Running Wilde

by Tonya Burrows

  She glanced away because the love she saw in his eyes when he spoke of his two families was so intense, so genuine, it hurt. She couldn’t imagine what it was like to have so many people to love and so many people to love you in return. She couldn’t imagine what it felt like to experience emotions as deeply as Vaughn did, and it astounded her that this hard man was willing to open himself up and bare his heart like he was now.

  “I lived on the streets for a while,” she blurted almost before she’d made the decision to tell him. But it was out now, so she sucked in a fortifying breath and forged ahead. “That’s the closest I’ve come to camping.”

  “Oh, vixen,” he whispered, not looking at her, still staring into the fire. “It’s not even close to the same.”

  “Good.” She attempted a laugh, but it came out all wobbly. “Because it’s not something I ever care to repeat.” She followed his gaze, watched the mesmerizing twists of orange and yellow playing over the wood, and tried not to relive those horrible months. Alone. Scared. Hungry. Cold.

  She swallowed the lump rising in her throat. “After I dropped my real identity and before I assumed Violet Smith’s…I was nobody. I had no name, no home. Definitely no family or support system. It was terrifying.”

  “But you survived.”

  She lifted a shoulder, let it drop. “It’s what I do. Survive.” But she didn’t live, and it was starting to get to her. She wanted more than mere existence.

  Vaughn said nothing for a long time. “Are you ready to tell me your real name now?”

  She wanted to. She even opened her mouth, but nothing came out. Her tongue would not form the name. Too many years on the run had trained her to push it out, push it away, pretend she’d never been that person. At this point, she wasn’t even sure her birth name was her real name anymore.

  The silence stretched too long, broken only by the crackling flames.

  Vaughn shook his head and grabbed another handful of pistachios from the bag. “I’ll take that as a no.”

  She thought of Marcus’s text. “You’ll find out soon enough.”

  “I don’t want to find out. I want you to tell me.”

  “I can’t,” she whispered.

  “You won’t,” he corrected.

  “Okay. Won’t.” She shifted to face him. “I survive. And the only reason I have is because I’ve never told anyone who I was. That woman? I left her behind when I ran and haven’t been her in five years. Honestly, I don’t know if I want to be her again.”

  “Who do you want to be?”

  She sighed and reached into the bag for a handful of pistachios. “That’s the question, isn’t it?”

  Chapter Ten

  Morning poured over their little campsite in dappled golden light, accompanied by birdsong. It was one of those perfect camping mornings, crisp and cool, with wisps of fog floating along the river below them.

  Vaughn had woken up sporadically throughout the night to rebuild the fire, but now it was down to smoldering coals, and the morning dampness had settled into his bones. Moving was going to be a bitch.

  Sometime in the last few hours, Sage had snuggled up against his body. Probably just to keep warm, but he still let himself savor the contact as he lay there staring up at the gently swaying leaves of the forest’s canopy, trying to convince his aching muscles it was time to move.

  Last night had been…intimate. More so than sex ever was. He’d told her more about himself than he’d ever told anyone, his brothers and brothers-in-arms included, and he wasn’t sure why. If he tried, he could convince himself it was a tactic to get her to open up about her past, but that hadn’t been the reason. They’d always had an easy rapport, so maybe he could chalk it up to that, but the whys of it didn’t really matter. She now knew more about him than anyone—and he still didn’t know her name.

  He gazed down at the top of her head and pushed a strand of blonde hair away from her face. Who was she? And why the fuck did she captivate him like no other woman he’d ever met?

  Uncomfortable with his line of thought, Vaughn shifted out from underneath her and shoved himself upright. Every muscle in his body groaned at the movement, and he’d definitely bruised some ribs—if not cracked one. He had a freakishly high pain tolerance, so just the fact that he was hurting as much as he was now told him he was not in good shape. And he needed to empty his bladder.

  He gazed down at Sage, watched her for several moments to make sure she was still deep asleep. She was, her breathing slow and even. Good. He hauled himself to his feet and walked a short distance away to do what he needed to do.

  But as soon as he had his fly down, he heard a scrambling in the leaves behind him. No fucking way had she been faking sleep. He swung around in time to see her clawing her way up the short embankment toward the road. After everything, still trying to escape him.

  Where the hell did she think she was going? They were in the middle of nowhere.

  Cursing, he tucked himself back into his pants, grabbed his bag from the ground, and chased after her. Halfway to the road, he recognized the rumble of an engine and picked up his pace.

  Fuck. She was hitching a ride.

  He burst onto the road, already opening his mouth to yell at her to stop, and she turned away from the small RV idling on the shoulder.

  Smiling, she waved him over. “Hey. There you are. They said they’ll give us a ride into town.”

  Us.

  She wasn’t running.

  Everything in him uncoiled in relief, but he tried to keep the emotion off his face. He must have failed, though, because she frowned as he approached.

  She touched his arm, a feather-light caress meant to be soothing. “Are you okay?”

  “Yeah.” The word came out more tersely than he’d intended, and he inwardly winced, even as he added, “I told you to stop asking me that.”

  Her frown dropped into a scowl and she folded her arms across her chest. “Still not a morning person, I see.”

  Ignoring that remark, he turned his focus on the couple in the RV. They were older, probably a pair of traveling-the-country-by-RV retirees, and they looked harmless enough. Still, the idea of accepting a ride from anyone made him twitchy.

  “We’ll walk. Thanks.”

  The white-haired man in the driver’s seat shrugged. “Suit yourselves.”

  “We’re not walking,” Sage said.

  At the same time, the man’s wife said, “For goodness sakes, Arnold. They are not walking. Look at them! They must belong to that car accident we saw back down the road.” She leaned forward enough in her seat to study them out the driver’s side window. She was a small woman with salt-and-pepper hair, and her skin was as dark as her husband’s was pale. “Listen to your wife, young man.”

  “We’re not—” Vaughn started, but Sage elbowed him in the side, which sent pain singing through his ribs.

  Right. Okay, she must have told the couple they were man and wife. It did make for an easier explanation than whatever the hell they really were. Captor and captive? Guard and prisoner?

  …Lovers?

  “Vaughn,” Sage said in a tone that left no room for argument. “You’re hurt, and I’m freezing. We’re taking the ride. Get in.”

  With that, she turned on her heel and walked around the RV, leaving him no choice but to follow or lose her. He stalked after her and reached the door just as the woman pushed it open and waved them inside.

  “Come in! I’m Edna. You already met Arnold.” Her husband grumbled from the front seat as he shifted the vehicle into drive, but she waved him off. “Oh, ignore him. He’s all growl and no bite.”

  “Huh,” Sage said and cast a too-sweet smile in Vaughn’s direction. “Sounds like someone I know.”

  He desperately wanted to flip her off but settled for a scowl since they were in mixed company. He had plenty of bite, and if she didn’t know that by now…well, he’d just have to prove it to her the first chance he got. He’d start with her earlobe and nibble his way down her
neck, sink his teeth into the sensitive tendon at the base—

  Sage was staring at him, a knowing smirk on her lips.

  What, she could read minds now? Or maybe he was just that transparent around her.

  He refocused on Edna, who was chattering away. If she’d noticed the silent byplay, she pretended not to.

  “We’ve been wanting to do this for years,” she was saying. “We never had children, so when Arnie retired from the military, I convinced him to sell the house and buy this RV.”

  “It’s lovely,” Sage said.

  It was a nice one. Vaughn imagined it had cost almost as much as a house. Leather seats, granite countertops, a huge TV on the wall—in fact, it was nicer than some of the apartments he’d lived in over the years.

  All the more reason this couple shouldn’t be picking up strangers on the side of the road.

  “You should be careful picking up hitchhikers,” he said.

  From the front seat, Arnold snorted. “I know how to handle myself, son. I spent thirty years as a Marine.” He glanced back. “You’re military. I can see it on you. Marines?”

  “No, my brother is, but I went the Navy route.”

  “Ah, a squid.”

  “Nope. A frog.”

  Arnold gave him a quick onceover, then nodded. “Yeah, I should’ve figured that. You have the look.”

  “Besides,” Edna added cheerfully, “we don’t usually pick up hitchhikers. You’re our first.”

  “And last,” Arnold said.

  Edna shook her head at him before returning her attention to them. “We saw your car a ways back. We stopped to help, but nobody was there. Oh, here, sit down! You must both be exhausted.”

  “We are. Thank you.” Sage sat the on the couch-like seat across from the TV. “We thought the town was closer and we’d be able to walk, but we ended up sleeping on the ground last night.”

  “You poor dears! Here.” She bustled over to the kitchen area, and moments later the smell of coffee filled the motorhome. Vaughn could have kissed the woman when she handed him a mug.

  “All right, Edna,” Arnold said. “Leave them alone now. They had a long night. Give them some space.”

  Edna fussed a bit more, making sure Sage had a coffee and a blanket before returning to her seat next to her husband. “If you two need anything, you just ask. We should be to town in fifteen minutes or so. Unless there’s somewhere else you want to go…?”

  “The next town’s fine,” Vaughn said. If they could get to civilization, he’d be able to charge his phone and call his brothers. Though, admittedly, the thought of asking them for help chafed his hide. Maybe if the town was big enough, he’d find another rental place, get another car, and they could continue on to DC without his brothers ever knowing about the heaping pile of trouble he’d stepped in.

  Sage bumped her shoulder against his. “You’re scowling again.”

  “I’m not scowling,” he said, even though, okay, he probably was. He took a drink of the coffee to hide it. “I’m thinking.”

  “Uh-huh. And you always scowl when you think.” She wrapped her fingers around her mug and sank into the comfort of the leather seat. “You’ve been a bear since you woke up. What gives?”

  He remembered the jolt of disbelief followed by the flood of anger he’d experienced when he thought she’d run away from him again. “Nothing.”

  “Oh, of course. Which explains why you’re getting all grumbly again.” She said nothing more for a long moment, then finally released a breath and shifted in the seat to face him. “You thought I was trying to escape you again.” A statement, not a question. “I told you I was done running. The engine woke me up, and I didn’t want to risk missing them”—she tilted her head, indicating their good Samaritan saviors—“because I was looking for you.”

  “You heard the RV, but you didn’t hear me get up?” he said doubtfully.

  “The engine sound was out of the ordinary. You getting up before me…wasn’t.” She lifted a shoulder, going for a casual shrug and not succeeding. Color filled her cheeks. “You always got out of bed first when we were together, and I trained myself not to notice. Guess I still don’t.”

  For some reason, her admission made his chest ache. He rested his head against the seat and shut his eyes. “I’m going back to sleep.”

  He wasn’t actually tired, but it seemed easier than facing her right now. Call him a coward—and maybe he was—but there was too much going on inside him, a jumble of thoughts and emotions. One minute he was pissed off beyond words at her, the next he wanted her so badly he ached, and underneath it all was this nagging hum of fear she’d escape him and he wouldn’t be able to find her again. He needed some time to sort that shit out and get his head screwed on straight before he could deal with her.

  So, yeah, coward or not, he was going to feign sleep for the next fifteen minutes.

  Chapter Eleven

  There wasn’t much to the town—a gas station, a small mom-and-pop grocery store, a post office, and a motel. Really, it wasn’t so much a town as a pit stop clustered around the on- and off-ramps of the state highway that led to Atlanta. Sage had seen hundreds of other places like it during her travels.

  Arnold pulled the RV up to the pumps at the gas station, then turned in his seat. “You two sure this is your stop? Not much here. I don’t even see a police station to report your accident.”

  Sage stiffened at the mention of police. She couldn’t help it. The last thing they needed was to contact the police for a whole host of reasons. Not the least of which was, technically, that she was a fugitive. She wasn’t wanted for a crime—well, other than identity theft—but there were people in law enforcement who would love to find her.

  Vaughn noticed her unease. He noticed every-freaking-thing. He cupped her elbow with his hand and pulled her up to stand beside him. “Right now, all we want is a hot shower and a soft bed for the day, so this is perfect.” He motioned out the window at the motel across the street. “We’ll figure the rest out tomorrow.”

  “Thank you so much,” she said to Edna as he guided her toward the door.

  As soon as the cold air hit her, she started to shiver again. And just as she was starting to warm up, too. But the temperature seemed to have dropped in the twenty minutes since Arnold and Edna had picked them up, and she was suddenly so very grateful to the couple for their generosity. “We should give them something for helping us.”

  Vaughn said nothing in response, but when they circled the RV to where Arnold was pumping gas, he held out a hand for a shake, thanked the man, and tried to offer some money.

  Arnold vehemently refused. “You two take care of yourselves. And each other.” He gave Vaughn a little salute, smiled up at his wife who was sitting in the window, then went inside to pay for the gas.

  “They’re adorable,” Sage said, and a hollow ache opened up in her belly as Vaughn steered her toward the motel. Even if there was a day sometime in the future she could finally stop running, she’d never get what Arnold and Edna had. She was too…damaged. Life had sharpened her once rose-colored glasses to a cynical edge, and she didn’t believe in love anymore. She knew it existed, saw it in others, but she didn’t believe in it for herself. She wasn’t capable of loving any more than she was of being loved.

  No, that wasn’t true. She definitely could love and was pretty sure she’d been falling hard for Vaughn before she’d been forced to leave DC.

  At the motel, Vaughn requested a room for a night, and the bored-looking kid behind the desk barely glanced up from his phone long enough to hand over the keys. Just as well. She didn’t particularly want people noticing or remembering her.

  The room was nothing special. A typical hotel set-up—two queen beds, a dresser, TV, and a little table with two chairs. But it was clean, the air smelled fresh, and it had a shower. She couldn’t ask for much more.

  “I call dibs,” she said as soon as Vaughn opened the door. She didn’t wait for his response and made a beeline towa
rd the bathroom. She felt disgusting, grubby. It reminded her far too much of her months living on the streets, and she wanted nothing more than to be clean again. While she couldn’t do much about the nasty state of her clothing since she’d been unable to reach her bag in the car, she could at least clean her skin.

  And she didn’t want to think about the two thousand dollars she’d left behind in that bag. All of her savings. Her escape plan.

  Damn.

  She shut the bathroom door and peeled out of her sweatshirt and leggings and left them in a pile on the floor. There would be no saving the sweatshirt, stained with blood and mud and ripped at the elbows as it was, but the leggings might have a shot. One knee was ripped, but they were black, so they didn’t show any stains. She took a moment to wash them out in the sink and hang them to dry over the towel bar.

  As she crossed to the shower, she caught sight of her reflection in the mirror over the sink and winced. No wonder she ached everywhere. She was a giant bruise. The seatbelt strap had left an outline of itself across her chest in a bright purple and black streak.

  Vaughn’s pin still hung on the chain around her neck, bright against her abused skin. She rubbed it. She should probably give it back, but she still couldn’t bring herself to part with it.

  Sighing at herself, she pulled the chain off and set it on the counter, then started the shower.

  The water felt amazing. She tilted her head back and let it rain over her face, groaning at the pure bliss of it.

  This was heaven.

  The curtain scraped open, startling her out of her shower-induced daze, and Vaughn stepped into the tub behind her. She opened her mouth to protest, but he didn’t give her a chance. He swallowed her squeak of surprise, his mouth hot and hard and demanding on hers. She pressed her hands to his bare chest with every intention of shoving him away, but she couldn’t do it. Not when his kisses sparked such heat inside her, warming her faster than the hot water had.