Outlaw

by Amanda Lance

  “If you’re doing nothing, then why do I need to hold still?”

  The gig was definitely up now. I’d be lucky if I only had a few more seconds before she caught on to what I was doing and got mad, or worse yet, covered up her face so that I couldn’t sketch her at all.

  I worked fast, barely acknowledging the scratch on the end of my nose. If I didn’t have a lotta time, then I had to get as much detail in as possible. The next time I looked back up though, her face was bright, and while she tried to hide her laugh, she wasn’t doin’ a real good job at it.

  “What are you laughin’ for?”

  She covered her mouth, making the giggle echo. “Nothing.”

  I had maybe a second before she tried to jump at the sketchbook, but luckily, it wasn’t too hard to keep away from her.

  “You had better not be doing what I think you’re doing.”

  “No!” My yellin’ was all phony and I guess she musta known it, ’cause I was laughing the entire time. “It ain’t finished yet!”

  I stopped laughing though, and lost my breath when she sat next to me and wiped something from my nose. Under the light of the cabin her expression softened, and just for a second I couldn’t see those bruises I was responsible for.

  But then I could. And the moment was gone.

  “Thanks.” I looked away.

  “You looked ridiculous.”

  I smiled. “I’ve heard that ’efore.”

  We laughed together for a second until I saw that she was letting her guard down again. Only then did I pick the sketchbook back up and try to finish up the sketch.

  “You’re movin’ your mouth too much.”

  She pulled away from me. “Excuse me?”

  I resisted laughing, though I never was too sure how. “You can’t talk if I’m sketching ya. It messes it up.”

  “I thought you said you weren’t doing anything.”

  Even after almost getting’ killed… “Just stay still for five minutes, will ya?”

  Finally listening to me, she sat still—not looking away when I looked up at her for inspiration. And when the first five minutes passed I was grateful, when the second five minutes passed, I was ecstatic. After that, I knew I was taking advantage, but I couldn’t help myself. It was different sketching her awake from asleep. With her eyes open, she didn’t have those shadows around ’em, and with some control over her hair, she twirled it around her finger. She had symmetry like Escher, and while I knew I’d never be able to get it all right, I also knew I’d kick myself if I didn’t at least try.

  “Are you done yet?”

  Why’d she have to go and try to break my concentration? “Almost.”

  “How about now?”

  Truth was I could have spent hours fixing it up and even doing another one. But as it was I already had a couple drawings of her, and I felt pretty lucky to have that.

  “Yeah, I’m done.”

  There wasn’t much choice but to hand over the book to her, especially since she seemed so excited about it. I, on the other hand, felt my stomach all knotted up again like a bad roller-coaster just watching her going through my work. She was so delicate with it, like it was something important, and the idea that she cared made my heart go funny, too. What if she didn’t like what I had done? What if thought I hadn’t made her pretty ’nough or hadn’t gotten her eyes right? All the blood pulsed in and outta my heart as fast as a hummingbird. All in all though, her face was smiling and from what I knew of her that had to have been a good sign—I just couldn’t make myself believe it.

  “Wow.” She sighed. “This is…incredible.”

  I stood up and got a smoke from my pocket. I had heard wrong, right? Or maybe she was just messing with me? Rotating the smoke around between my fingers I smiled and put it back. If she didn’t like me smoking outside, or in the SUV, she sure as hell wouldn’t like it in the cabin.

  “Yeah, yeah.”

  “I mean it.”

  I tried not to pay any attention to the enthusiasm in her voice—better not to get my hopes up and all that.

  “How did you do this?”

  I stuffed some clothes in my duffle bag. “Do what?”

  She scoffed. “Make me look this good?”

  I turned to look at her, a goofy expression on her face while she had the sketchbook tilted to the side. Was she being serious or was she just one of those types who wanted to hear ’bout how gorgeous she was?

  “I just draw what I see is all.” I smiled to let her know I knew what she was up to.

  Pretending not to notice, she went for that bag of hers with all her girl stuff in it. I had hung it up on the back of the door, not puttin’ a lotta thought into it at the time, but now I was glad I had brought it along since she looked happy just to be brushing her hair with her own brush.

  Well, I thought. At least she’s easy to make happy.

  As soon as I thought it though, a look of worry came over her and she started pulling on the ends of her hair like she was going to pull them straight from the scalp.

  “Um, wh—what are you doing?”

  Zipping up my bag, I caught a glance at that nervous face of hers, though what she was so scared about, I couldn’t be real sure. What, she think I was gonna throw her to the wolves now?

  “Across the hall—I’m takin’ Polo’s cabin. You’ll, ah…” You’ll what, ‘be hiding from the fellas here?’ ‘Be held prisoner here?’ “Stay here.”

  I thought that was better than the alternative, but other than biting her lip, she mighta been a statue. In my head, I searched for what I had said or done wrong to make her afraid again but it wasn’t coming to me.

  “Wh—what about your other friends?”

  Guess if I were in her shoes I wouldn’t wanna be around the guys, either. ‘Cept that I realize it’s not just the guys she’s worried ’bout. They ain’t the reason her voice is all shaky.

  “Wallace ain’t on this ship.” It was hard to keep my voice steady, but I managed to do it. “A lot of things were leadin’ up to it, but he ain’t working with us no more.”

  Addie sighed, but I never did know if it was ’cause she was relieved, or just annoyed ’bout the whole thing.

  “If you take his cabin, where will Polo sleep?”

  Her voice sounded like she really cared. I smiled a little more. “Who cares?” I shrugged. “It’s just Polo.”

  Laughing, I tossed the duffle bag over my shoulder. When I saw that she wasn’t laughin’ though, it made me uneasy again. It was hard to believe that anybody could ever be afraid of Polo, but then again—everything ’bout this situation was a little hard to believe. “He’s a little slow sometimes. But he’s good kid—he won’t hurt ya or nothin’.”

  “Good to know.”

  Was I supposed to leave her alone in there again? Invite her to walk across the hall with me? How would that sound, though? Had I met her in any other place at any other time, I would’ve happily turned on the southern charm and invited her back to wherever I was staying. Now though, obviously that was out of the question.

  Other than not knowing what to do, though… I had no idea.

  In the end, I figured I’d leave her there by herself for awhile. After all, I was only gonna be across the hall and gone for like, a maximum of five minutes. Just as I thought I was free of my heavier thoughts, she had to go and lay another one on me.

  “Am I a prisoner here?”

  As I stood in the open doorway it was all I could do to look back at her. I coulda lied, or said something smart, but there wasn’t no point in any of that. A clever girl would figure it out sooner or later and probably only read more into it when she realized I’d been lying to her.

  “I gotta say yeah.”

  I left real quick then, mostly ’cause I was afraid she would start crying again and I wasn’t too sure I could handle that without smashing something up.

  ***

  I came back as quick as I could, I don’t think stopping to breathe while I gave Polo a s
hout-out and threw my bag in his cabin. In fact, my chest hurt so bad by the time I got to knocking on her door, that I thought I might die. Wait—her door? Why was I was willing to give up my stuff to her right away?

  “Knock, knock.”

  “What’s the password?”

  In her voice I heard the laughter, and while I was glad of it, my chest still kinda hurt and my own hunger was starting to get to me.

  “I’m tryin’ to be real nice…”

  “Sorry, try again.”

  My stomach growled at me. But when it did, I had a new wave of inspiration.

  “You wanna get some food?”

  Like cops with a battering ram, the door busted open and I got to see her face all lit up again. All my problems were long gone.

  “Yes! Yes! A million yeses! I could eat tree bark I’m so hungry.”

  “Come on.” I laughed. “Soup’s on.” I silently prayed that whatever Polo made was edible, or at least didn’t smell too bad.

  “But aren’t I a stowaway?”

  Couldn’t get nothin’ past this one. “Right now the first shift is on; most of the crew is first, so they won’t be ’round the galley.”

  This time, she walked in front of me, which was both good and bad. Good ’cause nobody could grab her from behind or nothin’, but bad because I had nothing but her and her swaying hips to look at.

  “You guys do stuff around here… on the ship?” I hit myself on the head. I wanted to answer her, but my tongue might have been stung by a bee for how swollen it was. I smacked myself on the face to look away from her. Focusing on the floor instead, I held my hands real close to me.

  “We got to.” My nervous laugh was pathetic. “Me and Ben got the shippin’ company in the pocket and Ben is technically part owner, but for appearance’s sake, everybody works.” As soon as the words came out, I bit the inside of my mouth. I shouldn’t have said so much to her, told her so much about how things were done.

  We turned the corner and she nodded. “That makes it easier to smuggle things from country to country.”

  I hit one of the electrical boxes above me. What was it about her being smart that was so sexy? Or was it just that I hadn’t gotten laid in awhile?

  “That truck I saw you guys stealing from, what was in it?”

  I stopped her as we rounded another hall. At this rate she’d probably have everything figured out in a week anyway, so what was the point in lying about it?

  “Mostly hard drives, graphic cards, fiber optic cables, some CPUs…”

  I loved how she knew to keep quiet about this part of our conversation, how she whispered her response. “Wow.”

  “Yeah,” I whispered back. “We only gotta make this trip a couple times a year.”

  “I would guess you wouldn’t need to do it every day.”

  Opening up the galley doors for her, I caught her smell as she walked by me. Strangely enough, my toes twitched and I grinned like an idiot. “No need to be greedy.”

  She smiled back. “Funny, I never thought I’d hear that from a thief—”

  “You’ll never know what you’ll hear from a thief,” Reid said with food falling outta his mouth. “That’s the point.”

  I shoulda known Mouth would go and spoil my good mood. Granted, this time however, he mighta beat his own record. I shook my head, feeling her move close beside me while I went to the line. That by itself told me if she wasn’t scared of them, she musta not liked ’em. And just thinking about it made me want to laugh—without a doubt, she had good taste.

  When I looked back up she was walking around the galley like she owned the place. I liked it though, liked how she tried to make herself at home with all her mustered up courage. I’ll admit it was tough, though: trying to admire her while not being obvious in front of the guys was like juggling. I had never cared nothing ’bout what the guys thought, but if they knew what I thought about her anymore than they already did, it coulda caused more trouble.

  So I looked down and latched a smoke behind my ear and scooped up some food. Looking back up at her, I swear I saw her blush.

  Just when I thought I was feeling better, Reid had to go and start talking again.

  “Here I thought Yuri was screwing with me when he said you had made it through.”

  I turned to make sure she wasn’t looking before I flipped him off. Like some little kid though, he just blew a raspberry at me and started smirking.

  “Sorry to disappoint?”

  I damn near choked on the chow in my mouth but recovered quickly and took a heaping bite of stale bread. Guess I didn’t need to stick up for her after all.

  The food wasn’t as bad as it usually was, which was good, because I thought she might have been one of them picky eaters or something. Although she did eat, her bites were slow, and she did it while looking up at both Reid and me every so often, something that I thought was kinda funny until I burped and she started laughing.

  “What?”

  “Hey!” Reid snarled. “Not everybody went to charm school.”

  I looked at the sleeve I had just wiped my mouth on before cracking all the knuckles on that hand. When you spend your time around other guys and criminals, traveling and stuff, it’s easy to forget your table manners. And though Elise gave up on that stuff a long time ago, I’d no doubt that Vicious could probably tell me ’bout the different types of forks…

  “Exactly, and it’s done Charlie a world of good,” she said, patting me on the head. “Just think how uncivilized he might be without it.”

  Then again, maybe she’d jam one of those forks right in your hand.

  We smiled at each other then, just like we were normal people doing regular stuff. If it wasn’t for Reid making a scene with swearing and trying to kick out his chair, I woulda happily smiled at her for the next six days.

  “You guys act like you were raised by wolves.”

  I made my eyebrows wiggle. “Maybe we were.”

  I was…for awhile, anyway.

  “Ha, ha.”

  Something in my brain was stirring back to say to her when Polo and Yuri came charging in. I was starting to really regret not just bringing her some food down to the cabin.

  I didn’t have time to wallow in it though before Polo spotted us sitting together and rushed the both of us like an excited puppy whose people had just come home. Knowing his reputation for not hitting the brakes, I held my arms out to stop him.

  “Easy there, boy.”

  He ignored me and started in on us both, kneeling so that he was right in between us. “Hi, you guys!”

  Within a couple of seconds, I saw her kinda cringe while Polo wrapped an arm around each of us and Reid and Yuri starting laughing. Naturally, I wanted to lay the hurt on them both, but around her wasn’t a good idea.

  “I’ve been wondering about you guys all day! Where’ve you been at? Causing trouble without me?” He laughed and laughed.

  “Strictly a trouble-free zone.” Whatever gave her the impression that she had to be nice to Polo was going to have to change, ’cause even as she was shrugging him away she was being real gentle about it, like she didn’t want to hurt his feelings or something. I tried to tell her I was sorry for him without saying it and got up for some more grub. Almost at the same time, Yuri and Reid got up and followed me.

  I was barely out of my seat before Polo jumped in it and tried to cuddle up to her. If he had been anybody else, I woulda drowned him in his own soup.

  “Oh man, oh man, oh man! It’s a real good thing you didn’t die!”

  From standing above and away I could see her stirring figure eights into her bowl. It was real simple, but the pattern makes me happy.

  “Thanks, Polo,” I heard her say. “I think so, too.”

  “No, but like, really!”

  I was looking for something to throw at him when I saw Addie nod real slowly even though he was flinging his head and tapping his fingers like a crazy person. If she was scared of him anymore, she was doing a real good job of
hiding it. Meanwhile, Reid and Yuri were dancing around me, mouthing that playground song ’bout kids sitting in trees and kissing.

  “If you had, I think Charlie woulda like…killed everybody!”

  k-i-s-s-i-n-g

  Before I went back to the table, I punched both of ’em in the gut.

  Probably sore at me, they sat far away on the other side of the table. And knowing I’d never be able to get Polo to move, I just went and sat on the other side of Addie—smiling at the way her shoulders relaxed when I did.

  “If any of you guys is the chef, I could give you some pointers.”

  Like a real Queen, Reid got pissed right away, slamming the table like he does when he’s losing at cards or Elise kicks him outta the house. “Ungrateful little bitch! You really complaining—”

  “I wasn’t complaining!”

  If anything else was said after that, it didn’t register. The second he resorted to calling her names, that was it for me. As much as I wanted to not scare her anymore, there wasn’t no question that I wasn’t gonna let that go. He musta seen it when he looked over at me, ’cause he sat back down and stared into his bowl.

  I knew I shoulda dropped it then, but I couldn’t. That want to punch something, kick someone until their ribs poked holes in their heart wouldn’t let up. And just thinking about how bad I needed to do it, made me want it even more. My heart was beating in my ears from the anger and all the tension was making my head hurt. Between it all though, I felt her eyes on me, and when I looked back at her it all went away—floated up and out like thin air.

  “I didn’t realize you boys were so sensitive.”

  Hell, she even had Yuri laughing on that one.

  Chapter 8

  To my surprise, she was still interested in my sketches when we got back to my cabin—though maybe she was just being nice.

  “Where did you learn to draw like that?” There was some hesitation when she went to sit against the side of the wall, so I looked away, pretending to busy myself with something else while she made herself comfortable.

  I skimmed through a book for a clean page. Most of ’em were full now, and I made a mental note to get some new ones at the next stop. “It’s just something I’ve always done.”