5. 5
5
A fter the third full day on the back of his bike, Savage was sore and tired. He wanted to get clean then unwind a bit. When they stopped for the night, he got the key to his room, then looked at Sackett.
“What are your plans?” Savage asked.
“I don’t know. I thought I might cruise around a little. Take a look at the town. I want to find something to eat, but other than that I don’t have any plans. You?”
“I’m going to shower first. I’ve got to get rid of some of this dust. Then I’ll find something to eat, I’m not real picky about that, but I want to find a drink.”
Sacket lifted one brow. “I take it you don’t mean water?”
“No,” Savage said with a scoff. “I need something a little stronger tonight. I’m not sure what I’ll end up with, but I’ll find somewhere to get a drink.”
“Let me know if you want someone to drink with. Or if you find a place with a pool table and are up for a game or two.”
Savage nodded. He watched as his friend turned and went back to the row where they’d parked their bike, the SUV the women had been using on one end and the truck the prospects had driven on the other. After a moment, he realized he’d zoned out standing there watching where most of the bikes still sat lined up. He shook his head, trying to jar loose whatever he’d been thinking then headed for his room. A shower would help.
S avage tipped back the bottle and took a long pull, then looked around the room. Not for the first time, he found it lacking. He hadn’t wanted to go too far, because he didn’t like to ride after he’d had more than a single drink, but this place was dim and dingy, more than the typical bar. And he didn’t see a dart board, pool table or anything to distract a person. He guessed that the people who came here were into serious drinking, and while he didn’t mind doing that occasionally, it wasn’t what he was looking for tonight.
That was the real question. What was he looking for? Obviously not this. He finished his beer and set the empty on the counter before giving the bartender a nod and leaving.
He’d found a place only a couple of blocks from the motel, now he didn’t feel like going back, not yet, though maybe when he was ready to go back, he’d find somewhere to pick up a sixpack and take it back. Maybe Sackett would be up for a couple of drinks. For now, he was going to check out the area on foot and see at least a little bit of the town, and in a state where he’d never been.
By the time he made it back to his room, it was maybe nine and he was tired. Three days on the back of a bike all day was more exhausting than you would realize. Because they only had a couple of hours left, tomorrow they weren’t leaving until later, which was good. Savage needed to get some exercise in, though he wasn’t sure the motel where they were staying had a gym.
With a shrug he let himself into the room he shared with Sackett. He’d figure it out.
“Hey, I take it you didn’t find a pool table?” Sackett asked from where he lay back on one bed, wearing just his jeans. He had one arm tucked behind his head while the other hand held a remote aimed at the TV.
“Nah, all I found was a local drinking hole, didn’t even have darts. Anything change while I was gone?”
Sackett shook his head. “Not that I know of. You ready to crash? I can turn this off. I have a book if you’d rather quiet.”
Savage couldn’t help but smile at the reminder of how his roommate had gotten his nickname. “Nah, it’s fine. You want one of these?” He lifted the bag with the sixpack of longnecks.
“Sure.” Sackett pushed himself up, so he was more upright on the bed. “Bar must have been bad if you’d rather come back and drink here.”
Savage handed his brother one of the bottles, pulled a second for himself then put the rest in the dorm size fridge in the cabinet under the TV. He used one of his rings to pop the top off the bottle, tossing the lid in the trash and taking a long pull as he made his way to the single chair in the room. He unlaced his boots and toed them off before setting them aside, flexing his toes and closing his eyes at just how good that felt. He had his boots good and broke in, but sometimes getting out of them was the most amazing thing he could think of. Well, almost.
Standing, he stretched then picked up his bottle and carried it to his bed. “What you watching?”
“Nothing. I can’t find anything that catches my interest for more than a few minutes.” Sackett held the remote in his direction. “You want to try?”
Savage shook his head. “I don’t care that much, just thought you might have found something entertaining.”
“If you’re just looking for noise, I can put it on one of the news channels,” Sackett offered.
“No thanks. I know enough about the horrific things happening all over the world. I want to enjoy this trip, so I’m swearing off the news for the whole thing. It will make it easier to enjoy my time away. I’ll have time to catch up on the latest atrocities when we get home.”
“I hadn’t put it in so many words, at least not consciously, but I feel the same way. So no news. Anything else sound entertaining?” He flipped the TV to the guide channel, and they listened to the local weather while they watched the current programming scroll across the bottom half of the screen.
They ended up listening to that for a while then putting it on a rerun of a basketball game, Savage didn’t really care about basketball, but it was easy enough to follow and distracting enough to keep him from staring at the ceiling wondering what could go wrong next.
H e woke early the next morning, and unable to roll over and go back to sleep, he’d tried, he got up, pulled on a pair of sweats, and dug out his headphones. He would see if this place had a gym, and if not, he could at least get a run in.
Stepping out of the room, he shivered. It was colder outside than he’d been expecting. It had been months since it had been this cool in Tucson, even first thing in the morning. All the more reason for him to get moving and warm himself up.
A quick check in at the office confirmed what he’d feared, no gym. Well, that wasn’t entirely right there was one but when he checked it out their idea of a gym was two treadmills and an elliptical machine. He’d rather run outside. So he went back out, turned on the music on his phone, adjusted his headset and set out.
He’d gone three miles and was working his way back toward the hotel when he spotted what looked like a bundle of rags huddled on a bench. He hated seeing the homeless out like this, he hated that they didn’t have somewhere warm to sleep, a shelter to keep the rain off, but he was one person, what could he do?
Savage continued running, keeping an eye on the bundle of rags, as he got closer, he noticed it was a woman, young, innocent looking but different from most of the homeless he’d encountered. Not that there was a huge number of them around here but still, there was something different about her. As she stood and stretched, as if working out some of the stiffness of sleep, he noticed she wasn’t wearing the multiple layers of clothing that most were.
She seemed to be dressed in a simple long sleeve blouse and ankle length skirt, not even a jacket. That made him take a closer look at her face. She looked tired but not in the same way that he’d come to expect from what he’d originally taken her as. With no jacket last night, she had to have frozen. Well, maybe not literally, it wasn’t that cold, but it was too cold to sleep comfortably without more than what she wore.
Savage shook his head and continued running. A check of his watch said he hadn’t gone quite as far as he wanted so he circled the block. On his second trip, he noticed the girl who’d been laying on the bench looking around as if she was afraid she was being watched. That made him pause. As he approached, he slowed, then turned off his music as he stopped.
“Excuse me, I couldn’t help but notice you. Are you okay?” Savage said, pulling one headphone from his ear so he could hear better.
“I—I don’t know.” Her eyes went wide, and she looked like she would run off at any minute. “Where did you come from?”
One corner of Savage’s mouth quirked. “Well, just now I went around the block but before that I was coming from back that way.” He jerked his thumb in the direction he’d come from. “But the motel where we spent the night last night is about a block and a half that way.” He motioned to the road in front of him.
“Motel? You’re not from around here?” her voice trembled, and her gaze flicked around them again. She used one shaking hand to move a strand of hair hanging in her face and tuck it behind her ear.
“No.” He kept his voice gentle and tried to keep from making any sudden moves so as not to frighten her, but he glanced around too, wondering if she was seeing something or if she was just looking for it. “We’re just passing through, we came in last night, we’ll continue north in a few hours.”
“We?”
“Yeah, me and some brothers, a few others.” He didn’t want to tell her that it was his brother’s wives, she didn’t need that much information. “We’re going to visit another brother, then we’ll head home.”
“Where’s home?” The longer they talked the less frightened she seemed. Had she thought he was with whoever she was watching for?
“Arizona. How about you, are you from Casper?”
She glanced around again as she shook her head. “I came in last night on the bus, then realized I didn’t have enough money for somewhere to stay. I barely had enough to get something to eat.” She glanced around again. “I wanted to get farther, but I guess this will have to do. Do you happen to know where a shelter is?”
The idea of this woman, a woman who seemed so fresh and innocent going to a shelter, or even needing a shelter, made him ache to hit someone.
“I have no idea. Like I said, I’m just passing through.” He hesitated, wondered what the others would say then thought to hell with it and said what he was thinking anyway. “We’re leaving town in a couple hours like I said, but you could come with me. We’re not going too far, at least for now, and if you decide you’d rather find a shelter, I’ll help you find one. Now or later. We’ll be headed south in a couple of weeks. You can come with us to Arizona, or we can find somewhere you’ll feel safe.” He hurried to get the words out, sensing that there was some reason she seemed so nervous. He wanted to help her. He needed to make sure she was safe.
Savage didn’t question that instinct. He’d long ago learned to trust it. Now, he had to figure out how.