“Yeah, I know you’re not that dumb.” Cali giggled and rolled her eyes as him.
“Be back in a second, Cali.”
She waved me on. “Take your time, and don’t leave out the part about this being my idea.” She winked at Walker and then turned up the radio.
“Come inside the station to talk? It’s gettin’ a little chilly out.”
I hugged my jacket to my sides as I nodded and followed Walker into the store. I went behind the counter to the same seat I’d used the last time I’d been there, only a few days before. Walker went and grabbed us some coffee before taking the seat next to me.
“So what’s going on, Mags? Why are you here?”
“Don’t sound so sad about it!” I nudged him, trying desperately to ease the awkwardness in the air.
“I just don’t get it. That’s all.”
I turned to him, took both his hands in mine, and stared into his eyes for a few seconds before getting the courage to blurt out, “I am here to beg you to come back home. To fight for us instead of what you think a dead man deserves.”
A smile played on his gruff face, starting at his cheeks and eyes before making its way to his lips. “Do you really think it is that easy?”
I nodded. “Actually, it can be, Walker!”
I grabbed his beautifully tattooed forearm hard as I begged with every muscle in my body for him to just simply give in, but deep down, I knew Walker was a lot more stubborn than that.
“Mags, I have to.”
“No. No you do not. All you have to do is report to base for however long. And then come home.”
“Two weeks,” he muttered.
“All right, two weeks. And then you come home right in time for Thanksgiving with your real family!”
A twinkle I hadn’t seen since the day he was leaving for his fishing trip with all the guys sparked in Walker’s eye. “Family?” The word played in the air for a minute before the question behind it really sank in.
“Yes, Walker. You said it yourself. You feel like we’re your family and I feel that we are too. We’re very dysfunctional, but what freaking family isn’t?”
He nodded, staring down at my hand still gripping his arm. “Is this really what you want?”
“Nothing in this world could make me happier!”
“Do you really think this is what Randy would have wanted?”
I nodded. “I need to play something for you.” I pulled out my phone and let the melody play and the lyrics sweep through the space between us. “Just really listen to the words.”
As the chorus came on, Walker’s mouth fell open. “What band is this?” Walker asked during the instrumental bridge.
“The Hysterics. Maverick wrote it—the guy who has, or had, a thing for Cali.”
“Wow.”
“That’s not that freaky part. Maverick told Cali that a seagull and a tall man came to him in a dream and these lyrics were what he came up with after.”
Walker just stared at me, his eyes glassy, his jaw flexing as he thought. “Do you think…?” His drawl was husky and thick as he whispered.
I nodded. “I know it was meant for us to hear. That in some crazy way, Randy had something to do with this. That’s why I am here. This song.”
Walker forcefully grabbed both sides of my face with his rough hands, kissing me with a want and a desire that could be felt in every nerve in my body. Walker’s body shook as tears cascaded down his face.
“I just don’t know, Mags.”
“What don’t you know?” I brushed a few tears from his cheek as his lips pulled down.
“I don’t know if I can live with this weight anymore.”
“Walker. Look at me.” His eyes snapped to meet mine. “The weight is lifted. Your secret is out to the people who needed to know. Randy would want us to be happy and safe, not running into more heartbreak and danger.”
I wrapped my arms around his shuddering shoulders as his chest heaved from the heaviness of my words and the war his own emotions were waging. I pulled away from him just enough to be able to breathe out, “Please, please say you’re going to come home after your orders are done.”
“I promise, darlin’. I will never leave you like this ever again.”
His lips went to my cheek then just under my ear, sending chills down my spine.
“Promise to never run away from me ever again!”
“Promise.”
Our lips locked together again, but briefly. Walker sat up, grabbing my hands before shoving up from his seat.
“Mags, I have to get to my buddy’s house soon. He lives near the base and said I could crash on his couch tonight so I didn’t have such a long drive in the mornin’. He has a new baby and I don’t want to get there too late and keep him and his wife up.”
I nodded. “All right. We have a long drive, so I guess it’s better if we hit the road.”
We started to walk out of the station before Walker stopped and spun me around to look at him. “Or…” A childish grin peeked out from one side of Walker’s mouth.
“Yes?”
“You could stay up here tonight, we could get a hotel, and then you can drive my truck back down tomorrow after dropping me off at the base?”
I looked from Walker to Cali and then nodded. “Give me a second.” I trotted over to Cali’s window as she rolled it down. “Go home. I’m going to take Walker’s truck tomorrow.”
“It went that well, huh?”
I could feel the blush spreading rapidly over my cheeks as I bit my bottom lip.
“All right. I’ll text you when I get back to Mitch’s.”
I leaned in through the driver’s window and hugged Cali. “I love you.”
“Love you too. Be safe.” She tried to glare at me as she unsuccessfully stifled a smile.
“I will. Now get on the road before you’re too tired to drive.”
She rolled up her window, and Walker wrapped his arms around me from behind, leaning in to whisper, “I love you.”
I turned in his grasp, wrapping my arms around his neck. “I love you too.” I pecked him on the cheek and pulled away from him. “Let’s get going. I haven’t eaten all day and my head is killing me!”
“Yes, ma’am.” Walker opened the passenger’s side door for me and I slid onto the worn out bench seat. “Damn, I missed how good you looked up in my truck.”
He slammed my door and jogged to his side to let the diesel engine prime and then roar to life.
“Damn, I missed how good that sounds.” I winked at Walker and slid over to sit right next to him on the seat. He wrapped his arm around my shoulders and started to make his way down the gravel drive of the station.
Twenty-One
The dust kicked up, making it hard to see out the passenger’s side window. The dirt road quickly turned into asphalt, making it much quieter in the cab as the crunching of road and dirt ceased. For a few miles, Walker and I rode hand in hand, just sitting in silence as the night sky twinkled with uninhibited stars. The soft ridge of rolling hills was lit by a full moon.
I leaned farther into the crook of Walker’s shoulder to rest my head, my forehead on his neck. “You gave in pretty quickly.” My voice was more timid than I’d been expecting, but the words had been biting at my tongue for too long to not come out.
“Maybe I had already made up my mind.” I could hear the smile in Walker’s words as he squeezed my hand a little. “And right when I saw you running toward me, I knew that I had been selfish again.”
“Selfish?” I pulled away from him as his muscles tensed and his eyes followed down a dirt road off to our right that was coming up quickly.
“Yeah. You were right to ask me to stay and to ask me to fight for you. It’s something that I should have done since the first day you walked into our fraternity house.”
The truck slowed as Walker pulled off to the side of the road. His eyes were fixed on the next turn that was now right in front of us.
“What’s down there?�
� I pointed through the windshield and saw Walker wince at my question.
He took a long, slow breath in through gritted teeth and then turned to me, gripping both my shoulders in his hands. “It’s my family’s property.” He pointed off in the distance to where a few glowing lights could be seen. “That’s the trailer I grew up in.”
My mouth fell open, begging to ask so many questions that were swimming around in the stillness of the truck, but I just nodded.
Walker cleared his throat. “I guess now is as good a time as any. You wanted to know more about my past, right?”
I nodded again, scared to death of what nightmare might unfold as Walker played show and tell with his biggest skeletons.
“All right then. Here goes nothin’.”
He shifted the truck into drive and flew down the bumpy dirt road. He parked just about fifty yards from the other two trucks and cleared his throat.
“Just a quick rundown before I throw you into this fire. My mom plays as nice as the devil does when he wants your soul, so be careful what you believe and what you say to her. My brother is a scumbag who just got out of prison for blowing up the back shed from cooking meth. He hasn’t learned his lesson and loves his meth pipe a little too much and will always have something terrible to say about me. Don’t pay him no mind and he will be harmless. Just don’t bring your purse in with you. He’ll steal it. And my stepdad, Chet… He’s usually too many sheets to the wind to know his ass from a hole in the ground. He gets a little handsy, so just don’t sit next to him.”
“Okay. Got it. Stick close to you and keep my mouth shut.”
“You’re gonna be fine. We’ll leave in an hour or so and never have to come back here again.”
“Let’s rip this Band-Aid wide open.”
I grabbed his hand and scooted out of the driver’s side door after him. Walker wrapped his arm around my neck, pulling me into his side. He stopped right before the front step, kissed my hair, and bent down so his lips were barely touching my ear. “Love you.”
I smiled and looked up at him, his face lit up by the yellowish light on the front stoop. Even in the poor lighting, his face was rugged and beautiful all at the same time. My heart melted and broke when I recognized the scared look that was hiding in his eyes behind his rigid posture and flexing jawline. “I love you too. Now stop stalling. Let’s get this over with so we can get to the hotel.”
He nodded and led me up the three wooden steps to the trailer door by my hand. He banged loudly a few times before calling out, “Ma! It’s Walker. Open the damn door.”
I could hear feet stomping around and someone mumbling loudly. Walker banged a few more times and called, “Silas, I know you’re in there! Your fucking truck is in the drive. Open the damn door.”
A loud, low grumbling scream came from inside and Walker’s face went white. He let go of my hand and pushed me back down the steps.
“Stand back,” he mouthed right before he kicked his boot right at the front door, making it fly open.
He grabbed my hand again and led me into the living area of the double-wide. The smell of puke and mildew made my stomach lurch a few times as I fought the bile to stay down. Silas came storming out of the kitchen, his pasty skin glistening with a thick layer of sweat, his eyes bulging out of his head. He came running past us, barely even looking our way, and he hastily paced for a few laps around the space in the living area. I barely recognized him from when he and Walker had fought in the parking lot of the gas station. He looked like he was one step away from the loony bin or death’s door.
Walker stepped in front of him, gripping his arm to stop him mid stride. Silas’s eyes snapped to Walker’s as he showed his teeth and growled at Walker. “Well lookie here. Big-time war hero is here to save the fucking day!” He rolled his eyes and took a missing swing right at Walker cheekbone.
Walker’s grip dug harder into Silas’s arm as he seethed, “Where’s Chet and Ma?”
Silas spit at Walker’s feet and then started bellowing the most sinister laugh I had ever heard. “Not up for a visit.”
“What the fuck does that mean, Silas?”
Silas started to look around the room, trying to avoid Walker’s gaze at all costs, until his eyes found me. His pencil-thin lips curled under as a smile started to peek out on his face, his shoulders hunching forward as he tried to take a step toward me. Walker steadied him and grabbed his jaw to force their eye contact again.
“Don’t pay her no mind, Silas. I asked you a damn question.” Walker nodded his head toward the kitchen as he made eye contact with me.
My knees locked as my feet tried to obey Walker’s request. Finally my body started moving until I was standing in the doorway of the tiny kitchen. I stepped in and turned to look at the fridge when my heart stopped. Lying facedown on the floor in a puddle of blood was the body of a large woman. My body went completely cold as I fell to my knees, screams coming from deep in my chest. Walker was by my side in a second, dragging a snickering Silas behind him.
“Mom!” Walker shrieked, turning to Silas, punching him right in his gut as he screamed, their noses almost touching. “What the fuck happened to her?”
Silas slumped down to the floor, his arm in the air, still gripped in Walker’s grasp. “Chet was mad. He got in my stash again. So I took care of him.”
“What happened to Mom, Silas?”
“Chet got mad. She got what she deserved. So he got what he had comin’. Teach that bastard to steal from me. Rat fucking bastard.” Silas was talking a mile a minute as spit sprayed from his lips, his eyes glassy and unable to focus anymore.
Walker looked at me, shoving his phone into my hands. “Go outside. Please call the cops.” He was pulling me off the ground, speaking lowly and calmly into my ear. My eyes shifted from Walker to Silas as he sat in a daze, completely unaffected.
I scurried outside and got an operator on the phone before the door slammed shut behind me.
A monotone woman’s voice came in low on the other end of the line. “911, what’s your emergency?”
“My boyfriend’s mother is dead in the kitchen of their trailer.”
The rest of the call was a blur of my not knowing a lot of the information she was asking for and a lot of her telling me to stay calm. I sat on the top step, slumped over, holding my knees until the glow of flashing lights appeared at the open gate at the front of the road.
I jumped up and pushed back into the horrible scene of Silas snickering and Walker pacing around an old, beat-up plaid couch on patchy, green carpet, his hands trembling as he ran them over his freshly trimmed crew cut. I ran to him, pulling his arms around me as cops burst through the front door. He pulled me tight into his chest as he started to talk to an officer.
“My stepfather killed my mother, and my little brother killed him. Mom’s body is in the kitchen and Chet’s is in the back bedroom.” He pointed to both of the rooms as he spoke.
The officer was standing right behind me, his low drawl booming as he spoke. “And y’all are?”
Walker spoke for us as I turned, shyly staring at my feet, scared to look up as the paramedics carried out Walker’s mother’s body. “I’m Private Walker Eastman and this is my girlfriend, Margret McManus. We were coming up for a visit before I have to report to base in the mornin’. Unfortunately we came a little too late.”
Silas came out of the kitchen, escorted by two deputies, his hands behind his back and already in handcuffs. The cop coughed and made my gaze pop up to meet his. “Ma’am.” He nodded toward the door. “May we speak outside for a moment?”
I started to make my way for the door, gripping Walker’s hand as the officer grimaced at me.
“Alone, ma’am.”
I turned to Walker, getting a reassuring wink. “I’ll be right in here, babe. Don’t worry.”
I walked outside after the officer and slowly shut the door. “How can I help you?”
“Well, I wanted to get your side of the story.” His eyes never left min
e; after a moment I realized he wasn’t staring into my eyes, but at my swollen, black eye.
“Walker and I were heading closer to his base when we decided to swing in here and surprise his folks. I’d never met his family, so we figured it would be nice. Apparently we came at the wrong time.”
“Yes, apparently. Ma’am, are you okay?”
“Sir?” I knew why he was asking me, but I was a little pissed that he was insinuating that Walker was unsafe for me or that he was the one who’d put my shiner in place.
“Where’d you get that black eye?”
“That really has nothing to do with this.”
“But it very well could. I’ve known this family for a few years. Not your boyfriend—he was gone by the time I moved into these parts from Atlanta, but the Wayletts have been bad news since the day I took this badge.”
My teeth gritted. I hated how bad Walker’s family was, soiling his name and making his seem to be covered in the same layer of slime. “If you must know, sir, I was assaulted by a man that I thought was a friend. He tried to rape me and Walker saved me before the bastard could take it too far. He’s been looking after me since my late husband died fighting for our freedom right in front of Walker’s eyes. He is the best man I know and I beg you to not jump to any more conclusions about him because of the scum he rose above and ran away from.”
He officer nodded. “I understand. Thank you for your time and honesty.”
We walked back into the trailer, where Walker was sitting with his head in his hands on the worn couch. He jumped to his feet, taking me into his strong, tattooed arms again. The officer, Walker, and I watched in silence as the officers and detectives started to rope off the crime scene, placing numbers on the floor next to pieces of supposed evidence. There was the shotgun lying in the hallway right outside the bedroom where Chet’s lifeless body lay facedown on the bed with a huge gaping hole of a bullet wound in the upper back.
I cried at the horror of the scene while Walker held on to me from behind.
The officer explained, “Seems like he was shot point-blank in the back with buckshot.”
The Crashing Series Page 36