by Box Set
Instead, his cellphone beeped. Glancing at the text, he scowled. The message was from Brody, one of his buddies from his camp days. They’d formed a brotherhood of sorts, and it seemed Brody was calling in a favor.
With a final glance at the unmoving body in the bed, Al stood. “Okay, old man. Message received. Stop sitting on my ass and go make a difference. There’s an innocent in need of my questionable help. I’m off to protect her. If I don’t see you again…”
He trailed off, giving the hand a final squeeze. “I’ll see you on the other side, father.”
With that, he was off for a shower. He’d keep the overgrown facial hair—if the goal was to hide a girl, his fame would do him no favors. Perhaps looking like an unkempt ruffian could serve a purpose.
If anything, he’d be doing what Stone wanted. Making a difference.
He’d help the girl for Stone’s sake.
Chapter 3
She woke up with hives, but no bites. She guessed it was a psychosomatic response to the dingy surroundings. Then again, just waking up and trying to figure out where she was and why had been jarring enough…
It didn’t seem fair to be itchy on top of that.
Intending to shower, she leaned in to turn on the faucets in the bathtub. Only the cold worked, and the knob for the hot came off in her hand. Seconds later, a spider dropped down from the shower nozzle and she squeaked, banged her head on the medicine cabinet, and practically fell into the toilet.
Giving up on hygiene for the day—it wasn’t like she planned to impress whoever they sent to help her, anyway—she stuffed back on the hat after finger combing her hair as best she could. Only a few hours passed since she’d rented the room, so daylight streamed in from the glass front doors of the motel, even past the fingerprints and nose prints from whomever passed that way before her.
She replaced her sunglasses on her face and caught the nearest bus—still assuming public transportation would hide her better than hiring a taxi or otherwise getting her own mode of travel. She made it to the airport an hour ahead of the scheduled meet time, according to the conversation with her sister, and sat in the front lobby in a hard plastic chair. People came and went around her. One couple with a gorgeous baby offered her water bottles because they couldn’t take them on the plane. Since the seals weren’t broken, she accepted them and added them to her bag. She hadn’t thought to pack food or water, so maybe they’d come in handy.
Another man, in a suit, stared at her in a suspicious way. She clutched her bag close, not sure why he eyed her.
But the man lumbered off, apparently a creepy guy rather than someone who knew something of her situation. Every time a security guard passed her, speaking into his radio, she was sure her gig was up. They’d haul her away to prison and she’d be getting supply lists from her mother instead of care packages, she just knew it.
Finally, a guy who looked like a metrosexual lumberjack paused near her, staring longer than what made her comfortable. A glance proved he hadn’t moved, a still body in a sea of travelers off to wondrous locales—while she tried to avoid iron bars.
The guy was hot, at least, probably about her age or a little older. He had unkempt, curling dark hair which fell low over his somewhat intense brow. If she had an ounce of her mother’s painting skills, she might ask him to model, even, because something about his stare made her stomach flip and her heart race in a sheerly feminine way.
He wore jeans and a button down shirt over a comic book tee shirt, though. Unemployed, she guessed, still living in his mother’s basement.
But then again, who was she to judge? She was a criminal on the run, after all.
The man stepped closer to her and said clearly, “Jude Cramer?”
Leaping to her feet, she bum rushed him, clamping a hand over his mouth even as he tried to step back and evade her. “Shhh!”
One brow quirked over those delicious eyes and he spoke through her hand covering his mouth. The feel of his lips on my skin is downright erotic, an unwarranted and unhelpful part of her mind cheerfully pointed out. “Mmf-ur-llmer,” he said.
“Excuse me?” she asked, flustered.
Realizing she still held his mouth closed, she removed her hand and stepped back. “Sorry, I panicked. Kind of running on a lot of adrenaline right now.”
“Hmm,” he said.
“I’m guessing you’re Brody’s friend? From summer camp or something?” Rubbing her hands down her legs, she tried to calm her racing pulse. The thing was, it wasn’t entirely her situation making her scatterbrained. Part of it was him. The man was attractive, even if he did have enough beard to house a small colony of barn swallows.
Flavor saver, her mind contrarily provided.
“Yes, and I’m guessing you’re going to tackle me if I say your name again, so let’s call the introductions good, shall we? I took the liberty of renting a car. The service should be waiting outside. Are you ready to go on a road trip…?” He trailed off, as if unsure whether it was safe to use her name or not. He finished with a shrug, “You.”
“Yes, please, let’s get out of here. I’m terrified someone will recognize me.”
He snorted, pointed at her hat and sunglasses and quipped, “You’re lucky I recognized you. If it wasn’t for the distinct smell of paranoia coming off you in waves, I might have left without you.”
Brilliant, she thought. He thinks he’s funny. They sent me a comedian when I asked for a hero.
***
Although he tried to ignore her nerves, she fast drove him toward the end of his patience as he steered the rented car into the desert. If she wasn’t tapping her foot, she strummed her fingers on the armrest. When he offered to stop to get them something to eat, she’d handed him a water bottle.
Every single time he passed a speed trap, she hunched down in her seat. When truckers passed, she tugged her ugly hat low over her face. Basically, her behavior screamed suspicious, but he didn’t think she’d care to hear his estimation.
He’d answered the call to come help her because his pal thought she was innocent, but she acted beyond paranoid, which set off his nerves. If he’d stayed with Stone, maybe he could’ve done more good than he was doing Jude as it seemed pretty damn obvious he wasn’t comforting her in any way.
Not to mention his plan was half-baked at best. He’d jumped on a plane and set out to meet a stranger… not having any clue about her other than a pixelated picture he’d been texted for identifying her. Supposedly, she’d witnessed a murder and now they suspected her of the crime, at least according to her sister’s garbled babble over the phone. He thought he could pick her up, drive her to Texas and hide out at his parents’ house until they figured out what was actually going on.
Unlikely anyone would look for or find her there, since he didn’t know her. He also didn’t know if she really was the “innocent” in her situation, although a little voice in his head and gut—that sounded a lot like Stone—suggested he was doing the right thing.
Besides, the look on his father’s face when he brought home a woman… that alone would be priceless. The mischievous part of his nature reveled in the thought of presenting Princess Paranoia to his parents then having them no doubt suppose he was in a relationship with her, followed quickly by his father’s undoubted instant dislike of her. They wanted him to settle down, become a man, and get into a normal adult relationship…
And he was bringing home the Ugly Hat, Twitchy Face woman.
He swallowed a chuckle at the thought. For the third time since they’d gotten on the road, he reached down to turn on the radio and she smacked his hand away. He’d tried cracking jokes a couple times, too, but she’d shot him down. She snarled something about heroes and comedians and went right back to her twitching.
The sun dipped low, likely to set soon, but he’d reached his planned destination for the night. Turning into it, he enjoyed the way she jerked to attention and gripped his arm. “What are you doing? Where are we?”
Althoug
h not answering her might have satisfied him more than responding, he pointed to the right side of the road. “We’re in the Painted Desert and over there is the Petrified Forest National Park. They don’t allow you to park overnight at the park, but they do allow it here and one other place. We’re at the south entrance to the state park, and over there is Highway 180.”
“Why would we park overnight?” She groaned a little as she stood.
Shoving out of the vehicle himself, he clicked the locks and waited for her to close her door. They’d been in the car for almost eight hours, so aside from untwisting, he for one really had to take a piss. He strode toward the nearby gift shop, intending to find a restroom first and something to eat second.
“You didn’t answer my question. Where are you going?” Her hat flopped in a comical way as she stumbled after him. Her legs were shorter, and he hadn’t modified his stride in the least, not to mention she likely felt about as stiff as he did from being in the car for so long. His very ass felt numb, to be honest.
“To take a piss,” he answered. “If that’s okay by you, Princess Paranoid.”
She halted, dust kicking up from her inappropriate shoes. “What did you just call me?”
“Princess Paranoid. Cra-a-azy lady. Whatever, I have to piss.”
Without another glance back, he simply entered the gift shop. Sure, he intended to help her—out of some stupid commitment to a promise to a dying man, of all the reasons—but he was about sick of her behavior. It all seemed very reasonable to him. If one were being rescued, one could at least pretend niceties to one’s rescuer. Nope, not his damsel in distress. Instead, she was a twitching, snarling creature more apt to take a bite out of him than to say a kind word.
Likely he was simply hungry, tired, emotionally drained and otherwise not in the best of moods himself, but as he used the restroom, he cringed at the sound of the bell on the door of the gift shop. Probably her, if she left her paranoia behind long enough to make use of the facilities. Once he’d washed his hands and exited the restroom, he didn’t catch sight of her anywhere, which meant she either still lingered in the ladies’ room or maybe ran off on her own into the desert.
Right that second, he wasn’t sure which he’d have preferred to be true. Stocking up on overpriced snacks, drinks, and a few other things for the night and road, he swallowed a groan when she finally reappeared. “Hey,” she said.
He grunted in response, adding a fleece blanket with an image of the desert on it to his rapidly growing stack of goodies.
“Look, I think we got off on the wrong foot,” she began.
He didn’t answer, passing his credit card to the purple-haired girl behind the counter. The girl popped a bubblegum bubble and eyed Jude strangely. This seemed to make Jude more paranoid as she ducked behind him, gripping his sides in her surprisingly chilly fingertips. He could feel them through the thin cloth of his shirt and it shot a cold shiver up his spine. Shuddering from the sensation, he peeked over his shoulder at his damsel in distressed paranoia. “You need anything or wanna just meet me back at the car?”
She snagged a Snickers bar, added it to the stack, and retreated with a grateful half smile.
The moment of gratitude did him in. “Hang on, don’t run the card yet,” he said to the girl behind the counter. She nodded and waited while he added a couple more of the touristy blankets, more snacks, drinks and a fresh tee-shirt in what he guessed was about the right size for Jude to his pile.
The girl openly grinned at him. “Your girlfriend will thank you if you add this. I’m guessing you guys have been on the road a while.”
The girl presented a bag of wet wipes, and although he wasn’t sure why Jude might need them, he stuck them on top of his tottering stack. She popped another bubble as she began ringing things up and bagging them, so he asked in a conversational tone, “How’d you guess we were on the road for a while?”
“Few things, actually. For one, you both made a beeline for the bathrooms—dead giveaway there. For two, you both look hangry.” Holding up a bottle of pop, she asked, “You want this in the bag?”
“Yeah, thanks. Hangry… that’s hungry and angry, right?” Jude’s paranoia was getting to him, apparently, since having her out of sight made his nerves skitter and his skin crawl. What if someone saw her? What if an officer did a normal drive by and asked if she was okay? She’d flake, that was what. He needed to get back to her quickly. Why on earth had he bought so much extraneous crap?
“Yeah,” the girl answered, passing him a credit card slip to sign. “And you both look hangry as hell.”
He snickered, passing the slip back to her. “So, we’re going to crash in the car tonight. We’re on the way from LA to Dallas, and I’ve done it before, but…”
“But not with a girl in the car?” she asked with a knowing smirk.
“Yeah, not with a girl in the car.” The way the girl looked him up and down suggested she was checking him out, which was ridiculous, but…
“Look, I’ve parked here too a time or two in my day. Yeah, you can overnight in the parking lot, but if you want privacy, there’s a gravel driveway behind the store. You go up it about a quarter of a mile and it circles right to the edge of the park. You park the car there and no one will see what you’re up to, if you know what I mean. It isn’t on the property of the park, so the rangers won’t bother you, yet it is private, make sense?” The girl blew and popped another bubble before adding a wink. “You’ll be all alone—you, your girl and the night.”
“Thanks for the tip,” he told her. Passing her a twenty, he winked back. “Appreciate it.”
“Lucky girl,” the cashier mumbled under her breath as he exited and he couldn’t resist grinning at her comment.
The smile still decorated his lips when he rejoined Jude at the car. Unlocking the doors—he could’ve passed her the keys instead of making her stand outside in the heat, but he hadn’t thought of it—he turned over the engine and restarted the AC before he stuffed the bags in the back seat. Once he had everything stowed, he rejoined Jude.
“Don’t need to buckle up,” he advised. “We’re not going far.”
She hesitated but watched as he followed the cashier’s directions and pulled behind the store and into the gravel driveway he’d been told about. Once he got the car positioned in a slightly hidden way, he cut the engine and rolled down the windows. “She didn’t mention the view would be this good.”
“Who?” Jude asked. She rummaged through a bag, looking for her candy bar, no doubt. Instead of answering, Al pulled out the blanket, wipes and other items he’d gotten for her and stacked them in her lap.
“This stuff is for you,” he said. “Although I’m not sure what the wipes are for.”
“Oh, you wonderful man. They’re not as good as a long hot shower, but they’re wonderful.”
Her impetuous hug shocked him so much, he stiffened in her embrace. She smelled good—like toffee or vanilla ice cream melting under the decadent sin of hot fudge. Instantly uncomfortable with his body’s reaction to the near-stranger, he escaped her gratitude with a grumbled, “No problem.”
Opening his car door, he stuffed his hands in his pockets and drew deep of the still hot air. Closing his eyes, he prayed for a patience and zen he’d never possessed. After a few seconds, he bent to look at Jude through the open window. “I’m going to walk around a bit. I’ll be back. Eat something, get comfortable, okay?”
With that, he walked away, thinking there wasn’t far enough in the whole desert for him to walk to get rid of the guilt of being turned on by a woman who needed his help.
Chapter 4
They weren’t talking, which was almost worse than his attempts on chatter on the trip up to this point. She’d availed of the wet wipes while he’d vanished, using them to wash up a bit. It left her feeling altogether more human than she had ever since a bullet that sounded like air ripped a hole in her well-planned life. She’d eaten junk food and her adrenaline levels finally dropped�
�it seemed even the possibility of going to prison or jail for a crime she didn’t commit couldn’t keep her freaked out for a long, sustained period of time.
She crackled with energy, far more awake than she should be, yet he stayed silent as he reclined in the seat and looked out the windshield.
The sun sank, setting fire to the striations of color ribboning the rolling landscape before her. Well, not exactly rolling. It seemed more like bumpy land. Like colorful sandcastles melting into the desert—rounded by time, cut by water and wind, and left behind by a careless child. After the colors turned to deep purples and blues, all of it faded to shadows leaving behind a darkness more complete than any she’d ever seen before.
Since his breathing slowed quite a while ago, she figured he’d fallen asleep, and she carefully began opening the car door. The interior light flashed on for a second, until she managed to turn it back off, but his breathing didn’t change, so she closed him inside and crept into the night.
Twice she stumbled, once stubbing her toe pretty badly, before she found a nice flat looking bit of rock to sit on. Once in place, she tilted her head back, the slight breeze lifting her hair with dry fingers, and she just breathed. With her eyes closed, she tried to process everything that happened, to think logically about it, but her mind simply whirled with unhappy possibilities.
“I’m guessing you couldn’t sleep?” His voice jarred her, breaking the almost eerie silence of the night, and she twisted around to try to see him in the darkness.
“Yeah, too many thoughts in my head for rest.” Sighing, she patted her rock in an inviting way. “Look, like I said before, I’m sorry we got off to such a bumpy start. I’m not usually so terse, but I was freaked out.”
