I handed him the car keys and he reluctantly left to go find work. I looked around the house and got to work taking off the sheets and dusting off everything. Despite the cold, I opened the windows to get some fresh air inside. While the first floor was airing out, I went upstairs to check out the bedrooms again. I found linens in the closet, but they smelled musty. I threw them in the washing machine and opened the windows upstairs as well.
As I was rummaging through the kitchen, I made a list of groceries we would need. We couldn’t just eat out whenever we wanted. We would have to really watch our spending. It was different when it was just me. I knew what I spent normally, but now I had a man with me, and I had no idea how much he ate on any given day.
I decided to take a walk around town and see what was available. If they had some self-defense classes, I could trick Josh into taking them. If he was going to be on the run with me, he was going to have to learn to defend himself. I also needed to find a gym he could join. I was serious about him needing to bulk up. He needed to look totally different than before. If we were lucky, those two guys that were after us had been killed for failing to capture us. If that was the case, they would send others after us, and they wouldn’t know exactly what we looked like at this moment. Now was the perfect time to change.
As I left the house, I thought about why those guys were after me. After four years, why now? What did it matter if I was alive? Obviously, it hadn’t mattered before if I was alive or dead, but now someone was after me, and I had to find out why. I just couldn’t let Josh in on this little part of my life. Although, with the way he reacted to everything that had happened so far, I was pretty convinced that he really didn’t have anything to do with the men that were after me. The only thing that made sense if he was in on it, was that he was trying to get me on his side, to trust him. But for some reason, my gut was telling me he was really an innocent bystander in all this. I wanted to trust him. For once in the four years that I had been on the run, I wanted someone on my side.
I walked around town for a few hours, checking out some thrift stores and I found a local gym that not only was cheap, but also offered self-defense classes. I grinned as I took a pamphlet home. Home…that was a strange thing to say. Josh was essentially my home now, and that was just ironic considering we didn’t know anything about each other. When I walked up the sidewalk to our house, I saw Josh sitting on the swing, waiting for me. He came over and grabbed some bags out of my hands, waiting for me to open the door.
“Where did you go?”
“We needed to get some clothes, and I found a gym for you.”
“You were serious about that?”
“Yeah,” I said, shoving open the door. “We need you to bulk up. Also,” I pulled out the self-defense pamphlet and handed it to him. “I figured I could take some self-defense classes. I figured that at least one of us needs some proper training.”
His brows furrowed. “Shouldn’t that be me?”
“Why?” I asked innocently, baiting my trap.
“Well, because I’m a man and you’re a…”
“A what?”
He cleared his throat. “Well, you’re a woman. I mean, I’m the man. I should be protecting you.”
“Look, I’ve been doing this for a long time on my own-“
“Yeah, but I’m here now, and if anyone is going to be saving anyone’s ass, it’s going to be me. Besides, I’m bigger than you. I should be the one that does the ass kicking.”
I rolled my eyes, internally smiling. “Fine, but then I get to take the firearms class.”
I turned and walked away, smiling as I headed for the laundry room.
“Hold on, who says you get to take the class? Doesn’t that fall under protection?”
I turned, quirking my head at him. “Well, I just figured that since I already have the gun…”
“Yeah, and you shook the whole fucking time you were holding it. I grew up around guns. Granted, they were rifles, but I know enough that this will be easy for me.”
I crossed my arms over my chest, quirking my head at him. “Fine, you can do that too.”
He grinned, like he was proud he won me over, and I pretended to be annoyed by the whole thing. It really worked for us.
“Did you find a job?”
“I had some luck. It’s temporary, but I have a feeling if I do a good job, it could be a more permanent job.”
For the first time since this whole thing started, I felt really bad about ripping him out of his life. This was normal for me, but for him, he was starting all over when he shouldn’t have to.
I gave a tentative smile and held out a bag to him. “I picked up some clothes for you. They’re from the thrift store, but I figured that if you were working as a mechanic, it wouldn’t matter if they were new or not.”
He nodded and looked inside, pulling out a plaid shirt. “Really? Plaid’s not really my thing.”
“Well, you’re not supposed to be you, so that’s a good thing.”
“Yeah, but…it’s plaid.”
I shrugged. “I could have gone with some beautiful pink shirts they had on sale.”
He nodded, shoving it back in the bag. “Plaid’s good.”
“That’s what I thought. How about we go grocery shopping and then we can call it a day?”
“Sure. You know, I feel bad having you pay for everything. I only have like fifty bucks on me.”
“It’s fine. Really. I’ve saved plenty over the years.”
In truth, I took fifty grand when I ran. I had it stashed in various places around the country, but I always had ten grand on me, and continued to work and live off what I earned in case I had to run fast. As long as we both worked and lived off those wages, we had nothing to worry about and could replenish what we had spent.
Josh
“Hey, Cortisol,” my boss, Cyrus Nicholls, called out, shaking his head and laughing. The other guys laughed along with him. I sighed and climbed out from under the car I was working on and wiped my hands on a rag. He motioned for me to follow him to his office. I did as he asked, shutting the door behind me.
“Take a seat.”
I did, and waited for whatever he had to say. He stared at me for a minute. He was maybe thirty-five years old, but I could tell that he knew exactly what he was doing. He had years of life experience under his belt, and where he got those years, I was really starting to wonder. He had eyes in the back of his head and could read me like a book.
“So, you’ve been here a week and you do good work, some of the best work I’ve ever seen.”
I didn’t say anything, just waited for whatever he was going to say.
“Where did you learn to work on cars?”
“At home with my dad.”
“Yeah? And where’s home?”
I was silent for a moment, and then I grinned. “Kentucky.”
He nodded. “I grew up in Kentucky.”
“Really,” I said, swallowing hard. Fuck, I was so screwed. I had never even been to Kentucky before. Why the fuck had I said that?
“Yeah, what town are you from?”
“Grant,” I said, not knowing if there was even a fucking town called Grant in Kentucky.