Chapter 8
Eight
The gravel crunches under my truck's tires as we approach the cabin. I park a short distance away, scan the tree line, then cut the engine.
"Wait here," I tell Naomi. "I won't be long."
Her eyes lock onto mine. "What are you doing?"
"Just getting some supplies."
"I can help."
I shake my head. "I have this. Trust me." It’s the second time I’ve asked her to do that, and I didn’t mean it in any significant way.
But the half beat of silence that follows it and the look in her eyes tells me that I just told her a far more meaningful thing.
Because of that, her simple nod after it speaks volumes.
I move quickly through the door, muscle memory guiding me in the dim interior. I've had this plan ever since I built this place.
I grab my go-bag from under the bed. I collect additional weapons from various hiding spots: two handguns and ammunition from behind loose floorboards, a combat knife tucked beneath the kitchen counter.
In the bathroom, I grab basic supplies and medications.
I clock myself in the mirror. My face and hands are covered in blood.
I hoped they wouldn’t be again. I promised myself they wouldn’t be.
But I don’t feel as bad as I thought I would.
It didn’t feel like I was making a mistake.
It was the right choice. The only choice.
I quickly wash what blood I can from my skin.
After collecting the supplies by the door, I pour lamp oil across the floor, over the furniture, and splash it up on the walls. I pull out my lighter, flick it open, and drop it without hesitation. Built with my own hands and destroyed by the same.
I watch the flames leap hungrily across the wooden floor and lick at the walls. The heat pushes me back through the door, and I don't look back as I stride to the vehicle.
I feel Naomi's eyes on me through the window as I walk toward my truck, the light of flames framing me and its heat warming my back.
I'm positive this only adds to the mystery I've become for her. How I killed that bear. Took out those men. And now laying waste to what she believes is my home. I’ve spent our entire time together analyzing her, and now she's rushing to catch up, reframing everything she thinks she knows about the hunter she took hostage.
I haul everything to the truck and toss duffel bags of all the supplies I’ve collected into the truck bed. I pull off the license plates and replace the ones I've used for the last couple of years with fake ones.
I walk to my cabin, which is now fully engulfed in flames, and toss the old plates into the fire to melt.
I feel nothing for the cabin as I watch it burn.
I’m simply erasing Walker Cole from existence.
Again.
But I am feeling things I haven't felt in a long time. Feelings I thought I never would again. I feel alive in a way I never thought I would again.
And it has nothing to do with what I'm leaving behind. And everything to do with the person sitting in the truck, watching me.
I say nothing as I slide into the driver's seat.
We pull away, the orange glow receding as smoke billows into the gray sky.
Naomi sits silently beside me, her beautiful profile lit by fading firelight. I can feel her studying me, recategorizing everything she thought she knew. The quiet hunter with the sad eyes is something else entirely.
I keep my eyes on the road ahead, focused on putting distance between us and what I've just destroyed. My hands grip the steering wheel, steady despite everything. There’s a long stretch of silence before she says, “You burned down your home for me.”
"It wasn't a home.”
"But why?" Her voice is quiet but firm. "Why sacrifice so much for someone you don't know?"
I meet her eyes. "Because you're innocent." I don’t know the whole story. I don’t know all that much about her. But I know that’s true.
It also doesn’t feel like much of a sacrifice. But I don’t think she’ll believe me.
She looks out her window. "You can't know that."
"I know killers," I say simply. "You're not one."
The silence stretches between us, heavy with unspoken questions. I don’t know her whole story. And she has nothing but more questions regarding mine.
Ipull into the motel parking lot, choosing a spot near the back, away from the office and street view. Naomi and I have been quiet for the rest of the ride, lost in thought or too exhausted to talk. Maybe both.
"Wait here," I say, climbing out. "I'll get us a room."
The night clerk barely looks up from his phone when I enter, just slides a registration card across the counter. I fill it out with practiced ease—false name, false address, false everything.
Pay cash. Decline the receipt.
Two key cards later, I'm back at the truck. Naomi hasn't moved, but her eyes are active and scanning for threats.
"Room 118," I tell her.
She follows me silently, staying close as we approach the door. I scan the lot one more time before unlocking it. Her orange pants are dirty enough that they aren't as loud as they would be if they were clean, but it's best to keep her from being seen until she can change.
The room is exactly what I expected from the state of the place outside—worn carpet, faded landscape prints, a bedspread that's seen better decades. But it’s better than a cold, wet forest or a prison cell, and it’s the kind of place that doesn’t want to know the people inside its walls.
Naomi steps inside. I lock the door behind us, engage the security chain, and draw the blackout curtains. We move together, carefully but quickly and in sync, like we've been doing this for years.
"You should shower," I say, dropping my bag on the chair by the window. “I'll get you some clothes. Food too. After that, you should rest. We've got a long way to go tomorrow."
"Where?" she asks.
"Away from here. We have to keep moving." I move toward the door. "Lock this behind me. Don't answer for anyone but me. Three knocks, pause, then two more."
She turns to me then and really looks at me for the first time since we left the burning cabin. In the dark, mundane quiet of the hotel room, her prison uniform, the dirt, the exhaustion, and everything that's happened between us in the past day or so come into stark focus.
"Walker.” She says my name like it isn’t new to her. Like she’s been saying it for years. "Thank you."
I nod once. I want to tell her she doesn’t have to thank me. But then I risk admitting to her just how far I would go to help her. And I’m not sure I even know myself. Instead, I say, “I won't be long.”
The door closes behind me, and I hear the lock click into place.
I arrive at the local department store twenty minutes later. I push my cart through the nearly empty aisles, grabbing essentials. Another cheap duffel for her since I wasn't planning to have company when I left. Next are women's clothes.
My hands hesitate over the rack of women's underwear.
I grab a pack, toss it in quickly like it might burn me, then do the same with some bras.
Been a while since I've touched anything like that.
Been even longer since I've thought about a woman wearing it. I should have asked her sizes. I’m just guessing.
Some super soldier I am. I can kill, survive. Plan. Execute. But I don’t think I could have asked her what size panties or bra she wears.
I should go away. Leave her the truck, disappear into the night. That's what survival instinct tells me. But something won't let me.
My fingers brush across a soft cotton T-shirt. I try to focus on practicality. Size. Durability. Not how it might look on her.
And I fail miserably. I want it to hug her curves. I want to dress her and strip her and hug them myself.
She asked why I was helping her. My answer didn’t feel like a lie.
And it isn’t. But she’s right to question it.
Here, in the harsh fluorescent light of the store, I don’t understand it myself.
What the hell am I doing? Risking everything for a woman I barely know.
A prison escapee with people hunting her—people willing to kill to get her back. People who'll now try to kill me, too.
I grab jeans, a hoodie, and socks. Also, some yoga pants. Not because they’ll look amazing sculpted to her perfect hips, ass, and legs. But because it’s what’s normal fashion nowadays.
I move on to food. Toss in some granola bars. Jerky. Water bottles. Toiletries are next. A razor to shave that exquisite body. If she wants to.
I pay cash, keeping my head down so my cowboy hat covers my face. The cashier barely looks at me.
When I get back to the motel room, I knock the rhythm I told Naomi to listen for. After a moment, the chain moves and the door opens. I mean to move inside quickly, but I can’t when I see what’s in front of me.
Naomi stands there, wrapped only in a cheap white motel towel.
Her hair's still damp, curling slightly at the ends. Steam escapes the bathroom behind her. Her skin is flushed pink, scrubbed clean, glowing in the dim light. She is no longer the primal goddess in moonlight. She’s the transcendent angel in sunlight. Clean. Pure. An absolute vision.
My throat goes dry. Naomi looks confused for a moment and then steps aside so I can enter. I recover what sense I can and step inside quickly, closing the door behind me. I take a moment before I turn again.
"You okay?" she asks, looking at my face.
I nod, not trusting my voice yet. Set the bags down on the bed. "Got you some things,” I grunt out.
She sifts through them, pulling out items one by one. The simple, practical clothes I've chosen suddenly seem inadequate. Should've gotten something nicer. Something worthy of her.
"These are great," she says, pulling out the clothing I got her. Including the tight yoga pants and panties. "Thank you."
I clear my throat. "I'm going to shower now. I was all right having a stink when we were both a little ripe, but now that you're clean, I think I'll join you."
That earns me the whisper of a smile. Just a slight curve of her lips, but it hits me square in the chest. Makes me want to see the whole thing again—a real smile, one that lights up fully those pretty blue-gray eyes.
"I hope there's hot water left," she says, clutching the clothes to her chest. “No telling in a place like this. I just needed a long, hot shower to feel clean, you know?”
“Yeah,” I say. Though I don’t know what it would feel like to feel clean. Haven’t in a long time. I grab my bag and head for the bathroom. Given the way she heats my blood, I need a cold shower anyway.
The water cascades over my shoulders, washing away days of grime, sweat, and the blood underneath my clothing that I missed. I do keep it hot, not to feel clean but so it stings, a small penance for sins too numerous to count.
The image of Naomi in that thin motel towel floods my mind—the way it clung to her damp skin and how her hair curled against her neck, still wet from her shower.
The knowledge that she was naked underneath, nothing but cheap cotton between her and the open air.
My dick stirs to life, hardening against my will.
I imagine her putting on the panties I bought her. Sliding them up her legs and covering parts I can’t handle envisioning being inside.
Then I imagine pulling them back off with my strong hands.
"Fuck," I mutter, resting my forehead against the cool tile.
What the hell's wrong with me? She's at least ten years younger than I am. She's scared, vulnerable, running for her life. I'm supposed to be helping her, not fantasizing like some teenager who's never seen a woman before.
I try to focus on something else, anything else, but my mind keeps returning to her eyes. Those eyes that somehow reach out and grab something inside me that I thought died years ago.
My hand slides down, almost of its own accord. I wrap my fingers around myself, stroking slowly. The pleasure is immediate, electric. I close my eyes, and there she is. Naomi. The towel slipping from her chest. Her skin glistening under the dim motel lights.
I work myself faster, biting my lip to stay quiet.
The thin motel walls won't hide much. The water drowns out most sounds, but I'm not taking any chances.
I imagine her mouth on mine, her hands replacing my own.
I imagine the warmth and wet of the water is her pussy.
I fuck the stream and my hand. The fantasy builds quickly, and I come with a strangled groan, leaning hard against the wall as my legs go weak.
As the evidence of my shame spirals down the drain, reality crashes back. I’ve just jerked off thinking about a woman I barely know. A woman who held me at gunpoint. A woman I torched my life for.
Wrath is the sin I’m used to. He’s been my companion.
Lust is a brand-new one on me.
The hell of it is, I'm not even that mad at myself.
Something is almost reassuring about the whole pathetic episode.
I've spent years feeling like a husk, the empty shell of something that used to live and breathe.
But this? This feels human. Normal, even.
Naomi makes me feel like a man again, not just the weapon I was forged into.
Maybe that's why I'm helping her. Not just because I believe she's innocent, though I do. But because she makes me feel something beyond the dull ache of guilt that's been my shepherd.
And I feel that way because she is something special. She is the most beautiful woman I’ve ever seen, but it’s the way she’s been able to survive that is nothing short of magnificent.
That’s also why I can’t stay. I got her clothes. I got her supplies. I got her to safety. But tonight, I'll slip out. Leave her the truck and weapons. She'll be better off without me. I can trick myself into thinking the lives that I took today were for a good cause. Saving myself. Saving Naomi.
But it’s always a trick.
Every life I took was always covered by the lie that it was for the greater good.
But death is my currency. It is the air I breathe and what I cloak myself in. If I'm with her, I'll simply be a danger to her.
And if I start caring about her, that may be even worse.
I open the bathroom door, steam billowing around me. The cooler air of the room raises goose bumps across my chest. I'm about to say something—maybe turn on the TV to see if the news has anything to say about us—when I freeze.
Naomi sits on one of the motel chairs, dressed in yoga pants and a T-shirt. That’s distracting enough. But it’s the Glock in her hands that really has my attention. "We need to talk."