Learning to Blush: Swarii Brides, Book Two

by Korey Mae Johnson

  Thorton sighed and shook his head, knowing he’d have a struggle on his hands as soon as they saw Ellie’s body.

  * * *

  Penny kept glancing toward the back of the truck until her brother put his arm around her shoulders to prevent her from doing it.

  She felt a little jerky about hitting someone with her truck, particularly men so damn large—one of them had to have been about seven feet tall… He was so much larger than Timmy and Tommy, the tallest boys in the county as they both stood nearly six and a half feet.

  The men were extremely handsome, even though they had very strained expressions. They seemed tired and weary soldiers she’d seen only during war documentaries. She couldn’t place their accents at all; at first they sounded Celtic, or maybe even Baltic. Either ethnicity might explain the fact that they were pale, as if they simply didn’t get out in the sun, despite the fact that their builds made them seem like they spent time in the military or even professional football, and were walking in the sunlight in the middle of nowhere.

  Still, she did want to learn more about them. They were probably in their thirties, so probably too old for her, but they were both extremely attractive with very nice muscle tone in their arms and chests. Though they were tall, they weren't at all lanky. The shorter one, Thorton, could easily be described as bulky—his shoulder muscles and arms were more defined, although he had cut-off sleeves that elevated the look, as well as shards of a tribal-like tattoo that stretched across his arm and all the way up his neck. He wore what looked like an orange-gold earring in one of his ears, completing a perfect bad-boy look.

  She might have been attracted to them even if they weren’t foreign… But foreigners, despite where they were from, held an undeniable appeal on its own. Even though she was over eighteen now and the Californian border was only an hour and a half away, she still had never left the state.

  In a way, she had recently come to be envious of her cousin, Ellie, who had wandered out of the wilderness two months ago after a two-year-long disappearance. The clothes she wore were ripped to tatters and her wrist had been broken, but there was a sharp, strange accent to her now, and every now and then Penny had heard her curse in a foreign language. Nobody knew whether to believe she had been hidden away in the protective custody program where she'd claimed to have been, but Ellie certainly wasn’t telling any other stories.

  Ellie had to have gone somewhere really far away. Really, really far… Because she came back different; strangely wiser, even smarter and quicker, and she cursed and smoked far less than she used to. Penny’s family believed that Ellie had to be off doing things she wasn’t ‘proud of,’ but Penny didn’t care. She still found herself wishing she could have been in Ellie’s shoes.

  Tim and Tom stopped in front of her family’s garage, pulling off to the side of the street rather than in the lot. “Go in and wait for us to get back, ‘kay?” Tom asked her.

  Penny nodded and looked back at the truck, grinning at the strangers. “You’re gonna be okay? Again—I’m really, really sorry …”

  “We’ll be fine,” Thorton grinned, showing a row of absurdly white teeth. “Thanks for your concern.”

  “I’ll… I’ll see you later, then.” She attempted a smile, but she felt ridiculous.

  “If I’m lucky,” Thorton replied and bowed his head. Graham, the taller one, didn’t even look at her. He looked extremely solemn. “Good bye.” Thorton gave a small wave of his hand, and Penny focused on his extra fingers. She swallowed when she looked back at their faces and saw how forlorn they looked.

  “Good luck,” she found herself saying, giving a weak wave, knowing by the look of them that they needed it. Then, with a scrunched nose, she watched them all drive off.

  Chapter Three

  Mike came into the garage all in a spitfire. He had been that way all week, since his girlfriend had broken up with him. Now, it seemed like every time he looked straight at the garage, it filled him with rage. His girlfriend didn’t want to get serious with a ‘car mechanic’, and although it hurt, he almost couldn’t blame her. The garage was too damn monotonous anymore, even with his family working with him… Family he normally liked.

  Even when his baby sister definitely wasn’t working on what he’d told her to. “Damn it, Ellie, you need to be working on the Toyota!” he said, spotting his sister’s small red sneakers and dark-blue jumper pant legs poking out from underneath a Nissan truck.

  “Toyota’s done,” Ellie called back as if the task had bored her.

  “You replaced an entire transmission already?” he doubted. It was a two-person task just lowering the transmission in—especially in Ellie’s case, whose body was small enough that a strong wind could blow her over.

  “Transmission wasn’t the problem. The old transmission was in good shape, Mike. You diagnosed it wrong. A terminal circuit was on the fritz. I just replaced the damn thing, and it’s good as new.” She grumbled and kicked her foot as she applied force to something underneath the truck. “Now, THIS is a big goddamn problem. I might as well be working on the Titanic for how much this has rusted over. It’s so fucking flood damaged… You know, maybe just pass me a pistol. I got a clear shot. We’ll just shoot the damn thing and put this out of its misery.”

  Mike glared at her shoes. “It’s not your job to run diagnostics. You work for me, Kid. When it says on the sheet to replace a transmission, replace the damn transmission,” he ordered her, sounding exasperated.

  “Okay, then I’ll just remove my brain before I come in here,” she replied snidely.

  “You might as well,” he shrugged. “I didn’t hire your brain. I hired your hands.” As if he even hired her at all; she'd been working in the family garage since she was old enough to lift a wrench.

  Suddenly she laughed. “Get me a saw and I’ll give ‘em to you,” she told him.

  He made a face and then decided to try to give up being angry. He could never be angry for too long at a time—not with his kid sister, anyway. He shook his head and chuckled.

  In truth, Ellie’s know-it-all personality was annoying, but he was happy to have her back. Although she was harder to handle than his cousins, it was nice to have someone working under him who cared and came to work sober. “Touché,” he admitted, writing something on the sheet. “Alright, well, I’m sure the Henderson’s will love keeping a thousand bucks in their pocket. You’re going to make us all destitute, though.”

  “Are you kidding? We have more jobs than we have hands or space for. We need to expand,” she whined. “Hire some more people, get a bigger place. Move out of the sticks.”

  “Come on, we’ve been in this town for forever,” Mike reminded her. “Though, really… Even if we had a money tree growing in the back yard, it doesn’t matter.” He scratched his fingers through his hair. “Ever feel… unchallenged? No matter what folk bring in here to fix?”

  “Ah, a mechanic’s ennui,” Ellie replied, her shoe kicking straight as she tightened something. “Yeah, I feel that way constantly about myself. It’s because this stuff is all so lame. Boats, cars, lawn mowers, Cessnas and computers… Snoreville. Still—ain’t like anyone else can do it as good.”

  Mike was monotonous as he replied, shaking his head despite the fact that she couldn’t see his body language, “Yeah, well, since Dad and Uncle Pete retired, we can’t really afford to go bigger. We’re stuck, Kiddo.”

  Ellie audibly sighed but was drowned out by the sound of Penny walking through the front door, causing the bell in the corner of the door to ring.

  “So, something totally weird just happened,” she announced, smoothing the air in front of her with her hands.

  Mike immediately looked out the window to see Tim and Tom driving Penny’s truck towards the stoplight ahead. The truck, which was new, was absolutely filthy and caked with dust and mud with two guys sitting in the back of the truck. “What did you DO to it? How do you DO that in six hours?”

  “We were just racing down the trail,” Penny
shrugged, very used to her cousin’s nagging, but still not liking it. “It was their idea… Until I hit a couple of hikers with the damn truck. They just came out of nowhere!”

  Mike gasped and paled. “What? Was someone hurt?”

  “No, they got up okay…” Penny told him. “Big guys. They dinged the truck door a little bit, but I already had the brakes to the floor when I got to them, and they just got knocked over. They were barely even fazed. I mean, HUGE. One guy had to be seven feet tall. And get this—both of them have six fingers. And I mean, functional fingers, like great-grandpa had.”

  Ellie quickly rolled out from under the Nissan. “What about two big guys with six fingers?” she demanded, pushing herself up onto her feet.

  “You killed my father, prepare to die…” Penny quoted, sending herself into a giggle fit.

  “I can’t believe you put a fucking dent in it already, Pen!” Mike lectured, frowning. “You need to be more careful. I could fucking kill Tim and Tom. They know better. We can’t afford shenanigans. What if you guys got sued?”

  “Shut up,” Ellie said firmly, hushing Penny’s giggling and Mike’s lecturing with two harsh words. “Did these guys have names?”

  “Yeah… Captain something-something and Commander something-something,” Penny drawled, looking suddenly very unsure of herself.

  “Commander Thorton Hux? Captain Graham Masterson?” Ellie asked, her body as still as a statue, her eyes getting larger and rounder by the second.

  Mike and Penny were wondering if Ellie had ever looked so serious.

  “Yeah!” Penny chimed excitedly. “That was it!” She shook her head and raised an eyebrow. “You KNOW them? How?”

  “I gotta go, I gotta get over there! Where’d they go? How do I look?” She was suddenly pacing around erratically until she stopped and suddenly charged, “YOU HIT THEM WITH YOUR CAR?”

  Penny blanched. “Uhhh…. J… just a little…” she stuttered.

  “Where are they?”

  “Uh…” Penny swallowed. “Tim and Tom took them to the hospital,” Penny said, but put out her hands and waved them about as soon as Ellie’s eyes lit up with horror. “No, no! They said they weren’t hurt. They said they were on their way there already!” Penny wrung her fingers on her long braid. “I’m sorry! I didn’t hurt them!” she assured, looking like she might buckle under the stress of the question.

  “Stupid!” Ellie shouted. “Stupid, stupid!” Ellie ran to the mirror by the front desk—it was really a beer sign with a mirror backing, but it revealed a reflection covered with engine grease and sporting ratty hair. She gasped. “I look terrible!” she cried. Without another word, she sprinted towards the stairs and to her apartment above the garage, leaping up the steps three stairs at a time.

  Mike slowly turned his head towards Penny, as if he was hoping she could translate Ellie’s behavior into something he could understand.

  She merely shrugged.

  “Huh,” he said, a crease appearing in the middle of his forehead as he sat down at his desk. “That was highly irregular. Did… Did she say she knew them?”

  “That’s what she said,” Penny replied. “I don’t know when she could have met them… Unless…”

  “Unless these guys are part of the Case of the Missing Eleanor,” Mike agreed with a nod. “Maybe we’ll see whose theory is correct, huh? We should meet these guys…”

  “Why? What do you think she was doing for those two years?” Penny asked, lifting herself up so she was sitting on the desk.

  He looked hesitant to say for a second, but then decided that it was better to be sure about being right. “Two words,” he finally said. “Pony girl.”

  “What?” Penny gasped. “Did she tell you this?”

  “No, but she didn’t need to!” he said. “And she wouldn’t tell her brother, anyway. But it’s obvious that she just wanted to live an alternate lifestyle with a boyfriend somewhere. Probably planned it before she disappeared. He would just provide her with everything she needed, which is why she didn’t pack any clothes to take with her. If she WORE clothes at all, that is….”

  “Huh—that might explain why she got all her body hair professionally removed. That ain’t cheap,” Penny added. “It would make sense if she was some millionaire’s toy or something… Still… Ellie?” It didn’t make sense, really, despite the evidence, and even Mike knew this. Ellie just wasn’t sexual at all before she’d disappeared. She sat up straight and shook her head. “Timmy doesn’t think that,” Penny reminded in a chiding voice.

  “No. Tim’s favorite two conclusions thus far deal with aliens and werewolves. He can’t DECIDE on a favorite yet,” Mike said sardonically, rolling his eyes. “That boy’s B-movie fetish cannot be healthy….”

  Suddenly, Ellie came downstairs, showered in Jonas-family-record time and dressed in a dress Penny recognized as hers. Ellie's hair was wet and her skin was pink, as if she had scrubbed the hell out of it. “Pen, I’m borrowing your clothes,” she announced, rushing to grab Mike’s keys from a hook by the desk. “Mike, I’m borrowing your SUV.” She practically tripped as she tried to tug ballerina-like shoes onto her feet as she jogged out the door.

  They just watched her as she got into the SUV. “I don’t know if they told you this,” Mike said, his voice hushed. “But when she came back and went into the hospital for the broken arm, they found her ass was beaten. I mean, welted from mid-thigh to her back. I think things got too rough and she bailed on the guy. Everybody thinks so….” When Penny gave her trademark 'judgmental look', he added, “Except Tim.”

  “Well, she’s rushing out to meet him. She wasn’t too serious about the bailing on the guy if that’s the case.” They watched Ellie burn rubber as she skidded the SUV quickly onto the main road. “I didn’t know she knew how to wear a dress!”

  “I don’t know. Maybe she’s in a trance and we said some magic words or something…”

  “Mike?” Penny said, pursing her lips.

  “Huh?”

  “You are so full of shit.”

  Mike put up his hands. “We’ll see, we’ll see.”

  * * *

  “Whoa! Watch out! Crazy woman driver!” Tim said, watching a black SUV swerve around them to get off the express ramp to the hospital. “Holy shit-sauce!”

  “Hey,” Tommy said, wanting to get annoyed but too distracted to do so. “Was that Mike’s…? Shit!” He turned a corner only to see the SUV stopped and swerving into the parking lot in front of them, missing the front of their car by a foot. They heard a ‘thump’ and an annoyed groan from the two giant guys trying to hold onto dear life in the back. “Sorry!” Tommy tried to tell them, shutting off the truck and jogging out of it.

  “What the fuck, Lady?” he demanded, shouting. He watched a girl in a blue sundress climb out of the front seat. It took him a good long few seconds to realize it was Ellie. “Whoa! El—What—?” he began, but Ellie suddenly ran past him and up to his car.

  “Graham!” she screamed.

  Graham stood up from his seated position and looked over the hood of the truck like he had been sitting on a spring. His body was completely rigid. “Eleanor?” He couldn’t believe it. He was SO certain she was dead—and there she was; as beautiful as ever, though her eyes were as wide as saucers and her lip was quivering…

  He jumped off the car quickly and ran up to her and picked her up, swinging her around as if she didn’t weigh anything—her arms wrapped tightly around his neck, her legs scandalously around his waist. He breathed her in. He had forgotten how damn good she smelt. “Eleanor!” He kissed her neck and then pulled back to gaze at her face. She was crying. “I was so worried…” he said, his throat tight. He didn’t know if he was going to start crying too, or laughing, or singing—he had never felt so full of emotion before…

  “I thought you weren’t gonna come for me!” she cried, sobbing into his shoulder. “I didn’t know if you knew where I was, or if it was too dangerous, or if I made you too angry with me for what I
did… I’m so sorry!”

  “I’ll always come for you,” he promised her, rubbing her back consolingly.

  Tommy and Timmy looked up at Thorton, who was leaning against the hood of the truck, resting his head into his hand and smiling happily. He gave a happy sigh before he looked at their completely puzzled expressions, smiled more broadly and shrugged, saying, “You gotta love happy endings.”

  Suddenly there was a loud honking noise as another car actually tried to get into the parking lot. Tim groaned and got back in the truck to park it out of the main lane and Thorton jumped off the back and stood patiently by the couple.

  “I’ve gotta tell ya, Kitten,” Thorton finally said, looking how Ellie parked the car, which was obviously supposed to be within the lane, and not across three slots. “You don’t build a very good case for yourself if you want to get the Boss to let you apply for your cruiser license…”

  She put an arm out and grabbed Thorton by his coat, dragging him over into a group hug.

  Timmy was already texting someone about this—probably Penny. Tom got out of the newly-parked truck and watched. “Um,” he finally said, loud enough that he hoped to get even Ellie’s attention. It didn’t seem to work, and he frowned. “Um? Ellie?”

  Ellie let Thorton go and went back to snuggling into Graham’s chest, looking helplessly content, even as she cried.

  Thorton walked up to Tom, saying, “So… You know her?”

  “Hell, yeah. We work and live together—we’re cousins…” Tom said, curling his lip with confusion and shaking his head.

  “Wow… This is a really small planet,” Thorton said, looking both disturbed and amazed.

  “Who… How…” Tommy grinned and shook his head. “I didn’t know she even had a boyfriend.”

  Thorton snorted. “They’re not friends. They’re married.”

  Tommy and Timmy both slowly turned and looked at each other, shocked. Eventually, Timmy looked back down at his cell phone and continued to text as fast as he could. “Man, my thumbs are on fiyah!”