CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
Massimo
It went pretty much as I said it would.
The cops were called. They took pictures and wrote up reports. The news covered it for one cycle.
And then it all just… disappeared.
“I think the lesson here is to live a life where people actually give a shit when you are shot in the head,” Traveler had said when reading over August’s shoulders on the second day after the kidnappings and shootings.
“Any word from your father?” I asked.
“Not really. He said there is a lot of violence going on right now. People scrambling to get their own little drug empires going now that Colin is gone. Told me to use the taser he gave me,” she said, snorting.
“I mean, that’s good advice,” August said, brows furrowing as he looked at her. “You’re right in the middle of a bad neighborhood.”
“Maybe it would be good advice,” Traveler said, bending down, then coming back with a gun in her hand. “If I didn’t have this.”
“Christ. Put that thing away,” August said when she wiggled it at him. “I thought you were too love and light for that shit.”
“Love and light?” she asked, letting out an airy laugh. “Protect the planet. Treat the animals right. Yes. But shoot the dick off a potential rapist? Yes, also. Love, light, and a heaping dollop of go fuck yourself. That’s who I am.”
And I swear the goddman moon-eyes my brother sent her as she walked away made a smile tug at my lips.
For all the shit he gave me about Cammie, it looked like he also found himself preoccupied with a woman while on the job.
“So you guys are heading back,” Traveler said, tone oddly robotic for her as she moved behind the counter.
“Seems like the future is in Navesink Bank,” Cammie said, giving her a sad smile. “I’m going to miss absolutely nothing about this area but your coffee and you.”
“I’m going to miss you too. I mean not so much the worrying sick about you getting kidnapped part, but you in general.”
“You can come visit. See the beach,” Cammie said, then smiled when she looked down at her pale skin. “From under the protection of a big beach umbrella, of course,” Cammie told her.
“I might take you up on that. I think it is necessary at some point in my life to experience a big, loud, mafia dinner. When are you guys heading out?”
“As soon as Nicky finishes collecting his stuff from his apartment,” Cammie told her.
We’d already gone to grab the cash she’d been keeping a secret since Cody.
We’d had a long talk about it, too. Because that much cash was impossible to put in the bank.
Ultimately, she’d decided to buy a house just outside of Navesink Bank where Nicky was going to settle and work at figuring out his future. Then she would put a chunk in several safety deposit boxes, even though she knew the risks that came with that.
Eventually, she was going to open a business when she figured out what she wanted to do. That way, she always had something legit, and she could slowly but surely fold in the dirty cash with the clean money from that.
Aside from that, there were no real plans.
She just wanted to do all the shit she hadn’t been allowed to by herself.
She wanted to shop and go out to eat. She wanted to walk around a park and go online and cook her own meals.
She just wanted to live.
And I was planning on being right by her side while she did that.
I wouldn’t pretend to fully understand what had grown between us, why it had been her, at what moment it turned into something serious for me. What I did understand, though, was the panic I’d felt when I’d realized she was gone, and the relief I’d felt when I knew she was safe, yeah, it felt a fuckuva lot the way I would have felt if it was family.