by Rose, Baylee
“And that’s why you’ve been rotting in jail! That is not a normal reaction! That is not what you do, Max! Violence is not the answer!”
“I warned you, Tess,” I growl as she follows me.
“About what? And what on Earth are you doing?”
“Disposing of the motherfucking body. Like I should have when I ended Renee’s boyfriend.”
“Dear God,” she says and stops to look at me like she doesn’t know who I am. I guess she doesn’t.
“I warned you, Tess,” I tell her again. When I get to the edge of the swampy, riverbank, it’s polluted and stinks to high heaven. The stench is strong. It seems like a fitting end for the fucker. I go through his pockets, seeing if he has anything useful, and I’m not really paying attention, so it surprises me when Tess speaks, standing right beside me.
“What did you warn me of, Max?”
“I warned you not to forget who I was. If you thought you had the answers and that sucking my cock was going to magically transform me into a fucking Prince Charming, that’s on you. I am, who I am. I am, who I’ve always been, and it doesn’t matter how good your fucking pussy tastes or if you can suck cock, like a pro. You aren’t changing me.”
She stares at me for a minute, and I see it coming, but I don’t even try to dodge when her hand connects with the side of my face. She might be little, but Tess knows how to deliver an open handed slap. I touch the stinging flesh, my eyes never leaving hers.
“That’s the only one you get, Kitten. Don’t do it again,” I caution her, and then I finish feeding Hernandez and Dweeb to the nearby gator population.
My mind is splintered in so many directions; I can’t even grasp a single thought that makes sense. I’m a mess. Max just killed not one, but two men. He was calculated and definitely cold-blooded. It was like he was someone else. No, he’s right. It wasn’t that he was someone else, it’s that my fantasies and the puppy-love crush on Max that made me romanticize who he is and what he has done in his life. There’s no way to romanticize what just happened. It was cold, ugly and horrifying. I think it may stay with me the rest of my days.
We’ve been walking for close to four hours. I know, because I keep looking at the man’s wind up watch that Max took from the dead man he called Dweeb. It’s silver, and looks uniform, and even I realize it most likely belonged to a prison guard. A prison guard, who more likely than not, is probably no longer alive. This is the world that I have been thrust into. This is the reality that came crashing down on me in such a huge, momentous way that I don’t know how to deal with it.
I get tired of trying to hold my clothes together and find another t-shirt of Max’s in the backpack and put it on to cover me, but I feel dirty. It doesn’t make sense because Hernandez did very little besides groping me, but it’s like he somehow marked me inside. Part of me is glad that Max killed him, and I don’t know how to react to that. That’s not the person I am. Or at least, it’s not the person I was. The woman who wanted to work in law, to make a difference for other kids growing up like I did. I’m upset, and though part of it has to with Max and what he did, the bigger part has to do with me. He’s absolutely right. He did warn me not to forget who he was. The bigger problem is that being with him is showing me a new Tessa and I’m not sure how to deal with that, or even if I’m prepared to deal with it.
Max turns right off the trail that we’ve been following, and it’s on the tip of my tongue to question him and ask what we are doing, but I contain it. Talking to him, would mean opening the door to talk about other things, and I can’t handle that. I just can’t—at least not right now.
He finally stops in a wooded area that feels more than a little creepy. I look around and see nothing.
“Max, what are we doing?” I finally break down and ask.
“We’ll bed down here tonight, and then tomorrow I’ll take you into town and drop you off,” he tells me in a monotone voice. There’s no emotion, nothing coming from him. I rub my chest because the difference in him hurts me. I can’t blame him after my tirade. The more I think about what I said, the more I regret some of it. Not all, because it can’t be normal to think kill first in these situations. I’m so confused.
I go next to an old tree and slide down on my ass, letting it support my back. Max is a good twenty feet away from me, going through the backpack. He pulls out the wool blanket he’d rolled into a tight cylinder and tosses it at me. It lands at my feet, and I bend down to get it.
“You can lie on that, and use this to cover you as best you can,” he says without looking at me and tossing another large flannel shirt my way. Guess he’s not planning on sleeping with me tonight. That’s probably for the best. “We can’t have a fire, so I need you to sleep now. I’ll let you rest, and then we’ll start again, using my flashlight,” he adds.
“But what about you?”
“One of us needs to make sure you don’t get eaten by a gator, snake or even a wild boar. Would you rather I not shoot and have a talk with one if it tries?”
I swallow hard at his words, trying to get the picture of that out of my head. “They’re animals, you can’t reason with them, so quit being an ass,” I huff back at him, fixing my makeshift bed.
“Hernandez and Dweeb were worse than any animal I’ve ever seen,” He says taking out the bag of jerky. It might have a bacon flavor, but it’s a long way from bacon. I reach over and take a couple of pieces when he holds the bag out, and then I turn my back to him. “Stay awake until I get back. Going to find some water.”
“Could I go with you?” I ask, hating that I’m asking him for anything when he’s mad at me.
“You’ll be fine here, Tess. Just stay alert,” he says, already getting up to leave me.
“No, it’s not that, I mean I’d like to wash off, you know?
“Tess, you just had a bath, we don’t have the…”
“Max, he touched me. I need to wash, please?”
I glance up at him when I tell him the real reason I want the water, and I see his jaw clamp shut. His eyes darken, and I think he might deny me again. He doesn’t though. “Suit yourself,” he says and then starts walking further into the dense forest.
I follow him. I figure it’s okay since he didn’t forbid it outright. It feels weird that things are so stilted between us. I don’t like it, but there’s not much I can do about it. He finds a small creek somehow. I have no idea how he manages to do the things he does. Maybe it is part of that soldier survival training or whatever. He fills up our canteens and then hands me a bar of soap. My hand shakes as I reach out to get it. How can he be so thoughtful one minute and a wild vigilante the next? How can he rock me with kindness when I have seen the deadliness that lurks just below the surface? I wait, but he doesn’t really move.
“Max, could you turn around?”
He studies my face, and I can feel my face heat from the scrutiny.
“So you can suck on my cock and ride my face, but I can’t watch you bathe and make sure you’re safe?”
“Just turn, Max,” I tell him, ignoring his blunt words. I can’t let myself think about that right now.
I think he’s tired of fooling with me because he turns. I waste no time taking my shirt off and washing everywhere Hernandez touched. I scrub hard, leaving the skin almost raw and red. You can’t tell I’ve been violated, but that’s exactly, what it feels like.
“Tess, sweetheart, you’re clean, come out of there, baby.”
The softness in his voice gets through the haze I’m in. I didn’t even realize I was crying until that moment. Max has the blanket he gave me earlier in his hands. He must have gone back and got it while I was washing. He wraps me up in it, and then picks me up in his arms and leads me back to our camp. I don’t protest; I don’t even think to protest. I’m pretty sure I’m in shock, and despite my confusion, I know one thing. I feel safe in Max’s arms, and right now I need to feel safe.
“Rest. I’ve got you.”
I’m crying harder, and as
he settles us down on the ground, I curl back into him and burrow my head tight against his chest. I’m crying too hard to respond. Slowly I calm and concentrate on the way Max is combing my hair and the rhythm of his breathing.
“I’m sorry, Max.”
“It’s okay, Kitten. You were only telling the truth. Your world and mine don’t mix. We both forgot that for a little while. It’s good we were reminded now, instead of later.”
“Max…”
“Go to sleep. We’ll travel when you wake, and by nightfall you’ll be in your own bed, and this will have just been a bad memory,” he says interrupting me.
“That’s not what I want,” I tell him and as confused as I am, I know that I don’t want to end things with Max like this. I’m not sure how it’s supposed to end, but not like this.
“Me either, but it’s how it has to be. Surely today showed you that if nothing else,” he replies and his voice sounds so monotone and final. We’ve gone too far, and there’s no going back. I have to acknowledge that. Max is right too, maybe our worlds don’t mix. My fantasies about Max Kincaid were just that…fantasies.
“I wish things were different. I’ll miss you so much. Goodnight, Max.”
He doesn’t say it back, and even that hurts. Just as I’m about to fall asleep with the beat of Max’s heart drumming beneath my ear, I hear him. It’s light, and I fight through my tiredness, to grasp the words.
“I’ll miss you too, Kitten, I’ll miss you too.” And it’s in those words I hear the sadness inside of him and part of me wishes I hadn’t. I hurt Max. I hurt him, and I don’t know how to fix it or even if I should. With each beat of his heart, my time is running out. What do I do? What on Earth do I do about Max Kincaid?
I didn’t mean to fall asleep. Both of us sleeping is too damn dangerous out in the open like this. If the animals don’t attack us, there are plenty of people out there looking to do it. The combination of all the walking, the mess that has been the last few days and the sadness of admitting I need to send Tess home, all combined to wear me out.
When I wake, Tess is still out to the world. She’s lying curled into me. Her face is buried in my neck and her arm is hooked around me. She fits me perfectly, everything about her feels right. Except that, I can’t keep her.
Tess is something that I never saw coming. I’ve lived an okay life. I was pretty satisfied. I had my shop, some good friends, cold beers, and what I thought were good times. I never had to work too hard to have a warm place to stick my cock, and that’s all I ever wanted. I didn’t do relationships and had no use for them. When I made the decision to end the life of the man that robbed me of my child, I had no idea what might be waiting for me.
I’m not sure you can prepare for someone like Tess. Had I known she was my future, I would have chosen differently. I would have still ended that sorry son of a bitch, but I would have played it smarter, I would have called in markers and done it safer.
My finger traces the delicate curve of her neck and shoulder. She’s so small and beautiful. I want more time with her. I want…
“Max?” she whispers sleepily. My dick has yet to be soft around Tess. I have three stages around her, hard, harder, and fuck if I don’t get relief I’m going to die. That stage is what I imagine overdosing on Viagra would be like. Four-hour erection? Tess has no problem inspiring them from me. With just her whispering my name I move into stage two, and I’m knocking on the door of stage three. I want to groan out loud, from the torture.
“If things were different, I’d put my mark on you,” I tell her before I can stop myself.
“Your mark?” she asks hugging me tighter, and I’m in no hurry to move from here. This feels a lot better than her fear of me yesterday.
“A tattoo. I’d want you to wear me on your body,” I tell her, kissing her just above her ear.
“Do a lot of women wear your mark?”
“I own a tattoo shop, Kitten.”
“Oh…right,” she whispers, and her voice is a strange mixture. I’m not good at deciphering women, I’ve never needed to be, but I think I hear the disappointment in hers. I smile.
“Not one woman has my name on her though, and that’s what I want on you, Kitten. My name, marking your skin. My name a part of you, so that any son of a bitch who comes near you, knows you’re mine, you’ll always be mine.”
She grows still, and I figure I’ve gone too far. Then her soft voice surprises me, “Would you wear me? I mean my name?”
I don’t even have to think about it. “Absolutely, Kitten. Absolutely.”
“We could still do it,” she whispers, and the temptation is so strong. I beat it down.
“We need to get going. It’s dangerous to stay in one place for too long,” I tell her helping her to slide off of me. I can’t allow myself to live in the dream world that tries to weave around me. I have a road already laid out ahead of me, and there’s nothing I can do to change it. I need to keep reminding us both of that.
“Where are we headed?” she asks sometime later. We’re walking towards Holy Hills, it’s an area near Ormond, and it’s also where the Vipers have their compound. I don’t know exactly, what I’m going to do, but I know Marcum will have my back and I’m going to need his help to survive. I look over at Tessa. I still want to survive, I’m trying to let go of the dream she promises, but I can’t, not yet, not entirely. Somewhere deep down inside, there’s a little spark of hope that burns from just being around Tess.
“I’m going to call in some markers to make sure we get you returned home safely.”
“You don’t need to do that; it’s not me they’re after, Max. You shouldn’t indebt yourself to anyone because of me.”
“They owe me, I just never cared enough before to call in the marker.”
“So, why do it now?” she persists, and I think about ignoring the question, but I don’t.
“I would rather not get shot to death in front of you, Tess.”
She’s walking beside me, but at my blunt words I can see her stumble in my peripheral vision.
“If you give yourself up, they won’t. I mean, we could tell them you were saving me, and we were walking back to turn yourself in. They wouldn’t have to know anything else, Max.”
“It must be nice living in your dream world, Kitten. I’m an escaped convict with a pretty woman who has been missing for days. They are definitely going to shoot first and ask questions later. Besides, I’m starting to think I want to be free.”
“You could get parole, Max. It might take a little bit of time for a new hearing, but I would testify for you. You could get parole, I know it.”
I listen to her words, and the hope laced in them, and I know she believes what she is saying. I also know that the courts aren’t stupid, and even with her on my side, parole is a long shot, after breaking free from jail for a few days. There’s also no guarantee. I could rot away for years in that hellhole. Before, it didn’t bother me, but knowing Tess is on the outside, and I can’t take care of her, or watch over her, would slowly kill me from the inside, out. I need to think. Problem is, I have trouble doing that around her.
“Please, Max,” she whispers, her hand on my arm.
“Are you forgetting I just killed two people and not a day ago you were scared of me?” The devil inside of me makes me remind her. Forces her to acknowledge our differences.
“They were trying to hurt me, and he was going to kill you. We could explain, Max. It would be extenuating circumstances. We have to try.”
I turn to look at her, and it doesn’t seem real. Maybe it’s the intensity of the situation; I don’t know. It feels as if we’ve been together a lot longer than we have. The plea in her eyes grabs me, and even though I know I can’t give her what she wants, I need to reassure her. The lie comes so easily. The relief on her face is my payoff.
“We’ll hold up at Marcum’s for a day or so, and I’ll think about it, Tess.”
Her sweet, full lips spread into a smile, and I feel like a ba
stard for giving her false hope. One more day I promise myself. I just need her sweetness around me for one more day. Then I’ll face what lies before me. Then I will let her go.
As we continue walking, I can’t figure out who is lying to themselves the most. Tess, for thinking it will all work out somehow if I turn myself in, or me, for thinking one more day is all I need or want.
It’s probably me. I’ve been saying one more day since the beginning, and I’m a big enough bastard to admit that I’m going to keep her longer still. There’s no way I can give her up until I absolutely have to.
“How long till we get to your friend’s?”
“Getting tired?”
“Just a little bit, around the edges. Not so you could tell. I could probably go for another week really,” she wisecracks.
My lips twist to keep the smile from forming.
“About another hour or so.”
“Or so? Is that like you’re telling me an hour, but in reality it is probably two or three hours?”
“That’s me telling you that if you talked less and picked up your walking, we’d probably make it in about an hour. But since you are you, it will probably be more like two hours.”
“That hurts, Max,” she huffs, but I notice she doesn’t argue with me. “Will there at least be beds at this friend’s house? And maybe even a hot shower? Oh good Lord in Heaven, please tell me there will be a hot shower.”
An image of Tess naked in the shower, my cock buried inside of her; flashes before my eyes and I have to adjust myself to keep the zipper in my pants from destroying my cock.
“I’d say a shower is a must,” I tell her gruffly. Her eyes follow my hands as I adjust myself. She doesn’t say anything, but the welcome is not there as it has been in the past. I guess the ghosts from yesterday are still between us. I’m still keeping her for a few more days. I’m not giving her a choice.
