Badd Mojo

by Jasinda Wilder

  "And we ended up screwing each other's brains out until the small hours of dawn," Zane said. "In fact, I don't think you ever actually left, after that, did you?"

  "Not for lack of trying, my dear. I was about to get away, but then you went and knocked me up."

  "Indeed I did. And I plan to do so again at the first possible opportunity."

  "My poor hoo-ha isn't ready for that again just yet, babe," Mara said. "Give it a year or so, and we'll talk."

  Excited conversation bubbled around us, but I tuned it out. My focus was on Canaan, who was gazing down at me, those signature Badd brown eyes hot enough to melt me.

  "What if I'd said I wasn't ready?" I whispered to him.

  He shrugged. "You're ready. I knew you were."

  "How?"

  He grinned. "The other day, I casually mentioned something we'd do after we're married. Buy a house or something, I don't remember what exactly. I mentioned it just to see how you'd react, and you didn't even bat an eye at the idea of us being married. Which was how I knew you were ready."

  "But...in three days?"

  He quirked an eyebrow at me. "You'd rather a big church wedding with a billion roses and 'Here Comes the Bride' and a fancy reception, and everyone we've ever met?"

  I tried to picture that, and I couldn't; I shook my head. "No, you're right, that'd be awful. A small, simple, fun ceremony with our family, here at the bar, with all the regulars and tourists and a band...that sounds perfect."

  "Exactly. Bax, Corin, and I all talked about this a lot and figured that's what you girls would want."

  "I'm surprised Eva doesn't want the big traditional wedding, though."

  Canaan waved the idea off. "Nah. She had that, with what's his nuts, the rich fuckhead she walked away from. She hated it. The triple wedding with a party at the bar...it was all her idea. She asked us when we were planning to marry you guys, and we said we didn't know, and then the next day Bax popped the question to her, during sex, I believe, and she suggested this plan, where we propose to you at their engagement announcement."

  "I'm glad you didn't propose during sex."

  "Yeah, it's not exactly romantic, is it?"

  I snorted. "The opposite, actually. I'd have cried so hard I wouldn't have been able to orgasm."

  He laughed at that. "Babe, have you ever not come during sex?"

  "No."

  "Exactly. That'll never happen."

  I rested my head on his chest, holding out my hand to admire my ring--a princess cut diamond, three-quarter carat, with two smaller diamonds on either side, which I took to symbolize Corin and Tate, the other two pieces of this puzzle that is the four of us. "You know, the other night we were falling asleep in the hotel room in Vancouver and we'd just had incredible sex and I was so deliriously happy that it almost scared me, and I remember thinking to myself I absolutely cannot possibly be any happier, and now you go and ask me to marry you, and I get to be your wife forever and ever, and now I'm even happier than I was then, which just shouldn't be possible, but it is."

  "You know what's funny?" Canaan said, tipping my chin up so our lips met. "I think the same thing pretty much every day."

  Epilogue

  Joss

  * * *

  "I really can't just leave you here, sweetheart." The truck driver was a big, burly, bearded man of fifty or so, wearing a red flannel shirt and a puffy black NorthFace vest. "Ain't exactly real friendly country for someone on foot, especially...you know, someone in your situation, eh?"

  I sat with the door of the semi half-open. "My situation?"

  He shrugged, struggling for the right words. "Young, female, alone...and, ah...in between permanent situations."

  I decided to let him off the hook. "Homeless is the word you're looking for, Mark. I am homeless."

  He shrugged again, rubbing the back of his neck. "Yeah, well...yeah."

  "I'll be fine. But thanks for the concern."

  "I'd sure feel a hell of a lot better taking you all the way to Prince Rupert, Joss. Look around you." He gestured at the thick forest on either side of the Yellowhead highway in western British Columbia.

  We were on the side of the Trans-Canada Highway, called the Yellowhead in some places, such as here, just a mile or so south of where it crossed north from the mainland to Kaien Island. It was a lonely, quiet, wild, barren place. It was December, and it was cold. Three below zero, Celsius. Which meant...like, twenty-six Fahrenheit, if I was doing the conversion right. Snow blew in thin, gusting swirls of small, hard flakes. The sky was a leaden ceiling, low, angry. In truth, I really didn't want to get out of the warm, toasty cab of the semi, but I'd learned the hard way about letting truckers drop me off in towns, or close to them. People see me get out of a semi, nothing but a backpack on my back, and they assume. They ask questions. They want to help, or just pass judgment. No. The best way is to get out away from towns and walk in, try to blend in, find somewhere warm to park my ass, try to find some temporary cash work so I can, maybe even find a room for the night.

  I tried to smile at Mark, but I'm not much for social niceties such as smiling and shit, so it probably looked more like a constipated grimace. "I promise, I'm fine. It's only, what, ten, twelve kilometers into town?"

  He shrugged. "Eleven or so from the bridge itself." He gestured again at the forest, and the snow. "It's cold and it's snowing and it'll be dark soon, and it's a good two and a half, three-hour walk from here. Let me take you closer. To the Butze Rapids Trail area, at least. Please. It really ain't safe, Joss."

  I held my breath, thinking hard. I looked out at the swirling snow, feeling the cold biting my cheek just from the open door of the cab, and thought about spending the next two or three hours walking in that weather. It was late afternoon already, which meant I'd be walking well into evening, and it got dark awful early this time of year. The cab was warm, and Mark was kind, and not at all creepy, and he played decent music, too--Elvis, The Beatles, Zepplin, that kind of stuff.

  I sighed and climbed back in. "The trail area, then."

  Mark nodded and shifted the truck into gear, and with a groaning and roaring of the engine, we ground and rumbled onto the highway. "Where you headed, anyway? Long term, I mean. You never said."

  I buckled the seatbelt across myself and picked up the atlas from the seat bench between us, and went back to examining it. "Not sure. Alaska, maybe?"

  "Alaska, huh? How are you gonna get there? Can be kinda tricky, what with all the islands and such." He glanced at me, obviously fishing for information.

  I rolled my eyes at him. "I said I'm not sure. No real plans. I'm just...drifting."

  Mark leaned forward to watch the snow skirl. "Awful remote area to be drifting through."

  "Better than being stuck in one place." I studied the map rather than meeting Mark's gaze. "If I don't have anywhere to be, I might as well be wherever I end up."

  Mark scratched his beard. "Not sure if that's smart or stupid." He steered with one hand and pulled a thick binder out from under the bench and set it on the bench, opened it, and flipped through it until he found what he was looking for, a booklet listing ferry times, destinations, and prices. "Here. Keep it. You wanna get out of Prince Rupert and into Alaska, that'll get you there."

  "Thanks, Mark."

  He shrugged again, and tugged on his beard. "I got a daughter a few years younger than you. I couldn't live with m'self if I left you on the side of the road in the middle of nowhere. That ain't right, eh? Hadda do something."

  "Well, I appreciate it."

  He nodded, and we drove in silence for a few miles, until we came to an area where the highway split off downhill to the right to a much smaller side road. A sign announced, "Welcome to the City of Prince Rupert," and it was down this road that Mark angled his tractor-trailer. We trundled to a stop a few hundred feet in. There were cars parked on one side, with concrete barriers on the other, and the forest beyond. A few people walked in pairs and small groups, bundled against the cold, some wit
h walking sticks, others with cameras. I prepared to get out, hitching my backpack onto my back.

  "I know I probably don't gotta tell you this, but be careful accepting rides from truckers, eh? Not all of 'em are like me. Some can be a bit rough around the edges, if you know what I mean. So just...be careful. Somethin' don't feel right, don't get in."

  I nodded. "Yes, I've learned that. Thanks."

  He stared at me, somewhat wistfully, clearly wishing there was something else he could do for me, so I waited, because he was kind and I didn't want him worrying about me.

  "Ah, I got it," he said, and put the gear into park. Climbing into the back, he rummaged around for a minute, grunting and muttering, until he came out with a huge, thick, puffy baby-blue parka, from Columbia. A knit hat. A pair of mittens.

  I started shaking my head. "No way, Mark. I'm not taking your stuff."

  He shoved it at me. "It ain't mine. I happened across a resale thing a while back, and found this stuff. It's girl stuff, good stuff, new. Got it for my daughter, but you need it more. She's got enough winter gear to last her 'til she's thirty, I just picked this stuff up because I can't pass up a good deal. Take it."

  I glanced down at my own coat, a tattered, thin, too-small fleece that wasn't at all up to snuff for the winter up here. "Dammit, Mark, I hate taking charity."

  "Ain't charity," he groused. "It's simple kindness and human decency." He shoved his hand in his pocket and pulled out a wad of cash, mixed US and Canadian currency, and tossed the folded wad into my hands. "That there is charity. I ain't been to church in a few months, which means I ain't done my tithing. Take it and no questions. It's enough to get you to Alaska. And if you wanna pay me back, find yourself a good place with good people, and live a good life. No more of the drifting."

  I felt my hand closing over the money, even though I hated accepting charity. I thought about tossing it back at him, but something stopped me. The cold, beyond the cab? The thought of hunting for work in the cold, sleeping somewhere outside in an alley? I had enough cash for a meal, but not enough to pay the ferry fee, or get me a room anywhere, and the cash Mark was offering would keep me from going hungry, walking through the night and sleeping in libraries or bus stations during the day. I knew I'd need it. Working for cash with no questions asked... it was hard to find.

  "I've never taken a dollar from anyone," I said. "I may be homeless, but I'm not a beggar."

  "You still ain't. You didn't ask--I gave it, because it's the right and Christian thing to do."

  I shoved it into my pocket, half expecting him to ask me for a favor in return, but I knew he wouldn't. Not a man like Mark. "Well, thanks. And if you're a Christian, you might ask God, next time you pray, why he hates me so much."

  "He don't hate you, sweetheart--"

  I shrugged the coat on over the one I was wearing, grasped the hat and mittens in one hand and climbed down from the cab. "Thanks again, Mark. For everything."

  I closed the cab door before he could say anything else, and walked away. I tugged the hat on over my dreadlocked black hair, which hung down almost to my waist, and then pulled the mittens onto my hands. As I walked through the cold of early evening, I found myself intensely grateful to Mark for the winter stuff, because the air blew cold, and the snow stung my eyes and face, and I knew without the coat and everything else, I'd have certainly gotten sick, if not frostbitten.

  I found a twenty-four-hour fast-food place, got a meal, ate it slowly, savoring every bite. I managed to kill a few hours there before the management started getting suspicious, so I found a twenty-four Tim Hortons and bought a large coffee and a couple of donuts, and took my time with them. I had a paperback in my backpack, so I got it out and spent a few hours reading, until I got sleepy and started nodding off.

  I was startled awake by someone sliding into the booth opposite me--a young girl about my age, pierced and tattooed.

  "I'm not supposed to let people sleep here," she said.

  I sighed. "I know, I know."

  She handed me a coffee. "But I happen to know the cameras don't record, and I'm the only one here 'til five. So, if you happen to lie down for a few hours, I wouldn't care. But I'll have to kick you out before my shift relief gets here at five."

  I could have cried with relief, but I didn't, because I never cry. But I could have, in an imaginary world, where that would be okay. "Thanks."

  She just nodded, got up, and left, disappearing into the back of the kitchen.

  I lay down on the bench and, hard and too short as it was, I curled up and managed to drift off to sleep instantly.

  I was woken by the same girl, the sky still dark outside. She had a paper bag in her hands, and a cup of coffee, both of which she handed to me. "Manager is going to be here soon." She toyed with a lip piercing. "I spent six months being homeless. I know how it is."

  I didn't even try to deny it, or refuse the food she was offering. "Thanks."

  Another of those terse nods, and then I left with the bag and the coffee. I made my way to the ferry terminal, eating the sandwich on the way so it wouldn't get cold. It was lightening up outside when I arrived, but the ferry terminal was still closed, even though there were people coming and going beyond the terminal, getting the ferries ready.

  I stood outside, shivering, hat tugged low, bouncing on my toes, sipping the black coffee until the terminal doors were opened.

  The woman behind the counter eyed me with a dull, uninterested expression. "Need a ticket?"

  I nodded. "First ferry out of here to Alaska."

  She tapped at her keyboard, staring at the screen. "That's going to Ketchikan. Leaves at seven. Seventy dollars."

  "That's fine. Thanks." I counted out the money, stuffing the remainder--eleven dollars--in my pocket, accepted the ticket, and followed her directions to the correct ferry.

  I took a seat, sipped the last of my coffee, and waited for the ferry to load. It only reached half-capacity, and then departed.

  Ketchikan, Alaska. I wondered, idly, what it would be like.

  I'd been drifting steadily westward for a long, long time. I'd started in Yarmouth, Nova Scotia...when was that? Two years ago? Three? Three, I think. I'd been stranded there, alone, after--

  I mentally stopped myself from going down that path.

  I'd started in Yarmouth, Nova Scotia, three years ago, and had slowly made my way across the entire continent, walking a lot of the way, taking rides as I could get them. Once, I even splurged all of my cash on a train ride across part of Saskatchewan, simply because I hadn't had the heart to walk across all that flatness. But then I'd been stuck, and had paid for my splurge in weeks of walking, begging for a day's work here and there from farmers and highway cafe and gas station owners. I'd wait on tables for tips, clean bathrooms for change from the till drawers, anything that anyone would pay me a few bucks cash to do. Anything that meant I could keep eating without having to strip, hook, or beg, all three of which I refused to do.

  The ferry ride to Ketchikan was long as hell, but it was beautiful. I finished my one paperback, and spent the last hour watching the waves ripple and crash and crest out the window, and I even saw some orcas porpoising together.

  When I arrived, it was blizzarding. Like, snowing so hard I couldn't see my hand in front of my face.

  Welcome to Ketchikan, I guess. I'd heard it wasn't supposed to get as cold here as most people expected, which is part of the reason why I'd been drawn to Ketchikan. It wasn't tropical, but it certainly wasn't the Arctic. So either they'd lied, or this was an unusual snowstorm.

  I sighed, pulled up my hood, tugged my hat lower, zipped the coat up all the way, and trudged out into the blizzard, totally unsure as to where I was going, just following the sidewalk, with the docks and the sound on my left, buildings on my right. It was something like noon, almost one in the afternoon, but perhaps because of the blizzard most of the stores and shops I passed were closed.

  I needed to get out of this snow. It was getting colder by the
minute, and even with the winter gear Mark had given me, I was starting feel the cold in my bones.

  Honestly, I'm not sure what happened next. Maybe it was the fact that I'd only managed a handful of hours of sleep at a time in the last week, and was exhausted. Maybe it was the blinding snow obscuring my path, making it so I only thought I was walking in a straight line, following the sidewalk. Maybe I just wandered in the wrong direction. I don't know.

  I just know one second I was walking, stumbling in the snow, my teeth chattering, cursing the snow, desperately hoping to come across somewhere open that was warm where I could wait out the storm. The next second, I was toppling airborne, my foot hitting air, and then I was weightless. I hit the water and went under, flailing in shock, so cold it hurt, so cold it burned. So cold I couldn't breathe, couldn't move, couldn't swim, could only pull helplessly at the water as I sank, weighted down by my coat and my backpack.

  And then...I don't know what happened.

  I just don't.

  I don't remember a thing. Just the cold and the darkness and the ache and burn, and then nothingness, and then I was waking up, bobbing up and down rapidly. In someone's arms? I saw sky, through a break in the snow, a hard, dark gray sky. A face. Thin, sharp features. Hard planes, high cheekbones. Elven, is the word that came to mind. Dark eyes. Chocolate brown, piercing.

  He was wet.

  Snow was coating his features, and ice was forming on his face, frozen by the cold, knifing wind.

  I felt him tugging open a door. The wind vanished, the sky vanished. Warmth, or so I imagined it to be, but I could only feel it as at the absence of cold. I was shaking, shivering, having trouble breathing. I heard voices, male and female, asking questions. The man carrying me didn't answer, and I felt him going up stairs. Felt him set me on my feet and then kick a door closed.

  I couldn't stand, and he caught me.

  "Gotta get you out of these wet clothes." He wasn't asking, he was telling.

  I shook my head. "No...no."

  "You'll die of hypothermia."

  I let him take my backpack, and watched him set it on the floor--that backpack had everything I own in it. I was numb, now. Aching. Beyond shivering or chattering, I was so cold I was almost hot. Bleary. Dizzy.