Southbound Surrender (12 page)

I navigate the truck up a small hill and around a bend that leads to a patch of happy little trees with a marshmallow happy little cloud. Big Dave used to love Bob Ross, and his painting show was about the only thing he would watch with me on TV when I was real little. I think he secretly wanted me to be a painter, or maybe he wanted to be a painter. I wasn’t sure, but either way, neither of us had a lick of creative juice in our blood. I pull into an old, vacant parking lot and kill the engine.

“This good?” I ask.

“Looks like a really great place for you to murder me and dump my body. You even have a plastic bag to suffocate me.” She holds up our provisions.

“Or I could just stuff that sandwich down your throat. Death by poison. It would be more of a hands-off approach and less incriminating.”

We exchange laughs before we put on our jackets and hop out in the spring air on the verge of overcoming winter. The sun sparkles a glimmer of hope.

I grab her hand as we walk down and through a ditch of matted weeds. Her hand is delicate yet strong and fits in mine like it’s supposed to. We’re walking hand-in-hand, me with a blanket tucked under my other arm, and Piper swinging a plastic bag in her other hand. A stream of sun brushes against her face, making her skin glow.

“Ugh.” My feet sink into the mud, and we both stop. I throw the blanket over my shoulder and turn to her. “Hop on.”

“Wow, you aren’t holding out, are you?” she teases before she jumps on my back. She wraps her legs around my waist and rests her chin against my shoulder. I close my eyes, smelling the peach that I remember from the closet. Her body rocks against mine as I lift her higher and move out of the ditch. Her legs clench tighter as we go further, and I wrap my hands stronger around her thighs.

God, I never knew giving a girl a piggy back could be so hot.

She whispers in my ear, “You feeling this, Cash Rowland?”

“Don’t get me started,” I say.

A sweet laugh rolls in my ear, and I think about dropping her on the ground right here, but I stop instead, holding her for a second before she hops off. Piper deserves better than a muddy forest in the middle of Nowhere, Illinois. I flap the blanket open and spread it on the ground.

“Dinner, my fair lady,” I say with a sweep of my hand. She throws the bag down, kicks off her shoes, and climbs onto the blanket. Her hand, her beautiful hand, rubs the empty spot next to her while she leans back.

Resisting is going to be harder than I think.

She lifts the sandwiches in the air. “Mystery meat number one or number two on the menu tonight. The choice is yours. It’s a delicacy either way.”

“Surprise me.”

She throws a sandwich at me, and I sit down next to her to unwrap it. “Just try it and you will see, you may like it in a tree.”

“The sandwich or…” I raise my eyebrows and look at her slightly parted lips. If I concentrate hard enough, I think I can already taste them.

“The sandwich,” she says around a mouthful.

“You just dive right in, no hesitations,” I say before taking the plunge myself. I chew slowly. It’s not horrible, but it’s definitely not good. I would say it’s more tolerable until I hit something gritty. I look at her with wide eyes, and we simultaneously spit our sandwiches back in their wrappers.

“Oh my God, what was that?” she asks as she continues to spit.

“I don’t know, but mine had something gritty.” I dig through the bag and grab the plastic bottle. “Here’s a water.”

She gulps down several swallows before passing the bottle to me. I take my turn, swishing out the remnants of the sandwich.

“M&Ms?” she asks, wrapping the sandwiches back up and placing both of them back into the bag. She dumps a bunch into my hand, and I pour all of them into my mouth at once.

“Really? You should really take the time to savor each one. Make it worthwhile.” She pops them into her mouth one at a time, chewing deliberately before moving on to the next one.

I swallow my mouthful of M&Ms. “So, I know a couple of things more about you now. You’re going to be a doctor, you eat M&Ms one at a time, and you go full gusto at sandwiches that may or may not kill you. What were you like as a kid? What was it like growing up as Piper Sullivan, daughter of a renowned neurosurgeon?”

“Renowned is a bit of a stretch. I’ll give him the benefit of the doubt and say well-respected. Anyway, I grew up in Chicago, and my mom died when I was two, as you already know. I lived a pretty non-fantastical life if you ask me. I spent a lot of time with different nannies because my dad worked a lot and then I went to expensive schools that required me to wear knee-high socks and plaid skirts which I absolutely hated. I threw colossal fits. I feel bad for the nannies now looking back at it, but I just hated wearing skirts. That’s all I can remember,” she says with a smile.

I conjure an image of Piper in a plaid skirt and knee-high socks. It makes my knees weak.

“Middle school?”

“No one should ever talk about middle school.”

“You’re probably right.”

“How about you? What was it like to be Cash Rowland?”

“I can’t say I went to expensive schools and wore skirts.” I shrug my shoulders.

“Thank God. What’s Big Dave like?” She’s leaning in closer, just inches away.

“He’s uh—something else,” I start. “No, he’s actually pretty great, all things considered. Completely normal childhood with Transformers and Spiderman and a spiritually-enlightened dad who let me do whatever made me happy. After my mom died, I guess he went pretty crazy trying to find the right spiritual path. He had some crazy therapist-slash-spiritual healer named Shaman Amy that helped him through it. It turned out okay for me, considering he’s probably the most laid back parent I’ve ever met. Watched a lot of movies, went to a Catholic high school, and lived a super normal, boring, well-adjusted life.”

“Sounds pretty great,” she whispers.

“So, now I know some more things about you. You wish your childhood was filled with Spiderman. Plus, you’re sexy as hell and incredibly irresistible.” I reach out and hold her face in my hand. Her jaw stops moving. I tilt her head up, and she runs her tongue against her upper lip. I don’t know if she’s trying to turn me on even more than I already am, and although I think it’s impossible, she somehow does.

“I probably have chocolate on my lips,” she whispers as she lifts her head toward mine.

“Let me help you with that,” I whisper and move toward her. Her eyelashes flutter before she closes her eyes and her breath catches. I close mine and lean further until my lips feel the warmth of hers. A jolt spreads through my body as my lips move against hers, tasting the peach of Piper that I missed for so long. She moves her lips softly against mine, slow at first with a longing that mimics my own. A small sound escapes from her lips, and I press a little faster, the urgency in my body flowing onto her lips.

Five years of waiting floods through my body.

My hand caresses her cheek as she suddenly slows her lips and finally pulls back a few inches. She’s breathing hard as she presses her forehead against mine. My hand is still on her cheek.

“I’m sorry,” she whispers.

“For what?” I ask, running my finger lightly across her skin. “If it’s for stopping, then I know a way to remedy that.”

“I’m sorry for lying about where I was going. I never should have told you that I was going to California,” she says. Her eyelashes fall down like a curtain.

“It doesn’t matter anymore,” I say. “All that matters is that we’re together now. We’re both here, on this blanket together, and we have another chance. I found you, and I don’t want to lose you again.”

Her eyes sear through me, but she doesn’t say anything. I just listen to her breathe, and I swear I can hear her think about all the reasons why we shouldn’t be together. The universe, she thinks over and over.

A cloud snuffs out the blades of sun that warmed us just seconds ago and a spring breeze brushes against us. Then she whispers three words that cut me like a knife, “We should go.”

***

The next three hours are filled with fast-food burgers and biochemistry. Piper pulled out her textbook from class and was running through questions.

Piper: What’s the second simplest amino acid?

Me: Alanine.

Piper: What’s the first?

Me: Glycine.

Piper: Enzymes are divided into how many categories?

Me: Six.

Piper: What are the categories?

Me: I don’t know.

“How can you possibly know this stuff?” she asks, biting the end of her pen.

To most people, that little action doesn’t mean anything. But for me, that pen between her teeth does me in. I know in this very moment that Piper is one deliberate girl, and more importantly, she isn’t letting on how she feels about me. For just a second I think I should pull out all the cards. I should lay everything out in front of us. Call a spade a spade. But I don’t. I want to savor this. After all, it’s only the first day.

“I don’t know. I just do. I read a lot. Well, I used to anyway. Now that I’m in the truck all the time, I’m kind of an audiobook freak.” I answer her question and try to ignore the pen.

“You read a lot? Most normal people read the newspaper or read a novel or read about random useless stuff on the internet like how many Blow Pops are in a bag or why the sky is blue. They’ll get the latest Dan Brown audiobook every five years.”

She’s right, most normal people do waste their time on being entertained with impractical information, and I wasn’t totally exempt from that, but I gravitate toward scientific facts. Maybe it’s because I grew up in a house with Big Dave where the spiritual world defied science at almost every turn. I had to ground myself in
something
other than the balance of my chakras or the orientation of Orion or the flow of Qi or whatever the hell he went on about in a particular week. And whether I knew it or not, I did want to find an explanation for the inexplicable: my Luella Intuition.

“You should take the test for me.” She closes her book, and shuts off the light on her phone. She stashes her things in her bag. The dash glimmers a pulse of yellow between us.

“I somehow doubt you’ll do badly considering you somehow managed a faultless score on the SAT.”

“Still not over the fact that I beat you, huh?” she asks. I can hear the smile in her voice. “In all seriousness, you should consider going back to school, Cash.”

“We’ll see.” I stare straight at the glowing white lines of the road. Medical school is the furthest thing from my mind right now. I can barely keep my eyes open, I’ve logged about as many hours as I can on the day. Stopping the truck means one thing, and I’m eager for the possibilities.

“Well, that’s my goal for this trip,” she says as if a light bulb popped over her head. “You can try to convince me that we should be together, and I’ll try to convince you to go to medical school.”

“I think I’ve already got it in the bag,” I reply.

“We’ll see.”

“Let’s pull off here. There’s a stop just a half-mile ahead. As much as I don’t want to subject you to the shady business of a truck stop at night, there’s no better place to be with a load in the back like mine.”

“What’s in the back?”

“Copper.”

“Copper?”

“Yeah, I’m hauling about three hundred grand of copper. It’ll be used for electric wires or pipes. It’s expensive stuff.”

The truck’s dash marks a bright 11:00 as I wind into the truck stop on the tip of Tennessee. Dozens of trucks already line the huge slab of asphalt, and within the next two hours the place will be filled like a pack of cigarettes, each truck in its place, just enough room to get in and out. I pull Cash Money up to an empty slot and turn off the engine. All that’s left is
the girl
and me.

“So that’s it? Day one is complete?” she asks.

“Not yet. I’ve got a TV in the back if you’re interested in finishing up that date of ours. Plus, we didn’t crack open the wine yet.” While I don’t typically drink during my nights on the road, Piper is cause for celebration. A drink could ease the nervous edge. Okay, more than a nervous edge.

“Man, modern technology is astounding. The only thing missing is a shower and toilet on this thing. Otherwise, it’s a bona fide house on wheels.”

“Welcome to Casa de Cash Money,” I reply, sweeping my hand in a grand gesture toward the platform that serves as my bed. I flip on the dome light and reach behind the seat to grab my stack of DVDs. “I have three choices for my lady as the Casa is fresh out of streaming services. The choices are, in no particular order,
Big Fish
,
Clue
, and the first season of
Game of Thrones
.”

“That is the most bizarre selection of choices. I’m not sure what to think about your taste in movies.”

I shoot her a sheepish grin. “Maybe we should ask one of the drivers next to us. They might have something to suit your tastes.”

“Yeah, like
A Romp to Remember
or maybe
Alice in Underpants
?”

“Or what about
Saturday Night
–”

“Don’t finish that one,” she laughs, waving her hand in front of her face. “Please, God, whatever you do, don’t finish that one. Why do truck drivers have such a bad reputation? I’m sure ninety percent of the guys are decent human beings who are just working hard…”

“Ninety percent?” I laugh. “Do you think ninety percent of the world’s population is decent? If so, you’re completely naïve. You should see what Viv pulls out of some of these trucks. She had to fire someone once, and he didn’t have time to go back to clean out his truck. She came out of that cab with a penis pump and a sticky BDSM magazine.”

“Aw, come on. I didn’t know people actually bought penis pumps. Well, when you put it that way, your selection doesn’t seem so bad after all.”

“Driving truck ain’t an easy life, ma’am,” I say in my best redneck accent. I tip the brim of my fake hat toward her.

“Did you just say ain’t? You’ve been hanging around this neck of the woods for too long. It’s time to get rolling on that education of yours.”

“Pick a movie. Otherwise, you’ll be subjected to my latest podcast of abdominal systemic and portal venous systems.”