by W E DeVore
Q breathed it in. “I never could figure it out. That smell. He didn’t wear cologne.”
Audrey put the key into the ignition. “It was these sachet things. He kept them in his shoes. That man had the stinkiest feet when he was a kid, gave him a complex about it.”
“The shoes,” Q whispered. “I never looked in the shoes.”
“Always, the last place you look, darlin’,” Audrey flashed her bright smile and turned the key. A wave of heat and flame threw Q twenty feet back onto the lawn as chunks of burning metal came down around her. Her ears rang and the world stopped moving. Q gasped for air, struggling to refill her lungs. She covered her face in time to block a chunk of plastic floating down to strike her forearms.
Rolling up onto her knees, she crawled to see Ben’s car in flames. The metal chassis was a black skeletal outline within the raging firestorm. She screamed for Audrey, unsure if any sound came from her mouth as the ringing inside her head intensified.
As she stared into the blaze, the world tilted and she collapsed to the ground.
Burn. Bitch. Burn.
◆◆◆
Q sat on the steps of her neighbor’s porch across the street, watching the bomb squad tramp through her house. Her ears rang and the cut on her arm throbbed uncomfortably, but the EMTs had cleared her of any serious injuries. She heard shouting as Sanger forced his way through the police barricade and down the sidewalk, cutting across the lawn to reach her. He pulled her up to standing and clutched her to his chest. She went limp in his arms, unable to bear her own weight. As she started to fall, he put his arm under her knees and picked her up, carrying her down the street to his parked truck.
Once they were inside the cab, Q said, “Audrey’s dead.”
“I know.”
“I should go lock my house.” She sat still staring straight ahead, not seeing anything.
“They’ll be there for a while, Clementine,” Sanger said. “It’s not safe for you to stay here, they’ve evacuated the whole block.”
“Oh,” was all she could whisper. “I should call Ben’s mom, shouldn’t I?”
“Later,” he said. “I’m taking you home. You’re in shock. Let me take care of you.”
“Audrey’s dead,” she repeated.
“I know, my love. I know.” His eyes were fixed on the road, waiting for a firefighter to wave them past.
“Audrey’s dead. Ben’s dead. Jasper’s dead. Mike’s dead. Tori’s dead. Niko’s dead. Stanley’s dead. Savion’s dead. Louis is dead. Mama’s dead. They’re all dead.”
Sanger glanced at her in growing concern as she stared straight forward, not moving.
“You’ll be dead soon, too. Everybody’s dead. Dead. Dead. Dead. Dead,” she mindlessly repeated the word until it lost its meaning.
He reached over and put his hand on her thigh. “Clementine, stop it.”
“Why? It’s the truth.”
He didn’t say anything and put the truck in gear.
“We should end this,” Q said. “You and I. We should end it. You were right.”
“Is that what you want?”
“I’m going to get you killed, just like I got Ben killed. Just like I got Audrey killed. I get people killed. It’s what I do.”
“You didn’t answer my question.” Sanger’s voice was serious.
“I want you safe, Aaron.”
“Is that all?”
“Yes.”
They drove in silence the rest of the way to Sanger’s house. He parked in front and Q sat still as he got out of the truck and walked around to the passenger side door.
“Do you think you can walk?” he asked.
“No,” she whimpered. Her voice sounded small and very far away beneath the rushing, high-pitched whine that filled her ears.
He slid his arms around her and carried her into his house, setting her down on the couch.
“You should have let me die,” she said. “You should have let Ethan kill me. None of this would have happened if Ethan had just killed me.”
“What do you need?” he asked.
“I need a drink.”
He walked to the kitchen and opened the freezer, pulling out a bottle on tequila. He returned with it and handed it to her. She drank a long swallow and handed him back the bottle, shivering slightly.
“Better?” he asked.
She shook her head. “No.”
Sanger set the bottle down on the coffee table. “I love you, Clementine.”
“I know you do, cowboy.” She reached for the bottle and took another drink. “You should stop, though. Sharing my bed isn’t safe.”
He took the bottle from her and took a sip. “Well, it’s a nice bed and I like living dangerously.”
As the alcohol hit her bloodstream and washed away some of the shock of the afternoon, she said, “I mean it, Aaron. I don’t want you to get hurt because of me.”
“Do you love me, Clementine?”
She swallowed hard and silently nodded.
“I’m not going to die, Clementine,” he said, stroking her hair. “I promise you that.”
“I’m so tired,” she whimpered. “So tired of death. Why is there so much death?”
“I wish I knew.” He helped her stand up and guided her into the bedroom. As he knelt on the floor to untie her shoes, Q rested her hand on his shoulder to keep her balance, stepping out of them. He glanced up at her. “You gonna tell me what’s going on in that head of yours?”
She pointed to her chest. “Read the shirt. Says it all.”
“...And You Will Know Us by the Trail of Dead,” he read out loud. He pushed her shoes off to the side.
Q cupped his face in her hand. “It’s all my fault, Aaron. Ben, Jasper, Audrey. Those bullets, that bomb, they were after me. They just got in the way.”
Sanger stood up. “It’s not your fault, Clementine. Bad things happen to good people all the time, you know that.”
She shook her head. “Not like this, they don’t.”
Sanger unbuttoned her jeans and pulled them down. “Come on, let’s get you into bed.”
She stepped out of her pants and collapsed onto the bed, putting her arm above her head and closing her eyes. “Audrey thought we were going to elope.”
“Is that right?” Sanger asked, stroking her hair and lulling her to sleep. “Go to sleep, my love. You need to rest.”
“I want to marry you, Aaron Sanger,” she whispered.
He kissed her forehead and stood to leave. “If you still feel that way in the morning, we can talk about it. Get some sleep.”
Her eyes fluttered on command and the world blacked itself out.
◆◆◆
In the half-light of dawn, Q reached for Sanger and found both him and his pillow to be gone. Her head pounded in her ears and she pushed herself out of bed, walking to the bathroom to find something to quell the throbbing in her skull. Regarding her reflection in the mirror, she traced the scratches that marred her face before opening the medicine cabinet and retrieving a bottle of Tylenol. She popped two pills in her mouth, taking a drink from the faucet to swallow them down before splashing the cool water on her face. She gripped the vanity, staring at the water as it rushed down the drain.
It was time to end things with Sanger. She knew it was the only way to keep him safe, but she wondered how she was going to find the words to do it. Shutting off the water, she looked at her reflection one more time, then dried her face and went to the living room.
Sanger was asleep on the couch, snoring loudly, covered with his favorite old quilt. Shivering in the early morning chill. Q padded across the room and sat beside him. He stirred on the couch and turned on his side to face her, breathing deeply. She curled next to him, sliding her legs beneath the cool quilt, settling into his warmth.
He sighed and drew her to him, his hand resting just below her bellybutton. Taking a ragged breath, she wiped her eyes with the back of her hand, and wondered how she was going to leave her best friend. Turning her h
ead to look at him, she found that he was awake. His head was propped up in his hand, concern flattening his eyebrows into a worried line.
“You ok?” he asked.
She moved onto her back. “No.” Sanger remained silent, waiting for her to continue. “Why weren’t you in bed?”
“I heard some noises in the middle of the night. Checked them out. Then I couldn’t get back to sleep, trying to figure out who’s doing this to you.” He scowled at himself in recrimination. “It could have been you, yesterday. I could have lost you.”
Tears started to form in his eyes and Q lifted her head to kiss him. As soon as their lips made contact, they both opened their mouths to taste more, coming together like a car crash. Sanger pulled them up to take off her shirt. She tugged desperately at his clothes, wanting to be as near to him as possible. He pushed off her underwear and slid his tongue down from her neck to her breast, taking it entirely into his mouth. Q arched her back and held his head to her. She drew him back up to her, covering his mouth with hers, blindly unbuttoning his jeans and kicking them down with her feet.
She held onto him as he pushed inside of her, wrapping her arms and legs around his body, clutching him tighter. She bit his shoulder as she felt his teeth on her neck. Sanger moaned as he moved inside of her. Q cried out, her orgasm building and crashing down in an instant. She shuddered against him and he slowed his movements. She held his face in her hands and looked into his eyes.
I love you.
As she stared at him, she knew he saw it. The instant she fell completely in love with Aaron Sanger without reservation, without hesitation. His eyebrows stitched together as if he wasn’t sure he could trust his instincts. She held him firmly to her with her legs until he was fully inside her. Nervous energy flooded her body as her mouth struggled to form the words.
“I love you,” she whispered.
He started to say something and she covered his mouth with her hand. He kissed her fingertips.
“I love you, Aaron,” she whispered again.
He started to move again, thrusting deeply, maintaining eye contact with her until her entire body shook as another orgasm seized it.
“This is forever, for me,” she whispered. “You understand?”
He smiled under her hand and nodded silently, resuming an endless rhythm until they slipped away into the promise of forever.
◆◆◆
Six orgasms and four positions later, Sanger and Q lay curled in each other’s arms back in his bed, tangled in the sheet, sharing a glass of tepid tap water and the only pillow left on the bed. She lay back against him and he wrapped his arm around her to take her left hand in his, using his thumb to trace slow circles on her palm. He stopped at her ring finger.
“You thinking about taking this off?” he asked tentatively.
She admired their interwoven fingers. “I guess I should. Otherwise, people will think you’re running around with a married woman.”
“Am I?”
Q hesitated, “Not yet, you’re not. You have to ask me first.”
He craned his neck to look at her.
“What?” she asked. “It’s true.”
“That, it is,” he said quietly. “You need to leave. I have to stay here and figure this out. This isn’t something I can push off to someone else.”
Heartache filled Q’s stomach and she thought she might be sick with it. She curled closer to him and shivered slightly. He reached down for the comforter and wrapped it around her bare skin. She traced her fingers along the muscle line on his chest.
“No,” she said in a strangled whisper. “We stick to our plan. My bags are packed. Let’s just go.”
“Run away, you mean.”
She sat up and scowled down at him. “Yes. Run away. Derek’s right. It’s our best play. I’m so fucking tired of staying and fighting. Let someone else find this guy. I want you to be safe. I thought about ending things with you just to keep you safe. But I can’t. I’m too selfish. I don’t want to give you up.”
He stroked the side of her face. “I’m not the one they’re after.”
“Neither was Ben or Audrey.” She took his hand and held it in both of hers. “I can’t lose you, Aaron. I won’t survive it.” She began to cry and he pulled her down to him, smothering her tears with a long kiss, rolling towards her to cover her with his warmth.
“Nothing’s going to happen to me, Clementine. I promise.” He kissed her lightly and said, “Come on, I’m taking you out for breakfast.”
She shook her head. “Let’s go check into a hotel until the flight leaves.”
He got out of bed and pulled on a fresh pair of jeans. “I told you, I'm not leaving. I’m taking you to breakfast and then you’re moving into Constance’s. I’ll meet you in Tel Aviv when this asshole’s in jail.” She started to argue and he held up his hand. “I’m going to keep you safe. It’s not up for discussion.”
Moving to the dresser in the corner, he opened a drawer. He tossed her a pair of jeans and a t-shirt. She reluctantly put them on and laced up her Converse while he grabbed his badge and his gun.
She leaned against the footboard and gazed at the half-packed suitcase in the corner. “Please, Aaron. I have a bad feeling about this one.”
He reached over and kissed her cheek. “I’ll always come home to you. Don’t you worry.”
Resolve
As they stepped onto the porch. Sanger patted his pockets. “Damnit. I forgot my wallet. Be right back.”
Q rested against the railing and looked up at the sky, feeling the warm sunshine on her face. Turning to the quiet street, she glanced behind her to see a man get out of his car to approach her. As Sanger joined her back on the porch, the stranger abruptly stopped at the house next door and jogged up onto the porch, digging into his pockets for his keys. She looped her arm through Sanger’s and pulled herself close to him.
He kissed her forehead and she breathed in the cool morning air as he locked the house. They walked down the uneven brick sidewalk to the small café on the next block and sat at a cozy table outside. Q wrapped her hands around her coffee cup and smiled at her companion. He winked at her and drank his own coffee.
When the waitress brought their food, Q poured honey all over her pancakes. As Sanger watched her lick an errant drop off her fingertip, he said, “You’re making me wish we were home in bed.”
She bit her thumb and replied, “Seems like the safest place for both of us to be, baby.”
Sanger stared at her for several minutes before he finally said, “I’m in love with you, Clementine.”
She swallowed her food, looking down at her plate of pancakes, asking it for advice. She reached for his hand. “Then run away with me. If something happened to you…”
“Don’t go borrowing trouble,” he interrupted. “I’ll tell you this, if all I get is this one perfect morning and a plate of pancakes knowing that you love me, I’ll die a happy man.”
“Now who’s borrowing trouble.”
The sun glinted off the wind chimes overhead and a mockingbird suddenly took flight. She tracked it with her eyes, gazing beyond Sanger’s shoulder to see the same neighbor she’d noticed earlier walking down the middle of the street.
She nodded her head in his direction. “Your neighbor’s here.”
When Sanger turned to look, his entire body tensed. He suddenly swung the metal table onto its side with a clang, sending its contents flying and turned it to face away from Q, reaching for his gun.
“Get down, Clementine!” he yelled.
Before she could react, a shot echoed through the empty street. Sanger’s right arm flew back and his gun landed on the ground in front of her. She dove to retrieve it, cutting her hand on a broken plate chard, as another shot rang out and Sanger crumpled to the ground. He pulled himself onto his side and Q pressed the gun into his left hand. The wound on his leg was bleeding too much to be superficial and she held her hands on it to stem the flood of red.
Sanger screamed in pai
n and Q looked up to see the gunman pointing his weapon at her head. She closed her eyes as the shot rang out. She heard a thud and looked over the table. A bloody mess rested where the man’s head used to be.
“His gun, Clementine,” Sanger said, his voice full of agony. “Get his gun.”
She let go of his leg, standing up to kick the gun away from the dead man. When she hurried back, the left side of Sanger’s jeans was soaked through with blood, confirming what she had feared.