Twist My Heart

by Brooke Taylor

  “Save it, cowboy.”

  Cowboy? Coop would get a kick out of that.

  The sexy curve to her bare, pink lips teased him closer as her patronizing tone backed him off. All he could do was hold position on the oil-splattered pavement. Before he could even ask her if she wanted to save a horse and ride him instead, she cut him off. “From the way you’ve been staring at my ass, you’d only last two minutes, and I don’t even have time for one.”

  His bouncy little Tigger was a tiger after all. Even better. “In that case, darlin’, which would you prefer—I wreck your plans for the next several hours defending my stamina or accept the challenge of getting you done in one?”

  Her plush lower lip plumped between her teeth, a clear indication she was considering picking the former. But as easily as she threw the nozzle at the pump, she tossed back at him, “Get yourself done in one.”

  Nik blinked.

  His speechlessness was rewarded with a devilish smirk as she swung her hot tail into the truck and peeled away. In true Tigger fashion, she bounded over the curb to avoid oncoming traffic. A protest of honking followed in her wake.

  Nik chuckled. Sweet and spicy. Yep, she’d be one hell of a tiger to have by the tail. With any luck he’d have another shot at a piece of it farther down the road.

  Chapter Two

  “Idiot,” the elderly lady with the horse trailer who’d returned to fill her truck with diesel grumbled at Nik. Was she referring to Tigger’s driving skills? Or his failed first attempt? Because the whole ‘Get yourself done in one’ business followed by a come-and-get-me grin was foreplay if he’d ever seen it.

  “Damn storm chasers!” the lady bellowed. “They get younger and dumber every year.”

  “Storm what?”

  She flagged her weathered hand at a black SUV racing through the traffic, causing another chorus of irate honks. “Bunch o’ psychopaths who get their jollies chasing after tornadoes. Heck, they even have tours…like for tourists. Can you believe that horseshit?”

  “Really?” Tornado tours? Huh. “How does one schedule a tornado?”

  The woman shook her sun-leathered face in disgust, her ashen ponytail swaying with the motion. “They’ve been hangin’ round town all day. Must’ve gotten word another un was formin’ close by. Can’t imagine what they think they’re gonna see. Gettin’ damn near darker than the inside of a cow out. I’d stay off the roads if I were you. If’n a tornado doesn’t kill you, those idiot chasers will.”

  Sure enough, not two seconds after Nik was back heading eastbound on I-70 with Pink Floyd’s Breathe turned up in an attempt to chill him out, five or six heavyweight trucks barreled past him. Skinned with flashy weather graphics and sporting long antennas bowing back from the speed, they played the part of storm chaser better than Tigger’s beat-up, white pickup. A few of them were armored like the Humvees he was used to—all that was missing was the bad-ass artillery.

  Within a half-hour the sky was spitting rain sideways with enough force the drops sounded like pelting marbles against the Jeep’s hardtop. The noise drowned out the music. Wiper blades slapped at full speed, unable to keep pace with the sudden onslaught. Nik pulled over, meeting back up with the storm chasers who’d gathered on the side of the highway, hazards flashing. Catching himself straining through the rain and wind shears, he admitted he was scanning for Tigger’s truck and forced himself to quit. Surely he wasn’t desperate enough to seek out a one-night stand during a freaking tornado.

  She looked too young for him anyway. Was she even old enough to legally drink? If her mouth wasn’t old enough for liquor, it sure as hell wasn’t old enough to be licking him. He preferred women with experience, not only in bed but in life. No need for the guilt of some overly romanticized youngster getting sucker-punched when he bugged out before sun-up. Fuck. That was not the ass of some twenty-one-year-old. That was a woman’s ass and it needed his hands all over it. His tongue needed to plunge deep between those pillowy, sass-talking lips. Her impatient, pink-tipped fingers needed to curl tightly around his massive… Set of blue balls. Double fuck.

  What was he doing thinking about this woman? She was long gone.

  A heavy bolt of lightning crashed through his dilemma. The Jeep rocked from the strong frontline wind gust, shaking as roughly as if an IED had gone off nearby. Hail ricocheted down like artillery fire. So similar to the jackhammer assault of bulletproof glass taking on enemy rounds, Nik reached for his rifle.

  His fingers closed around thin air.

  While he was alone in his Rubicon, the weather raged a war he couldn’t fight with a rifle, imaginary or otherwise. Explosions of thunder surrounded him as bold strikes of light whizzed through the air like missiles. Power flashes went off in the distant town. Just like with the ambush that led to Will’s death, Nik battled his instinct to throttle the Jeep and blast through it. All he knew anymore was how to charge headlong into danger with the volume turned up. But that was in a different world than this one. A different life.

  If Nik didn’t stay rooted in the here and now… If he allowed his soul to absorb the adrenaline rushing through his veins like heroin in an addict… He’d be one step closer to signing back up to chase his own particular brand of storm—living in kill or be killed mode. And his team would be pounding Tridents into his coffin with their fists just like he’d done to Will’s.

  By leaving the military, he’d hoped the mental demons might eventually quiet down. Quitting the Teams would never stop the real-life demons of this world, though, which had made the choice to re-up or not such a nasty bitch. But he’d made his choice and somehow he needed to figure out a way to live in the civilian world with his soul on lockdown.

  Purgatory, Coop called these months and years fresh out of the Teams. But on this highway, trapped in his Jeep, unable to distract himself from the night of Will’s death, Nik may as well have been in hell.

  As the cloud cover parted, the boldest chasers jumped out of their cars and trucks, ducking from the remaining spits of hail. Nik stepped on the brake to put the Jeep in gear. He needed to get moving. Get away. Get off the X, as they said in the Teams. But a man in a sporty Action Eight News jacket waved his arms in a warning fashion shouting, “Tornado on the ground! Tornado. On. The. Ground!” His hand signals indicated the tornado would move in front of them, taking a nearly perpendicular path to the highway.

  Steadying his breath, Nik grounded himself. Cameras aimed off in the distance, the storm chasers who’d scrambled for better viewing waited for the deadly devil to show itself.

  A ferocious gust front wrapped rain around the vortex, hiding its true magnitude…the rawness of its violence. Nik could hear it, though. The groaning moan built power as the tornado edged ever closer, so similar to the restless roaring in his own savage soul. The actual twister didn’t worry Nik nearly as much as the storm already inside of him, but he needed to get away from both and neither sounded ready to die out anytime soon.

  It didn’t take long before the angry bastard started flinging cars and buildings out of its way on the horizon. The chasers hooted out cheers while Nik held back from getting out, boxing their heads, and shouting, “Innocent people are losing their homes, maybe their lives, and you’re whooping your punk asses off?”

  They were thrill-seeking, danger-loving junkies no different than he, but he couldn’t wrap his mind around their motivation. They didn’t do it for God or country or peace or even because it was the right damn thing to do. No, they did it for the entertainment value of the power and destruction.

  Those stupid assholes reminded him of the barflies, with their starched white collars and soft-palm handshakes, who’d beg him for stories of war, delighting in the weapons and desperate to know his kill number. As if being so close to a killer made their balls swell up a few sizes. It wasn’t like taking someone’s life even took balls. Sometimes it didn’t even take skill. But, as much as he denied it, it always took a chink out of his own morality and immortality. The more they ask
ed, the more truth he wanted to bleed out. But no one said it better than Colonel Jessup in A Few Good Men. Hell, half the time Nik couldn’t even handle the truth. He told them what they expected to hear until it grew tiresome. Invariably, they found Nik arrogant when after a few too many questions he’d knock back the last shot they’d bought him and shut things down with, “Thinking of giving it a try?”

  They seethed when the buddies they were desperate to impress, or worse their girlfriends, would stifle a laugh. The mere image of their pasty asses so much as standing post in the wicked, dark places Nik burrowed into night after night, much less going for a SEAL Trident of their own? Impossible.

  As the poster says—everyone wants to be a lion until it’s time to do lion shit. But Nik craved the lion shit. When he was at war, he became every bit the king of beasts with darkness in his soul and blood dripping down his fangs, eager for his next hunt. Being stateside, sitting in bars entertaining college pricks and sad dads was about as close to being caged on display at a zoo as he could get.

  A flurry of lightning strikes split the sky, revealing the monstrous black funnel churning less than a quarter mile away. As Nik straightened his spine, his abs contracted hard as armor. The slow roiling mass dominated his field of vision. It was as if he were witnessing what he’d only ever felt inside himself before—The Darkness.

  The wedge churned with violence and power as it lumbered across the highway—fucking ambling!—toward the northeast. As soon as the funnel cleared the westbound lanes, Nik thrust his Jeep back in gear. With a jerk of the steering wheel, he pulled away from the chasers hurrying back to their vehicles.

  The downdraft was still dropping debris as Nik zigged and zagged, dodging the swath of rubble littering the roadway. Swerving, he avoided colliding with a metal hay ring as it rolled in front of him. An assault of lightning lit up the sky. Out of the corner of his eye, about three hundred yards to the northeast, was a flash of white metal—Tigger’s truck!

  Another flash. The truck appeared to be wadded as if it were made of tin. No way she’d survived it. Shit, shit, shit… He yanked the Jeep across the highway median and slammed it into four-wheel drive. Barreling in front of oncoming traffic, he created his own exit from the highway by taking out five strands of barbwire before sloughing through the mud of the hail-beaten wheat crop.

  The Jeep’s roof-mounted KC LED’s should’ve lit up the area, but dust particles hanging in the thickened air cloaked his view. He sprinted toward a pair of legs protruding from the wreckage. Mud sucked at his boots, slowing him down. Cursing, he skidded to his knees alongside of the lifeless appendages. Heaving away debris, he uncovered the body. Relief shouldn’t have crashed through his frozen veins in a welcome rush, but the copper-haired victim’s pixie face didn’t belong to Tigger. He stared blankly at the tattooed phoenix being licked with orange flames on her forearm as he waited to feel a pulse at her wrist. None. A quick scan of wounds and he realized there was nothing he could do to bring her back. Dammit.

  Nik stood up and resumed his search, hoping Tigger wasn’t still inside the crushed truck. Trying to get a better look, he climbed up on a bended wheel well. Something snagged his pant leg—metal most likely. The second time the snag was more of a pull, like the gentle tug of a child.

  He wheeled around, his eyes widening on a dark-furred beast. The animal snapped out a quick bark—loud and succinct. As the canine reared up on its haunches, his white fangs encircled Nik’s wrist and jerked at him again, this time harder. If it had attacked, Nik would’ve been forced to tackle it, snap its neck or something equally regrettable, but even with it emphatically barking at him, the large dog clearly meant Nik no harm. The way it kept nipping and pulling, the dog intended him to chase after it.

  A double-check of the redhead confirmed there was nothing he could do for her. No time to wonder who she might be or why she was with Tigger’s truck. Tornados tended to throw things long and far. Which meant this woman could be anyone and the blonde he’d seen in Goodland could be anywhere. But Nik wasn’t going to let a little thing like the impossible stop him from finding her.

  Chapter Three

  “Stay with me,” a masculine voice instructed. It was not a request or suggestion. It was an order given to keep me alive, conscious. I tried to keep my eyes open and focused. A man stood above me, ripping and slinging large, splintered boards and heavy, mud-caked metal panels away from my chest and legs as I drifted in and out of consciousness.

  The next thing I truly registered was a large male German shepherd who seemed to know me from the way his tongue slapped my cheek and tail wagged wildly. The tag on his collar read ‘Titan’. Tilting my head to the side, I eyed the glow of a fire licking flames close enough I could feel the burn of it on my cheeks. A faint glaze of orange highlighted the tattered edges of everything.

  In the distance beyond the man and the dog, I made out an awkward line of twisted trees, ragged-edged metal curled and bent, cars and semi-trucks heaped and scattered. This was not how the world was supposed to look, but this was my first look at it.

  Where the hell am I?

  “Breathe.” The man’s hard, even tone controlled me, as opposed to comforting me. Yet there was comfort in his taking control since my mind threatened to spin out of it. As soon as he’d removed the last of the weight holding me down, I pushed my palm heels into the sharp, glass-covered ground and willed my knees to bend. I had to get away. I wasn’t sure if I was in danger or in trouble, but the instinct to run overwhelmed me.

  “Wiggle your toes. Can you feel them?”

  “I have to go. I need to leave,” I kept repeating. My legs hadn’t gotten the memo the heavy debris on top of them was gone, though.

  He grunted. “Always gotta bounce, don’t ya, Tigger?”

  “What did you call me?” Does he know my name?

  He turned away, ignoring my question and returning to his flat commanding tone. “I’ll get you help. You’ll be fine.”

  “Do…do I know you?”

  “I’m Nikolas Steele. Call me Nik.”

  “I’ve got to get out of here, Nik.”

  “Just the shock talking. It’s normal with a head injury. I’ll take you to the hospital.”

  “No.” I shook my head and immediately regretted it. Ringing waves threatened to knock me out again.

  More questions came, and I wanted to be able to answer them, but everything seemed to buzz in my brain. The static numbed the pain and stifled the noise. The truth seemed to hide just beyond my reach. The ringing in my ears made it hard to hear Nik or even to focus on him. Again and again, I told him I didn’t know my name, where I was from, or why I was there. But I knew the year, every math equation he threw at me, and I was damn good at telling him how many fingers he held up. About the tenth time he squatted in front of me I snatched his wrist, locked eyes, and growled, “Ask me to count your fingers again and I’m going to hold up just one of mine. Would you like to guess which?”

  I hadn’t meant to be so harsh, but I was frustrated my protests were being ignored. Instead of being mad, his laughter boomed, echoing in my ears. My eyes widened at the shock of his white teeth—the only clean and bright thing in this strange world I’d woken up in. He gave my shoulder a patting squeeze. “Easy, tiger, you’re starting to sound like one of my guys. Not sure if that’s a good sign or a bad one,” he added with a grin. He didn’t ask me to count his fingers or answer any more random math equations again.

  Dust hung so thick, I choked breathing it in. Something else permeated the air, something strong. I should recognize it. I tried to dig deep into my mind.

  What is that smell?

  “Gasoline,” he explained while continuing to clear away the debris around me so I could get up safely. He held up a piece of plastic that read ‘Shell’. Littered among the shelving and construction debris he’d stripped off me were Ding Dongs, giant rainbow lollipops, and balled donut holes. Munchkins, Nik had called them. There’d been a Dunkin Donuts attached to th
e gas station. I recognized these were franchise and brand names, like I knew the dog was a German shepherd. But all they were to me were words with definitions. I couldn’t say if I’d ever gotten gas or eaten a Munchkin.

  A breeze came through carrying fresh air. I tried to pull a deep breath but my lungs split in pain as if my ribs had stabbed right through them. Punctured?

  “Your lungs? No,” he replied as if reading my thoughts again. Maybe I’d been speaking out loud. With the cycling noise whipping through my head it was so hard to tell. “Probably got the air knocked out of you, at worst bruised ribs. You’re lucky you weren’t crushed. This steel girder”—he jammed a muddy boot-heel onto the heavy beam barely an inch from my head—“created a pocket for you and kept most of the weight off, but it could’ve killed you just as easily.”

  He surmised flying debris had whacked me from behind and knocked me unconscious. The tender, yet pounding spot on the back of my head agreed. “Won’t know how bad it is until we get you to the hospital. Let’s see what else might be going on.” His hand squeezed around my ankle. “Does this hurt?”

  “I really don’t have time for this.”

  “What about here?”

  “I have to go.”

  Why wasn’t he listening to me? I didn’t have the patience to check for other injuries. It didn’t matter what he’d find wrong with me, I absolutely refused to go to the hospital. Nor did I want to be seen by any of the policemen or firemen descending on the field of destruction surrounding us.

  I had to stay conscious. Alert. No doubt he’d call them over if I passed out again. Not only did I have to pretend to be okay, I had to convince him to get me away from here. And I wasn’t going anywhere until I could walk.

  “Can you help me up?” I held out my hand. He fisted his. “Please?”

  “That’s not a good idea.”

  “I really am feeling much better,” I lied, nodding for emphasis. Probably not the smartest thing to do with a head injury.