CHAPTER THIRTY FOUR

"How do you feel, sweetie?" asked Holly.

 

For the first time in a day and half, Ruby opened her eyes and blinked, testing her limbs, lifting them. Everything felt where it should be, at least. "Tired. And sore." Her skin was a sight: red and reptilian, feeling off in thin flakes. She wiggled her fingers, noticing the tubes inserted into the crook of her arm, raising her head to see where they were connected to the IV drip up above. There were other tubes and monitors taped onto her, and they all served to make her feel heavy and weak.

 

Holly, perched on a chair turned backwards beside her bed, followed her gaze. "They've been rubbing you with lotion and pumping fluids into you for two days. All you need now is rest. The doctor said Joe found you just in time. An hour more out there, and you would have lost too much water."

 

"It was really Joe, wasn't it?" she asked, awestruck. "I felt him, giving me water. Talking to me. Holding my head up. But I thought he was a dream," Ruby told her weakly.

 

"I'm sure you're not the first girl to say that about him," she said with a little exasperated smile. "He rode down there as soon as heard. Gave me the map in case I didn't hear from him. I waited by the phone until he called to say he'd found you. I don't know how on earth you ended up in a Mexican drug smuggling tunnel, but I promised Joe I wouldn't ask too many questions." Ruby didn’t respond, overwhelmed by what she was hearing. "You spent the night at the hospital in San Diego, then they took you back up here in an ambulance. As it turned out, you were only a mile or so from the border, but how you were supposed to know that, I'm not sure. After three hours in a pitch-dark tunnel, it's no surprise you got lost. I would have been terrified and probably dead. But you were so brave, sweetie."

 

"I was an idiot." She sighed, sinking down into the bedclothes and the heavy weight of her mistakes. That Joe had rode to Mexico and searched the desert for her didn’t seem possible. And yet none other than Holly was telling her it was.

 

"You were smart. You tried to stay in one place, which is exactly what you should have been. But the doctor said that the dehydration and heat stroke had already started to affect your brain, and you got confused and delirious." Vague memories of circling birds, of lizards crawling curiously over her limbs. Had those been real, or just delirium?

 

“Regan had to go to Arizona to see her grandma, kind of last minute. But I called her and told her you were okay." Ruby’s eyes darted to the curtain separating off her room from the next, to the door wedged open, the hallway empty except for a nurse pushing a patient in a wheelchair. "Joe left a few minutes ago," Holly said mildly, as if she knew the question Ruby was afraid to ask. "I tried to convince him to stay, but the nurse had said you would be alert soon, and he told me he was afraid you were still mad at him. He didn't want to be the first person you saw when you woke up," she explained. "But he spent all last night here. On that chair," she said, pointing to a supremely uncomfortable-looking plastic one with a stiff fabric cover. "Not sleeping."

 

"He doesn't need sleep," murmured Ruby. "So he told me."

 

Holly laughed. "He told me that, too, a long time ago. Then I found him passed out on our roof after sneaking in late one night and finding I'd locked all the windows."

 

"Holly, he...he saved my life."

 

"He sure did," Holly said, with a kind laugh in her blue eyes. "And it doesn't surprise me that he took off."

 

"Huh?"

 

“Listen, I've known him longer than you have. I think I've known him longer than he's known himself if that makes any sense. Joe is the puppy who wakes up his family to save them from a fire, then expects to get kicked in the ribs for barking too loudly. As a kid, no deed he ever did, good or bad, went unpunished, and I think it might take a little while yet for him to realize it won't always be that way."

 

So that was it. Joe thought she would punish him. That was so warped. When all she had wanted while clinging to life in that desert was to lose herself in his arms, even if that sweet vision of him turned out to be a vision of death. Knowing he was out there, had once made love to her, willingly and generously, was enough to sing her to rest. And then, like an angel, he'd come. And now she wasn't sure there was a way she could ever tell him that. After all, the one subject that had not been addressed was Lydia.

 

Lydia. After all this, she still couldn't reconcile Joe sending Lydia to break the news that he was no longer interested in her. And that was why Ruby knew there was a chance that, as heroic as he'd proved himself, saving her had been no more than an obligation to keep the promise he'd made to Kyle. She knew he had a sense of duty, of devotion, to his brothers. Maybe the reason he'd left the hospital was that he didn't want her to become too attached, to read more into his actions than was really there. She turned over and buried her head in the pillow.

 

Holly borrowed Colt's van to drive her home. She tried not to gaze too closely for familiar faces as they passed the Thunderbird. Ruby had convinced herself that she didn't need to be mothered, that she was strong enough to live without it. But she had also just gotten over the biggest health emergency of her life. Being mothered wasn't the worst way to recover, and she didn’t complain when Holly helped her into the house and ordered her to bed immediately. T was no denying that as she sunk beneath the freshly-laundered sheets of the spare room, she felt more at home there than she had anywhere in weeks. She told herself to enjoy it while it lasted because when she closed her eyes, she could see trouble around the bend.

 

***

 

"Wakey, wakey," a cheerful and uncomfortably familiar voice said a few days later. "I hope you don't mind my bringing you some fresh-squeezed orange juice and coffee."

 

"Huh?" Ruby hid her face in the pillow.

 

"Holly's still asleep, but Morgan was up getting ready for school. She didn't mind letting me in."

 

"Typical," Ruby muttered.

 

"Were you hoping it was Joe? He's not going to come unless you invite him, you know," said Lydia Beeson, who was as preened and polished as the first time Ruby had seen her, the golden highlights in her black hair sending out shimmering rays from the shaft of sunlight outside.

 

Ruby blinked and tested her weakened limbs. She had eaten dinner with the family last night and had gotten the energy to go out in the yard and see Kyle's bike, safe and preserved where she'd left it, even starting the motor and driving it slowly around the yard. She felt like a girl on a pony ride, but it comforted her. She tried not to look at herself in the mirror too much; her skin was healing, its snakelike scales shedding and its color morphing from lobster-red to brownish-pink. In another few days she'd merely look like someone who'd spent a week by the pool in Mexico, instead of someone who'd been nearly cooked to death in the desert.

 

She'd tried to fight boredom; she'd borrowed some of Regan's books, finished Henry James' "Daisy Miller," started Anne Bronte's "The Tenant of Wildfell Hall," and at night, watched Holly's old DVDs, which all seemed to star either Marlon Brando or Steve McQueen. For at least fifteen minutes a day, she tried to practice her yoga poses so her body wouldn't atrophy.

 

But none of that could fill the empty space she wanted most to fill. Every day that had passed where Joe hadn't come into see her felt like a knife raking over Ruby's already sensitive skin. Her body had started to heal, but her heart was still reeling. What kind of person saves someone's life, and then doesn't check back to see how she's doing? Could it really be that he'd only done it out of obligation, that he had no further desire to be with her or even look at her? Or could it be what Holly said, that he was too afraid that Ruby would punish him or blame him for letting Lydia chase her away?

 

"Invite him? I didn't think that would be allowed," said Ruby darkly. Besides, as much as she had to admit, she longed to see Joe again, she didn't want him to see her the way she'd looked in the past few days: ungroomed, unshowered, and covered in unsightly layers of red, peeling skin. And now Lydia was probably going to report all of that back to him.

 

"Look," said Lydia, perching on the window frame. "I'm sorry about what I said when we talked the other day about you clearing out. That was insensitive of me. Of course, you could have told me you had feelings for him."

 

"Who said I did?" asked Ruby stubbornly, throwing off the covers, hoping to convey to Lydia that she was healthy and not to be trifled with. She’d been sleeping in nothing but one of Holly’s old Joan Jett concert t-shirts and a pair of panties, and now she glimpsed herself in the mirror and frowned.

 

"Look, I'm nothing if not forgiving. I admit that Joe got to know you while we were on a break, and come on, he is a guy. It's only natural that his protective impulses got the best of him. But listen. I’m still in business with Aaron, and I'll be in and out of town for work even after Joe and I get married. As long as you guys keep it on the down low, who am I to judge?" She grinned. "After all, I've got my own extracurricular activities."

 

Ruby looked around for the bowl Holly had placed under the bed just in case, because what Lydia had just said literally made her want to retch. She thought back to what Tony had told her; if Joe had agreed to marry her, it was only because he'd had no choice.

 

"Lydia, why are you doing this?" she asked in a measured voice.

 

Lydia’s shoulders slumped. She began speaking quickly. "Look, maybe being an outlaw's mistress isn't precisely how you had your life envisioned, but we can't all get what we want now, can we?" She shrugged, an effort at nonchalance. Her brow was furrowed, the vein in her forehead prominent. She was not exactly the same glamorous, confident Lydia who had marched into the Thunderbird to single-handedly demolish Ruby's dreams of being with Joe, as handily as if she'd been wielding an axe. "We'll both be over for dinner tonight. It's your chance. I'd advise you take it."

 

She was scared, Ruby realized. The long-haired woman in leather knew her grip on Joe was, for whatever reason, starting to slip through her hands. She was trying to offer a bargaining chip to Ruby, hoping that if she could get the other woman to settle for second place, she wouldn't try to go for first.

 

She was determined not to think the worst of Joe. But she needed answers, and he was the only one who could give them to her. She had to believe Lydia was right and that he really was waiting for her to summon him. But he wasn’t waiting powerless. Ruby owed him her very life. Receiving her invitation, knowing that she wanted him in her room – even in her bed – and that she was willing to overlook the fact that he belonged to Lydia, once again gave Joe all the power and gave him confidence that she could. She would not be his other woman, and she would not beg. Yes, she would invite him, she decided. But somehow, she would have to make him beg.

 

She reached for the coffee Lydia had brought her, wondering idly if it was safe to drink. She didn't think Lydia was creative or stupid enough to resort to tactics straight out of a Shakespeare play, but as with everything, it was wise to be cautious. She brought the cup to her lips. "You know, you're right, Lydia," she said. "Maybe I have been a little short-sighted about all this." She thought she saw the other woman's ears perk up. "There's no reason why the three of us can't have a sort of arrangement. Of course, I want everything to be above board. Which means I need to talk to Joe."

 

"Right," said Lydia, a little too quickly. "Of course."

 

"But I might need your help." Lydia nodded and swallowed. "Where do you shop for lingerie, by the way?"

 

***

 

"Ruby won't be joining us tonight," Holly told Joe. "She's not feeling as well as she'd hoped."

 

Joe looked at the floor, trying to hide his disappointment. He should have already given up hope. It had been four days. Four days in which he’d thought of nothing but saying “fuck it” and coming over to see her. Once, he'd actually gotten on his bike and almost started it, determined to casually drop by the Curtis house and ask Colt if there was anything he could help him with in the garage, and then find some excuse to hang around even if there wasn't. After all, if he was there, there was a chance he might at least a glimpse of sunlight off the copper highlights of Ruby's curly chestnut hair, or a flash of her full, rose-colored lips through an upstairs window, or barring that, her handbag swinging casually off a kitchen chair, or even hearing Holly talk about how much Ruby had found she liked "On the Waterfront" after ribbing Holly about 1956 wanting its movies back. He'd been told she was healthy and doing well, and he had to be content with that. Holly had even told him that she'd talked about how grateful she was to him. He never doubted for a second that he was, but it was little comfort. Owing her life didn't mean she was ready to embrace him again after having thought she'd rid herself of him for good. He feared it was more of an inconvenience to her than anything that he'd been the one to find her. She'd be out of the Curtis's house, off to a new life on Kyle's bike, just as soon as she could endure the ride.

 

***

 

But at night, he had visions of trying to pry her parched, peeling mouth open, of leaning his head into her chest to listen to her shallow breaths rattle in her ribcage, afraid her vibrancy and light, that beauty he'd been able to touch for a brief time, was about to ebb away in his arms. Of knowing that he'd failed her, and Kyle, and himself. Of not getting there soon enough, and of letting her go in the first place. He knew Holly, if not Lydia, had told her that he had resolved not to come without an invitation. But waiting for that invitation like waiting outside the principal's office in school, or in front of his social worker to find out where they were sending him next, or worst of all, waiting in court to find out how long they were locking him up for. Only worse, because he didn't care what a principal or judge or social worker thought about him; that's why he'd gotten in trouble to begin with. But Ruby, and her opinion of him, had become his whole world.

 

At least Lydia was giving him space. She also hadn't run to Aaron to inform her cousin that Joe wasn't holding up his end of the deal. He figured he'd scared her enough with his threats of exposing whatever game she and Aaron were playing. He had her on the ropes, and that was what he'd been hoping for. After spending her first night in town curled up on his futon, she'd dropped the domesticity act and found a two-bedroom condo to sublet in Merced; far enough to keep her distance, but close enough to keep her eye on him.

 

And then, of course, the last meeting of the Jockeys had been excruciating, trying to keep A.J.'s simmering rage in check, knowing it was still too early to try to explain what, thanks to Rita, he now knew about Fox and the Reapers. And that was all without dreading the idea that despite his best efforts, Regan would come back from Arizona without her baby, Kyle's son, in her arms. Ruby had spent two days in the ICU, but he knew she was sleeping better than he was.

 

Now, as Colt was on his second glass of Jack and had resorted to telling stories about his early days in the Jockeys Joe had heard dozens of times, he excused himself from the table. He hadn't intended to go skulking around the dimly-lit front hall, he really didn't, but once he got out of the kitchen, the sound of running water from the upstairs bathroom tempted him closer to the bottom of the stairs.

 

He could see the door of Ruby's room was open, which mean that there was no doubt as to bathroom's occupant. But he'd already been staring at the bathroom door too long; if she came out now, she'd know immediately he'd been staring and think he was a creep, which, let's face it, he was if this was what he was resorting to. Standing there like a horny, oversexed teenage boy, hoping to catch a glimpse of...something, anything. The water shut off and the bathroom door began to open, and Joe tried to duck out of view, pressing himself against the wall in order to avoid being caught in the beam from the front yard light.

 

When Ruby emerged from the bathroom, she walked slowly and casually until she reached the open door of her bedroom. Joe raised his head, hearing his own heart beat in his ears. In the white light from the yard, her deeply-tanned skin looked golden, like a halo around her bronzed, curly head. Here she paused, swinging the belt in her hand as if she were deciding what to do next .Not once did she look downstairs; it was as if she was in a world of her own, and yet how could she not know? She peeled one corner of the robe, off revealing one curve of a shoulder, tanned to a smooth nut-brown. She looked to the side, outlining her shapely neck, the chestnut curls brushed to one side, ripe for tasting; in fact, he could already imagine how his mouth would feel on that warm, unyielding flesh. Paused in her doorway, he watched, not even daring to breathe, as little Ruby Clarke, quintessential good girl, dropped the robe, revealing underneath a leather metal-studded corset, skimpy black panties, garters and thigh-high heeled boots. Joe was halfway up the stairs before he even realized he’d moved.