Chapter Twelve
I found the interstate easily enough and turned unhappily east. I didn’t have a plan. I knew Phoenix wouldn’t far enough away so once I’d left it behind I planned to keep going. Out of Arizona, as far as it took for the agony in my heart to subside.
Maybe I would have to drive forever.
When the sign appeared for the road to Salome I cut the car to the exit so sharply I almost collided with a pickup truck. It was the inexplicable jerk of instinct. Yet when I had the opportunity I didn’t turn around. My hands gripped the steering wheel so tightly they ached.
I drove for a while before I reached the sign. It was right where I remembered. I braked so hard the car spun to the shoulder, calling up a cloud of dust. There were no other cars in sight and I sat there for a moment, breathing hard, as I gazed up at the painted billboard for Salome “Where she danced”.
The cartoonish stick figure illustrated on the billboard stared mysteriously back at me.
I loosed my grip on the steering wheel, breathing hard. Everything Orion had said kept playing through my mind. If he’d offered me money and a way out the night I got here I would have taken it in a heartbeat.
But instead he offered me something else. Perhaps his reasons were murky and perhaps he was having trouble sorting it all out. But at this point, but it didn’t matter.
What happened has happened.
If a hundred years ago a woman had worn shoes when walking on the hot sand this place would be called something else, or maybe it wouldn’t be a place at all.
My father and the Warlocks would never walk the earth again because someone grew angered about money which had never rightfully belonged to them.
And from the minute Orion Jackson touched me it was impossible for me to ever go back to being the guileless girl who idled through university lectures and always kept her knees closed.
And this, the moment of right now, couldn’t be redone later.
If I returned to the interstate and kept driving it would be merely part of my past. But I was still at the life’s junction where I could go either way. It could be done differently. I didn’t have to let Orion or anyone else choose my destiny for me.
I started the car and drove furiously back to the freeway.
It was still early in the day but Quartzsite seemed brighter and more vibrant than usual. Or perhaps it was just my imagination. I had to make a deliberate effort not to speed through the town. Now that I had made up my mind, I wanted to get things said.
But first, I needed to make a stop.
Adele had been right; the house did have a meth lab sort of glow. I didn’t know if I would find her in the crumbling yellow box of a home but wanted to try there before heading to Riverbottom.
She was surprised to see me but her face was friendly as she stepped outside. I heard a woman’s low voice cursing incoherently from within.
Adele’s eyes widened with shock when I pressed the bundle of bills into her hand.
“What-“ she stammered.
“Take it,” I said, giving her the keys to the car as well. “It was told that it’s mine and so I’m giving it to you.”
She was astounded. “Kira, I don’t understand. What the hell is this?”
I gave her a tender smile. “It’s a chance. It’s one I don’t need. All you have to do is grab your purse and take it, okay?”
The cursing from inside the house grew louder. Adele’s eyes flickered to the doorway with uncertainty. I could see her wavering. I thought she would refuse, that she would insist it was her lot to stay here and be whatever other people needed her to be.
But instead she nodded. I waited while she ducked inside and returned with a small bag. Before she got into the Corolla she kissed me on the cheek and hugged me with a fierce sob.
“Thank you,” she whispered.
I closed the car door behind her. “Go.”
The envelope, minus the cash and the keys, was tightly in my hands as I watched Adele until she was out of sight. I opened the envelope and stared at the papers inside which told me I was Kira Hall. And it seemed right that I would have a new name. Right that I be granted the opportunity to remake myself.
Riverbottom wasn’t far. I walked quickly.