Chapter Six

Brett wondered at his own stupidity.

They were five miles down the road to Long Pine when he decided he had the intelligence of earwax. He’d sneaked around unloading every animal that could go home and arranging care for the others, so he could spend some uninterrupted time with Jacie.

He’d actually dithered over what he was going to wear, not wanting to make it obvious that he was trying to look good. He glanced down at his jeans and blue chambray shirt with the white, western style snaps up the front.

Well, he’d succeeded. She’d never guess he wanted to impress her.

Monday was his day off, though he rarely bothered to take it. With care of all the animals arranged, he was free all evening and all day tomorrow.

Of course he was such a rotten, gutless wimp he’d yet to ask Jacie to spend any part of that time with him. He should at least ask her if she’d see him again. If not tonight or tomorrow...or tonight...then sometime.

‘Would you have dinner with me?’ Too dull.

‘I’ve enjoyed our time together, except for your pain and your brush with death, and the vomit.’ Eloquent.

‘Wouldn’t Garrison be a nice last name for your children?’ Or he could just toss himself out of the moving car and hope the wheels ran over him.

Men asked women out on dates all the time. Not men like him with women like Jacie Moreau. She was a woman you only met in dreams. She was idyllic. A fantasy.

On the downside, she’d attacked him him. Twice. But she hadn’t attacked for hours! That might mean she was starting to care for him.

So then, if he asked her out, there’d be no actual gunfire when she shot him down. The awkward, polite rejection she’d hand him, danced through the earwax in his brain. He didn’t have to imagine them. He’d heard them all.

‘Brett you’re nice, but I could never really love a guy with no tattoos.’ He’d heard that more than once.

‘We can see each other until my real boyfriend gets out on parole. By the way, it’s only fair to tell you I’ve recently flunked a blood test...’ That had been one of the friendlier women he’d met since he moved to Oaken. Her boyfriend was doing hard time, too. So, they could have been involved for quite a while.

‘You’re nice, Brett. If I need a babysitter, I’ll call, but I need more excitement in the men I date.’ The 35-year-old, widowed secretary of his church, a bespectacled, overweight mother of three, had delivered that verdict. He’d been living like a monk ever since.

And now there was Jacie. Breathtaking, classically beautiful, regally tall, brilliant. Perfect. And he was more interested in her than any woman he’d ever met. He just couldn’t wrap his tongue around the words, ‘Have dinner with me’.

So, he talked about the dumb, stupid buffalo and she nodded and acted interested. She gave an Academy Award caliber performance. He halfway expected Billy Crystal to hop out of the glove compartment and present the Oscar right there. He talked about how a buffalo could attack anyone and he didn’t ever get in the pen with one. Mr. Cautious.

He kept talking even though he was so disgusted with himself he wanted to choke. “We lure them with food and push them around with heavy gates and, if one gets stubborn, we prod them with long poles. I don’t like doing that though, because I know how it feels. I have little dime-sized red circles all over my body from women touching me with ten foot poles.”

He almost crashed the car when he realized he’d said that out loud.

“Yeah, right. You can’t get women,” Jacie said sarcastically.

“I didn’t...I mean, I shouldn’t have...” Brett fell silent.

Talking was exhausting.

He turned off the gravel road that he lived on, onto a winding rural highway that led eventually to the Interstate and Long Pine, and the end of the sweetest day and night of his life. The one single, perfect night when an angel had needed him.

Then the angel had regained consciousness.

And he would never see her again because he was such a colossal loser!

She broke the awkward silence. “You ought to try being me. I haven’t had a date...” A slightly bitter laugh broke through her speech. “Yeesh...since I can’t remember when.”

It was Brett’s turn to laugh. “Yeah, right, like you can’t get men.”

She turned to face him. “Look, I’m almost six feet tall. I weigh close to what your darling buffalo weighs. Trust me. Men don’t even pull out their ten foot poles around me.”

Brett snorted.

She turned firmly back toward the windshield. “Don’t forget I’m not all that nice!”

“Big deal. I’d take a reputation for ‘not nice’ over ‘nice’ any day. You know how many times I’ve been called a wimp in my life because I’d rather tame a wild animal than shoot it? Being called ‘nice’ is the romantic equivalent of getting a Dear John letter.”

“Who called you a wimp?” She sounded like she was personally insulted on his behalf.

“Jacie, you alone have called me some version of that a dozen times.”

There was an abrupt silence. For once she didn’t have a smart remark handy. He’d kind of gotten to rooting for her sassy mouth, so he was disappointed.

“I’m sorry, Brett. I really am.” She ran one hand into her short hair and rested her elbow on the window. “I am such a pig. Did I call you a wimp when you were saving my life at the pool? Or maybe it was while I was unconscious, and you took care of me?”

Brett couldn’t control a groan.

“What? What did I say?” She quit staring at the passing road ditch and turned to him. She looked worried and sounded genuinely sorry for calling him a wimp.

“You just make me sound so disgustingly nice, that’s all.”

A long moment of silence dropped over the car. Jacie started laughing, softly at first, then louder. Her head dropped against the head rest. Then she looked at him, her eyes twinkling with humor.

“Sorry.” She shoved her flattened hand at him as if to signal ‘stop.’ “From now on, to me, you are Bad Boy Garrison. Bad To The Bone. Yep. Dangerous, treacherous, foul-mouthed, Brett.” With an exaggerated country hick accent she added, “Woman chasin’, chain smokin’, rot gut swillin’ Bad Boy Garrison. You got you a shot gun in this here rusty ol’ truck, boy?”

“It’s a Toyota Camry and you know it. Beige no less. It has the highest safety rating of any automobile on the road and the fewest breakdowns. The only gun I own is an old shotgun for the occasional rabid skunk. I don’t smoke or drink. I chase women.” He added forlornly, “But I never catch one.”

“You’re breakin’ my heart, Brett.”

He nodded, and said cheerfully, “Well, that’s bad of me.”

She laughed again.

They turned to look at each other.

Brett turned to watch the highway and gathered every ounce of his courage. “Would you like to...”

“Sometime we should...” Jacie’s words came on top of his.

They both fell silent. Brett looked away from the road to see what was in her eyes. He was pretty sure it was, ‘Yes’.

The steering wheel shuddered. The car jerked hard to the left, into the path of an oncoming semi. Brett fought with the wheel and, finally, it swerved back into his lane. Then his right front tire dropped onto the unpaved shoulder of the road. The back end fishtailed. He fought for control.

The semi roared past them, laying on its deep-throated horn. Brett pulled the car completely onto the shoulder of the road and stopped. Swirling dust caught them and swallowed up the car. Dead silence reigned for a full minute as Brett tried to get his heart to beat again.

Finally, he said, “I think we’ve got a flat tire.”

He glanced at Jacie. Fear-inspired adrenaline coursed through his veins, and the desire to reach for her almost overwhelmed him, but car trouble as an excuse to steal a kiss was just too ‘high school’. He slowed his breathing as he checked his rear view mirror for oncoming traffic. The coast was clear, which was no surprise on this lightly traveled two-lane road.

Jacie said breathlessly, “That counts as a breakdown for the Camry.”

“I regularly check my tires.” Which was the safest, most responsible, nicest thing a guy could do. He got out of the car.

His front driver’s side tire was flat. Leaning into the car window on his side, he said, “I’ve got a spare tire, but it’s one of those donuts.”

He glanced to his right and saw a car coming. He walked around the car to her side.

She had the door open and was out of the car before he got there. “What do you want to do?”

A loaded question if ever he’d heard one. It didn’t help his adrenaline rush abate one bit. He stared studiously at the non-flat front passenger’s side tire beside him. Without looking at her, he said, “I can change the tire, but we can’t drive into Long Pine on the spare I’ve got. We’ll have to go back to the house. There’s no service station open to patch the tire tonight.”

“Then let’s go home.”

He looked up from the tire. She had moved closer to him. He turned toward her and erased another foot of space from between them. The ground was slightly uneven and he was looking right into her eyes. He realized he liked looking a woman straight in the eye, at least when it was Jacie. She curled her bottom lip under her teeth, then ran her tongue on the bitten spot to soothe it. A gentleman wouldn’t make her do that for herself.

He leaned forward, slowly, an inch at a time. He looked from her lips to her eyes to see if she would allow his kiss.

“Oh, quit being so nice.” She pressed her lips against his.

 

 

The Destroyer laughed when he slipped through the lock on the back door. The flat tire should bring them back soon.

He concealed the bombs, leaving only a nearly invisible wire between the doors and the C4. He set the timer for sixty seconds after the trip wire was activated, long enough to step inside and be engulfed in the inferno.