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He rolled to a stop at the end of the driveway, then reached underneath his seat and pulled out a revolver.
My eyes went wide, and I wondered if he thought I was going to try to run. “I’ll go. You don’t need that.”
His face scrunched up in a confused expression, and then he shook his head once. “Wait in the truck.”
My jaw hung open as this stranger got out of the truck and marched straight toward the front door of the trailer. Part of me considered jumping out and hiding in the trees so I could at least die in peace, but the truck was so warm, and when that man told me to wait, something in me wanted to obey him.
So, like the idiot I usually was, I just sat and stared as he stood at the front door for a few seconds before kicking it open.
5
HARRIS
What the hell am I doing?
Picking up a stranger on the side of the road during a bad storm was one thing. I was fine with being a decent human, but was I really going to shoot a stranger?
None of those questions were answered before I kicked open the door to the dilapidated doublewide, but when I took a quick glance around the room and saw empty bottles, lots of blood, and some piece of shit reaching for a 12 gauge, everything seemed to make perfect sense.
This was the fucker who had been abusing that kid. And he was scared for his life. The man was too young to be his father, which pissed me off even more because that probably meant he was some kind of a boyfriend. As the barrel of the shotgun slowly swung toward me, I lifted my revolver and put a bullet in his head.
It was all over pretty quickly, and the mess I left behind was much smaller than the one he’d created. I looked around to see if there was anything sentimental that the kid might want to take with him, but it all just looked like trash and other paraphernalia. I went back toward the bedroom area and saw a wallet. There wasn’t much cash inside, but I pulled it out and slipped it into my pocket. The kid deserved a hell of a lot more than a few bucks, but that was all he’d be taking with him from the trailer, other than whatever broken bones and haunted memories had been also created there.
There was a half empty bottle of whisky on the table, so I dumped it onto the guy’s lap and reached for one of the many lighters littered around the kitchen. With a single flame, his clothes were engrossed and whatever ghosts that were trapped in those walls were about to be permanently excised.
I stepped out of the trailer and looked around, half expecting to see blue and red lights flashing in the distance. But we were so far away from any neighbors, there was no way anybody could have heard the sound of gunfire or seen the flash of light. From where I was standing, I couldn’t see into the truck, but I knew he was still there.
Probably scared to death, but hopefully also relieved.
I calmly marched back to the truck and slipped my gun into the holster attached underneath the seat before I hopped inside.
Luna was still covering most of his body with hers, and the boy’s eyes were wide. “Is he really gone?”
I turned to him and nodded before backing the truck all the way up the driveway the way I came in. “Yep. You don’t have to worry about him anymore. So, now, where can I take you?”
He sucked in a deep breath, and it looked like all the tension in his body rolled out of him on the exhale. “Any town is fine. I’ll figure something out from there.”
I pulled the small wad of cash from my pocket and handed it to him. “I think this is yours. But that’s not enough to start over in a random town. Don’t you have any family? Some friends you can stay with for a while?”
He turned away from me, facing the window. “There’s no one, but I’ll be fine. I just need to get away from here.”
I didn’t know the area well, but I knew there wasn’t much industry for a few hundred miles, so I considered my options. I could get him a room in the closest hotel I came across and drop him off there. Or I could take him to one of the shelters in the city. There were more resources available there, and it would be easier for him to find a job.
But I knew I wasn’t going to do either of those things. As stupid as it was, I let my Daddy side sneak out, and I decided I was going to take care of him. “You can stay at my place. I’ve got empty rooms, and I know some people who can give you a job.”
He glanced at the money in his hand and scoffed. “I don’t have money to pay you or anything. I’ll be fine on my own.”
I wanted to say something about how well that had been working out for him so far, but I didn’t want to be a dick. “What’s your name, anyway?”
“Jesse.”
I turned and raised an eyebrow, waiting for more than that.
“Jesse Kramer.”
“It’s good to meet you, Jesse Kramer. I’m Harris Martins.”
He nodded and looked straight out the window, probably as overwhelmed by the situation as I was. After several long and silent minutes, he cleared his throat and turned back to me. “Why did you do that? To Bruce, I mean. Don’t get me wrong, I’m glad you did. But why didn’t you just drop me off somewhere?”
