AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“You kids aren’t from around here, are you? Don’t think I’ve seen you before.” He peers at us from behind thick lenses as he scans my items.
“No, just visiting,” Mara answers.
He smacks his gum obnoxiously, strings of saliva trailing between his lips, and I fight against the urge to reach across the counter and close his mouth for him.
“What brings you to town? We don’t get many visitors around here.”
Somehow, the words feel like a warning, and I suddenly regret the jokes Mara and I have been making about how this whole getaway feels like a thriller plot.
“We’re staying at the big house down the street. The old bed and breakfast.” Logan points in the direction of the house.
I cringe and notice I’m not the only one. Austin and Memphis are both giving him deadly stares when I turn around to look his way. He looks sheepish and steps back.
“Oh, the old Buchanan place? I know the one. That one used to have a lot of life in it. Good to see it have guests again. How long are you kids in town?”
“Not long at all,” I tell him.
“Just for a few days,” Paulette says casually, perusing the candy near the checkout. She adds two handfuls of candy bars to her basket. “It’s a cute town.”
“Been here all my life,” he drawls with a chuckle under his breath. “Cuteain’t a word I’ve ever heard to describe it.”
Behind me, someone in the group stifles a laugh that quickly dies out. I force a smile and pass him my card, unsure of what to say. Rather than swipe the card, he holds it up to the light as if he might be checking to see if it’s counterfeit, then whistles. “Lena Ortega… Lena, hm? That short for anything?” His brow lifts.
“Um, no. Just Lena.”
He continues to eye me, then Memphis and Mara. “Where’d you say you were from again?”
“We didn’t,” Memphis answers before I can. “We’re in a hurry. Can you just get us checked out so we can be on our way?”
The man looks at Memphis with an expression that scorches but swipes my card without another word.
Ten minutes later, we’re walking out of the market with our groceries in plastic bags and on our way toward the river. Memphis has made no effort to bring up what happened back there, but I feel as if I need to address it.
I hurry my pace to catch up with him near the front of the group. When I move next to him, he barely glances at me from the corner of his eye, and I can’t help noticing the small smirk on his lips.
“You didn’t have to do that, you know?”
He looks straight ahead, squinting at the horizon. “Do what?”
“Help me get away from that couple.”
He shrugs one shoulder and doesn’t say anything for a while. Then, surprising me, he says, “You looked uncomfortable.”
“Yeah, probably overreacting. They were just… I don’t know. I had a weird feeling about them. I’m sure they were just being nice.”
“Who was being nice?” Austin asks, inserting himself into the conversation, somehow walking and spinning in circles at once.
“This couple that was trying to talk to me in the store back there. They sort of cornered me while I was in an aisle alone and were being really weird. I was worried they weren’t going to let me walk away”—I look up at Memphis, who’s staring straight ahead with determined fascination—“until Memphis came over and got me out of there.”
“Weird how?” Mara asks, walking up next to me so we’re all in a line now. “What were they doing?”
“I don’t know. Mostly just asking me questions. But also staring at me in this strange way.”
“What were they asking?” Austin trips on the gravel road and stops spinning, catching his breath.
“Just… I don’t know. They were asking me where I am from, same as the cashier, but there was just something about them. They gave me the creeps.” I shiver. “I can’t explain it.”
“Babe, trust your gut. Simple as that. If it said they were weirdos, it’s ’cause they were. You should’ve told me, though. Caught my eye, gave me a little head nod. I would’ve fought someone.” She flexes her arm, patting her bicep with a grin.
