Chapter Twenty-Three
“Remember when I sort of warned you off True Mahan?”
Hope looked at the clerk, who seemed to be not looking at her.
“Wasn’t much sort of about it, but yes, I remember.”
The woman met her gaze then, as she handed her the bag with the new toothbrush and tube of toothpaste she’d bought. Her old one was so worn the bristles were splayed out until they looked like the branch of a dead Christmas tree. And since she was going to be back on the road soon, she’d decided to splurge. Nothing could make the gas station and convenience store bathrooms she had to use much better, but at least her mouth would feel cleaner.
And if the thought of leaving this place, leaving True, made her feel like someone was carving at her with her own knife, that was her own stupid fault.
“—back.”
Hope blinked. Tuning out like this was not a good thing. She had to get back in the habit of being hyper aware. “I’m sorry, what?”
“I said I take it back. Anyone who’d do what you did for young Adam, well they’re all right in my book.”
“I. . .I’m just glad I was there.”
“And knew what to do,” the woman pointed out. Then she smiled, and it changed her face, the dour look vanishing. “I should have known. Should have trusted True’s judgment.”
I’m not sure he should. But all she said was, “Thank you.” She couldn’t think of anything else. But when she came out of the store and headed back toward Zee’s car, parked in front of Riva’s Java, she found herself greeted now with smiles and cheery “Hellos” instead of curious looks. A couple of people even paused to express gratitude, and wouldn’t accept her rather awkward insistence that any one of them would have done the same.
By the time she got back in the car she was shaking. For once not out of fear, or from vicious memories, but from a longing unlike anything she’d ever felt before. A longing to fit here, to stay in this unlikely little town with the crazy history. To stay and make a place here.
To stay with True.
She found herself laughing at that wish. Mixed with the longing, it was a maelstrom of emotions that was almost overwhelming. Feeling as if she were precariously balanced on the edge of full blown hysteria, she curled her hands into fists and banged them against the steering wheel. Nothing. Harder. Felt the hurt, but it still wasn’t enough. She slammed harder, but nothing seemed able to overcome what was boiling up inside her. She changed the angle, going now for a sharp blow with her knuckles. It hurt even more. Again.
And finally the pain sliced through the swirling cloud and the tightness in her chest began to ease.
But then her gaze came to rest on the tattoo that circled her wrist, the permanent reminder of her own foolishness and mistakes. She stared at it, remembering the moments when it had been splattered with blood and tissue. If her frenzied pounding of a helpless steering wheel didn’t prove she was no good for the likes of True Mahan, that permanent reminder did.
*
“Want me to talk to her?”
True stared at Deck over the soda he was drinking before going back to join the crew working on the foundation for the pavilion. “What?”
The man once known as Crazy Joe, the recluse, shrugged. “I know a bit about being on the run.”
True didn’t know the whole story, but he knew enough. Enough to realize what a major offer that was. He shook his head in slow wonder. “You’ve come a long way, my friend.”
“Kicking and screaming all the way,” Deck said with a lopsided grin. Then, seriously, “She really can’t go back?”
“She’s afraid to. Not for herself,” he added quickly.
He wondered if the concept of wanting to protect someone that much was foreign to Deck. Then he almost laughed; of course it wasn’t, he had Kelsey now, and would die to protect her. And if he needed pointers, he had Kelsey’s mom, Lisa, to show him the way.
“And if she doesn’t?”
True grimaced. “She’ll keep running.”
Deck studied him for a moment. He had the oddest feeling the man could see way past the surface. True supposed he couldn’t be the writer he was without seeing things others didn’t.
“I hope you stop some day.”
“Stop what? I’m not running.”
“Aren’t you?”
True blinked.
Deck shrugged. “I just recognize the look. Faced it in the mirror for a lot of years.”
True tried to put the words out of his mind as he went back to work. He didn’t really need to be here, the crew was entirely capable of handling this, but here he was anyway. He told himself it was part of being thorough, but he had a sneaking suspicion it had something to do with what Deck had just said. Not that he was running, not really. But maybe. . .avoiding?
Yeah, that he had to admit. He was avoiding going home. It had been a long, difficult weekend, at least for him. Not because Hope was there, because she wasn’t. She’d worked practically the entire time, coming home only to eat something and sleep. It didn’t escape him that she was pushing hard to finish the job, and he had to assume it was so she could get out of here. And she’d been back at it again today, gone before even he had risen to start his day. He’d thought perhaps she’d broken her promise and taken off, but a glance at Zee’s place told him the lights in the office were on and she was already working.
He had wondered how Zee felt about that, but she had told him yesterday she hadn’t even realized what Hope was doing, she’d been so quiet. And asked him what he’d done to make her push so hard. He’d dodged that, leaving abruptly, and he hoped before Zee read the memory of that kiss in his face. The memory that haunted him, taunted him, and had kept him awake the last two nights with the effort not to get up, walk down the hall, and ask Hope if they could pick up where that had left off and to hell with the consequences.
Damn, Mahan, you’re acting like you never kissed a woman before.
He had, in fact. A couple of times since Amanda had died. Just to see. He’d felt nothing but awkward and wrong, as if he were betraying her somehow, even after she was gone. The only good side was that he’d done it on trips out of Whiskey River, not because no one here—Megan Clark, the real estate agent came to mind—caught his eye, but because he was certain the whole town would feel that way. He hadn’t lied when he’d said they’d all loved his wife.
They’d be as thrilled as I would be to see you happy again. . .
“Shit!”
It broke from him as the hammer came down on his left forefinger. He’d been too busy not paying attention to the form they were building for this week’s concrete pour and mooning over a woman who clearly didn’t want him. At least, not enough to stay.
So you think you’re worth her risking her life and her grandparents lives for?
It didn’t matter if it was really true or not, because she thought it was. And so she was working sixteen hour days just to get free of Whiskey River. And him.
“Mahan,” Chuck Simons, the foreman of the crew, called out with a grin, “you’re a menace today.”
“Yeah, yeah,” he muttered. He shoved the hammer back through the loop on his tool belt, then picked up the belt and slung it over his shoulder. He gave the foreman a rueful smile. “I’m doing more harm than good, so I’ll leave you gentlemen to it.”
The man’s grin widened. “You can trust us alone, honest.”
“I know,” True said, his voice serious now. Chuck gave him a nod in understanding and thanks.
He drove slowly, not even thinking about passing the delivery truck in front of him as it clung tenaciously to exactly the speed limit. He wondered if word had gotten around about the accident; things like that always rattled people for a while. But the ones not directly involved got over it and went back to old habits, or so it seemed. He’d bet the driver that had hit Adam wouldn’t.
He’d bet Hope wouldn’t.
The images slammed through his mind again like some jerkily cut
movie, the call from Sharon, that moment when he’d walked into the clinic to see her covered in blood, that heart-stopping moment before he’d believed she wasn’t hurt.
He’d realized, eventually, that his own reaction in that moment said all there was to say about how he felt about Hope Larson. His entire being had screamed out “No, not again!” with a fierceness that had shaken him.
But her reaction after he’d kissed her—to resolutely continue her packing—said everything about her determination to leave. And he’d be a fool—okay, a bigger fool than he’d already been—to ignore that.
He suddenly realized where he was. In the fog of his thoughts he’d headed home.
Lucky you didn’t hit someone, idiot.
He slowed. She wouldn’t be there, she’d be next door. It wasn’t even five yet, and she’d been working much later than that in her push to get the job done and get out of here. So it was safe to go home.
Safe.
How had the home that had been a haven for him, a quiet, peaceful place, suddenly become someplace he was afraid to go?
Like hell.
Chapter Twenty-Four
The obstinacy he’d been born with kicked in. True yanked the steering wheel and made the last turn. It was his damned house, and just because it didn’t feel like it right now wasn’t going to keep him away.
The stubborn is strong with this one. . .
Unbidden the sometimes teasing, sometimes weary words his mother had used flitted through his mind.
Be glad, Margaret. Sometimes that’s all that keeps you going.
His father’s answer, always steadfast, followed. And he’d been right. Sometimes, after the crash that had ended life as he knew it, that Texas size streak of stubborn had been the only thing that had kept him going. As it would now.
He saw the lights on in Zee’s office. He could even see, through the cloth blinds, a figure standing at the table in the back where they’d set up the document scanner. And hated that it gave him a sense of relief as he headed into his half of the house.
Knowing it was empty he wandered from room to room, not certain why. It was not like she’d left her stamp on the place, in fact the opposite, she was very careful not to, with not even a kicked off shoe lying around. Polite? Or maybe she just kept all her things together in case she had to run. That seemed more likely. The only trace she’d ever been here at all was the bookmark that was working its way through Deck’s books. She was midway through number three, but with the work hours she was keeping she wouldn’t finish before she left. He wondered if that mattered to her. Wondered if she was learning anything from them, because as he’d said, Deck knew a bit about being on the run. She could probably learn a lot from what the not-so-fictional Sam Smith had had to do to survive.
He turned on his heel, still angry at himself, and strode into the kitchen. Hell if he was fixing dinner tonight only to have her not even show up to eat it. He tossed his keys down on the counter. They skidded across the smooth granite, and he had to grab quickly to keep them from going over the edge. That was when he spotted the paper on the floor. It was a piece of paper from the pad he kept handy for notes. He could see from here it was a list of some kind. He picked it up.
A shopping list?
He’d never seen her writing, but he knew it just the same. Strong but choppy, some letters plain, some ending in a flourish.
Socks
Toothbrush and paste. This one was crossed out.
Shoes, if not too much.
Too much. What was too much if you were on the run? How did you choose between eating and keeping your feet from ending up bloody? He wondered if she’d gotten to the part in book three where Sam had stolen a blanket out of a laundromat just to try and survive the freezing nights outside. Had she ever been that desperate?
He dropped the list on the counter of the kitchen island. Stared down at it, this proof of her intention to leave. When the time came, would he see that writing again? Would she avoid saying it at all, and just skulk out some night, leaving a note? Or would she even do that? Maybe one day soon he’d get up and the house would be empty once more, every trace of her fastidiously removed. Except maybe that bookmark.
God, he was flat going insane.
His head dropped wearily. He braced his hands on the counter, widespread, and his shoulders sagged.
He didn’t know how long he’d been standing there like that when he heard the inner door. He resisted the urge to look at the clock on the oven; what did it matter to him what time she came home?
Came home. Such a simple phrase.
Yeah, simple like a shotgun shell is simple.
“You found my list.”
Her voice was quiet, tentative. She had stopped beside him, but not too close. Or was that not close enough?
“Yeah.” His voice was edgy, but he couldn’t seem to help it. “You’d better go shopping, you don’t have much time, the way you’ve been working.”
“True, I…”
His head came up then. And for the first time he looked at her. She was standing almost rigidly, her gaze fastened on that list as if she no more wanted to look at him than he did her. He stared at her, at the long, silky fall of her hair, the way the bangs brushed her eyebrows. He wondered inanely if she had a pair of scissors in that pack to trim them, or if she just hacked at them with that knife of hers.
Logistics. She was readying herself to run and he was fixated on logistics.
“The deal was for the two weeks,” he said flatly.
“The deal was for the job to be done.”
Because what reason could there be to stay once it was?
She put her hands down on the cool granite, as if she needed to steady herself. Or as if she was working up to grabbing that list out from in front of him.
His gaze shifted to her hands, expecting them to move at any moment. His brow furrowed.
“What happened?”
Her fingers curled and she pulled her hands back. He grabbed them, turned them to confirm what he’d seen; reddened knuckles, two with skin scraped off.
She pulled her hands free. “I just. . .scraped them, that’s all.”
“Funny,” he said, “they look a lot like mine did when I put my fist through a wall.”
Her gaze shot to his face. “You put your fist through a wall? I can’t imagine that.”
“Stick around,” he said dryly. She didn’t miss the inference, and looked away. “What did you hit?”
She made a small sound that wasn’t quite a laugh. “What makes you think it wasn’t a who?”
“Was it?”
“No.”
“What, then?”
She let out a compressed breath. “Zee’s poor steering wheel.”
Something stirred inside him, something unwelcome but soft. It echoed in his voice when he said quietly, “I’ve beaten up an innocent steering wheel a time or two.”
He didn’t say when, and when she looked at him again he knew he didn’t have to.
This time he took her hands gently, slowly, giving her every chance to pull away again. She just looked at him, and the tangle of emotions he saw in her face made him chance it. Maybe, just maybe she wasn’t quite as certain about leaving as she thought she was.
He lifted her right hand, looking at the bright red spots across the first two knuckles. Slowly, gently, he lowered his head and kissed the angry places. He heard her suck in a breath. Felt her sudden tension.
But she didn’t pull away.
It took him a moment to realize the sound in his ears was his own pulse, picking up, pounding in hot, heavy beats. And when he lifted his head to see her looking at him with a sort of longing he’d never seen in a woman’s eyes before, it blasted through carefully constructed walls as if it were the explosives they used to implode a building.
In that moment he knew he couldn’t go on like this. He was tired of the dance. He hated the idea of walking away from the only woman who’d made him feel anything since Amanda had
died, but he would if he had to.
“Now or never,” he whispered, meaning it.
He felt her tremble, but she didn’t look away. Her tongue crept out to moisten her lips, and a jolt went through him as if she’d touched it to his skin.
“Now.”
There was a quiver in her voice that gave him pause. His body was screaming not to question, but his rules by which he lived his life, the things that this town respected him for, gave him no choice.
“You owe me nothing, Hope. If that’s why, I don’t want it.”
Her chin came up. And her voice was steady now. “I did that once. Second worst mistake of my life.”
“I don’t want to be the third.”
She reached up then, ran a hand over his cheek, traced the line of his jaw. A hand, he noticed, that was steady now. “This doesn’t have anything to do with owing. Or obligation. Just. . .wanting.”
“That’ll do,” he said, his voice rough.
The need swamped him then, and he pulled her up into his arms. For a brief moment he realized how light, how little she was, and it amazed him that she was tough enough to get through what she’d been through.
Her arms went around his neck. She shifted, but not to escape. Instead she stretched upward. And kissed him.
Heat blasted through him so fiercely he nearly staggered against the counter. And suddenly he wanted her right there, right now, in the damned kitchen. On the counter she’d be at the perfect height, and. . .wouldn’t it be romantic as hell if Zee walked in? With his last shred of control he headed for his bedroom.
And stopped dead in the doorway.
“Hope,” he said, sounding as strangled as he suddenly felt, “I don’t. . .have anything.”
She gave him a puzzled look, as if she were coming out of a daze. “What?”
“Condoms,” he said bluntly.
Oddly, she smiled. “That’s nice.”
He blinked. “What?”
“You didn’t plan this. Because True Mahan would never miss something so crucial.” He wasn’t sure how to take that. Didn’t want to even think about trying to quiet his surging body into submission if this was going to come to a screeching halt. “It’s all right.” She let out a little breath. “My life may be a mess, but I’m not stupid. I stocked up on the pill before I left the west coast, where it’s over the counter.”
Whiskey River Runaway (Whiskey River Series Book 2) Page 15