Page 22 of I Hope This Email Finds You in Hell

“Thanks,” I say, voice rusty from disuse. We spent much of the drive in silence despite the hundreds of questions burning at the back of my throat. Every time I tried to ask one, Luke cut me off for a directions update or I swallowed it back down, not wanting to risk him changing his mind.

Luke closes the back door and pops the trunk. My jaw drops.

“Where did you get an entire arsenal?”

“Shh!” He glances around to make sure we’re alone. Turning back to the trunk, he rummages through the weapons. Maybe I should have felt trepidation before now, but it’s not until Luke picks up a Glock and tucks it into a holster that I truly wonder if I’m in over my head.

“How’s your aim?” he asks, pulling out another.

“Nonexistent?” I stare at it, stomach flipping. “I shot clay pigeons with my ex once.”

“How many did you hit?”

“None.”

“Out of?”

“A lot.”

He peers at the inside of the trunk. Despite there being dozens of metal and steel and pointy things, it’s organized. Some are in unzipped duffels and others hang on small hooks poked into the carpeted interior.

“My best shot is with arrows,” I say.

“As in a bow and arrows?”

I nod. “I went through an archery phase, thanks to the Hunger Games phenomenon. I was pretty good, too.”

“The Hunger Games?”

“You’ve never heard of The Hunger Games?”

He hesitates, then shakes his head.

I gawk. “It’s only some of the most poignant literature to grace the shelves this century. A blend of social commentary on capitalism and greed and poverty and—”

“Where does the bow come in?”

“The main character—Katniss Everdeen—uses it. And don’t even get me started on Peeta Mellark, my first love—”

“I don’t have a bow,” Luke cuts me off, clearly not interested in hearing my soliloquy about how the “if it weren’t for the baby” line single-handedly changed me as a reader. “Besides, they’re impractical. Too slow.”

“I told you the same about our CRM software the week you started, but it still took you until last Wednesday to look into the new one I scouted.”

“I knew you were bitter about that.”

“You don’t take my suggestions seriously.”

He frowns, as if deeply insulted I think he doesn’t value my opinions. “Not true.”

He pulls a dagger from a secret compartment where a spare tire usually sits. The black blade is identical to the one he sent Beliar packing with earlier, which he tucked into the back of his belt and covered with his shirt.

“They’re a twin set,” he explains, handing it to me by the blade so I can take the hilt. It’s not as heavy as I expected. “Should we get separated, drop it on the ground and it will point in the direction of its pairing. They’re like compasses. They’ll always find each other.”

“Where am I supposed to put it?”

Some more rummaging and he supplies me with a sheath. “Your thigh.”

I strap it on my right thigh over my jeans and slide the dagger in. “I feel like Lara Croft.”