to a tiny little tent right behind the house. “There’s a composting toilet in that tent.”

  “Why in a tent? And why a shower door?” I look around. There isn’t a soul for miles and miles. In fact, if you look up, you won’t even see white jet contrails in the sky. This place is that isolated.

  Chase and David share a look of mutual dismay. “Shit!” Chase spits out. “She’s right! Why the hell did we do all that extra work? It’s not like I care if I’m naked and soaping up with only the lizards to watch me.”

  My mouth goes dry at the thought of Chase naked and soaping up.

  David’s looking at me like I figured out some complex problem that’s been troubling people for ages. “I can’t believe neither me or Chase thought about that. We just figured we needed all those trappings of society.” He wipes a line of sweat off his face and gives me a grin. He looks like he’s a little kid again. I really do love David.

  Like a brother.

  “Maybe we do need them,” Chase says softly, planting a kiss on my cheek. David looks away. “You can come out here any time, Allie. You’ve got everything you could possibly need right here.”

  He’s right. I do.

  Chapter Eleven

  Chase and David spend the next hour showing me how Chase rides his bike over huge breaks in the rocks, jumps from rock formation to rock formation, protects himself from being hurt—

  And all of it on YouTube.

  David sets up a charging cable so that his phone’s battery doesn’t die. We watch video after video of stunts. Chase is amazing. Powerful.

  Fearless.

  “I can’t believe you’ve been doing this for months and you didn’t tell me,” I say to David in an accusatory voice.

  He hunches his shoulders, sheepish and apologetic. “Chase made me keep it a secret.”

  “If I’d known you were his friend,” Chase says as he holds my hand and squeezes it, “I’d have given him permission to talk about this a long time ago.”

  Time.

  “What time is it?”

  David taps his screen. “One forty.” His eyes widen with alarm. “Oh, no! We need to head back to the car, so you can get to the bar.”

  I’m not worried. We’ll get back. What fills me with emotion is the fact that there’s so much I don’t know about Chase. Every day I learn a little bit more and I’m more intrigued. More interested. More attracted. He’s a really fascinating mystery and even though we have this compelling need to be together, there’s clearly something more.

  He’s not just this bad boy biker I have the hots for (and who, I think, has the hots for me).

  Chase has ideas. Ambitions. Goals. Just like me, he can imagine himself in a different place. Away from here, we both have dreams about taking our chance and going for it. Stunt work for him, acting for me.

  Could our dreams line up more perfectly?

  Maybe I’ll get to Los Angeles after all.

  And maybe Chase and I will go together.

  Chase says something to David, who looks at me and starts walking to the car, leaving us alone. Those strong, rugged arms go around my waist and I’m in Chase’s arms, his heart beating against my hand.

  “I want you to come here sometime, Allie. Any time, actually,” he says with a chuckle as his lips skim my forehead. Then my cheek. Then my lips.

  Oh, the lush sweetness of our tongues touching. I’m breathing but I’m not. Our kiss is keeping me alive. Thoughts of Chase are keeping me sane.

  He pulls back and smiles. “You working tomorrow?”

  I shake my head. I can’t really think right now. I just want more kissing.

  As if he reads my mind he bends down and presses his mouth against mine so urgently it’s like he can’t live without one more kiss.

  The sun is beating down so hard I break out into an instantaneous sweat all over my body, even under my clothes. Parts of me that are never naked want to be. I’m so hot.

  He makes me so hot. It’s not the sun.

  “Listen, you meet me here tomorrow, okay? Can you do that?”

  I shake my head. “I don’t know. Only if I can find a way to get Jeff to let me use the car.”

  He tips my chin up with his thumb on it, then moves the pad of his thumb up to my lips, running it down. The soft, wet inner pink of my mouth rubs against the rough callus on his finger.

  I shiver.

  “You’ll find a way,” he says, and without another word turns away and walks with purpose to his bike while I just melt into a puddle named Allie.

  An eternity later, I realize David’s waiting for me, so I turn toward him and do my best to half-walk, half-run to him. Once the dirt is more compact, it’s easier. He’s already in the car and it’s turned on, air conditioning blasting when I open the passenger side and climb in.

  Sweet relief. The arctic air pouring out of the vents makes me want to cry, it feels so good.

  David puts the car in reverse and backs out, then goes toward the road. We drive in silence until we’re about twenty minutes from the bar.

  “So,” David says. “You and Chase Halloway.”

  I grin. “Yep.”

  “Huh.”

  His eyes stay on the road and I can’t tell what David’s thinking. We’re like brother and sister, and it’s impossible for us to be together, so...

  “What does ‘huh’ mean?” I ask.

  “Just ‘huh.’”

  “There is no such thing as just ‘huh’.”

  He shrugs.

  “You don’t like him?” I ask.

  “No, I like Chase just fine. It’s more that I hope you’re being careful.”

  “We’re not sleeping together! We’ve barely kissed.”

  David’s nostrils flare with a smile and a laugh. “Not that kind of careful.” He frowns quickly. “But if you do start sleeping together, definitely be that kind of careful.”

  “Duh. You sound like my sister.”

  “Your sister is wise. Does she know about Chase?”

  “Sort of.”

  He arches one eyebrow but keeps his eyes on the road.

  “Not really,” I confess. “She knows his name, but has no idea about his life.”

  “So she doesn’t know he’s a drug dealing murderer.”

  Aha. Here we go. Now I know what David’s thinking.

  “He killed a guy who was raping his mom.” I frown. “Well, technically, he killed the guy who murdered his mom. His dad killed the rapist.”

  David’s eyes fly wide open.

  “No shit? Allie, that’s...” He lets out a long, overwhelmed sigh.

  “Yep. It’s true.”

  “Wow.”

  Yeah, wow. How awful for Chase
. My heart speeds up just thinking about the terror he must have felt when he was younger. How awful it must be to lose your mom right in front of you like that. My mom just disappeared after a hike with Jeff. She fell and it took forever to find her body. That was bad enough, but if she had been attacked and killed right before my eyes?

  I’m not sure how a person survives that.

  David takes a long, deep inhale and then slowly blows out the air. His fingers tap nervously on the steering wheel. He finally says, “You know I leave in twelve days.”

  A sad panic squeezes my heart. “I know.”

  We both know the next words I want to say are that I’ll come visit him. That he’ll take me all over Chicago and show me the sights. I can’t even give him gas money for driving me out into the desert. My stash is too important for escaping.

  Once David leaves and then I leave, we’ll probably never see each other again. Ever. Because I do not plan to come back to this festering hole of a town ever again.

  Not for all the money in the world.

  “I have to go to Los Angeles,” I say. “When I make it there, I’ll have money to visit you. Or you can fly out and see me.”

  “You’re my best friend, Allie.”

  “I know. You’re mine, too.”

  We ride in more silence, the landscape all I know, brown on top of brown, hot sun baking everything to a boring color. The pictures Marissa has sent me of the ocean, of the greenery of L.A., of the gorgeous mansions, make me crave leaving.

  David pulls the car into the parking lot of the bar and I turn to him.

  “Thank you.”

  “For what?”

  “For helping me get together with Chase.”

  His eyes are troubled. “Any time.”

  “You’re not sure you feel that way, though.”

  “I think Chase got a little weird about me back there,” David says slowly. “Like he thinks I’m interested in you.”

  Oh. Well. Hmmm.

  “But you’re not.” I say that so confidently, so clearly.

  Because it’s true.

  David’s sad eyes and raised eyebrows are my answer. “You figured that out long ago.”

  I nod. I might be naive about a lot of things, but it wasn’t hard to get the fact that David’s sexuality is decidedly...eclectic.

  “Does Chase know?” I ask.

  He shakes his head quickly. “No. No way. I’m not advertising that to a guy who rides with drug-dealing bikers.”

  A thought crosses my mind and fills me with alarm. “You’re not...you don’t like Chase, you know. Like that?”

  David’s laughter bursts out of him like a whistle on a heated steam kettle. “God, no. He’s totally not my type.”

  “What is your type, David?”

  “I have to leave here to find out.”

  I used to think the same was true for me. That I had to leave town to go out into the world and find true love. Or, at least, someone to date.

  But it turns out someone came to me.

  “Oh, shit, Allie. You, um...you better go.” I follow where David’s looking and panic blooms in my belly.

  Jeff is standing at the entrance to the bar.

  And he is not happy.

  Chapter Twelve

  As David takes off, I walk to the doorway, chin up. Jeff has less and less power over me. He doesn’t realize it, but it’s true.

  “Where were you?” he demands.

  “Hanging out with David.”

  He makes a nasty sound in the back of his throat. “And who else.”

  A chord of fear rings deep inside me. What does he know?

  “No one.”

  Jeff’s hard stare almost wears me down. Almost. If I didn’t feel strong from spending time with Chase, he’d succeed. I’m all done with letting Jeff win and make me feel small.

  A few more weeks and I’m completely done with Jeff at all. Period.

  “Get inside and set up for the night crowd.”

  “Are we expecting a big crowd? Atlas coming by?” I ask, keeping my voice neutral.

  Jeff’s neck whips around, fast, like I’ve slapped him. “Atlas?”

  “You know,” I explain, pretending like this is a normal conversation. “The biker gang.”

  “I sure as fuck know what Atlas is, Girlie.” I flinch. Jeff uses bad language all the time but generally not directed at me. I’ve hit a nerve.

  “Are you expecting a big crowd?” I walk past him and into the darkened bar. It smells like hot, sour beer with pine-scented deodorizer. The odor makes my stomach burn.

  Or maybe that’s the sick feeling of knowing I’m about to be screamed at.

  “You stay away from Atlas. Stay away from Chase Halloway.”

  “How can I do that and work at the bar?” I ask, pointing out the obvious. “They come in here sometimes. I don’t have control over that.”

  “He won’t be around. Chase. I took care of that.”

  “You what?”

  “Me and Galt have an agreement that you two are bad news for each other. Chase ain’t gonna be around here for a while.” Jeff studies me while he delivers this news. I pretend it doesn’t bother me.

  Inside, though, I’m dying.

  “Okay. Fine. Why should I care? He was turning into a creepy stalker type, anyhow.” I’m trying to use reverse psychology on Jeff. I hope it works. Maybe if I convince him I don’t care about Chase he’ll drop the subject.

  “Creepy sure is right. You know he killed his own mama?”

  The bottle of whisky I’m moving from one counter to the other drops right out of my hand and shatters.

  He makes a nasty snorting sound, his eyes narrowing, looking beadier than normal. “Yeah. That’s right. Galt Halloway’s kid killed his mom and a guy Galt found her cheating with. Nice. Fifteen-year-old boy blows his mom’s head off because she’s fucking some guy.”

  “That’s not true,” I hiss, walking over the shards of wet glass toward him, not caring about my shoes.

  “Oh? Just because you don’t want it to be true don’t make it a lie.”

  “Chase didn’t kill his mom.”

  “A whole lotta people beg to differ,” Jeff replies, shaking his head like I’m stupid.

  I don’t believe Jeff. I can’t believe Jeff. There’s no way Chase killed his mom. He told me the truth today out there in the desert. Jeff’s been told a lie. The way he smiles as he tells it is what’s creepy. Not Chase. Jeff’s the one who’s more likely to have killed a mom.

  My mom.

  Marissa and I don’t talk about it anymore, but we’re pretty sure Jeff killed our mother. We don’t have any proof, and when it happened we were just stupid teen girls in the eyes of the cops who investigated. Jeff was smooth, and able to talk to them man to man. He played the grieving spouse, the out-of-his-mind loving husband who didn’t know where his wife had fallen.

  Meanwhile, it was me and Marissa who were out of our minds with true sorrow.

  Jeff was never arrested. When they found Mom’s body he cried, but only in public. Never in private.

  Doesn’t that say so much?

  “I don’t give a shit what a lot of people say,” I snap at him, then break into a run. Screw Jeff. I can’t take the car and it’s sweltering outside, but I spy my bicycle out of the corner of my eye. I’ve stored it by the side of the bar for a long time and only use it when I’m desperate.

  I’m desperate now.

  Chapter Thirteen

  The gears creak with neglect, but the bike works. Tires are fine, and as I pull out of the parking lot I half expect Jeff to grab the back of my shirt and drag me down. The feeling takes me by surprise and sends a full-body chill through me as I pump my legs hard to get away from the bar as fast as possible.

  I know he’s not chasing me, but still. He’s mad. I’m madder.

  Anything could happen right now.

  Screw Jeff. He can tend the bar alone tonight. I’m not going back. I’m just not. The farther I get away from the ba
r, the angrier I feel. He had no right to say that about Chase. Those lies. Chase told me what happened, and I believe him.

  So why am I so upset?

  The road is long, boring and straight for more miles than I can see. Keeping the bike moving is so easy. My hair flies behind me like a kite tail and the breeze feels so good in this crazy-hot place. All I’ve ever known is this town, these barren lands, this brown state. I’m biking in the general direction of Los Angeles, headed west, and I wonder.

  I wonder what would happen if I just kept going.

  My stash is back at the bar, unfortunately. While the idea of leaving right now and just riding forever until I literally fall into the ocean is appealing, I can’t. Not yet. I’m so close to getting it right.

  Plus, there’s Chase.

  If he’ll go, I want him there, too.

  A car passes, blowing a huge gust of wind on me. The cars are generally polite when it comes to bike riders. Why not? The roads are wide and it’s not like there isn’t enough room. Another car passes me, then a third. The engines fade off in the distance.

  My thighs are starting to complain. I don’t ride enough anymore to be in shape the way I was before I got my driver’s license. Jeff doesn’t let me use the car very often, and only when he needs me to run an errand for him. I’ve grown accustomed to driving places or being driven. My bike became an after thought.

  Now it’s a lifeline.

  Knowing I can just get away from Jeff feels so good. In a few hours I know I’ll regret this. I should go back. I should work the bar. I should shut up and act like nothing ever happened, like I didn’t mouth off to him.

  As these thoughts pepper my brain, another engine roars in the distance.

  This one isn’t a car.

  The motorcycle speeds past me just as I hit a huge bump and go flying over the handlebars onto the ragged rocks at the edge of the road, my elbows in front of me, arms bent out of instinct to protect my face. I fall so quickly I don’t even have time to scream. I’m not wearing a helmet.

  The crunch of gravel and dirt against my face feels like I’m being peeled alive. My skin burns and burns, and then I’m wet. The sound of an engine dies out and I hear someone screaming my name.