“Get in,” Blake says, clapping me on the shoulder as he heads back into the café. “I’ll hustle everyone else into the van. We’ll catch up. A truck that old can’t be going that fast.”
I nod, trying not to imagine what could happen to Sam if she got into a car with a creep. I try to remember how strong she is, and the way she fought back against that guy in Auckland, but I keep thinking about how easy it was to lift her in one arm last night as I carried her into our cabin.
Sam’s got a big personality and a big smile, but she’s still only five seven and a hundred and fifty pounds.
Against a man my size, or bigger, she won’t stand a chance.
Chapter Thirteen
Samantha
“The thorns which I have reap’d are of the tree
I planted; they have torn me, and I bleed.
I should have known what fruit would spring from such a seed.”
-Lord Byron
* * *
It’s over.
There won’t be any fresh start, no happy ending.
I should have realized Todd’s father’s connection to Hollywood would make the rape trial news even overseas. The entire goddamned planet worships celebrity. Jesus may still fill pews on weekends, but it’s celebrity and scandal that drives clicks and powers the twenty-four hour news channels.
I should have known better than to think I could put the past behind me and move on. The past was always here, lurking in my bone marrow like a cancer, providing the illusion of safety when it had the power to resurface and destroy my life all along.
“You can come all the way to Auckland with me if you want.” The middle-aged man with the mangy beard who picked me up slows as we pull into downtown Taupo, but doesn’t pull over. “I don’t mind. I like company.”
I laugh, a strangled giggle that sounds as crazy as I feel right now.
I haven’t said a word to this man since offering my name thirty seconds into the ride, and have ignored all of his attempts to make conversation. I’ve just been staring out the window, chewing on my lip until the skin feels bruised, my thoughts racing as I try to figure out what to do next.
I can’t go back to the hotel and wait for Danny, but I can’t take the car and run, either. Taupo is hours away from Auckland. Even if I leave Danny a note and money for a flight home, he won’t be able to afford a taxi, and I have no idea if the buses around here run that far.
“You want to get something to eat?” the man—Joseph, I think he said his name was—asks. “I could go for a roast beef sandwich. I’m buying if you’ll sit across the table and look pretty for me.”
Look pretty for him.
Like I’m a decoration, not a person, a person whose life is falling apart and who is obviously in some kind of serious distress. Surely not even this lug is so empathy impaired he can’t tell I’ve been trying not to cry since the moment I got into his truck.
No, he can probably tell. He just doesn’t care. The feelings of the flowers in the vase are irrelevant. Objects are meant to be observed and enjoyed. Objects don’t matter the way people do, and to this man I’m an object, whether he realizes that’s how he sees me or not.
“No, thank you.” I reach for the door handle, deciding to jump out of the truck while it’s moving if I have to. My gut didn’t ping when this guy pulled over, but it’s pinging now. “You can just let me out at the next corner.”
“You sure?” he asks, still not slowing down. “I know a good place in the next town over. Great sandwiches and they’ve got the cutest dog that sleeps near the door. Love that little dog. Pet him every time I stop in.”
“I need to get out in Taupo.” My grip tightens on the door handle as my eyes slide to the door lock, making sure it’s open. “My boyfriend is meeting me here.”
“Boyfriend, huh?” Joseph laughs uncomfortably. “I wouldn’t let any girlfriend I had hitchhike on the highway. Busy road. Lots of scabs passing through. You don’t know who might pick you up.”
“Lucky I found you then,” I say flatly, gaze shifting to the traffic light up ahead, willing it to turn red before the truck gets through.
“Yeah. Sure is,” Joseph agrees. “I don’t pick up hitchhikers often, but couldn’t let a pretty girl like you stand out there in the cold.”
The light turns red and Joseph begins to brake.
I don’t wait for the truck to come to a complete stop before jerking open the door and jumping out into the street.
The car behind us honks and the driver shouts something I can’t make out. Joseph slams on his brakes and calls for me to get back in the truck, but I’m already on the sidewalk, power walking in the opposite direction without a single glance back over my shoulder.
I don’t have time for any more bullshit. I already have more than enough shit on my plate.
I duck into a drugstore at the end of the next block, my nose stinging as an aggressive blast of heat attacks my chilled face. Shoving my hot-spring-fuzzed hair from my forehead, I make my way to the rear of the store. I find a lonely corner, where dusty canvases and boxes of paint so old the oil has probably gone rancid sit next to cross stitch patterns and neat twists of thread hanging in a row, and sit down on the cold tile floor. I pull my legs into my chest, press my forehead into my knees, and do my best to calm the fuck down and think.
One part of me is screaming that I shouldn’t have run from Danny, but the terrified animal crouching inside insists I had no other choice.
I can’t tell Danny the truth any more than I could tell a police officer or a room full of strangers. If Danny knew, a night like last night would never have happened. He would never look at me the same way again. He would never touch me with that easy familiarity that feels so right. I would become something to be handled with care, or not to be handled at all, and we would never be alone in bed again. They would always be there with us, ruining everything they touch, spoiling every sweet kiss with their whiskey breath and their biting fingers.
I pull in a breath and hold it, refusing to go back there, refusing to cry.
Danny is probably looking for me already and is no doubt worried sick. I have to figure out what to do.
If I hadn’t destroyed our phones, I could call him and try to negotiate a truce before we met in person, but our phones are no doubt on their way to a landfill by now and Danny decided against the pay-as-you-go phone once we saw how much they cost. Collect calls to Croatia are cheaper.
Everything here is so expensive. I’m going to run out of money soon, even sooner if I pay for Danny’s plane flight back to Maui.
With Danny by my side, building a new life from nothing had seemed like a scary, but exciting adventure. Alone it will simply be terrifying. A pound of apples costs as much as I earn teaching surf lessons for an hour, and there won’t be anyone in the water until spring. I have experience tutoring kids and babysitting, but who is going to want to hire a girl with no references, whose face they might have seen on the evening news.
A panicked sob escapes my lips, but before I can really start crying a girl’s voice breaks the silence at the back of the store.
“Are you okay?” the voice asks, making me jump in surprise.