A woman shot once in the forehead. Nothing taken from her but her car.
Then I realized… the tapes. There would be video of me walking into the hotel with Macie. I did my best to stay out of it though. I kept my head down, kept my face hidden. But the woman in the hallway… videos in the hallways…
I was shaking before I could leave the parking lot.
It was pretty simple - Luke had set me up. Then again, if there was video of me, there was video of him, right? The video would show Luke entering the hotel, the hallway, the hotel room. Then it would show him leaving.
As I drove, I checked my mirrors.
I didn’t have a tail.
I played everything carefully so I didn’t look suspicious.
I really had nowhere to go.
Well, except one place… but I’d just be waiting there, alone.
Then again, alone was better than dead.
~
The lights were off.
I parked the car and climbed out. I wasn’t sure how I was going to get into the cabin, but it was the only place I could think of where nobody would be looking for me. I just needed a night to think. Maybe I could keep going north. Get the hell out of the state and go until I was in Canada or something. Just disappear.
Yeah, right. Cross the border driving a car that isn’t yours… a car that belongs to a woman who was shot in the head.
“Just stay calm,” I whispered to myself.
I approached the cabin and got to the door. I turned the knob and lucky me, it was unlocked. I pushed the door open and looked around the dark place. There was a sense of Wes still lingering around. He had made food for us. He had all intentions of being a gentleman and protecting me.
Then I had to spill the truth on him.
He had been holding me when I started confessing it all. His big, strong, fighter arms around my body. That was the first time I felt alive in a really long time. To feel wanted, needed. I definitely had felt protected.
But not now.
I was on my own.
Completely on my own.
I took one step forward and heard a floorboard creak behind me.
I turned and saw the silhouette of a figure and a gun in my face.
18.
(Wes)
I saw the lights and heard the car engine. So I shut the place down and got ready for a fight. Well, not a physical fight, but I was going to just pull the trigger and let all hell break loose.
But then I saw her.
I saw Rose.
Standing there, staring at me.
I blinked. I shook my head. I tried to chase her image from my mind. But that wasn’t going to work because she was really there.
“Rose?” I asked.
“Please don’t kill me,” she said. “Please…”
I stepped back and turned on a light.
Goddamn, she was beautiful. A tear fell from her right eye down her cheek. Her hands were at her sides. And she just stood there, ready to take a bullet.
“Wes?” she asked. “Are you really here?”
“Christ,” I said. “I was thinking the same thing about you.”
She sucked in a breath and wiped the tear away. “I…”
“Where’s your fucking brother?” I asked. I wasn’t in the mood for games.
“Luke? I don’t know.”
“Bullshit,” I said. “You know where he is. That’s why you’re here. You’re working for him. Don’t give me the fake tears, sweetie. It’s not going to work this time.”
“Wes, I swear,” Rose said.
“No,” I said. I didn’t put the gun down. I knew in my heart I wasn’t going to hurt her. I wasn’t going to shoot her. Goddammit, she was too beautiful to hurt. That was my weakness though. Her beauty… “No. I’m not accepting that this time.”
“He killed her,” Rose said. Her eyes suddenly looked dazed. “He killed her.”
“What are you talking about?”
Rose stepped toward me, toward the gun. Her eyes were still dazed. Her hand grabbed my wrist and she put the gun to her chest, right over her damn heart.
“I’m ready then,” she said. “If this is how it’s going to go. I’ll never stop getting found. Chased. Hurt. The only way to stop the pain is…” Her eyes flickered. She was staring right at me now, not through me. “I trust you enough, Wes. You do it. You kill me. Get him back. For what he did to your brother. Eye for an eye.”
“Holy shit,” I whispered. I tore my hand away from Rose before she could grab my finger or the trigger and do something stupid. I tucked the gun away. “What the hell happened?”
She lowered her head and started to weep. I swore to myself that the tears of a woman would never do damage to me. But I was fucking wrong. I was so fucking wrong. Tears of a man were nothing but defeat. The tears of a woman were something different. Something special. They were emotions pouring from a body, a soul.
Goddammit, Rose was cracking my shell.
I gently touched her shoulders and pulled her close to me. Her hands shot around to my back and she gripped my shirt tight. It was like she’d been waiting to do that for a long time. Who knows, maybe she was.