"Are you sure?" she asked, her lip nearly quivering.
I reached up and patted her shoulder. "We'll be fine, Jordan. I promise you, things will be just fine."
For the next two hours, Francois steered us expertly along the winding, twisted highway. We crested the mountains just north of Big Bear and started down into the California desert, the hard desert where only the hardiest of native plants and animals lived. "Think we can pick up speed?" I asked.
"Why? It would be useless to arrive early unless you plan on getting some Taco Bell to take on the flight out of here," Francois said, shaking his head. "If that's the case, I'm sure I can find somewhere we can do drive-through."
"No, not at all. I guess I'm just anxious, that's all," I replied, looking out the window. There was a harsh beauty to the desert, and I thought about my homeland. It had been nearly six months since I'd seen Europe, and far longer since I'd been to what was best described as home. As beautiful as it was, it wasn't the same sort of beauty as the arid vistas around us. I'd remember the California desert for a long time, I knew for sure. "Jordan, would you turn on the radio? I need something to distract my mind."
"Sure," Jordan said softly, switching on the Jeep's radio. Hitting the search function, the first three options were talk radio, an NBA basketball game, and country music that was so horrible Jordan did not even need to be asked to change the channel.
The fourth time, however, I was greeted by an almost familiar melody. I listened more, then realized Jordan had played it the night before on the guitar, in a piece that was originally meant for violins, piano, and a full orchestral background. Steven Tyler's vocals kicked in, and I heard a song I hadn't listened to since my teen years, speaking directly to my heart as I thought about Jordan. "I don't want to miss a thing," I said softly as I looked at her rich cherry wood hair. "I don't want to miss a thing."
"What was that, Felix?" Francois asked, his eyes flickering to me in the rearview mirror. I knew he was concerned about me, but he would understand my decision.
"Nothing. How are we looking for time?"
"Just fine. In fact, we should probably make a stop for refreshments and to make our timing better," he said. "Are you worried about making our rendezvous?"
"No," I said quietly. "Just thinking about other things."
Jordan looked back at me again, her eyes pleading silently, and I had to blink and look out the window to not say what I wanted to say right then. It wasn't the right time, and Francois would have flipped out. I'd rather have that happen when he couldn’t throw one of his infamous tantrums. He never did learn the value of self-control, something our father had tried to teach him over and over and over again. It was what held him back from reaching his potential as a thief and, sometimes I thought, as a man.
At about four in the afternoon, an hour and a half before the sun would begin to set, Francois pulled into a dusty gas station and put the Jeep in park. “We’re less than twenty minutes from the meetup point, and we've got at least forty-five before the plane lands. We need to kill time."
My stomach growled lightly, and the three of us laughed lightly. "I guess the motion carries," I answered. "Okay, but nothing too heavy. We don't know how good this plane will be, and I'd prefer not to lose a stomach full of potato chips all over the back of a Piper Cub."
"With the amount of money we're giving them for this, I want a Gulfstream," Francois remarked, then sighed. "Then again, we're going to a ranch strip. You're probably right."
I clapped him on the shoulder and looked at Jordan. "Come on, let's get something."
We were about halfway through our shopping when I saw the tweaker come in. Unfortunately, the deserts of California were crawling with drug addicted burnouts, with crystal meth being the drug of choice. Cheap, intense, and easy to manufacture even in your own home, the deadly side effects were of little concern to the desperate. This one had been on the hook for a long time from the look of it, his skin had that drawn out, sallow look of a perpetual meth user, and when he reached up with a scabbed hand to wipe at his crusted lips, I could see most of his teeth had rotted out of his head as well. "Francois," I whispered, tapping him on the shoulder. "Just in the door."
He looked into the security mirror and nodded. I took Jordan's arm and guided her down and behind the shelf. "Meth head," I whispered. "Keep low, stay behind us. I have a bad feeling about this."
I no more than had the words out of my mouth when a crash came from the front of the store, the meth head screaming as he flipped something heavy onto the ground. "Empty the register motherfucker! Now!"