Bittersweet Chronicles: Pax (12 page)

Vaughn turns so his back is to Carly and rolls his eyes at me. He doesn’t seem to think she might catch on to my connection to Lush. I think he underestimates her.

“Yeah, well, if you’re going to play that stuff, you should try ‘She Snake.’ It’s a much better song.”

Everyone who knows Lush knows that “She Snake” is about my mom, who can be, as I’ve mentioned, a little intense. That’s a nice way of putting it. The song isn’t so nice about it, and while my mom realizes that Uncle Joss wrote it as a joke, it’s still kind of a touchy subject in my house. Vaughn seems committed to doing everything he can to dig at me.

I grit my teeth and ignore him, taking a step to one side so I can see Carly. She’s leaning against the wall behind Vaughn, picking at her fingernails, her hair hanging down so her face is hidden.

“So, what did
you
think of the set, Carly?” I ask her.

“I think Vaughn’s an ass to make me come over here. That’s what I think,” she blurts out before pushing off the wall and stomping away down the hall.

Vaughn puts his hands up in the air. “I’m going to the bar, man. This is why you and my cousin never should have happened. You two are going to keep putting me in the middle, and I refuse to take sides.”

Shit. I sigh and wave him off as I head down the hall after Carly. I catch up with her as she shoves open the back door to the parking lot.

“Carly!” I call out as I barrel through the door after her. I grab her arm and tug her around to face me. “Wait a minute,” I plead. “Can we at least talk about this?”

“Talk about what?” she demands. “I think we’ve talked about it plenty. You’re going to do this job for Lagazo, drive a delivery van full of God knows what—drugs or stolen goods or guns—probably get caught and sent to prison for ten years, and I’m going to have that on my conscience for the rest of my life, Pax. The situation was pretty clear when we talked about it earlier today.”

I turn on the Clark charm as I softly rub my hands up and down her arms. “Come on, babe. You can’t stay mad at me about this forever. And I’m not going to get caught. I promise. I’m doing this so you’ll be free of this guy. And just think—it’s already been almost a week. Only three more to go and it’ll all be over.”

She huffs out a breath, although she also leans into me—just a tiny bit, but enough that I know I’m having an effect on her.

“I’m starting to wonder if you’re doing this for me,” she mumbles, “or yourself.”

I pull her closer, wrapping my arms around her back as I bury my nose in her long, soft hair. “I just want you to be free. Free of your dad’s legacy, free of that life. I know we’ve only just met, but I think you deserve the same chance at a good life that we all do. I’ve been lucky. I’ve had love and money and lots of people who’ve given me every opportunity I could ask for. This is my way of paying it forward. I saw a chance to help someone, someone I think is pretty fantastic, and I took it. Don’t hate me for that.”

We’re standing just a few feet outside the door to Burn, surrounded by weak, flickering light from the fixture that shines down on the parking lot. The crunch of gravel is intermittent as cars pull in and out, and from inside the building comes a sporadic drumbeat from whichever band is playing now. The air is crisp, damp from the ocean a few blocks away, but Carly’s hair and her skin are warm, and she presses against me closer, her face burrowing into my chest, her arms pinned between our bodies.

“I could never hate you,” she mumbles before she finally lifts her face to me, our mouths mere inches from one another.

Her breath washes over my skin, and I can’t help but lower my head, pressing my lips to hers. I savor the feeling of her slick, warm mouth as I stand there, unmoving in the cool night air. And then she shifts, and I remember that we’re out here because of the deal—the deal I made to save her.

I pull away a few inches, and she exhales as I do. Her slim fingers have wrapped around my T-shirt, and she clutches it even as we end the kiss.

“So, we’re good?” I ask. “I’m forgiven for trying to help you out?”

She buries her face in my chest again. “Not really.” Her muffled voice carries up to me. Then she steps back, releasing my shirt and leaving me chilled in the process. “I don’t want you to do this stuff for Lagazo, and more importantly, I don’t want you to do it for me.”

“Why?” I demand, impatience and frustration seeping into my voice. “Why won’t you take my help? Why would you want to be indebted to him if you don’t need to be?”

“Pax. I spent my whole life watching my dad in danger. People after him for money. Loan sharks, bill collectors, bail bondsmen, scorned ex-girlfriends. Every night, when I went to bed alone in whatever crappy, run-down apartment we were living in right then, I had to wonder if he’d be there in the morning when I woke up or not. I don’t want to do that anymore. I’d rather deal with Lagazo myself than have to spend the next three weeks wondering if you and Vaughn will get hurt or arrested or, God forbid, killed. Can you understand that?”

Her eyes are desperate. She looks at me as if I possess a miracle cure for an illness she’s contracted. I want to help her, but leaving her to handle Lagazo alone isn’t the way. It never will be.

“I understand it, but I can’t honor it. And Vaughn would never either. I’m not going to leave an eighteen-year-old girl at the mercy of a guy like Lagazo. Never, Carly. It’s just not who I am.”

She sighs as I run a hand through my hair and kick at the gravel beneath our feet in frustration. My heart is racing, and I feel the anger coming on. Not at her, but at this whole mess, at the kind of people who would go after her like this in the first place. At the kind of parent Carly’s old man was.

I turn away from her, leaning my palms against the concrete block wall of the building, my elbows locked, my face tipped down at the ground, which is so inadequately lit that all I can see is a gray blur.

Then I feel her hand on my back, just a whisper of a touch, and then another on my neck, and her fingers drift through the hair at my nape, sending little chills down my spine.

“There’s this thing called compromise,” she whispers as she drags a finger along the stubble of my cheek.

I turn my head so that more of my face is within her reach, craving any touch this girl is willing to give to me. “Yeah? How would that work?”

Her fingers work their way farther into my hair, and then her palm cups the back of head as she applies pressure to get me to face her. With one hand still on my skull, she brings the other up to my cheek. I gaze into her velvety eyes, and for a moment, I can’t remember why we’re even here.

“Take me with you,” she says.

“What?” I give my head a small shake to reorient myself as heat travels down, down, down my body.

“Take me with you on the jobs for Lagazo. Let me feel like I have some control over what happens. Don’t make me powerless like I was all those years with my father. I need to know what’s going on when you do this stuff. I need to feel like I have something to do with what happens out there. Please at least give me that.”

I remember Carly when Lagazo kidnapped us. How determined she was even though she was also afraid. She stayed calm, she didn’t back down, she was patient, and she knew to keep her eyes and ears open. She’s street smart, even if she is young.

I sigh, gazing down at her beautiful face. I know I’m in way over my head. With Lagazo, with my dad, and with Carly. I’ve never felt this way about a girl before. I don’t know what it will mean after all of this is over, but I can’t cloud my thinking with that now. I can only take things one step at a time.

“Okay,” I finally concede. “You win. You can come with me on the jobs.”

Her face breaks out into a grin, and she gives a little jump as she plants a loud, smacking kiss on my lips. I can’t help but chuckle as she does it. I think a reaction like that is part of why I’m so fascinated by her. Even with the strange life she’s had, there’s this unquenchable enthusiasm about her, and she can go from being angry to serious to cheerful in moments. Nothing could ever be boring with Carly around.

“Thank you, thank you,” she says. “You’ll see. This will go so much better if you have me there. We’ll do this together. We’re a great team.”

I smile and shake my head at her optimism. “I hope you’re right. If something happens to you, I’ll never forgive myself. And worse than that, Vaughn will take a chunk out of me.”

She scoffs. “Please. Vaughn’s all bark. One time when we were kids, I broke his favorite scooter. He not only didn’t do anything to me afterwards, he even lied to his mom and took the blame for it.”

“He’s not going to like this arrangement,” I tell her.

“Well, it’s not up to him—even though he wants to think it is.”

The man himself interrupts us then.

“What the hell are you two doing out here?” he asks as he sticks his head out the door. “I have a beer waiting for you at the bar, dude.” He steps out and leans a shoulder against the doorframe, watching us. “Your little lover’s spat over?” He smirks.

“Shut up,” Carly says, playfully pushing him.

He doesn’t budge. Vaughn is lean, but tall, and Carly is kind of a runt.

“You two are going to drive me nuts. You know that, right?”

“Yeah, man, that’s pretty much the intent,” I tell him as I give him a smack upside his head and open the door.

Vaughn throws an arm around Carly’s neck and kisses her on the top of the head. “How many more weeks of you two do I have to endure?” he asks as she squirms in a weak attempt at escaping his embrace.

We go back into Burn, and for the next few hours, we’re just three friends having a night out. It might be our last night like this for a long time.

**

The delivery van I’m supposed to drive is parked at an abandoned lot near the docks. The keys were left in my mailbox along with two addresses—one for where I pick up the van and one for where I leave it in Port Oasis. Vaughn and I head up during the day and leave his rental car at the drop-off so we can get home later tonight.

When it’s dark, Carly, Vaughn, and I pile into my truck and drive to the abandoned lot, apprehension about what we’ll find in that van making the atmosphere tense. When we get there, I park next to the generic, white Ford with no rear windows.

No one makes a move to get out yet.

“You think it’s drugs?” Vaughn asks quietly. “Or stolen goods?”

“I don’t know, man. At least this isn’t a border state, so we can rule out twenty-five illegal immigrants stuffed in the back starving or something.”

Carly nudges me. “Not funny.”

“I didn’t mean it to be,” I answer. I take a deep breath and release it. Sitting here won’t change what we have to do, and it won’t change whatever’s in the back of the van, so I open my door and tell them, “Let’s get this over with. The damn thing’s not going to drive itself to Port Oasis.”

Vaughn gives one sharp nod and opens his door as well. Carly follows me out my side, and we meet Vaughn at the back of the van.

“You want to know?” I ask, indicating the rear door with a tilt of my chin.

“Yeah,” Vaughn says in a stronger voice. “Open ’er up.”

I shove the key into the lock and turn the handle, wrenching both doors open at once. The lighting in the parking lot is almost nonexistent, but there’s a big moon out, so we can see outside pretty well. Inside the van, things are darker, and it takes a minute before my eyes adjust.

Vaughn shoves his head in next to mine. Between the two of us we’re blocking Carly’s view, and that naturally frustrates her.

“What is it?” she asks, jumping up and down behind us to look over our shoulders.

I look at Vaughn, completely confused. “For real?” I ask.

“What the hell?” he responds.

“What is it?!” Carly jumps up again, trying to shove us apart.

“Here. Take a look for yourself,” I say as I step to one side.

She moves forward next to Vaughn and then stops. Her head tilts to one side and then the other as she processes it all.

“You’re kidding.”

I shrug as she glances at me.

“That bastard,” she mutters.

“The guy’s a lunatic,” Vaughn seconds.

“Well, at least we don’t need to worry about getting pulled over by the cops,” I tell them.

“He’s up to something,” Carly says. “There’s no way he’d send you all the way to Port Oasis with an empty van unless he had a reason.”

“Well, I have no idea. I say we count our blessings, take this very empty van and get it to where it’s supposed to go.”

We’re nearly to Port Oasis when my phone buzzes. I pull it out of my pocket and hand it to Carly.

“Can you answer that?” I ask.

“Hello. This is Pax’s phone,” she says after she slides her finger across the screen. “Yes, of course. He’s right here.” She holds the phone out in front of me. “It’s your mom,” she whispers.

Vaughn reaches over Carly to grab the phone. “I’ll talk to her, man. You’re driving.”

I nod in response. My mom loves Vaughn, so I’m happy to let him handle whatever she has going on.

“Hey, Mrs. Clark, it’s Vaughn… Yeah, he’s here. He’s just driving. We’re on our way somewhere.” He grimaces at Carly and me. We both shrug. “What? You’re kidding. God, I’m so sorry.”

His voice tells me that whatever my mom has told him isn’t good, and my heart races as I remember that the last time I was out on the highway in the dark, I thought I might lose my sister.

“Is it Lyric?” I ask loudly, my hands tightening around the steering wheel.

He shakes his head and holds up a finger to indicate he’ll be with me in a moment. “Yes. Yes. Okay. I’ll let him know. I understand. Tell Lyric we all love her. Goodnight.”

Vaughn ends the call and I’m frantic with worry.

“Maybe we ought to pull over, Pax,” he says as he sets the phone down on the dash.

I swallow and nod, slowing down and pulling the van over onto the shoulder. I put the flashers on and turn to face him. Carly reaches for my hand and gives it a quick squeeze.

“It’s Canuck,” he says, referring to my family’s ten-year-old chocolate lab I named after the Vancouver Canucks hockey team when I was twelve.