"I don't think so," I said meekly.
"I know. No one does."
"What was her name?" I asked after another minute of silence had dripped by. Time had slowed to a crawl. I was thinking of Jeremy, and my own family, and Reign as a teenager …
"Miranda," he answered quickly. Saying her name hurt him, you could see it in his eyes.
"I'm sorry, Reign," I finally whispered, meaning it with all my heart. It killed me to see him looking so haunted. I reached up, touched the mark over my eye, which had faded some but still felt tender to the touch. So that's why he was so eager to help …
"Just come here," he said, and reaching out grabbed my shoulders, pulling me back against him. One arm snaked across my chest and down my stomach, holding me by the waist. His face buried into my wild black hair. I felt his heartbeat against my spine.
We lay like that for a long time. Billy Joel wondered if his girlfriend was right, if he was crazy. Led Zeppelin offered to give someone a whole lotta love. Paul Simon talked about all the ways you could leave your lover, and Cream basked in the sunshine of someone's love. And then another tune started. A familiar one. Not familiar in the way all the other songs had been, because everyone knows them and has heard them a million times.
Familiar to me in a way that could only be described as intimate.
I didn't know why, but it struck fear so deep into my heart that I could actually feel the cold sweat as it pushed its way out of my pores. My airways seemed to constrict; I was being strangled! But there were no hands around my neck … I desperately breathed in through my nose, could barely take in enough air to speak. My nails dug into Reign's thigh as my body stiffened and went rigid, flashes of nightmarish violence bursting in my skull.
From somewhere that seemed very far away, Reign called my name, shook my shoulders, asked what was wrong, what was wrong. I couldn't respond. My tongue had swollen, filling my entire mouth.
Pick up your money,
pack up your tent,
you ain't goin' nowhere …
24
"Why now? What happened in the car? Jesus, Gabriella, you could at least … " Reign said, his brow furrowed, eyes barely concealing a feverish need for her to take back what she'd said. He'd never told anyone about his sister, except for Honey, and the moment he did, his confidant was ditching him.
Well that's what you get, his mind told him. That's payback for letting Miranda down, for letting them all down, for not protecting them the way you should have. You don't deserve to have someone like Gabriella.
But even as his mind told him that, in the least sympathetic of tones, he couldn't just roll over and give up and let her go – not just yet. Gabriella stood before him, shaking, eyes wide and ready to brim over with tears.
"I … I don't know, I can't explain it, Reign, I don't know, I just … I have to go. Now, tonight. I can't … not another … I have to … " Gabriella tripped over her words, her anxiety making each syllable crash into the next. She was shaking all over, her fingers looking like they were power-typing in mid-air.
After watching her park haphazardly outside her room and dash back and forth with her few belongings, including that signature blue duffel bag, he'd managed to convince her to come to the bar and pick up some food for her trip – she hadn't eaten since that mega-bacon cheeseburger the night she'd arrived.
Now, he almost regretted dragging her into the dirty, dingy bar – it wasn't exactly an ideal location for their goodbye. He didn't want her to remember him as the guy in the bar who kissed her goodbye while their shoes stuck to the floor and boisterous, hairy men shouted in the background.
"Please, Gabriella, one more night and I swear, I'll … "
"No! Reign, no! No more nights! You … you can … .oh, god, I have to go. Come with me," Gabriella said. The look on her face as she blurted out the last part told him that she was as surprised to be saying it as he was to have heard it. She bit her lip, her eyes falling still for once on his face. He reached out, stroked her arm, and shook his head.
You can't, you know you can't, he thought, visions of his brothers flashing through his head. For some people, the time came to make a choice between their family and their love. For Reign, that time was now; it wasn't his "real" family, but it was the realest he'd ever known. He wanted to go with Gabriella. Wanted it so hard his teeth felt like they would crack from how hard he was clenching his jaw. He wanted it so hard that he could feel the wanting inside him, the way a heroin addict wants their smack.
But he couldn't, and that was the royal bitch of it.
She nodded, understanding in her eyes, and took a deep breath. Closing her eyes, she seemed to steady herself. His hand lay on her forearm, fingers gently stroking the skin, the warmth where there skin met as comforting and homey as a fireplace roaring in the middle of winter while a storm blew outside. She felt like home, when he touched her.
And now, with her leaving, he got the idea he'd feel homeless for a long time.
When Gabriella opened her eyes again, Reign knew that she hadn't changed her mind – and wouldn't. He could argue more, try to persuade her to stay, but he'd be wasting his time and hers. Better he accept it, bade her well, make sure she made it to town limits at least. He dropped his head.
"Okay. I get it. But wait, half an hour, please?"
"Reign, I'm not … I'm not in the mood … " Gabriella said, sounding half ashamed and half frustrated. He had to be a bit amused; she thought he wanted to get one last bone session in before she left? Far from it. If he touched her any more than he was then, he'd have to hang himself after she left.
"No, I have some things for you. I got them early this morning while you were sleeping. They'll … they'll help," he said. "They're at my place though. Will you wait for me to come back? Please?"
Gabriella nodded, her eyes now filling with tears, seeming even deeper and wiser than they usually did. Something about the way that salt water pooled above her lower eyelid made her eyes sparkle. It broke Reign's heart to see her cry, but he had to admit she looked beautiful doing it.
If you stay with me, I'll make sure you'll never cry again, he thought, wanted to say, kept inside his throat. He turned from her, exiting the bar quickly. As he turned, he watched her collapse into a stool, her elbow hitting the surface of the bar with an audible smack. She lay her head in her palm, her black hair forming a curtain around her face. On the far side of the bar, he saw Honey watching them with interest. She couldn't hear anything, but Reign bet she knew what was happening. Endo was looking over, too.
Great, glad you fuckers caught the damn matinee, this is a one-time-only performance, he thought bitterly, pushing the doors open. Anger was growing inside him alongside the sadness, and the feeling of loneliness that had already taken root in his heart in anticipation of what it would feel like to watch Gabriella drive away. He trotted to his apartment behind the bar, willing himself to keep his emotions in check long enough to see her off with a forced smile on his face. She probably felt bad enough, he didn't need to make her feel any worse by acting like a child.
In his apartment, the cool air that usually brought immediate relief from the desert heat offered no salve for his pain. He gathered the few items he'd managed to gather in the short time Gabriella had been in Ditcher's Valley. How long had that been? How long had she been there? Two days? Three days? How had she made him feel this way in such little time? He, who used to brag about his lone wolf nature, who thought he'd never need a woman around to make him feel whole, had let himself fall hard over the short course of three days.
It seemed impossible. It seemed like something that only happened in cheesy romance novels. But there he was, living proof.
And damn, did he hate it.
Gabriella's face was not the one looking back at him from the passport and driver's license he held, but it was close. The face on both documents was much more Latina. But it would do. It would pass. It was the same fake passport, the same fake driver's license, that the club doled out to illegal immigrants who could afford the luxury get-into-America package.
The names were different, but the pictures were the same. Gabriella was so much more beautiful than all those other women, Reign felt irrationally ashamed to be giving her the forged documents. But they'd have to do; he hadn't had enough time to get her to sit for a new picture.
The phone he'd bought was the same model, style, and carrier as his own. Commonly known as a burner phone, and most often associated with shady figures hanging out in alleys, handing out free samples of low-grade black tar heroin to anyone who copped a dimebag. But it, too, would do. It would have to.