“You need my protection,” he repeats. “That’s what I was talking to Derek about. Me protecting you.”
Is the camera feed live? he’d asked Derek. That isn’t protection. “Lies don’t protect me,” I bite out, and duck to get into the car again.
“I didn’t lie to you.”
I stop moving, grinding my teeth at the realization that I ridiculously want him to give me a good reason for what I’d overhead. There is no good reason, I remind myself as I had a million times last night. I let my guard down with him and I can’t. Not when my family is already dead and I could be next.
“I can’t do this with you,” I whisper, not even sure if he can hear me as I lower myself onto the leather seat.
“I will find you,” he calls after me, and the words are pure conviction, a promise.
“You can try,” I say, and my heart is racing as I yank the door shut, lock it, and shout at the driver, “Go, go, go. Go now!”
The car jerks into motion at the same moment that Liam pounds on the roof. Scooting away from the window, I watch as he tugs on the locked handle. “Amy, damn it!” he growls. The man I know to be private and in control, at least in public, is nowhere to be found. “Open up.” We keep moving and he runs beside us, leaning into my view. “Don’t do this. Stop. Stop now.”
“Do we have a problem, lady?” the driver asks.
“Drive and we won’t!” I shout at him.
He guns the engine and we pull ahead of Liam and the absence of him beside me is both a relief and a blow. I twist around to stare at him, the baseball cap falling from my hair, my eyes desperately seeking Liam. He’s running after us. Running. Liam doesn’t seem like a man to run after anyone, but he’s running after me.
My fingers curl into my palms and I force myself to turn and sit down. Liam was desperate for me. I know this. It was in his eyes, his actions. In his voice. And I am desperate for him, for the man who I believed finally ended what felt like an eternal hell of being alone. But I do not know why he is desperate for me, if there might be reasons beyond real emotion, any more than I know why I am hunted or why he might be involved. I only know that he could be. And right now, I know why I let six years pass before I looked for answers. Not knowing who to trust, or how to find out what I need to know without dying first, is terrifying. But not knowing was a facade of safety that never existed and is simply no longer an option.
I will find you. Liam’s words play in my head and I know he meant them. He will find me if I give him the chance. My nails dig into my palms where my fingers are still curled. If I ever see Liam again, it has to be my choice.
I sit up straight and survey the area outside the car as we exit onto the highway and I think of the note in the JFK airport. Be smart. Don’t link yourself to your past. Stay away from museums this time. Be smart. We are traveling the expected path in a car that I’ve been spotted in by Liam. That is not smart, but calm slides through me as it had after the diner this morning, and I’m back in that ‘zone’ I’d found years before to escape the memories of the fire that had burned away my world. Stop and think, Amy, I tell myself. Stop and think before you act.
I resist the urge to scream for the first exit, thinking it, too, would be obvious. “Exit here,” I order several miles later, digging cash out of my bag and dragging the handle of my suitcase open.
The cab takes the frontage road. “Right or left?” the driver asks.
My gaze lands on a truck stop and a light bulb goes off in my head. “Get back on the highway,” I order, slipping my hair back under my ball cap.
“What?” the driver asks, sounding irritated. “You told me to get off.”
“I got confused,” I say and he stops at the light directly ahead of us and I open my door, tossing him cash.
My zone does not seem to stop my adrenaline from spiking like gasoline through my veins at the danger of being out in the open, a danger I’m ready to have behind me. Shoving the bag I’m using as a purse onto my shoulder, my singular suitcase in tow, I dart across the road. This will be over in a minute and I will be out of danger. I have a plan that is much better than the one I started with this morning.
The instant I’m inside the truck stop, I make a beeline to the back door that I can tell leads to the industrial gas pumps for the big rigs. I’m bypassing my Plan A, which had been to buy a cheap car off of Craigslist, one I wouldn’t need an ID to buy, and drive out of the state. Dangerous as it might be, I’m hanging onto my cash, and hitchhiking. It’s dangerous, but so is staying in the city any longer than necessary.
Stepping outside again, my plan is to find the most un-serial-killer-like person as possible but as I exit, a short, bearded man in jeans and a cowboy shirt grabs the door from me and stops a few steps from me. “You need help, sweetheart?”
Already this is seeming like a bad idea. “No, I’m good.”
He squints, thick lines around eyes that spend way too much time moving up and down my body, before he asks, “You need a ride?”
“She’s with me.”
I glance up to find a thin, fifty-something red-haired woman kicking up dust with her cowboy boots. She stops beside me. “You ready to head out?”
The look she gives me is all motherly authority and my heart squeezes with the memories of my own mother. “Yes,” I say, no hesitation in my reply. “I’m ready.”
She motions me toward a big red rig and I fall into step with her. “I’m Shell, honey. I’d ask what you’re running from but I’ll spare you a lie. I ride with my hubby Frank. You can join us if you like. Where you headed?”
“Away from here,” I say. “That’s all that counts right now.”
Sadness seeps into her eyes and quickly is banked, but I see it. I feel it. Oh how I feel it and once again with a stranger, I feel a connection. But then, all I have in my life are strangers. Who else would I connect with?
“Who do we have here?” A happy looking gray-haired man with a beer belly asks as we approach the shiny red truck.
“This is…” Shell begins, and glances at me, a question in her expression.
“Amy,” I say, clinging to the name that is the only thing I’ve managed to keep for six years.
“I’m Roy, Amy. You know how many truckers it takes to pump gas into a rig?”
“Ah…no. How many?”
“None. We make our wives do it.”
Laughter bubbles from my throat and Shell snorts. “He doesn’t make me do anything, honey.”
Ten minutes later I’m at the window seat of the rig with Shell between me and Roy, and my laughter has taken a nosedive. Roy pauses at the exit to check the road and my chest is suddenly killing me, a crushing sensation pressing against it like the big rig I’m riding in is rolling over me instead of the hot pavement.
We pull onto the access road and while I felt regret leaving New York, I feel none over leaving Denver. But there is plenty over leaving Liam. I still want my Godzilla slayer, which is exactly why distance between him and me is good. I don’t know who I’m running from or if I’m wanted dead or alive. I simply know I have enemies and that it’s time I find out why. I will do that by being my own hero and the hero that honors my family the way they deserve to be honored.
Chapter Two
Silver City, New Mexico
Population 15,000
“Where the hell is Amy?”
I rush through the back door off the kitchen of ‘The Dive’ just in time to hear the grumpy question asked by our bald, often cranky, cook. “I’m here,” I reply quickly, hanging my black backpack on the rack on the wall just inside the kitchen. “Ready for my shift.”
“You’re late,” George grumbles.
Grabbing the clip on the outside of my bag, I tangle my long blonde hair into a knot at the back of my head and glance at the clock that tells me I’m actually two minutes early despite a flashback that had brought me to my knees. But I don’t argue, just like I haven’t done anything else to bring attention to myself these past eig
ht weeks. “Sorry,” I offer, and Katy, the bottle-blonde waitress whose been here three years to my two weeks, casts me a friendly, sympathetic look.
Somehow, I force a small smile before cutting my gaze and grabbing an apron to tie around the waist of my pink uniform dress that all the waitresses here pair with laced white tennis shoes. It’s not that I don’t appreciate Katy’s concern. I do, and I like her quite a lot considering I’ve only been here such a short time, but I have no idea if we have anything but this place in common. Nor will I find out. I’m here another week, tops, and then I’ll find a trucker who feels safe, and who stops off the highway, and I’m out of here. It’s my only option until I have enough money and a good enough, well-researched plan that allows me to return to Texas without ending up dead like my family.
George flips a burger on the massive grill in the middle of the kitchen. “If you two are ready to work, then go give the dinner crowd some holiday fucking cheer. We have turkey and dressing on the menu until Thanksgiving.”
“It’s Halloween,” I say before I can stop myself, not ready for the holiday. Not this year. Not for the past six years.
“Close enough to a holiday for turkey,” George grumbles. “I got it at a bargain, so go push it to customers. Now get to work. This ain’t no Halloween party time for you.”
“Who needs costumes and parties?” Katy quips. “We have a monster in the kitchen every night.”
“I’ll show you a monster if I have turkey left over.” George adds a glower to what seems to be his typical grumble.
Katy waves him off and rushes toward me. “The drunks in the dining room are nicer than him,” she assures me as we exit the kitchen behind the long counter where customers can choose to sit rather than at one of the red booths or simple diner-style tables.
“I hope you’re right on that one,” I say, stopping just outside the kitchen, the scents of french fries and bacon mixing like sour eggs. Suddenly my stomach clenches, then rolls.
“Me too,” Katy laughs, turning to face me. “But you’ll get used to him, I promise.” Her brows dip and she frowns. “You okay?”
“I took a vitamin on an empty stomach when I know better,” I say, and as much as I hate the lies that are my life, this one comes easily. The two waitresses on duty head toward us to hand off their duties, and I barely register the exchanges that follow. My mind is in another place, back in Liam’s hotel room when we’d had angry, passionate, unprotected sex. You’re not pregnant. Eight weeks, three cities, one period, and one negative test says I’m not. But my period was barely there, spotty at best.
When I finally head toward my first table, any comfort I’ve talked myself into ends when another whiff of bacon hits me and my stomach knots. Not pregnant, I repeat in my head. I’m not. It’s impossible. Right? Just like the reality of me being in a roadside diner on the run isn’t possible and yet it’s happening. That’s enough to make me decide I’ll go take a test at my dinner break. Until then, I hope for a busy crowd to keep my mind off of the moment I look for that little pink line.
***
Almost four hours later, I head toward the window behind the counter area that is open to the kitchen to pick up my last order before my break. Thankfully, whatever had affected my stomach is long past, but I still want to take a test to put my mind at ease. Most likely, my lack of sleep, worry, and the incessant flashbacks I can’t control without the acupuncture that travel and my budget do not allow, have made me this way. But I’ll fix that. I’m working on a plan that lets me get settled in Texas, pull myself together, and be on top of my game when I address the past.
“I think every drunk this town has come here tonight,” Katy complains, joining me to wait for her next ticket to come up. “I’ve been groped and hit on all night and that was just the women.”
“Right there with you on that one,” I say, and for some reason I feel the need to promise myself this job, this life, is not my forever. It’s just a means to an end. It’s smart. It’s me staying off the radar and building resources.
Katy pats her apron pocket. “At least the tips have been good.”
“Oh yes,” I agree. “I’m close to my best night ever. And I can use every dime I earn.”
“Can’t we all.” Her gaze flickers over my shoulder and her lips quirk. “And honey, I have a feeling your tips are about to get better. A guy who looks real expensive and good enough to lick asked to be seated in your section as I was headed over here, and sorry, no offense, but I tried to get him for me.” She glances down at her ample cleavage. “The girls failed me. I guess he likes them au naturel.”
I go still at her words, and a familiar, too often repeated, memory of me telling Liam I want to lick his tattoo flashes through my mind. He is not here. It can’t be him. It just...can’t. But isn’t that what I said when he’d shown up at the airport? “Can’t” isn’t a word Liam likes. Can’t never applies to him.
“Order up,” George shouts and shoves two plates inside the pass-through window.
Staring at the plates, I will myself not to overreact. Not to create a Godzilla that doesn’t exist when I have plenty of problems before me that do. Liam is not here. I’ve moved around and paid cash for everything. I’ve found small diners to work for that accept my pitiful little girl with a lost wallet excuse during the paperwork. I promise to replace my ID right away and then write down random socials. Even the phone calls I’ve made to Texas to research my past were done on disposable phones that I ordered with Texas numbers and a pre-paid gift card. I’ve been smart. I am not traceable.
“You daydreaming or doing your job?” George demands, snapping me back to the moment to realize Katy is chatting with the other waitress.
Grabbing my order, I whirl around, pinpointing the table my plates are for, and any chance I have to scan for this lickable man Katy has mentioned is killed when several people walk in the door and block my view of the rest of the room.
Quickly, I set the orders on my customer’s table and the sensation of being watched comes over me. No. The sensation of being watched by him comes over me. Liam. Liam is here. No. No. No. He’s not here. No Godzilla, Amy. No Godzilla.
“Can I get ketchup?” My customer asks.
I manage a choppy nod and turn away, taking a few steps before I stop dead in my tracks, my attention riveted to the corner booth at the back of the diner. To where he lounges, looking as cool and confident as ever in jeans and a charcoal-gray pullover with the sleeves tugged to his elbows, as refined as a tailored suit.
This isn’t happening. It’s not supposed to happen, at least not now, not like this. Not when I am no more certain than when I left Denver if he is good for me and I for him. Not when he could be the hunter and me the prey. And yet there is no urge to run. There is only the urge to go to him, to touch him, and lose myself in this man as I had months before. Illogically, there is relief that he is here and somehow I am not alone, when my running from him says there should be fear. And maybe my reaction is what should scare me the most. Liam is my weakness, not the strength I’d once seen him as being.
Swallowing hard, I start walking toward him, certain he will have a plan to prevent me running anyway. He tracks my approach with those intense aqua-blue eyes of his, his neatly trimmed goatee somehow giving him a worldly, dangerous air, his cool stare turning hotter the closer I get to him. And terrifyingly, just as easily, my body burns in reaction, warning me I cannot touch him without losing myself in the process. That is the power of this man over me and knowing this, accepting it, is my only defense.
But my plan, like the one to stay off the radar, is lost on Liam. The instant I stop at Liam’s table, he angles toward me, gently shackling my wrist, pulling me to him, my bare legs pressing to his jean-clad knees. The heat of moments before becomes downright fire and I am weak and aching for this man as I have never ached for another.
“How did you find me?” I demand, and somehow my hand is on his shoulder, but I do not push him away. Why am I not pushing
him away?
“The same way someone else will if you keep living like this. The CB circuit is broad and truckers like money. And damn it, Amy, what if one of them had raped you? Or worse, killed you?”
“You think I didn’t worry about those things?” I demand, angry that the control I’d thought I’d had was nothing but a façade he’d destroyed with his money. “I did what I had to.”
“You ran when you overheard me talking to Derek. And, yes, I know. I saw the security footage. What I don’t know is what you assumed it meant. All I’m guilty of is trying to protect you.”
“I can’t trust you, Liam. I don’t trust you.”
“You think I’m involved in whatever you’re running from, don’t you?”
“I don’t know what I think.”
“Would I be here, in a public place with you, if I meant to hurt you? I could have waited until you were alone and cornered you.”
“You weren’t afraid to be seen with me in Denver.”
“Exactly.” He settles his free hand on my hip, and it is a branding, a claiming that sets my heart racing. “Because I have nothing to hide. And you have nothing to fear from me. Not from me. I would never hurt you.”
Not from him. There are so many ways to translate that. “Liam--”
“Do you know how good it is to hear you say my name again?” His tone is rough, affected. And I am affected by the emotion I sense in him.
“Let me go,” I whisper, telling myself I mean it, but I do not sound convincing, not even to my own ears.
“What do I have to do to convince you I’m the one you run to, not away from? Tell me and I’ll do it.”
“You put a camera in my computer. Nothing is going to convince me you are my hero whisking me away to safety. Nothing.”
“I didn’t put the camera in the computer. I found the one your ‘boss’ installed.”
I blink at the unexpected answer. Found it? Is he saying my handler put it there? That makes no sense. “Why would you even look for a camera if you didn’t know it was there?”
“Because nothing added up about your new boss.”