But the girl in my arms isn’t pristine anymore. She has the ghost of a dead man on her conscience. Two, actually, plus the loss of Bullet. And whatever remnants of the normal façade she was living in have more than likely shattered into oblivion.
My brain completely rejects the idea of letting her go. The thought makes me physically sick, bile rising up the back of my throat.
What the fuck am I gonna do?
I know the trek across the border is grueling, dangerous, and almost entirely run by the cartel. I don’t know if they’ll take her. I don’t even know if they’ll take me. But I don’t give a shit if I die in the desert.
Rue is a different story. I’ll do anything to keep her heart beating.
I’ve dragged her all the way down into the dirt with me, and I am far too selfish to let her climb back out alone.
“Noah?” She nudges me. “What are we going to do when we get there?”
“Um,” I clear my throat. “We find the guy Netty told me about.”
“And then?” Rue presses, shifting slightly so her fingers can find mine in the dark. She tangles them together, holding onto my hand. “What if he won't take us? What if we don’t have enough money?”
“I don’t know.”
“Noah—”
“We’ll figure it out when we get there, Rue,” I interrupt, my voice softening as I press a kiss to the crown of her head. I tighten my arms around her, locking my hands over her stomach, holding her so tightly she couldn’t slip away even if she wanted to. “I’m not letting anything happen to you. I’ve got you.Us.”
It’s a deflection. It’s a complete, delusional denial of the reality waiting for us in Arizona, but right now, under this canvas tarp, it’s all I can offer her.
I rest my chin against her hair, staring blankly into the pitch-black dark of our little canvas tent, and pray to a God I haven’t spoken to in years that I can actually keep that promise.
Because I just might kill myself if I break it.
48
RUE
I wake up to a pale,gray light filtering through the rusted slats of the boxcar. The heavy canvas tarp over our heads is stiff and freezing.
Underneath it, I am entirely cocooned against Noah. My back is pressed flush to his chest, his arms locked around me in a grip so tight it borders on painful. His heart is beating against my spine, and it’s an immediate sense of comfort for a split second—then reality breaks through.
We’re in a fucking boxcar. In the middle of New Mexico.
I blink my gritty, burning eyes open, staring at the splintered floorboards inches from my face.
The adrenaline of yesterday is completely gone, leaving behind a hollow, agonizing physical ache. Every muscle in my body screams in protest as I try to shift. My neck is stiff. My thighs are bruised from the relentless vibration of the motorcycle.
And we have to keep going.
“No, don’t move yet,” Noah’s voice is a low, sleep-rough gravel against my ear. His lips brush my freezing earlobe. “It’s too cold. I need you.”
I swallow hard, my throat feeling like sandpaper, and my heart skipping a beat. “We have to get moving. It’s light out. They could be looking for us.
He doesn’t argue, but he doesn’t let me go immediately, either. He presses his face into my messy hair for a long, heavy second, inhaling deeply, as if he’s trying to memorize the scent of me before the day ruins it.
Then, his arms loosen.
The moment he lifts the stiff canvas tarp, the biting New Mexico cold rushes in, raising goosebumps over every inch of my skin.
We dress in absolute silence. It’s a completely different kind of quiet than the one we shared last night. Last night was desperate and protective. This morning feels exposed. The harsh daylight creeping into the open doors of the train car strips away the illusion that we’re safe.
I watch Noah pull his shirt over his head. He tries to hide it, turning his back to me, but I see the wince of his shoulders. His left arm is stiff, the bandages beneath his shirt undoubtedly soaked through with fresh blood from wrestling the seven-hundred-pound Knucklehead into this rusted tomb last night.
