Part of me was shocked. Part of me had been sure he’d abandon me, and now that I realized he wouldn’t, that this was for real, a voice in my head said: You should have told him. He deserves to know who you really are. But it’s too late now.
So I didn’t tell him. I couldn’t. I was too busy staring at him in disbelief. I could have gotten on my knees on the cold concrete in that second and kissed his fucking feet. But he didn’t ask me to.
“You ready?” was all he said.
I nodded.
“You better be,” he said. “Let’s roll.”
Six
Cavan
Jesus, what a night. I’d almost blown it a dozen times, so many I’d lost count. I’d spent the entire party with the urge to look at her, to stare, to walk up and talk to her, hear her voice, hear that she was okay. It had taken everything I had to keep my cool.
Now Dani was in the passenger seat next to me, still in her short skirt, unbuttoned blouse, and high heels. The dark makeup around her eyes was smudged, and her lipstick was gone. She rubbed her palms on her slim, bare knees almost rhythmically, as if trying to calm herself down.
“You okay?” I asked her.
She bit her lip and nodded.
“You’re not going to cry, are you?” I said. “I’m really not good with crying.”
“No,” she said. “I’m not going to cry.”
It was good to hear her voice. I could read her then, read that she was scared and freaked out but still in control. That she wasn’t going to give out on me.
“First things first,” I said as the signs for the highway came out of the darkness. I pointed at our options. “East or west?”
A monumental decision, but she made it in a heartbeat. “West.”
“As it happens, I agree.”
She sat up straighter as I headed for the exit west, and ran a hand through her long, dark hair. “You say things like that, I’ve noticed,” she said.
“Like what?”
“As it happens.”
I laughed. I actually felt pretty good—something to do with the Black Dog MC receding into the distance behind me, probably, getting smaller in my rearview every second. “Don’t be too impressed,” I told her. “I’m hardly a Harvard grad. Just because I talk better than a Dog doesn’t make me quality.”
“Where were you?” she asked.
“Where was I when?”
“After two thirty, you disappeared.”
I’d had no idea she’d been watching me; I’d never seen it. She had serious powers of deception, young as she was. No one developed powers like that unless they had been through the fire. Unless they lived in the fire every day.
I took too long to answer, so she said, “Were you with a woman?”
I laughed again. “Sure,” I said. “I went and fucked some stranger, and then I left her to go get you. This is the kind of guy you picked to leave town with?”
She lifted her hands to her cheeks and rubbed them, glancing at me. “I didn’t know,” she said. “I was looking for you. It helped for me to see you. And then you were just gone.”
“McMurphy left,” I said, and I couldn’t help it—I watched her reaction.
There was nothing but numbness. “I know.”