Chapter Eight
It was remarkable how the human mind responded to tragedy in unpredictable ways.
Despite the severity of Leo's death, Margo’s focus had transitioned from reflecting on his loss to addressing her own need for survival.
Given that he’d demonstrated little care for her during his life, she found it challenging to feel grief over the loss of his.
Her current situation could be a perfect example of his disregard for her safety.
“How much further?” Margo looked through the side window of Hawkeye’s truck, misty-eyed but holding it in check, refusing to lose control.
She’d been back and forth for the last two hours on whether she’d made the right choice to agree to his terms. Yet, he hadn’t left her room to disagree.
After the fiasco with the man on the street, she wasn’t as high and mighty.
He’d stated firmly that they were going back to Creed’s Creek, the ranch where he worked as a hand in a small town named Fin’s Creek.
“Soon.”
Her mind pondered how she and Hawkeye had reunited on the sidewalk.
Of course, the hug had served a purpose for performance, but what had happened inside her had been anything but pretend.
He’d been so gentle and yet so strong. That hug had offered her strength and stability.
Then the kiss on her forehead. Sweat beaded on her brow even now thinking how good his lips felt on her skin.
How could she despise someone so much and still want him?
No, despise wasn’t the right word. She didn’t hate him.
His Stetson lay between them on the seat and without it he looked…what? Dangerously handsome. Nah. He was handsome with or without it. He had nice, prominent cheekbones and a wide jaw under all the beard.
In fact, he reminded her a little of her last hero, a silver-fox-cowboy-sheriff. There was insta-lust between the rogue hero and the feisty heiress heroine. This wasn’t fiction though. This was true life, and she was on the run.
She had to stay strong.
A thought came to her.
“My neighbor, Mario, will worry about me if I don’t let him know I’m okay. He may even file a missing person’s report,” she said without adding the little detail that Mario would be out of town for a week or two. She wished she would have asked him when he’d be back.
“Boyfriend?”
“No.”
“Then why would he worry? You’re over eighteen and people disappear for a while all the time,” he said briskly.
“You don’t have friends, do you?” Having a conversation with a man who didn’t have feelings exhausted her.
“I’m sure whether I answer yes or no you’ll come up with a smartass remark.” He rolled his shoulder as if it were to ease muscular pain.
“Why can’t I get another cell phone? Even a burner phone?” she huffed. “They wouldn’t be tracked.”
“Miss popularity, do I look like a Target?”
She ran her gaze over him. “Even places like Dollar General have phones these days.”
“Sure, I’ll stop off and let you run in and grab a burner phone so you can make a call. I wouldn’t want any of your friends to worry.”
“Really?” She felt a stitch of excitement.
“No,” he said mockingly. “You have no clue how real-life dangerous situations work.”
“I think you get off on being so offensive,” she snapped.
“Thank God Fin’s Creek is getting closer.”
“Rethinking the situation?” She flipped up her brow.
“Rethinking that you shouldn’t be in the same space as me. I’ll pull over so you can climb into the truck bed. Alone time will do you some good,” he snorted.
“So cute. Do they sell that attitude down at Cowboys-R-Us? Along with that hat and boots? You own a broomstick horse too?”
His mouth thinned. “No, but they do sell glue at every gas station. We could test the strength on your mouth.”
“That’s very offensive,” she stated with indifference.
“Little-miss-innocent, are we?”
She pulled her knees to her chest and kept quiet. Her anxiety was through the roof.
Hawkeye put a new definition on the grumpy term.
Her stomach growled so loudly that he gave her a side-glance. “I’m hungry,” she admitted. “I can get a little anxious, and rude, when I don’t eat.”
He stretched his arm across her, opened the glovebox and took out a candy bar.
He dropped it into her lap. Putting aside her pride, she ripped open the package and chomped down on the chewy caramel and peanuts.
Best candy bar she’d ever eaten. Instantly, she felt better.
“You and I agreed we’d be partners, but so far we’re doing everything your way,” she reminded him.
“You walking away from me back there wasn’t your way? Look where that got you.” Although his words were raw, they weren’t said in his usual rough tone.
“Under the circumstances anyone with an ounce of logic would have said that I did the right thing by walking away from you.”
“You almost got yourself killed,” he grumbled. “And I thought we were past this.”
“Actually, you almost got me killed.” She could feel his steely gaze on the back of her head.
“Nix that. Your boyfriend almost got you killed.”
She then looked at him, refusing the desire to flip him off. “He’s not…err, wasn’t my boyfriend. In fact, you probably knew more about him than I did.”
Hawkeye’s mouth twisted. “Oh, I doubt that.”
The insinuation in his tone set her on edge. “What does that mean?”
His shoulder came up and dropped. “It speaks for itself. Tell me, you never once suspected that Davani wasn’t exactly who you thought he was? Hard to believe a man who was in so many criminals’ pockets didn’t wear it like a red flag.”
She thought back. There were many late-night calls, and times he’d rush off with the excuse that he had an emergency with a client. He also had a habit of disappearing at social gatherings. When she’d ask specific questions, he’d refuse to answer.
And now he was dead.
She never loved Leo, but she had compassion for everyone. One second, he was talking and the next he lay dead covered in his own blood.
This all seemed like a bad dream.
She touched the shirt Hawkeye had loaned her.
Inhaling his scent lingering on the material, she liked the pleasant mixture of the outdoors, pine trees, and rain.
She’d tried to look more put-together and tied it in front, rolling up the sleeves because they hung down past her fingers, but she still swam in the shirt.
Oddly, it was comfortable. The material was buttery, worn, like it was his favorite.
The only clothing she had was what she wore. She guessed at least she wasn’t dead. Silver lining.
He drummed his fingers on the steering wheel in what she thought was his way of processing his own thoughts.
Restless energy. She liked his hands and couldn’t resist looking at his long, wide fingers, remembering the rough calluses on his knuckles.
Short, dark hair covered his forearms and thick, corded veins were like a roadmap from his wrists beneath the T-shirt sleeves.
His biceps were as big as her head and his chest could only be defined as massive.
He wasn’t a gym-rat, no. She imagined him tying rope, wrestling cattle, riding horses… sweat trickling down his torso.
Her pulse quickened. She couldn’t be sure what had attracted her to Leo because in all the time they were together she never felt butterflies.
She didn’t judge a man who got weekly manicures, waxes and had more beauty products than her, but there was something about a man who worked a tough, dangerous job that she found sexy and irresistible.
Not that she found the grumpy cowboy sitting next to her attractive.
A little if she was being honest.
Making the journey further on his body became a temptation that she had to fight tooth and nail. She didn’t want to give him the wrong idea if he caught her staring. Hard to forgive a guy for dumping her personal things into a smelly dumpster.
In the end, they were just things.
“Tell me about Fin’s Creek?” She played with a thread on the shirt, mainly to keep her agitated energy at bay.
“Think of any American, charming, small town. That’s Fin’s Creek.”
“How about Creed’s Creek?”
“You’ll be safe there,” he muttered. He continued to stare straight ahead.
That went well.
Getting an answer from him was like the time she tried without success to pull her own tooth.
She wanted to buy a red dress with frilly lace to wear and knew if she earned her own money her parents would let her get whatever she wanted.
So, she worked on the loose tooth relentlessly.
That little bugger held onto a root for dear life and in the end, she lost it while eating a piece of caramel.
It disappeared down her throat. All that work and no reward.
“Can you expand your answers? A little at least.”
He chuckled. “You like to talk, don’t you?”
“To be perfectly frank, no, but it keeps me grounded.” She shoved the last bite of the candy bar into her mouth.
“I guess I’ve gotten used to silence.”
She blinked. “That sounds very cold and isolated.”
“I’d like to call it critical thinking.”
“Or anti-social,” she quipped. Did she have a right to judge? She would consider herself Miss. Loner.
“Your jabs do not bother me.” He eased deeper into the seat and rolled both his shoulders which led her to believe the muscles of his arm were not completely healed.
“How long were you working for Leo?” She turned slightly to watch his profile.
“I lost count.”
“Really?”
“Yes, really,” he said in a disgruntled voice.
“How will you explain who I am to the other hands? Her ex-boyfriend died in her arms and now she’s being chased by bad guys seems a bit terrorizing, even for rugged cowboys.”
He flicked his gaze at her and his brows knitted. “I haven’t decided yet.”
“Shouldn’t you figure that out being that people are going to ask questions? I’m assuming you don’t live on this ranch alone?”
“No, I live in the bunkhouse with other hands.”
She slanted her gaze. “Are you expecting me to become a resident of the bunkhouse too?”