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Yes, I want to forget, and I have high hopes tonight will do the trick.
When the truck makes a familiar turn, my eyes flair open and some of the mellowness leaves me. We’re in the neighborhood where I grew up, only blocks from my home. How terribly odd. I chance another look at Marco. No, there’s nothing at all familiar about him, nothing that predates this night.
Just as the unease builds beyond levels I can dismiss, the truck slams to a halt as a midnight-colored cat darts across our path. Marco’s arm shoots in front of me as if my seatbelt won’t hold me back, but I barely process his reaction because something hard has hit my sandaled foot. Though it’s dark inside the truck, I make out a holstered handgun resting between my two feet. My heart leaps into overdrive while my thoughts race. Yes, guns are legal in this state. Yes, thousands of people have licenses and legally carry. As do I, a fact I am suddenly exceedingly grateful for.
Again I look at Marco, still oblivious to my angst—which doesn’t end there. The truck makes yet another turn.
Another right turn, into a grand circular drive, past a very familiar stucco mailbox.
A mailbox with the nameWalkerwritten in elegant script.
CHAPTER 3
Marco
The woman next to me has gone berserk. Nutso.
For real.
A psychotic break, perhaps?
Could be, because in the space of a single second, she has gone from melted chocolate at my touch to Miss Crazy Towns, USA. Yelling and screaming things that make no sense.
Right now, plastered to the door like I’m a leper, she’s glaring at me from across the front seat of my Chevy truck.
“Is this some kind of joke,” she shrieks.
Sorry, at a loss for words here.
Suddenly, she yanks open the door and jumps down, wheels around and yells another question I can’t answer: “What kind of game are you playing, buddy?”
Not the one I want to be, that’s for sure, but I keep the sentiment to myself. In a blink, I’ve gone from the glow of anticipation to trying to figure how to ditch this chick without incident. Unfortunately, since she’s without wheels, I don’t see how that can happen. Maybe I can order her a cab.
“So this is yourhouse?” she asks, but it’s more of a taunt.
I nod, but I’m baffled as heck—until I register the emphasis she places on the wordyour. A light goes on in my head. Maybe she knows the Walker family and thinks I’m trying to pass this beachfront manse off as my own. That was never my intent, but frankly, we haven’t spent a lot of time on conversation.
“Oh my gosh, you’re such a liar!” she screeches at a decibel level that makes me glad the nearest neighbors aren’t too near. If word of this gets back to Tripp…
I yank my own door open, because that can’t happen. I was stunned at first, but now my anger is rising. I circle around the bed of the truck, ready to deliver a piece of my mind, when I see a gun, a shiny 9mm aimed directly at my heart.
Whoa.
Pulling to a stop at the rear tire, I reach for the sky, having no intention of meeting my Maker tonight. Little Miss Crazy is backed into the open passenger door, reaching for her cell with one hand and holding my life in her other. “I’m calling the cops,” she declares, wild-eyed.
At first, I’m cool with this because this lady is bat-blank crazy. However, after a moment’s contemplation, I harbor serious doubts she can hold it together long enough to sort through things—whatever they may be—with the cops.
Her eyes move off me for a split second, but that’s all I need.
She angry-squeals when I pry the gun from her fingers, and, that fast, the shoe is on the other foot and I’m the one with the weapon. I tuck it into my waistband.
But as she pivots back to the truck, I remembermygun, the one I’m never without, the one I placed there earlier this evening. Sure enough, she reaches for it, but she isn’t faster than I am. I have a little experience with this sort of thing, thank you very much.
She backs herself into the door, and the crazy leaves her, replaced by outright fear.
I hate that. Truly, I do, but I have no idea where things went wrong, therefore, I’ve no clue how to fix them. “What is your problem, lady?” is the best I come up with. I place both weapons in the bed of the truck so we can talk. If she gives me the answers I need, I’ll gladly return hers. “What the heck is going on?” And let me confess right here, I replaceheckwith a fierier word.
Her chin comes up with a glare that packs more heat than I do on my most dicey assignments, and she marches up and gets her face right in mine. It ticks me off, sure, but now that I have charge of the weapons, I don’t really care how close she gets. “You’re a liar and a con. I can’t believe I fell for it!”
