Chapter 55 #2
We left New Orleans while the sky was slowly turning pink.
For the first hour, I stopped wondering whether Jasper had another reason for leaving and let myself enjoy the absurdity of what we had done.
We had gotten married yesterday, spent our wedding night in a room above a biker bar, and were now running away from our families before breakfast. It was not remotely how I had imagined marriage when I was younger.
Then again, I had never imagined Jasper either.
I curled one leg beneath me and watched Louisiana pass outside the window while my fingers kept finding Granny’s ring.
I had touched it dozens of times since yesterday, almost needing to make sure it was still there.
The metal was worn smooth in places from decades on Granny’s hand.
Her husband had put it there and she had never removed it until she gave it to Jasper.
Now it was mine.
Not mine exactly. Something like that belonged to more than one person, more than one marriage. I wondered whether Granny understood what she had handed me when she slid it from her finger. Of course she did. Granny understood almost everything before the rest of us caught up.
When I looked toward Jasper, his wedding band caught the light on the steering wheel.
I smiled.
He noticed immediately. “What?”
“Nothing.”
“That smile ain’t nothin’.”
I let my eyes drop deliberately to his hand. “I was thinking about my husband.”
His mouth curved. “Handsome bastard?”
“Annoying bastard.”
“You still married him.”
“I was under pressure. There was a priest standing there.”
“A priest my mother practically ambushed us with.”
“That sounds like grounds for an annulment.”
Jasper reached across the console and took my hand. “No refunds on Cajuns, Ma Belle.”
I laughed and laced my fingers through his.
We spent the next stretch of road arguing about which member of our family would realize we were missing first. I put my money on Granny.
Jasper insisted his mother had some kind of supernatural ability to sense when he was doing something she would disapprove of.
We agreed Georgie would be the loudest once someone told him, and I made Jasper promise we would eventually call before my brother convinced himself I had been stuffed into the trunk.
It felt easy. Almost ordinary.
That was probably why I noticed so quickly when Jasper stopped being ordinary.
The first time he checked the rearview mirror, I thought nothing of it. The second time, I noticed only because his eyes stayed there slightly longer than necessary. By the fourth, I had stopped watching the scenery entirely.
Jasper still held my hand. His shoulders remained loose, and nothing in his face would have looked unusual to someone who didn’t know him.
I did. There was a particular stillness that came over him when his attention narrowed onto something.
I had seen it in smaller ways during conversations when he was deciding how much truth to give me.
I had seen a much darker version in the parking lot when he pulled the man off me.
I waited.
A sign ahead indicated the road continuing south. Jasper took the turn east instead.
I stared the sign as it disappeared behind us. “Did you miss the turn?”
“No.”
His answer was too simple.
A few miles later, he turned again.
I watched his profile. “What are you doing?”
“Checkin’ somethin’.”
There it was. A very Jasper answer. Technically informative while telling me almost nothing.
I twisted around enough to look behind us. Several vehicles traveled the road; none close enough to seem important. A white pickup. A sedan. Farther back, a dark SUV that looked like a thousand others I had probably passed without noticing.
“What are you checking?” I asked.
Jasper glanced at the mirror again. “Not sure yet.”
That tightened something in my stomach.
He took another turn that made no sense. The white pickup continued straight. The sedan disappeared at another intersection.
The dark SUV followed us.
I turned forward again and watched Jasper’s face. “Is that SUV following us?”
His jaw shifted slightly before he answered. “Looks that way.”
Fear arrived slowly instead of all at once, because the idea didn’t fit anywhere. We were in Louisiana. We had left before sunrise. Nobody except Gator knew where we were going, and I couldn’t think of one reason a stranger would care.
“Why would somebody be following us?”
“I don’t know.”
His answer came quickly enough that I believed it.
My first thought went to the people we had left sleeping in New Orleans. “Is it somebody Granny sent?”
“Don’t think so.”
“How can you tell?”
Jasper checked the mirror once more before making another turn. “Montclair’s people wouldn’t hang that far back after they knew I spotted them. They’d pull alongside just to piss me off.”
That sounded believable too.
“What about the Bourbon Kings?”
“No reason for Wade to send somebody. He knows where we’re headed.”
The SUV remained behind us.
My hand had tightened around Jasper’s without my realizing it. He turned his palm beneath mine and closed his fingers more securely, but his attention stayed on the road.
“Need you to trust me for a little while, Ma Belle,” he said.
“I do.”
That was the easiest answer I had given all morning.
He didn’t speed away or do anything dramatic. He simply changed direction again, guiding us onto increasingly smaller roads while watching the mirrors. I had no idea where we were anymore. After several turns, even the road signs stopped helping because none of the town names meant anything to me.
Eventually, the SUV disappeared.
Jasper kept driving.
I waited for him to relax.
He didn’t.
After several more miles, he pulled the burner phone from his pocket and called Gator while keeping one hand on the wheel. His cousin answered loudly enough that I heard the joke about us already missing him.
Jasper didn’t laugh. “You got anybody checkin’ on us?”
The silence on the other end came fast.
“What you mean?”
“Dark SUV picked us up about an hour outside the city. Stayed with me through enough turns that it wasn’t coincidence.”
Gator’s voice changed. “You still got him?”
“No. Lost him about fifteen minutes ago.”
“You sure?”
“I’m sure.” Jasper glanced into the mirror again. “You send anybody?”
“Hell no. You asked me to get you out quiet; I got you out quiet.”
I stared at Jasper while the meaning settled over me. Whatever this was, he hadn’t expected it. Neither had Gator.