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Judging me.
“It’s just for now,” I repeat stupidly before escaping the car with my clothes, slamming the door to make a point and striding towards the seedy motel veranda.
I leave my broken beauty to his own devices. He doesn’t need to be coddled. Well, guess what, buddy? Neither do I.
The sound of a second car door slamming forces me to roll my eyes as heavy footsteps make a confident rap along the path behind me.
Slow.
Steady.
Heavy.
I get to my door, slide the key in and jiggle it around the tight fitting, but it doesn’t turn. My cheeks burn. Mortified, I scowl at the inanimate object for so easily adding kindling to the flames of my embarrassment.
A gang of burly men leave the room a few doors down.
Throw another log on that fire, universe. Go on!
The stench of tobacco and the sound of deep chortles surrounds me as they slow their struts. I keep my head low, but glance sideways through my lashes to find Xander shouldering between them. Forcing them to part for his body, he breaks their formation in a way that suggests he didn’t even notice them. Too focused on me.
They keep walking but turn to sneer. That’s all they can do, though—a pathetic show of pride. Xander is their counterpart in overall size, but where they have round curves and clean faces, he presents finely cut edges and a bloody complexion that matches his unsmiling demeanour.
Casually, he leans his shoulder on the wall beside my door as I curse the damn lock. “Fucking. Stupid.”
“Where are your sisters?”
“In a different”—I shove on the door with my side— “room. You can go, Xander! I just wanted my damn clothes. And. I. Have. Them.” I growl and then gasp when the door jolts forward, tugging me into the musky-scented room. I fight the key from the hole.
“There’s no chain.” He yanks the soaked tissues from his nostrils, ditching them to the pavers. He barely looks at me as he says, “Lock the door, Woman. Do it now before I leave. I want to hear it lock.”
Wrenching the silver key free, I spin to face a stone-faced Xander Butcher. Hurt by his cold front, I force my lips to speak, “Goodbye, Xander.”
He is deadpan as I close the door on him. My palms cup my face and I breathe into them.
No “See ya” this time.
Goodbye isnota contronym.
It’s the most definitive, unquestionable word in the English dictionary.
Goodbye!
I hug myself, thinking about the day, the beating he received in exchange for a moment where we were pleased to see each other again, the twenty seconds of blackout panic.
Suddenly, the motel door is kicked open and the thud of it hitting the plasterboard echoes through the tiny motel space.
I look at the wall dusting plaster from the crack he just made, and my hands fist at my sides.
How dare he!
I said goodbye!
That means goodbye!
“Goodbye is not a contronym,” I growl at him. “You punch-drunk hothead.”
His body fills the opening and then the room as he strides in and slams the door, pain painted across the brutal plane of his face, but the agony is not from a fight.
