Burnt Road: Dante

by Neal, Toby

  Melody mounted Beauty and holding the rifle across her thighs, led the way.

  Dante trudged along the road in the moonlight, the steady clop of Sweetie’s hooves behind him a soothing metronome. Soon there was nothing in the world but the silver-gilded shape of Melody on horseback, the ribbon of the road ahead, and the grueling task of putting one foot in front of the other.

  “I’m worried about staying at the dude ranch.” Melody hesitated as they approached the familiar arched gate. “It’s a plum target to draw thieves and men like…we ran into. But I know you need to rest, to heal.”

  “I just need a shower,” Dante said shortly. “There’s a wagon in the barn that they probably used for camping trips and such. We’ll take that and leave tomorrow morning.”

  Melody looked down at him, one hand on Beauty’s rump as her body turned toward him. Her back was arched, her breasts swelling moonlit curves. He would have found her pose sexy at another time. “How are you doing?”

  Dante was throbbing too badly with pain, exhaustion and humiliation to answer. He dropped Sweetie’s reins in front of the cottage and staggered inside, stripping off his clothes on the way to the shower.

  The soap stung his wounds but he scrubbed every inch of himself he could reach, over and over.

  Melody opened the bathroom door, a gust of cool air entering with her. “Can I help? I can wash your back.”

  The thought of hands on his body revolted Dante.

  But this was Melody. His back was a mess. She could help. He was being neurotic.

  The memory of their passionate lovemaking in this very shower came to him: the sounds she had made, the taste of her, how good it had been. Now it felt like a dream. Would he ever want that again?

  “No. You can doctor me after I’m done in here.” Dante pulled the shower curtain closed.

  * * *

  Dante sat on a chair, swaying with exhaustion as Melody daubed him with antiseptic wipes, murmuring under her breath. He tipped his head to hear her.

  Cusswords.

  Melody was muttering every curse he’d ever heard in a nonstop mantra. All that filth from his beautiful Melody’s mouth. Because of him.

  Dante lifted a hand and put it over her lips. They were soft and supple, yet firm against his skin. They felt good. “Please don’t say those things. Please don’t lose yourself because of this. They will have won, if that happens.”

  Rain-soaked grass. Her eyes were the color of rain-soaked grass.

  “Oh, Dante.” Melody’s mouth came down to kiss him.

  Immediately Dante was swamped by the memory of Bent’s brutal touch, his invading tongue, his punishing bite.

  “No.” Dante pulled away. “I love you. But I can’t right now.”

  Melody froze, then withdrew. “I understand. Of course.” She moved around to face him. “This mark on your chest. It looks like a heart.”

  Dante remembered the smell and sizzle of burning flesh but he’d been gone by then, lost in a haze of Melody, and hadn’t felt a thing. She touched his left pectoral muscle and a searing memory reared: Snake’s laugh, Bent’s breath, scorching pain.

  “It’s going to leave a scar.” Melody’s voice cracked.

  Dante captured her hand holding the wipe. “It’s okay. Whatever he meant by it, now it’s the mark of how much I love you.” He could touch her if he initiated it. The realization ignited a tiny flame of hope in Dante’s frozen chest. “And I thought I heard you say that you…”

  “Yes. I love you, Dante.” Melody looked down at the floor. “I’m such an idiot.” Her voice was low. “I’ve been falling for you from the first day, but I was afraid.” Melody’s breath hitched. “It took almost losing you for me to realize.”

  He tugged her hand. “Look at me.”

  It was the first time he had ever asked another person to look directly at him.

  Melody lifted those green eyes and gazed at him.

  Tears flowed down her cheeks. Dante wished he could kiss them away, but that thought still made him queasy. How could he put his skin, which Bent had bit, mauled, and defiled, on his Melody? Maybe someday. “We’re going to be okay. We’re going to make it. Let me sleep a few hours. The pain pills are working, so I think I can rest. We’ll hitch up the wagon and get going soon. We’re going to make it to the Haven. We’re going to be all right.”

  “I love you.” Melody’s voice was soft and gentle. She helped him into bed, pulling the sheet up and over his wounded nakedness. She leaned over him, her hair brushing his cheek as she kissed his forehead.

  Dante suppressed the shudder that chased over his skin at the touch of her lips.

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Melody

  Melody watched Dante sleep. His long lashes were fanned out on his cheeks. His face was swollen and lumpy, beaten and bruised. His bottom lip was split, and there was a gash on his left cheek. She’d put a butterfly bandage on it, not trusting herself to do stitches. Hopefully it would heal without infection.

  None of the wounds would kill him, but the chaos of bruises that covered his body made Melody ache. The scarification on his left pectoral was red and angry. Melody could almost feel it on her own skin when she looked at it. She almost wanted to feel it.

  She concentrated on the gentle fall and rise of his breath. His peaceful, drug-induced sleep gave her some comfort.

  Dante would be okay. She had survived rape, too.

  But not like his.

  Not two perpetrators. Brian didn’t tie her up or beat her. She had been drugged, and the memories of the incident remained hazy and hard to piece together. But her mind could not even rest on Dante’s ordeal for more than a second or two.

  Melody looked out the window. The sun was rising, the soft beauty of dawn breaking over the landscape.

  A frisson of fear wound up her spine. It wasn’t safe here.

  Men like Snake and Bent were everywhere, unleashed by the plague. Evil survived. It was up to her and Dante to make sure good did as well.

  Nervous energy throbbed through her body. Melody needed to do something, but she didn’t want to leave Dante while he was so vulnerable.

  She knew what it was to lose that sense of security. Of course, Dante had faced bad things in his life. He must have been bullied, probably beat up. Rape was different, though. It was bigger, badder, and harder to recover from.

  Melody didn’t know why entirely, but part of it was that she had felt like a fool. She should’ve been more on guard with Brian. She shouldn’t have left him alone with her drink. When she started feeling woozy, she should have run out the door.

  Maybe Dante wouldn’t have that same regret because he’d suffered for Melody.

  Snake and Bent capturing Dante had kept Melody from being chased down. If Snake hadn’t had Dante to return to, he probably would’ve pursued her. He would’ve tried to shoot the horses out from underneath her. Snake left that canyon because he had Dante to play with.

  She should remind Dante of that. He had saved her.

  Melody stood up and paced the room, her limbs buzzing and her heart thudding. She was scared and excited, nervous and yet feeling powerful. It was up to her to get them on the road.

  She could check out that wagon and see what was involved with getting them ready to move. Melody resisted the urge to kiss Dante and stroke his hair before she left. He didn’t want to be touched. Dante had made that clear with his body language and his words. Melody remembered feeling that way after her rape.

  Even hugging her mother had felt like a violation, dirty and wrong, bringing back her shame and pain. Melody must be careful and slow, and give Dante plenty of space to return to her. She pulled on her boots and left the cabin, the puppies following her.

  Melody crossed the dude ranch to the small barn Dante had said housed the wagon. Dust motes floated in the light that struck through the gaps in the barn walls. The wagon was in the center of the space. About ten feet long, covered in white canvas stretched over curved struts, it looked li
ke a replica of the wagons that families used to cross the United States back when the west was being settled.

  Melody opened the back flap and found that it was kitted out with kitchen supplies and two narrow twin beds. The dude ranch must have used it for camping trips.

  She went through the supplies and found some cans of beans and cooking tools, but not much else. A bench seat and a single long piece of wood with metal loops extended off the front of the wagon, which was where the horses would be attached. There were no harnesses in the storage area, so she headed back to the horse barn to check the tack room.

  The day was warming and the sun felt good on her face. She was surprised to feel free, like a barrier had been removed.

  Melody had admitted her anger and rage.

  She had never done that before.

  Pursuing goals and monitoring her thoughts had allowed her to find success and happiness. It even allowed her to find pleasure in sex, if not intimacy. But through it all she’d never acknowledged how angry she was, how truly and deeply enraged Melody was that Brian had taken advantage of her.

  And that rage had been fuel she needed, and would probably need again in the days ahead.

  Melody went through the trunks in the tack room and found another shotgun in a holster and more treats, but no harness. Her eyes scanned the walls and she saw what could be harnesses hanging with the bridles. There were two yokes, with lots of leather straps coming off of them.

  Melody sat on one of the trunks and stared at the puzzle.

  She and Dante would figure it out. In fact, he could probably figure it out without her.

  Melody chuckled at the thought and the puppies jumped at her. She picked up Abigail and Barkley, holding them to her chest and kissing their heads. “Don’t worry kids. It’s going to be okay.”

  She stood up and put the puppies down before grabbing the yokes and bundling up the leather lines. Carrying one over each shoulder, she headed back toward the wagon.

  Melody dropped the harnesses by the front of the wagon and didn’t bother to try to figure them out; Dante was better at that kind of thing. Melody went to the closed-up “general store” and took all the bottled water and snacks that she could find, settling them into the kitchenette of the wagon.

  Once everything was in place, she headed back toward the cabin. The door creaked as Melody opened it, but Dante did not stir as she moved quietly across the room and stood over him.

  His eyes twitched beneath his lids. Should she wake him up to give him more pills? Melody checked on the pile of bottles she’d collected from Snake and Bent’s house; it was a drug addict’s dream.

  She filled a glass of water and left it on Dante’s bedside table along with two more pain pills. He'd need them when he woke up. The pain would probably be worse; he’d be stiff and sore and his wounds itching and painful.

  But he'd survive. They would survive together.

  Melody went to the cabin next door and gathered bedding, then returned to the wagon and made up the twin beds. When she was done, she sat back and looked at the space.

  It was cute.

  They were like the first settlers who traveled across the continent, heading out on an adventure, determined to make something of their lives.

  But this wasn’t a movie. It was real life, which made it both better and worse than fiction. What she felt for Dante was the stuff of stories. But in real life it was so much richer.

  Melody hadn’t known that love could free you, empower you, allow you to tap into new parts of yourself, and now she did. Her love for Dante had helped her face the rage inside herself. For him, she could do anything.

  Dante had said she made him feel like Superman. Well, he’d turned her into Superwoman. They were the perfect couple.

  But the hero and heroine in this romantic tale could die. They could succumb to disease and disaster. Violent outsiders could, and had, attacked them.

  Melody shook herself. What would be would be, but they’d go down fighting.

  She walked to the dude ranch’s office, housed in a cabin similar to those for guests, only smaller and outfitted with office furniture.

  There were pamphlets on the desk advertising the ranch’s activities. One featured a photograph of the wagon with a family sitting around a fire in front of it, toasting marshmallows. “Experience the Real West” was the tagline. Melody thumbed through it. They offered trips into the Red Rock Canyon National Conservation Area. The pictures of towering red mountains jutting up from flat plains were impressive. Maybe they could go through the park to get around Vegas.

  She needed to look at a map. Melody rifled through the filing cabinets. The owners had kept meticulous logs on everything from guests to horses to the weather and wagon routes.

  There was a seven-day tour which took guests through canyons and crossed a river. The wagon route looped back around, ending at the ranch, but Melody was pretty sure that if they continued north, they could leave the wilderness conservation area and head toward Idaho.

  They needed more maps, something that would help them chart a course once they were past Vegas, but this would do for now. The sun was up, a hot ember in the blue sky. The puppies nipped at her heels. She paused and looked back at the horses. They ate the alfalfa she’d fed them contentedly, unaware that the world was a nightmare.

  Melody started back toward their cabin, carrying the binder of wagon routes as well as a bag of chips and a can of beans for Dante’s breakfast. He probably would not want to eat, but it was important to try to get some calories in, especially with the pain pills he was taking.

  Guttural, anguished cries came from the cabin.

  “Dante!” Melody sprinted toward the cabin as she heard an ominous thud.

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  Dante

  “You’re so pretty. I can see the girl in you, and she makes me think impure thoughts.” Bent’s hissing voice, his chili-scented breath, the bite of his fingers holding Dante’s jaw, the sensation of his slippery tongue. This time Dante bit that tongue, and the coppery taste of Bent’s blood filled his mouth.

  Bent gave a harsh cry like the sound of a raven swooping over carrion. He twisted Dante’s private parts again and flung his bound body face down on the couch. “You’re going to regret that, pretty. You brought this on yourself.”

  The rasping sound of a zipper.

  Dante screamed, but the sound was trapped in his throat, muffled in the couch cushions, reverberating in his head. “You brought this on yourself, pretty.”

  Dante woke, gasping and thrashing, tangled in the bedsheet. He blinked. Light came through the blinds of the comfortable cabin bedroom.

  He was safe. It was over.

  But the pain left behind was intolerable.

  Stiffness had set in, as well as swelling, bruising and scabbing. His body hurt like hell, but his soul hurt worse.

  Pretty boy. As if he’d asked to look like this, be like this, feel like this. As if his looks and his autism were his fault.

  The very recent memories that Dante had suppressed began to flood his consciousness. He convulsed in on himself in a fetal position, rolling back and forth on the bed, deep cries tearing from his throat.

  He was an animal in a trap, reduced to inarticulate agony from within and without, and he couldn’t stop the feedback loop of the memories.

  His throat grew dry and his voice hoarse. Blood from his opened wounds smeared the sheets.

  There was only one way to stop the thoughts. It had always worked in the past.

  Dante rolled out of bed and hit the floor with a crash. Disentangling himself from the bedding, he crawled to the wall. Kneeling, he placed his hands on it. A scream of anguish ripped from his chest as the memories swirled across his vision. Then he smacked his forehead into the drywall.

  Bam! Bam! Bam!

  Each blow detonated a white-hot burst of pain, momentarily interrupting the memory loop.

  The drywall caved beneath the blows. Dante shuffled his knees over
to an unblemished section and hit his head again. He wasn’t done getting rid of this, not by a long shot.

  “Dante! Oh my God!” A voice behind him, hands on him. Dante shoved that person away, intent on oblivion.

  Just a few more and it would be gone.

  “Dante! No!” Hands grabbing his shoulders.

  Dante snarled and heaved himself around, lashing out, and caught Melody in the shoulder.

  She cried out as she fell backward onto her butt, landing up against the bed, her eyes wide and frightened.

  Frightened of him.

  “Melody!” Her name came out as a croak. Dante crawled toward her, reaching for her, but she held her hands up.

  He stopped, dropping to his haunches, his hands on his knees.

  He was naked. He was trashed from yesterday’s attack. And he had just been acting like a fucking loony tune. No wonder she was frightened.

  “I’m sorry. I didn’t know it was you.” Dante felt a trickle of blood blazing a hot trail down his face. His forehead throbbed as the new contusion swelled. “Sometimes this is the only thing that works to stop the thoughts.” Dante dropped his chin to his chest. Shame swamped him. The impulse to go back and hit some more overwhelmed him and he shook with it. “I pushed you and hurt you.”

  “No. You just scared me.”

  “I want to hit my head again because I hurt you.”

  “Dante. Look at me.”

  He looked. Melody’s eyes were wet jade behind spiky eyelashes, her cheeks blotchy with stress, her beautiful hair tangled. She was wearing jeans and the yellow cowboy boots and one of her tank tops. There was a knife on the belt at her waist and the shotgun rested against the bed. His girl was dressed for action. She’d probably been packing the wagon so they could leave, while he indulged himself, acting like a psycho.

  “Dante. It hurts me when you do that.” Melody sat up, swung her legs around, and leaned forward onto her arms, imitating his posture. “I can’t stand what happened to you. It makes me want to bang my head, too.”