35. Rosie
Ispend the entire flight trying not to giggle and flirt with Holden like a teenager with a crush on her best friend’s older brother. A side of him I’ve never seen has come out. He’s pinching my waist, interlacing his fingers with mine, and not letting me get even twenty feet away from him. He’s smiling more, smiling at me.
Sex is something I’ve never considered being powerful enough to make me fall so hard for someone, but last night’s rendezvous, along with this morning’s steamy shower, where he got on his knees for me again, has my head spinning. The orgasms, combined with this tender, protective side of him, is about to turn my uterus inside out.
“Are you hungry?” he asks as we exit our flight and start following signs for the rental cars.
“I could eat. We should find some good sushi.”
His hand cups my lower back, guiding me around a group of men in jerseys. A few of them glance in my direction before seeing Holden’s expression and quickly looking away.
I shall never emotionally recover from this.
I bite my lip, wondering if he’ll take us straight to the hotel or to meet his contact first. My mind is already swirling with more positions to try, debating if he’ll be willing to bend my body around while it’s not fully healed yet. My lower half is slightly sore from last night and this morning, but it feels strangely good.
My eyes flash up to observe his profile, and I admire the stubble on his jawline he didn’t shave this morning. I ache to feel it against the skin of my inner thighs again. In the background, an image catches my eye. My stomach knots as it comes into focus.
It’s my face, plastered on a large TV screen in a hotel bar. Next to it is an older picture of my mother, from before she was drinking vodka around noon every day. I stop dead in my tracks, a swirl of nausea building inside me. Holden’s head swivels to follow my gaze. My heart pounds, my blood turning to ice. His grip on my hand tightens as we both stare at the closed captions on the screen.
A former Texas beauty queen was found alive today, after being held against her will for nearly three weeks at an undisclosed location near the small town of La Pradera, Texas. Evidence that her twenty-one-year-old daughter, Rosie Dixon, had been held captive in the same location for some amount of time was found at the scene. The woman who was found, Sheri Dixon, says she never saw her daughter, but she heard her screams sometime during her captivity.
At this time, Rosie Dixon is still missing.
She is the daughter of the mayor of La Pradera, Clay Dixon. Mayor Dixon and local authorities have started a nationwide manhunt in search of the victim’s employer. As it turns out, Holden Redford is a formerly convicted felon who was just released from prison less than three months ago. Redford was behind bars for killing a close relative of the victim, Cain Dixon, and was recently pardoned by the governor of Texas for the crime, although many believe the ruling was unlawful.
My throat constricts as Holden’s mugshot fills the large screen. I’ve seen the photo countless times, but somehow, it looks harsher and crueler than I remember.
With his cowboy hat and facial hair, he looks considerably different from the image where his hair is cropped short and his black-brown eyes hold no remorse. Judging by the casual faces of the people around us, no one seems to recognize us. They’re not paying attention to the screen. The photo they used of me is an old high school one from my senior yearbook headshots.
My body feels numb as Holden tugs on my arm, ushering me into a gift shop with racks of clothing. My vision goes blurry as I watch him grab a gray hoodie off of a rack and take it to the salesclerk, pulling me behind him and keeping his body directly in front of me. He grabs a pay-by-minute phone at the register and adds it to the purchase.
The clerk rings him up, and he pays for the items with cash. He turns to face me, ripping the tag off the hoodie as he holds it out for me to put on. I comply, my body suddenly growing weak and sluggish.
“I think I might faint.” I stare down at my off-white sneakers, still stained from the dirt at Redford Ranch.
Holden pulls the hood up over my head. He leans down, wrapping me in an embrace and directing me toward the exit.
His warm breath is on my ear, his lips brushing my skin. “You have to make it to the car, Rosie. Make it to the car, and we’ll figure this out. Lean against me.”
His arm cradles my shoulder, tucking me into his chest as we walk through the crowd of travelers. His cowboy hat draws attention, considering this is the northwestern United States and most of the men around here wear skinny jeans and loafers without socks. Holden’s strut is confident, and the stares seem to mostly be from women who haven’t seen a real cowboy their entire lives unless it was in a movie.
If they’re looking at him, hopefully they’re not looking at the TV right now …
We finally get to the rental car place and check in. My head swims, my thoughts swirling in a hazy scramble before we finally get the keys. Holden’s Southern drawl makes the desk clerk giggle. I’m grateful that he seems to have it all together, or I truly would collapse on the scuffed linoleum floor.
He guides me out to our car, which is a Chevy Malibu. Apparently, it’s the last vehicle available that’s not run on electric at Portland International Airport.
He opens my door for me before storing the bags in the trunk and climbing into the driver’s side.
“Thank fuck for tinted windows.” He starts the car and peels out of the parking space.
He pulls the phone out of the bag, handing it to me. “Can you put the SIM card in?”
My fingers are trembling, but I slowly attempt to complete the task.
“Why are they saying you kidnapped me? Who found my mother? What the fuck is going on?” I attempt to roll the window down to get some fresh air, but the child lock is on.
Holden does it for me from his side. Immediate relief floods through me when the clean air reaches my lungs. After a few seconds, rain starts to sprinkle in with the cold air.
“I have to get Jed’s phone to the man who can go through the deleted files to prove that I had nothing to do with yours or your mother’s disappearances. Once you have the SIM card in that one, we’ll call Cash and see if he’s heard anything.”
I release a shaking breath as I power on the phone and hand it over to him. He dials the number and puts it on speakerphone.
“Hello?” Cash says.
“I just saw my mugshot on an airport bar TV in Portland.” Holden glances in the rearview mirror before merging onto the highway.
“Yeah, I told you I’m not interested in selling it. That bike is one of a kind.”
Judging by his casual tone and his words, Cash isn’t alone. I look over at Holden, who clenches his teeth.
Who’s there? The sheriff? Why can’t we just tell them I was found and Holden rescued me?
“We’re going to meet Warner’s contact as planned. I’m gonna need you to get away and call me on this number. If you get arrested, give it to Warner and have him call me.”
“Yeah, man, if I hear of anything similar for sale, I’ll be sure to let you know. I gotta go. Bye.” Cash hangs up.
“Fuck!” Holden slams his hand against the steering wheel.
I jump, my body tensing. “I don’t understand. Why can’t I just go home and tell them I’m safe? You didn’t do this.”
He shakes his head, jaw clenching. “You don’t get it. They’re framing me. They’re setting me up for it, just like they did with Cain. What you say won’t matter. I’ll still go back to prison.”
A thousand possibilities and unanswered questions fly through my mind. “But … you did kill Cain? You were doing it in self-defense to protect Dolly, but the gun was …” I trail off.
He waits for me to continue, only speaking after a minute of tense silence.
“The gun I used was legal. Cain raised his to shoot me. When he started to point it at Dolly was when I fired and killed him with a shot to the head. I could have gotten off because it was self-defense. The bullet that was supposedly in his skull was actually planted in the evidence room by someone. It wasn’t mine. When they came to collect his body, your father had my bullet removed somehow and replaced it with one from an illegal, unregistered gun. He had someone falsify the evidence and plant a stolen weapon on my ranch, which is why the judge ruled that I had to serve time for it. I killed him with an illegal weapon, according to the evidence. False evidence.”
This can’t be true. Why? Why would my father … or anyone want to do that?
Holden’s voice is calm. “My killing Cain and getting away with it wasn’t on the table for your father. If I’d known how far he was going to take planting evidence, I could’ve prevented it. By the time we realized what he’d done, it was too late. There was no way to prove myself innocent.”
Is he lying to me? Would my father really do something like this? Plant evidence?
My chin starts to quiver as I stare out the window. Dark clouds have begun gathering in the sky. Thunder rolls in the distance, and steady raindrops pelt the windshield. My window is still open, but I don’t roll it up. I release a shaky exhale.
“So, you’re saying my father is framing you for my and my mother’s kidnapping … to send you back to prison?”
His silence is the only answer I need as bile rises in my throat. Instead of throwing up all over the carpeted floor of the rental car, I lean my head out the window and vomit. Holden pulls the car over on the shoulder as I retch out the airport breakfast we had a few hours ago. Cold raindrops wet my hair.
By the time my stomach is emptied, I realize his hand is on my lower back. I pull myself back into the car, taking the napkin he must’ve found in the console.
“We don’t know anything for sure yet. That’s why we’re playing it safe and taking Jed’s phone to someone who can help. Do you believe you’re safe with me?”
The tears on my cheeks have mixed in with rain as I peer up at him. I’ve never seen such a look of concern and fear mixed into one expression. His eyes are dark and soft at the same time.
“Whoever was behind this, we will find them out. Your mother is safe now. You are safe now. All that matters is doing whatever it takes to keep it that way.”
The determination in his gaze helps to ease the ache in my chest slightly. I slowly nod. He rolls up my window before pulling back into the traffic on the highway.
Holden calls his lawyer and updates him on the situation. I can’t hear Warner’s side of the conversation, but I do know Holden seems determined to keep me away from La Pradera until whoever the hacker is can break into the deleted files on the phone.
The feeling I can’t seem to shake the farther we drive into the pouring rain is that I want my aunt and my mother to know I’m safe.
Surely, there’s a way to notify them that I’m okay even if we don’t go back home and turn ourselves in.