The Killing Ride

by Michelle, Christine

  He shrugged his shoulders. “I’m not happy that she died while she was with me. That is on my shoulders. I can say that I didn’t want to be with her, and she knew it. From the beginning, she knew what our relationship was. It was never about love or even anything beyond a friendship between two people who sometimes had sex.” I cringed at his admission. Obviously, they’d had sex before if he was to believe that there was a possibility she had been pregnant with his kid. Still, it unnerved me to hear about it. He sighed at my reaction.

  “I know things are going to be a little awkward for a while because of the circumstance but look at what you’ve read so far in her journal. I can tell you, because I already read them, that it goes on to chronicle their affair together. It goes on to talk about how they each thought that they were meant for one another – soulmates – or whatever. We both know Lindsay was off her rocker, so there’s no telling if Steven felt that way too. The thing is, look at how it turned out for them because they were trying to hide it. I don’t want to hide anymore. I’ve been running from my own life for too fucking long, and I’m ready to just move on now. What if we pass on this opportunity? Who are we passing on it for? Two people who were dead and buried, both who betrayed you in such a shitty way? Both of them added to your misery instead of helping to heal you. Do they deserve your loyalty?”

  “It’s not loyalty to them that is holding me back,” I insisted.

  “Then what is it?”

  “Honestly?” I questioned. He nodded his head and waited for my answer.

  “It’s because it feels icky. You just talked to me about how you used to have sex with a girl I thought of as my best friend before she died.” I told him as I indicated the journal lying haphazardly where I’d discarded it earlier. “I know now that she wasn’t the person I thought she was. I know that things between you weren’t what she pretended, and honestly, she didn’t pretend that much until after you guys visited my apartment that first time. The thing is, everything is still fresh. I’m still coming to terms with her betrayal. I’m still struggling with the fact that, in my head, I inadvertently caused her death.”

  “You didn’t,” he began to argue.

  “I know. Logically, I know that. Getting my heart to understand is a different story though. I need time, Jay,” I insisted.

  “I understand.” He stood and got ready to leave. “I’ll be around, Christina. I’m not giving up. It would be a fucking crime not explore the crazy attraction and chemistry we have. I know you feel it too. You felt it then, just as I did. We shouldn’t have to give up that connection or refuse to explore it because of someone else’s actions.”

  I knew what he said was true, and still the past held me tethered in its chains. I nodded my agreement and saw him to the door as I contemplated what he had suggested. I didn’t know if I was capable of moving past everything to try to figure things out with Jay. Time would tell.

  Chapter 21

  Sweet Destiny

  Christina

  After Jay left, I sat there thinking about what he’d said to me. We could easily end up like Steven and Lindsay. Two people who maybe were meant to be together and trapped by circumstances until tragedy struck, or we could just dive in and live to be happy. It made sense. The one thing that would have held me back before was my loyalty to Lindsay, and I didn’t owe her that any longer.

  It had been a week since then, and I hadn’t heard a word from him. I assumed he still had my phone number since he’d texted and called before after getting it from Lindsay’s phone. I went to work tired but feeling better about life and everything that I had in front of me. That was, until I turned the corner, just about to the building the gallery was housed in, when I noticed a blond woman glancing back at me over her shoulder. I would have sworn it was Lindsay. She giggled and turned the next corner, leaving me standing there gaping after a ghost. I knew it couldn’t be here, and yet it had seemed so real.

  “It’s about time you made it back,” my boss, Grant, snipped at me as I walked in. I didn’t know why he was getting snippy with me since he had been gone all week. Judging by the deep tan he had on his skin now, I assumed he was somewhere soaking up the rays.

  “Sorry,” I mumbled the apology as I went to stow my stuff in the breakroom.

  “Sorry won’t cut it. Do you know Donna had to work extra shifts to cover for you? She’s seven months pregnant, her feet are swollen, and she’s too emotional to be trying to sell people art. She cries over every piece.” If he was so damned worried about Donna, he would have been around the past week to take up some of her shifts when she wasn’t feeling well. She just offered a convenient way for him to tell me I’d been a bad employee, taking time off after the death of someone close to me.

  “I said I was sorry. I get it, she’s pregnant. My best friend, the only person left alive that I considered to be family, died. I had to bury her. I had to…” tears started flowing down my face. They had nothing to do with grief though. They had everything to do with frustration instead. I should have been able to tell him all of this truthfully. I couldn’t cope with yet another death in my young life, but, Lindsay’s death had been overshadowed by the choices she had made in life. The very same choices that made me wish I could bring her back just so I could have the satisfaction of being the one to shut the door to my life in her face. She didn’t deserve a friend like me. I’d always thought it was backwards. I thought I was the worthless half of our friendship. I couldn’t have been more wrong.

  “Oh Lord, help me! Please, do not start crying in here too,” Grant shouted as he moved to the back room.

  I swiped at my eyes and then turned to head back out into the main floor space to check on what they had hanging in the gallery today and what the prices were like. Being away for two weeks was hell on me. Trying to get back into the swing of things had been slow going, especially since the gallery had some new pieces come in that were only just now being cataloged and hung. I had a crap case of the Mondays, and the day was going accordingly.

  “Sink or swim, Christina,” I told myself as I pulled the loose strands of hair that had fallen around my face, back and tied it with an elastic. The freshly dyed teal streaks popped against the rest of my naturally dark hair, making it hard to ignore whenever it escaped the confines of the bands, I wrapped around it to hold it in place. At least Grant hadn’t bitched about the hair color. He had almost had a conniption fit when I’d used pink before.

  “What the hell happened to your hair?” He asked in a grumpy tone as he wandered by me carrying a large framed piece. Well, shit. I definitely had to stop thinking out loud, because that jerk heard me, for sure. My day only went downhill from there too.

  By the time the day had rolled into early evening, my feet were dragging and sore, my hair had fallen around my face again, and my elastics – all three of them – were all laid to rest in the garbage and unsalvageable. I had been relegated to the back room doing inventory for the better part of the day. I had to deal with dust motes as big as my head and spiders who used them as their home. A shiver ran up my spine every time I thought about the momma spider I tried to squish, only to set free a million little baby spiders who immediately attempted to crawl toward me. I needed a long, hot shower and maybe some therapy after the day I’d had.

  I was just about to head out for the day when I heard Grant’s voice grate on my last nerve. “Christina, you forgetting something?”

  I turned to offer up my best resting bitch face. “No,” I told him and turned to leave.

  “I don’t appreciate you getting personal deliveries during business hours if you’re just going to leave them lying around the shop.”

  “I didn’t get a delivery today,” I told him.

  “Oh! Did I forget to tell you?” He asked with mock innocence which made me want to throat punch the bastard. Too bad he was the son of the gallery owner.

  “Tell me what?”

  He squatted behind the counter and came back up with a vase full of an asso
rtment of flowers. I moved closer to get a better look before Grant thrust them into my hands. “These were delivered for you a couple of hours ago.”

  “What in the hell? Why didn’t you tell me?”

  He just shrugged his shoulders and walked away. “Be on time tomorrow, we have a lot to get done.”

  I wanted to scream in frustration and throw the flowers at him, but the flowers probably didn’t deserve that. Instead I set them down on the counter and dug into the bunch looking for a card. When I finally found and opened it I was momentarily stunned. There, on white card stock, was a message from Jay.

  Our destiny is calling, but I’ll wait as long as it takes. Promise to do the same?

  Jay

  His number was written right below his name too. I debated the whole way home on whether I should text or call to thank him. Then I wondered just how long he would wait. My mind pinged back and forth among a bunch of different scenarios before I made it to my door. After I was inside, I set the flowers down on my kitchen counter and ran my hand across the note again as I leaned in to take a sniff. Finally, I decided what I would say.

  Christina: Promise.

  Short, sweet, and to the point. I was sure it was the best option. Of course, when no response came, I second-guessed my one-word response. Then I ran through likely scenarios. He was in a motorcycle club; he was probably busy. Hell, he could be busy with a club whore or something. I doubted it though because he had briefly mentioned to me how his buddy had died. I didn’t see him hooking up with women like that after such a tragic event in his life. Then again, as if I should have to keep reminding myself of this, we didn’t know one another very well.

  I thought he had already written me off based on my one-word response to his flowers. I mean, I didn’t even say thank you, just ‘Promise’. What kind of heathen was I? Who did that? I had completely forgotten my southern manners. Biker or no, I knew that Jay had some of that southern hospitality bred into him. I bet he was wishing he’d never sent the damn things. I worked my ass off all morning in order to try to take my mind off of Jay and what he may or may not be thinking.

  Halfway through my miserable Tuesday, a food delivery came in. “Grant!” I called, thinking he had ordered something.

  “What?” He called out from his office down the hall.

  “Your food is here,” I called back.

  “I didn’t order anything. They probably meant to take it next door. Happens sometimes.”

  I was just about to tell the delivery guy that it was the wrong address when he asked for me by name. “Christina Murphy?”

  “Yes, that’s me, but I didn’t order anything.”

  “Oh, well, this was a special delivery from,” he set the bag down on the counter and dug around in a pocket before producing what looked like a scribbled-on receipt. “Yeah, here it is. Jay. This is from some dude named Jay.” When I just stared at him open-mouthed, the man went on. “You know, tall, athletic, big beard, and he’s a biker.” He handed the bag to me and stuffed the receipt into my other hand. “There you go, have a nice day.”

  “Wait, let me get you a tip,” I shouted after him.

  “Already taken care of,” he answered before walking right out the door. I moved to the door, flipped the sign to closed and used the little spinning dial clock on the sign to indicate that I would be back in an hour. Then I walked with my newly acquired lunch back to the break room. After I inspected what was in the bag and my mouth started watering, I took the receipt out and proceeded to flatten out the wadded-up paper.

  1 day closer to our destiny!

  That was all the note said with this delivery, but I immediately knew who it was from. I reached for my cell phone and tapped out a message, one that I probably should have sent for the flowers too.

  Christina: Thank you!

  Then I thought about what I’d seen in the bag and a thought occurred to me.

  Christina: How did you know what I liked?

  It took a few minutes for him respond. While I waited, I dug into the meal that had been brought specially for me.

  Jay: Leap of faith. As you can see, it worked out.

  I suppose it had. He managed to get me texting him.

  Chapter 22

  Jealous

  J-Bird

  The clubhouse seemed different to me as I sat on the barstool looking over everything. I remembered even when T-Bone and I used to run around in here as children the odds of seeing one of the club whores or something going down between one of them and a brother was almost always a given. That was the whole reason we’d snuck over there as much as we could. There weren’t whores hanging around the club these days. The closest to it was when a brother brought a woman home with him. That didn’t seem to be happening as much since the men mostly hung out at one of the strip clubs if they wanted easy pussy these days. The men with families were mostly home with their families, having learned a lesson from Double-D’s fuck ups, no doubt.

  In a word, it was quiet. I’d almost say peaceful, but then I’d have to ignore the ghosts and memories that lingered in this place. The peacefulness came with me being okay to say goodbye. I was finally ready. No more running away from the shit I didn’t want to face anymore. This was about me growing and moving on after realizing the dreams I had as a kid no longer applied. I supposed that was part of growing up. Maybe, it was just part of finally feeling hope for my future. Christina was that hope. She wasn’t the end all, be all to my happiness. She couldn’t be if we were going to manage to find that special balance that kept couples together. She was the symbol of what I had come to realize though. Life is short. You either take it by the balls while you’re here, or it takes you. Fuck if I wasn’t tired of being taken. I was ready to go explore a new life with a new woman. She suited me, calmed my inner turmoil, gave me shit, and then her smile melted me. Every. Single. Time. I couldn’t explain the connection I felt to her. It was beyond me. There wasn’t any lover yet, just a deep appreciation for another person and an obsession that wouldn’t quit. As if she knew I was thinking about her, Christina sent a text.

  Christina: I don’t know what I did to deserve you spoiling me like this but thank you!

  The smile that bloomed across my face couldn’t be helped. I loved getting her little messages after she received one of my packages. It was taking every single bit of self-control I possessed not to go claim the woman before she was ready, so I had settled for making her day better with something new. Every workday for the past couple of weeks I had sent something new to her at work. It started with flowers and delivered food. Today, I sent her one of those edible arrangements with the chocolate dipped fruits. Thinking of her putting those damn things in her mouth and sucking on them, lips stretched out, almost made me rethink my choice in gifts. I hadn’t met her boss yet, but I did know he was a wealthy, preppy boy who was supposedly good looking, if you liked that sort of thing. The thought of him seeing her the way I’d been picturing had almost had me change the order. Knowing she would love it made me send it anyway. Fuck that guy. He couldn’t have her. She was already mine; she just didn’t know it yet.

  “I haven’t seen that look on your face in a really long time,” Ever commented. I hadn’t even seen her walk up beside me which was startling in itself.

  “What look?”

  “Happiness,” she answered, making it sound so simple.

  I glanced up from my phone then and smiled at her.

  “You talking to the cemetery girl?”

  “Yeah, Christina,” I reminded her of ‘cemetery girl’s’ name.

  “Good. So, what’s her story? How did things go when you spoke to her?”

  “You really want to know?” I asked.

  Ever nodded her head. “Wouldn’t have asked if I didn’t.”

  “You didn’t want to know about Lindsay,” I reminded her as a smirk tipped up one side of my mouth. “I thought maybe it was because you were jealous.”

  Ever laughed at me. She legitimately, doubled o
ver, slapped her knee, and laughed so heartily at my statement that my face began to heat up with embarrassment.

  “Jealous?” She questioned, and laughed some more, making me feel like a complete jackass for saying it. “I was never jealous of Lindsay, and if you remember, she was a complete twat to me when we met. I can tell by your reactions about Christina that she is different. You light up about her. You never did that for what’s-her-bitch. Your eyes twinkle when anyone brings up Cemetery Girl though.”

  “Huh,” I muttered.

  “So, what’s up with her? Don’t leave me sitting here in suspense.”

  I told Ever what happened when I took the journals to Christina’s house. “I hated that I put them in her hands. I wanted to take them back and forget about showing them to her.” I glanced over into Ever’s jewel-like eyes to see compassion there. “She needed to know though,” I insisted.

  “She did,” Ever agreed before reaching over and patting my knee. “Don’t beat yourself up about it. You did the right thing. I think keeping it from her would have been cruel. She would have been mourning a woman she thought was her friend, and probably would have missed out on having such an amazing person in her life as a result.” She gave me a knowing look.

  I couldn’t help the grin. “She still tried to push me away.”

  “Yeah? Well, considering you were reading a text from her when I walked up, I’m going to assume you did something to change her mind.”

  “I think I did.”

  “What do you mean, you think you did?”

  “I’ve been sending her something special every day she’s at work. Flowers one day, then food delivery the next. I’ve sent little things or meaningful stuff that I knew she wouldn’t return. One day it was a small canvas set, another it was some new brushes. Today, I sent her an edible arrangement.”

  “Oh my God! Jay, that is the sweetest thing I’ve heard in a long time. Your wooing game is strong!”