Objective: (Bloodlines Book 2) (21 page)

“This is the best way. You know that. We’ve discussed why countless times.”

“I’m aware and I’ll be back in four days,” I say snidely.

“Four?” I knew this would be an issue for him. Get the job done and get the hell home. Those were my directives.

“Four,” I repeat firmly.

“Unacceptable. You have a meeting in two.” I want to pound my phone into the dirt. My meeting is a shipment of guns coming in. New sellers make my uncle nervous and therefore all hands on deck are required for this new shipment coming in. God forbid something goes awry and a full on war breaks out.

“Uncle E,” I plead, trying not to sound weak. Weakness is not tolerated in my world. “It’ll be four days.” I snap the phone closed and toss it on the rock at my feet before stomping on it. It’s probably compromised now anyways. I’ll have to get a new burner when we leave.

I turn around to head back inside but
Mags is sitting on the step of the house, watching me intently. She’s breathtaking even with a bruised face. Her black hair hangs down around her breasts hiding all the good bits from view. She isn’t smiling or crying or scared. She’s just watching me, observing.

“Morning!” I call out as I start towards her. She doesn’t reply or move in any noticeable way at all.

“Mags?” I try again, starting to wonder if something is wrong.

“Sorry...” she mutters and shakes her head like she was waking up. When I reach the step I stop and sit next to her. She flinches slightly as I do and it kills me. All I ever wanted to do was protect this woman and now I’m the one she fears. She remains silent and still and it makes me nervous. I watch her stare out at the bleak landscape that surrounds us, unmoving. Her face is hard and unreadable and it breaks my heart. Who has she become?

Chapter 16

My sunglasses are on, the music is jacked and I'm driving with one hand on the wheel and one around
Mags. She's stiff in my arms as if she doesn't trust me still. She's holding back. There's a little sun left to burn in the sky, and a breeze blows into the open window and whips her hair around. With nothing but the two lane country road ahead I let myself slip into the ease that is me and Mags. I want to give this to her, to us. I want what was stolen from us. She sighs quietly and as she exhales I feel the tension and stiffness in her release. She molds to me and swipes her thumb back and forth across my thigh. It's everything and not enough all at once. My brain doesn't compute our reality, how we got here. There is nothing left outside of the two of us. I need her more than I need air to breathe. I thought I was living the last year, but now it's painfully obvious that I was merely existing. I was simply not dead. I squeeze her to me gently and relish the feeling of her pressed into me. Her silence worries me, she’s holding back so much, I can sense it. We’re both feeling each other out. Testing boundaries. It’s strange to feel this way after sharing our lives for so long.

“So where are we going?” she asks.

“I thought we could do Nashville, Lexington, maybe check out Virginia...” I stop because I don’t want to mention home. We both know what that means and I don’t want to bring it up now.

“How 'bout Blacksburg, Virginia?” she suggests.

“Never heard of it.”

“It’s where I got my tattoo,” she admits quietly.

“Yeah? Tell me about that,” I push. She moves out of my arms and leans her back against the passenger side door to face me. I watch from the corner of my eye as she tucks her legs under herself and starts to blabber on about some tatt shop in Blacksburg. She’s animated, smiling and vibrant. She is just as I remember, just the way she was when I fell in love her. I listen to her go on and on about the woman who did her tattoo, her daughter and the two hot men she met there. I grit my teeth a little listening to her gush about these two apparently super-hot men but I keep myself in check for her benefit. She’s mine. She always will be, but now’s not the time to get into that. My shirt hangs on her so much so that you can’t even see her shorts. We’ll have to remedy that soon. I can’t have her wandering around shoeless and dressed like a vagrant. She’s got her hair braided loosely over one shoulder, no makeup on, and wearing pretty much just my t-shirt, yet she couldn't be any more attractive right now, even with her cuts and black eyes.

“So what do you think?” She cocks her head to the side waiting for an answer.

“Huh?” I say glancing at her again.

“Cane!” she squeals before chuckling. “Were you even listening to anything I said?”

“I was too busy watching you to listen,” I grin. Her face falls slightly but I don’t know what I said wrong. She raises her fingers to her face and tentatively touches her cheekbones and nose. Shit. I should’ve known.

“You’re gorgeous,
Mags. Always have been, still are right now,” I say determinedly.

“Yeah...” she
mumbles, readjusting herself to face her window. The next hour is silent except for the radio, which she adjusts every so often to find a more suitable song. I try once to rest my hand on her thigh. She used to love it, but she casually removes my hand, pretending to fiddle with the radio to avoid seeming offensive. How will we overcome what we’ve each turned into? We pull into the Walmart parking lot in Jackson, Tennessee at eight pm. I kill the engine and contemplate my options. There is still a chance she might run and I can’t have that, but she needs some clothes and shoes and she can’t go in barefoot.

“Uh, can you grab me a bra while you’re in there?” she asks hesitantly.

“Yes.”

“I need a
thirty-four...” I cut her off, remembering well what her size is. “C. I know, Mags. I know you,” I say gently. I want her to know that I remember every detail of our life together. That I never forgot her. No small detail was over-looked on my part. I want her to feel my love for her.

“Right.” Her tone is short and indifferent.

“Mags?”
She sighs before turning to me. I reach my hand out and cup her face, moving my thumb gently across her beaten face. She definitely can’t go into the store with that face. “If you want this trip to be all roses and romance you’re gonna have to work with me.” Her mouth quirks up one corner at a time.

“Roses and romance, huh?” she snorts.

“Just cut me some slack and tell me what you need,” I beg, feigning irritation. Her eyes spark with mischief.

“A bra. A dress. Shorts. Two tank tops and a long sleeved shirt, all smalls. And panties and tampons,” she rattles off quickly. I mentally check off everything she listed and stop short at the last item.

“What?” I squawk.

“What?” she shrugs.

“Wait? Really?”

“I have a vagina...generally speaking that means tampons are needed every once in a while,” she deadpans.

“Right. So, uh, is there like a brand or size you need?” I choke out.

“Super jumbo sized for heavy flows. If you can't find them, ask one of the sales people.” She quickly turns her head to face the window and goes silent. Of all the things we shared, and it was mostly everything, she never, ever, would admit to having a period. She said it made her unsexy and she didn't ever want me to think she wasn’t hot. I’d laughed then, but secretly had been happy with her little confession. It seems now she was no longer concerned with holding up that facade. Crap.

I pull out a set of handcuffs from the glove box and hold them out to her. She eyes me warily and makes no move to take them from me. Her arms cross over her chest.

“
Mags. Come on, there’s no guarantee that you’ll be in the car when I get back,” I say trying to stay calm. Jesus, fuck this is hard. Do I trust her? Can I trust her?

“I won't
run,” she states.

“I can’t know that for sure.”

“You can because I’m telling you,” she offers softly. I sigh and press the heels of my hands to my eyes.

“You always do that when you’re stressed.” Dropping my
hands, I look over to her.

“What?”

“Mush your eyes, you do it when you’re stressed. I have no shoes, barely any clothes, no phone or money, Cane. I’m not going to run,” she states matter-of-factly. I let her words sink in and finally just take it for what it is. I exit the car, slamming the door shut behind me in frustration, and head into the store. She better be there when I get back.
 

Goddamn tampons. There is an entire wall of those things. Tiny, medium, large, super large, scented, unscented - it’s like Bubba reciting a million different kinds of shrimp to Forrest. Gross. Shrimp-talk and tampon-talk should never enter the brain at the same time. Super jumbo for heavy flows doesn't seem to be printed on a single box and I’m losing my mind trying to pick out the right ones. Applicator or no applicator? Jesus, what is the need for so many different sizes and kinds? A vagina is a vagina, right? How hard can this possibly be? In pure frustration I grab one box of each super-sized kind and throw them all into the cart with the clothes I’ve picked out. I push the cart to the checkout lady and toss all the boxes on the conveyor belt along with the clothing, shoes and undergarments.

“First time?” The forty-something clerk chuckles as she rings up all the stuff. If I could shoot laser beams from my eyes and kill, I would. Instead I just glare at her and stay silent. One hundred and sixty three dollars later, forty eight of them being for tampons alone, I schlep all the bags back to the car. Mag’s head isn't in the passenger window where it should be. Panic flares and I sprint the rest of the way to the car. Dropping all the bags on the asphalt I tag the keys from my pocket and unlock the doors. Her head pops up from the back seat and gives me a confused look.

“What the shit?!” I
huff, yanking open the door to the back.

“What?” she asks bewildered. My heart is pounding in my chest from thinking she disappeared on me. I crack my neck and roll my shoulders to try and settle myself down.

“I didn’t see you.”

“I was tired. I laid down,” she gestures to her sprawled out form running the length of the back seat.

“I see that,” I clip before turning and picking up the dropped bags. I toss them into the back seat with her not caring about her surprised ‘Hey!’ shriek before slamming the door shut and folding into the driver’s seat again. The crinkling of plastic bags fills the car before her cackles do. I turn to face her and find her lap filled up to her chest with at least ten boxes of tampons. Her shoulders are heaving with her laughter and she snorts a few times for good measure.

“What is all this?!” she finally gets out between cackles.

“Tampons,” I deadpan. Her shoulders start to shake again, her swollen eyes squeeze shut and her hands grip the seat edge tightly as she tries to control her giggling. I can’t take it. Her mouth opens and the biggest, loudest roar of laughter gushes out of her. My lips turn up and my ribs start to shake uncontrollably and just like that I lose it right along with her. The stack of tampon boxes tumbles from her lap as she fully on body laughs. As she tries to catch her breath she almost inaudibly says, “I don’t even need them....” I catch her eyes and realize this has all been a huge joke on me. My stomach hurts from laughing so hard. Somewhere during the ab workout we shared she climbed into the front seat again and now she playfully smacks my arm to get my attention. Her breathing, hell my breathing, is finally under control. I swing my face to hers and before I can utter a sound we both fall into a fit of hysterics again. My girl is funny.

At almost eleven pm we pull into downtown Nashville. Mags has been asleep, head on my lap, for the last forty five minutes. I swing the car into the Hilton Downtown. Before the valet gets to the car I gently shake her awake.

“We’re
here, baby girl. Time to wake up.” I brush the hair from her face and watch the way her nose crinkles adorably as she comes to. She sits up slowly and stretches. I hop out of the car, toss the valet the keys and grab the bags from the back before opening her door for her. She yawns and slides out before gasping and looking around in awe.

“Wow...” she breathes with excitement. “Look at this place, all the lights! Listen!” she shrieks. “You can hear the music!” I chuckle to myself at her show of awe. I grab her hand, lace her fingers through mine and tug her close to my side. When she’s up against me I lean in and kiss the spot just below her ear. Her body convulses at the contact and she stills. “My girl likes Nashville,” I whisper into her ear. I fucking love the
blush that creeps up her neck to her face. Standing up, I tug her behind me into the lobby so we can get a room.

The looks I got in the hotel lobby, in reaction to her clearly beaten face, almost made me lose my shit. As if she could sense it she’d placed her palm over the back of my hand and started rubbing her thumb back and forth methodically while wedged into my side. It was enough to keep my bubbling anger at bay. The key card makes a quiet click, the light goes green and I push the door open to our suite. One of the many perks of gun-running is having more money than I know what to do with on a regular basis.

“Whoa...” she whistles from behind me as we enter. The living area has taupe leather couches that are sleek and all angles. It’s not her shabby chic style but I know she’s impressed. Off to the right is the bath, complete with granite and a glassed-in large shower. To the left is the bedroom. The king-size bed looks lush with pillows piled high and a heavy down comforter. I watch as she walks the room, checking everything out and commenting on each miniscule detail. So. Fucking. Cute.