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It was wonderful, finally hearing these things. Getting an actual back story for this woman we all loved together, rather than having her balk or clam up or change the subject.
But I also knew there was a reason she was telling us these things now. And either it was a really good reason… or a very bad one.
“So I did palms, and tarot card readings. A few star charts too, but I never liked those. The money was good, and I had low overhead. Nothing and no one to spend it on.”
She trailed off, remembering. She’d been calm and placid up to this point, but now I could see her expression going sour.
“So what happened?” I asked quietly.
“I got robbed,” Savannah said bitterly. “I didn’t even have a safe. Someone broke in, and took everything I kept in the drawer.” She took another sip of tea and winced. “But I was between places. Staying at the shop while I upgraded my apartment. I watched the whole thing go down, and then followed the thief outside and into the streets.”
“You’re out of your mind,” said Erik. “You know that?”
“Yeah, probably,” Savannah replied. “But I was angry, and being that furious makes you even more reckless. So I followed this guy all the way back to his place, and waited until he left the next morning.”
I chuckled, realizing where this was going. “And then you robbed him, didn’t you?”
“You’re goddamn right I did.”
Roman grunted, maybe in approval. Erik shook his head.
“The thief was Louden,” I said flatly. It wasn’t a question.
“Yes,” Savannah admitted. “I went in and raided his own shitty apartment. Got my money back and then some. But he caught me on the way out. Told me he’d been watching me watching him.”
“And was he?”
“Yeah, Louden was always one step ahead like that,” she continued. “Rather than take the money back, he laughed and told me to keep it. He said he was impressed by my tenacity, and said the money was nothing compared to what he was making doing other… things.”
She paused again, her mind going back over the events of her past life. Playing them over in her mind, probably picking out all the biggest mistakes.
“So what happened next?”
“She dated him,” said Erik, taking over the story. “He was your typical alpha bad boy. A little dangerous, maybe a lot more handsome than he is now. And you were still young and foolish. And—”
“Lonely,” Savannah admitted, staring at her feet. “Don’t forget lonely.”
There was a moment of silence, during which none of us said a thing. We waited patiently, until she eventually went on.
“Yeah, Louden brought a chaotic excitement to my life that I’d been missing,” said Savannah. “We dated almost two years. To say it was tumultuous would be an understatement. And it got worse as time went on.”
“Did he touch you?” Roman growled.
“No, not really,” said Savannah. “But he’d break just about everything in our apartment. Half the time he was sweet and charming, the other half — full of rage. But he was always crazy, always nuts. It was like he had two sides, and both were equally terrifying.”
“Then why’d you stay with him?” asked Erik.
“All the typical reasons,” she said. “In the beginning I thought I loved him. I was attracted to how sure he was of himself, even when he was doing bad things.” She shrugged. “Or maybe it was the bad things I was attracted to, I don’t know.”
Savannah pushed back from her chair and got up. She began pacing a little, and we moved aside for her.
“Eventually I worked up the courage to leave him. I gave him this big long speech, terrified the whole time he was going to do something crazy to me. Only he remained eerily calm. Instead of getting mad he shrugged and told me he agreed with me, and that we’d be better off apart. But before he ‘let me go’, he told me he and Jarrett had one last job.”
Roman’s eyebrows came together. “Jarrett?”
“The guy from the shop,” guessed Erik.
Slowly she nodded. “Louden told me they had a really big score lined up. Said if we did this one final job it would make us all rich, and we could go our separate ways. But they needed a third. They needed a driver.”
