“I’m looking for something.” I wasn’t about to start telling my story to a complete stranger, especially one who looked as if he could break my heart just as easily as he could reach in and rip it from my chest.
His expression grew grim. “You should get back on the bus and head straight back to wherever the hell you came from.”
I stiffened my shoulders, trying hard not to let his harsh words upset me. “I don’t see how that is your business.”
Again, he stared at me a long moment before speaking. “It’ll be dark soon, and you’ve got two miles ahead of you. Want a ride?”
I looked at the bike and the cold, hard gaze of the man in front of me.
“No, thank you. I prefer to walk.”
He nodded and headed back to his bike.
“Thank you again, Mr.—”
The fading light cast a wild gold glow in his eyes. “Name’s Wolfe. Jem Wolfe.” He threw his long leg over the seat of the motorcycle. It rumbled beneath him as he leaned his massive shoulders forward and sped off.
Chapter 4
Jem
The mouth-watering aroma of grilled onions drifted through the broken window in the kitchen. One of the hazards of living right next door to a busy truck stop diner was the constant trail of hunger-producing smells floating through the house. And, since a home-cooked meal was completely foreign to me, I usually ate half my meals next door. Milly, the owner, was one of the few people who didn’t sneer and look the other way when I walked into her business. She had learned to cook in the marines, and she dealt with ornery truck drivers all day so she had a high level of tolerance for bad elements like me.
The light in the small fridge was off. Not a good sign. I reached in and my fingers wrapped around a beer. It was piss warm. I shoved it back into the worthless refrigerator. Not drinking wasn’t an option tonight. Especially after the fucked up end to the work day was followed by the unexpected encounter with the impossibly sweet confection standing on the side of the road. Hell, impossibly sweet was a fucking understatement. She hardly belonged on this planet let alone in this shitty, dirt-hole of a town.
I walked out the door and headed across the weed patch to the front house. Almost every piece of property in town had been built with two on a lot, and almost every house was a dilapidated, crumbling pile of stucco and wood. Our place, or the place that my dad had squatted on long enough to take over as his own, was one of the worst.
After I’d come back from my three years on the road looking for a place to belong, any place other than Blackthorn, I’d moved into the back house. There was no fucking way I could stay under the same roof as my dad. Even if his whiskey soaked liver was slowly dragging him to the grave, I still couldn’t stomach the idea of living with him. Dad’s failing health and Dane’s lack of common sense had brought me back to Blackthorn. I knew once the old man kicked, Dane would not survive on his own, or worse, the town might not survive an unsupervised Dane. Not that I gave much of a damn about this town. They’d been judge and jury in my life since the day I was old enough to stand. I’d been born into a family with a tarnished reputation, and that stain had followed me wherever I went and no matter how hard I tried to scrape it off.
Through the shredded screen door, I heard laughter and nearly decided to forget the beer. I stepped inside and ignored Draven and Rocky, Dad’s two sketchy business partners, as I walked past the front room to the kitchen. Dad was leaned against the kitchen counter talking quietly into his phone. He looked up as I stepped into the room and quickly walked out speaking so low it was a wonder the person on the other end could hear him at all.
I walked to the fridge, pulled out a cold beer and sat at the kitchen table. A secretive call meant he was about to deal in some shady shit. After all these years, I still had no fucking clue who was holding my dad’s puppet strings, but whoever it was, they had never loosened the hold. I knew Dad and the two clowns leaving their stink on the front room couch dealt in stolen goods, whatever was hot and valuable at the time, but I had never known any more than that. I was thankful he’d kept me out of it. Dane had been more involved when we were younger, running errands and helping move goods, but my dad had soon realized that his loose-lipped son who rarely ever processed any rational thoughts was more of a liability than an asset. I, for one, was glad when he’d pushed Dane out of the business.
Of course, my dad’s fall into the world of black market trade could easily have been blamed on the town. In his teens, he had worked for the lumber mill like everyone else. His dad had left when he was six, but his mom, our grandmother, had been respected in town. After the accidental death of Dad’s high school girlfriend, the town jumped into their usual vigilante mode. They’d decided it was easier to despise him than trust him. No one would hire him. No one would give him the time of day. Any normal person would have taken the hint and left, but even after his mom died of heart failure, my dad, Alcott Wolfe, stuck around town just to spite everyone. Or at least that was what he’d told Dane and me.
Dane’s mom had died of suicide, a drug overdose, when Dane was two and I was still only a flicker of movement in my mom’s belly. My mom had me and then split the town for good, leaving my dad, a man whose parenting skills were right up there with all of his other life skills, in charge of a toddler and a baby.
Even though Dad had been, according to him, a ladies’ man in high school, his tragic track record with women didn’t exactly make him a catch. His despair at having nothing but two boys, including one who wasn’t quite put together in the head and one who found every reason to rebel against him, had grown so great, he’d tried to kill himself.
In the fifth grade, I was sent home early for talking back to the teacher, and I walked in on my dad’s makeshift gallows. He’d climbed up into the rafters in the garage with a rope and jumped off with a noose around his neck. I’d stood there for several seconds wondering if I was just watching some imaginary movie play out in our dusty, cobweb covered garage. His legs were twitching but his face was beet red. He gurgled his last few breaths of air as I raced over to him. Back then, he outweighed me by a good hundred pounds, but I lifted his body up high enough for air to flow back into his pipes. He was out cold for a good hour, and there was no one around to help. I held him up, keeping his windpipe free of rope until my entire body shook with fatigue. The mailman finally passed by with his little cart. He heard my yells. Dad still has the scar from the rope as a reminder. I could never tell if he was mad at me or thankful. I wasn’t completely sure I’d do the same for him now.
Dad walked back into the kitchen, and his two cronies followed. Draven was a few years younger than Dad. He was a beefy guy who was half muscle and half blubber. He wore a long ponytail even though the crown of his head looked like a plucked chicken’s ass, and he always smelled gross, like a mixture of cigarette butts drowned in stale coffee and the harsh gritty detergent he used for cleaning pots and pans at Milly’s Diner, where he worked. I remembered the soap smell from my summer job at the diner. For the longest time, I thought Draven spoke with an accent, but lately I’d determined that he just had terrible speech. He pronounced the letter a long and flat making all his words sound like a splat. When he wasn’t working with my dad, he was washing dishes at Milly’s. Jason Rockfield, the other guy, was from a long family of loggers. In his twenties, he’d nearly lost a leg as a chainsaw kicked back at him. He had a major limp that was so bad it seemed most of the time he was just dragging his second leg behind him. Hal, the mill owner, had given him a job moving logs with a tractor, but he’d still kept his side job of running stolen goods with my dad.
I gulped back the rest of the beer and pushed out my chair to leave.
“Stick around, Jem. I’ve hardly seen you this week.” The whites of Dad’s eyes were stained like the walls of a house filled with smokers. It was obvious from his eyes and the sickly pallor of his skin that his l
iver would be checking out soon. He’d always been one of the biggest, toughest men in town, but he was withering away to a pale yellow shell of his former self. “What have you been up to?”
“I’ve been working.” I lifted the beer. “And when I’m not working I’m drinking, playing poker and—”
“And fucking,” Rockfield said with a laugh.
I pointed my beer toward Rockfield to give him credit. “And fucking.”
Rockfield licked his lips. “How’s that little brunette, Annie? Ooh, if I could just have one night with that hot little piece of ass.”
“That’s right, Rocky, just keep those unreachable dreams flowing.” I finished the beer and smacked the can on the table.
Rocky scowled at me as I stood up. I turned to walk out.
“Heard there was some girl out on Phantom Curve,” Dad said to my back before I could step out of the kitchen.
I turned around. “Yep. Just another family member coming to pay respects.”
Dad stared at me as if he was trying to figure out if there was more to it. He’d always had an unhealthy interest in the deaths out on the curve.
I lifted my hand in question. “What?”
He shook his head. “Fuck, Jem, just brought it up. Dane said she was out there all alone, a real pretty girl with a duffle bag like she was traveling through.”
“Well, Dane had on more of his thinking cap than usual then.”
“So?” Draven sat forward with interest.
I raised a brow at him.
“Was she pretty? How’d she look?” he asked, and I could almost see the drool dripping from his mouth.
I thought about the question. The girl had looked at me with round blue eyes peering out from long blonde bangs, and for a second, the rest of the fucking landscape had disappeared and all I could see was her. “Too damn pretty for this place.” I turned and walked out.
Dane was working on the old jeep he’d bought for three hundred bucks. For a guy who wasn’t always thinking straight, when he focused on something mechanical, he was like a brilliant surgeon with a wrench. He straightened from under the hood. He wiped the back of his greasy hand across his forehead and left behind a black streak.
“What happened with that chick? Damn—” He shook his head. “The only place I’ve ever seen a girl like that was in the center of my magazine.” He ducked back under the hood. “Did you get her number?”
“Now why the fuck would I get her number? She was standing in the ravine, not in the middle of a bar.”
“You disappointment me, bro. Never known you to walk away from a pretty girl without a phone number. No matter where you met her.”
I shook my head and leaned my forearms on the edge of the jeep to look down into the engine. “Yeah, well this wasn’t your every day pretty girl.”
“Yep, she was out of his world.”
“Well said, Dane. So are you about ready to breathe life into this monster, Dr. Frankenstein?”
He laughed. “Almost. Hey, Jem, you ever hear from that girl, Kiki? The one who used to send me naked pictures of herself just to piss you off.” Another laugh.
I straightened and scrubbed my hair with my fingers. “Oh yeah, I forgot about her doing that. Kiki was definitely wild, but no, I haven’t talked to her.” The day Kiki and I’d split up to head our own ways was the last time we spoke. It was over by then, and we both knew it. There wasn’t any reason to stay in touch. I’d been on the road for a long time, and I’d met a lot of people. I’d picked Kiki up hitchhiking on the highway. For six months we’d traveled the country on my bike. Her dad had been a successful pool shark, hustling people out of their pocket money, and he’d taught Kiki all his tricks. She’d fill her pockets with the money of the poor duped souls she played, and I’d win cash laying down poker hands. In between, we found motels and shabby rooms to rent and fucked until the bed springs broke. One day we were filling up the bike at the gas station and Kiki walked inside and bought herself a straw hat to shield her from the sun. I knew she was taking off again. She walked over, kissed me good-bye and headed to the highway without looking back. Neither of us had any idea what love was. We’d walked away from each other as easily as two strangers.
“Are you going to head over to Rotten Apples tonight for some brewskies and poker?” Dane asked.
“Might as well. You want to go?”
“Yep. Think we’ll see her?”
“See who?”
“The girl, the magic genie with the blue eyes and the amazing tits.”
“A girl like that doesn’t belong in a place like Rotten Apples any more than she belongs in this town.” I headed back to my house. “We’ll head out in a couple hours.”
Chapter 5
Tashlyn
I’d nearly missed the dented welcome sign as I crossed into Blackthorn Ridge. Just as Everly had promised, a sharp left and a two block stroll landed me directly in front of Gregor’s Market. The storefront looked more like a quaint old house, complete with a porch and blue bench to sit on. The only things to give away that it was a store and not a cozy home were the advertisements in the window. Today’s special, apparently, was Jane Yarden’s homemade boysenberry pie. The thought of fresh fruit pie only intensified my hunger pangs.
Everly came running out onto the porch. She had a smile that was so incredible, it made the scars seem insignificant. “You made it.” She raced down the steps and took hold of my duffle. “I worried you’d gotten lost. I’ve got a sandwich waiting for you.”
I followed her up the steps.
The inside of the store reminded me of the tiny market a mile outside of The Grog. Aunt Carly was pretty militant about us eating produce, eggs and bread made and grown locally by our neighbors, but occasionally, even she had a craving for potato chips and a frozen burrito. Of course, she’d lament for a week about her fall from grace, but it was still worth it.
A big man with an extraordinarily friendly face was standing behind the counter. He looked up and smiled. “So, your friend made it, huh, Ever? Landon Gregor, and welcome to Blackthorn Ridge.” He reached out a giant, slightly shaky hand. I shook it.
“Tashlyn Younglove, but, please, call me Tash.”
His brows raised in surprise as I told him my last name. I was used to the reaction, although his seemed a little stronger than most.
“Tash Younglove,” he said with a tilt of his head. He had snow white hair and blue eyes that sort of twinkled from behind his round cheeks. I hadn’t imagined the shake in his hand. I wondered if it was Parkinson’s or some other malady. “Both names are certainly original. I think I’ve only heard Younglove one other time.” He seemed to ponder that probability for a second and then his wide smile returned. “Well, I know Everly made you a sandwich.” He glanced at my duffle bag. “You look like a hungry, weary traveler. Are you just passing through?”
Everly huffed. “Uncle, I told you she’s staying here. I’ve invited her to stay with me.”
“Guess I wasn’t listening well. I thought she was only here a few days.” He looked at me as if he couldn’t figure out why the heck I would be staying in his town. It was the same reaction that I’d gotten from Jem Wolfe. I was beginning to wonder if the townsfolk were just really particular about letting strangers live in their town.
“That’s what we term as selective hearing, Uncle.” Everly motioned for me to follow her.
“Nice meeting you.” I nodded toward her uncle.
“You too. Enjoy your sandwich.”
Everly led me to three small round tables in a corner behind a pyramid shaped display of granola bars and snack foods. Everly tilted her head toward the geometric tower of boxes. “Impressive, huh? I was bored, so I got creative with the Nature’s Bounty snack food boxes.”
“Wow.” I reached down for a box at the bot
tom. “Oh, look, these are my favorites.”
She gasped.
I laughed. “Just kidding.”
“You got me. The good news is that we’ve been kind of slow today, so my uncle is going to let me have the evening off. That way we can walk out together and get you settled in at home.” She pointed to a table that had a brown wrapped sandwich and a drink. “I took a chance and picked cream soda.”
“Perfect. Thanks again for everything, Everly. And thanks for making me feel so welcome. That seems a little hard to come by out here.”
“Are you kidding? I should be thanking you. I’m thrilled to have someone new to talk to.” The front door opened just as she pulled out a chair for me to sit. Her gaze shot to the front of the store, and her bottom lip rolled as if she had sucked on a lemon. “Yuck, I hate it when those guys come in.”
I glanced toward the door. Two men, one with thinning hair and an amazingly long ponytail at the end of it, and one who was limping so profoundly it made my leg hurt just to look at him, stepped into the store. It took only seconds for them to spot Everly and me in the corner. The one with the ponytail grinned at us. Everly looked away. “Just ignore them. They’re just a couple of goons. My uncle will have them out of here fast.”
Right on cue, her uncle barked angry words at them. “You two, find what you need and be on your way. Don’t need you two milling about the store.”
The one with the limp smiled back at Landon Gregor. “We’re just here for some goods, Mr. Gregor. No need to be so inhospitable.” He said the retort in an almost sing song voice as if the whole exchange was merely a joke to him.
Everly drew my attention away from the front of the store by tapping the sandwich. “Eat and I’ll finish sweeping the stockroom so we can get out of here.”
“Right.” I opened the wrapper and took my first bite. My eyes watered, a testament to how good it tasted and how hungry I was. As I gobbled down the chicken salad sandwich, I watched the two questionable looking men fill their arms with beer and snacks. They carried their load up to the counter. More than once, they cast a creepy glance my direction. I feigned extreme interest in my sandwich to avoid their attention. Landon Gregor, who had seemed gentle and polite, morphed into a gruff grizzly bear as he rang up their purchase. His mouth was pulled tight, and he refused to look them in the eye as he grunted out the total. They were obviously two unpleasant characters, people to avoid. Like the Wolfe brothers, as Everly had warned me.