Chapter Sixteen
S unlight shot through the windshield, brightening the motorhome.
Aiden kept his eyes closed, cocooned on the pull-out next to Georgia.
He didn’t remember falling asleep, only that he’d left the lodge still damp from a lukewarm shower.
He rewound last night like a cassette, catching moments in slow motion.
Sitting in the booth while Shay wrapped a bandage around his thigh, opening the door to the RV, masking a limp in the crowded living room, gripping Shay’s hand on the stairs, soaking wet, arching his back with Shay buried inside him, tasting coins and salt, perched on the vanity, gasping and moaning, saying come inside me like a two-bit whore?—
Jesus, fuck. Okay, so. Ecstasy? Great. Also, not great. The fang-prints on his thigh stung, his hips ached, and his heartbeat sledgehammered behind his eyes. Exhaustion sank bone deep. Party induced. Drug induced. Sex induced, too.
He dug around under the pillow for his phone.
Aiden Moore: don’t take this the wrong way but when’s the last time you got tested?
A phone dinged in the bedroom. Pru cracked an energy drink and drummed her hands on the steering wheel.
Shay Bennett: Two months ago. You?
Aiden Moore: when i was in the hospital. i’m clean. few hookups after but nothing serious
Shay Bennett: I am too. Caught something right after I signed with Chain and got it cleared up. No big deal.
Shay Bennett: You oaky?
Aiden pushed his thighs together.
Aiden Moore: little sore but i’m fine. you?
Shay Bennett: just fine?
Aiden Moore: you’re not the first person to fuck me on a sink. don’t get cocky
Muffled laughter, the sleepy, cute kind, sounded beyond the fold-out door.
Shay Bennett: We still need to talk, Aiden. Especially now
Aiden Moore: yeah, i hear you. you go first.
Shay Bennett: We’re not doing this over text you idiot
Aiden huffed at his phone.
“Someone awake over there?” Pru asked .
He slid his legs over the edge of the couch-mattress and raked his fingers through his mussed hair. “Mornin’.”
“Oh, you. . . Hi. It’s afternoon, actually,” she corrected, and gestured to the empty passenger’s seat. “Keep me company?”
“Yeah, give me a sec,” he mumbled.
In the cramped bathroom, Aiden splashed water on his face, peeked at the broken capillaries under his bandages, and brushed his teeth.
Remembering last night felt like remembering a dream.
How vulnerability had poured through Shay, onyx-eyed and on his knees.
How they’d clung to each other, tried to devour each other, turned wild and savage with each other.
He spit, wiped his mouth, and stumbled through the cabin, falling into the seat next to Pru.
Sherlock sunned on the dashboard next to burger wrappers and salsa packets. Aiden propped his feet on the dash, scratching the ferret with his big toe. “Where are we?” he asked, staring at golden desert shriveled by another overbearing summer.
“The Extraterrestrial Highway,” Pru said. She pushed at her heart-shaped sunglasses. “You doin’ okay? Found some bandages on the counter last night. There was a, uh, thoroughly squeezed antiseptic tube in the trash, too.”
Well, shit. Aiden chewed on the inside of his cheek. “Yeah, no, I’m fine. Just cut myself shaving.”
“You say that a lot. I’m fine . It’s noticeable.”
“Is this the part where you tell me you’re here if I ever need to talk? If so, just save it.”
“It’s physically impossible for me to care any less about your attitude problem,” she said, and laid her arm against the window, guiding the steering wheel with tattooed fingers.
“So, no, I’m not here if you need to talk .
I’m a college drop-out who took a semi-decent-paying job.
That job is to get Knight’s Blood from one venue to the next and make sure none of you die on the way.
I’m loyal to exactly zero people in this RV. La verdad—now.”
“Ay Dios mío. Look, the truth’s a little complicated, okay?
A lot complicated,” he said, inhaling a long, drawn out breath.
“I’m fine, though. I’m good . For once, seriously.
I don’t know why I’m explaining myself to you, but.
. .” He shrugged, squinting at an oasis in the distance. “It’s not a big deal.”
“Okay, I tried,” she said, blunt as stone, and reached into the slim space between the door and the driver’s seat. The hunting knife looked too big in her hand, too long and dirty, still caked with dried blood and disturbed earth. “La verdad, Aiden. Now .”
Aiden’s stomach kicked into his throat. Lungs spasmed, white spots swarmed his vision, and panic forced adrenaline into every tired limb.
He snatched her wrist. “Let go,” he growled, voice hushed.
She gripped tighter, stubbornly strong. He remembered years ago, fourteen and furious, chasing Camila through the house after she’d stolen his iPhone.
He’d peeled her fingers backward until she’d relented, so he did the same to Pru.
She let go and steadied the steering wheel.
He jammed the knife beneath his shirt, blade flattened against his belly.
“What the fuck is that for?” Pru hissed, tearing her sunglasses off to meet his eyes.
He glanced at the pull-out. Georgia snored faintly, nestled in the blankets with a pillow over her head. “You went through my shit,” he said, teeth grinding.
“Yeah, to make sure you weren’t swallowing pain-killers like breath mints. Seriously, man, a pocketknife I could get behind, but that’s some serial killer shit.”
“It’s just a knife,” he said, exasperated.
“Me estás tomando el pelo,” Pru said, knuckles white around the steering wheel. “It’s the size of my forearm?— ”
“We’re traveling across the country in a beat-to-shit RV.” He gestured wildly at the windshield. “I thought we could use a little protection.”
“Explain the blood,” she said, feigning calmness.
“It’s not blood.” Memories flash-banged inside him.
Slippery knuckles. Shay saying his name— Aiden —like please , like wait .
“I dropped it,” he said, scraping the lie from the roof of his mouth.
“In a. . . a gutter right after I bought it. I never…” Shay smiling against his mouth, lulled by ketamine.
“I never got the chance to clean it, you know. But it’s not—it’s just. .
.” He scrubbed at his watery eyes. “It’s there in case of emergencies. ”
Pru shot him a suspicious, sorry look.
He turned the window crank. Hot air whistled into the motorhome, pushing against his face, scented like somewhere new.
“Are you sure you’re fine?” she asked, cautiously.
He inhaled the grainy desert and stood. It should’ve been me. “Don’t go through my shit again,” he whispered, and stashed the knife in his backpack, slouched carelessly against the window atop the booth-table, still carrying dust from the Ocean Grove trailhead on its straps.
A quirky cartoon UFO topped the Welcome to Roswell road sign, backdropped by the same dry, yellow desert they’d driven through for hours.
Little green men flashed peace signs in shopfront windows, murals of unidentified flying objects covered abandoned buildings, and balloons with owlish eyes floated above car dealerships.
Even their motel, operating on the outskirts of town near the alleged UFO crash site, had its own weather-worn alien statue standing in front of the lobby.
After a competitive round of rock-paper-scissors, Georgia and Pru won the suite with a bathtub, leaving Aiden and Shay the smaller, second-floor room.
Dylan stayed in the motorhome with Sherlock, staking his claim on the tub for at least one hour.
They unpacked at sundown and slinked to the 24-Hour diner on the other side of the parking lot.
“Can’t avoid me forever,” Shay said, holding the door open.
Aiden slipped past him. “I’m not avoiding you.”
“You stood in the hall and threw your backpack into our room. Literally, like, threw it.”
“Yeah, and. . . ?”
“Aiden, c’mon.”
He tipped his head toward the booth where Dylan, Georgia, and Pru picked at onion rings.
For ten years, he’d wanted Shay—so much he’d plunged a blade into his stomach, so much he’d begged the devil for mercy.
Actively avoiding him hadn’t been the plan, but how did they go back to being who they’d been after doing what they’d done?
“Yo,” Georgia said. She slid a menu across the table. “How’s the room?”
“Small, ugly, smells like a retirement home,” Aiden said. He sighed, scooting into the booth next to Dylan. “What’s everyone getting?”
Dylan scratched his chin. “Pancakes.”
“Chicken and waffles,” Pru said.
Georgia hummed, tapping her chipped black fingernail on the tabletop. “Can’t go wrong with a diner burger.”
“Yeah, true.” Aiden scanned the menu. Tried to focus on italicized, alien-themed items and faded Comic Sans.
His thoughts raced. Shay, recording new music, Cassandra’s body in the parking garage, Thomas, tarot readings, fangs in his throat, power, teeth on his thigh, a tour, finally, a real tour.
What is he? What are we? How do I become like him?
He closed the menu and cleared his throat. “So, what’re we doin’ tomorrow?”
“You’ve got studio time from nine to two-thirty. After that, stay tuned for track edits.” Pru sipped from a steaming mug. “I, for one, will be going to the alien museum. I should find a groomer, too. Sherlock needs his nails trimmed.”
“Count me in for the alien museum.” Georgia grinned, shimmying her shoulders. “You guys down for some band bonding time?”
“Do they have real aliens?” Dylan asked, seriously.
“Yes,” Georgia said, at the same time Pru snorted and said, “No.”
Shay hesitated, but eventually nodded. “Sounds good. We’re here for two nights, yeah?”
Pru nodded. “We head to Austin the day after tomorrow.”
“Think Jacob’ll let us drop the new single at the next show?” Aiden asked.
Dylan shrugged. “I don’t see why not.”