Chapter 18

Grim

Drag Creek, Kentucky

“We got a big problem, brother. Fuckin’ outta this world.”

“Whatta ye mean—we gotta problem?”

“We’re in transport. Get a room ready. Interrogation.”  Romeo hangs up without saying more.

“Godddamnit. Son of a bitch,” I mutter under my breath and shut the TV off.

“What’s wrong?” Foxie asks, from the kitchen.

“Nothin’, have some shit to handle is all. I’ll be back when I’m back. Gimme some sugar,” I tell her, stepping out of her way as she moves to the sink to drain her noodles.

She pours the contents of her pot into a strainer that is waiting in the sink. Once she is finished she wipes her hands on a dish towel and sweeps her hair from her brow. Going up on her toes, she kisses the corner of my mouth. “Maybe I’ll still be here when you get back.”

“You’ll be here,” I say with a snort. “Couldn’t pay ye to leave.” I laugh and she smacks my chest.

“If I didn’t know better, I’d think you were trying to hurt my feelings.”

“Never.” I wink and kiss her forehead. “Save me some of that, whatever it is.”

“Pasta salad.” She smiles with a nod, and I head out the back door.

Over in the basement of the Roadhouse, I open up a room that hasn’t been needed in a long ass time, maybe too long. Maybe I’ve gone too straight.

Flicking on the light, I go around pulling the white sheets off the furniture.

As I go through one of the cabinets, I stumble across an old photo. It’s of Slim, Foxie, myself, and Gypsy Red. Her stomach was swollen with our child, with my girl, my precious Baby.

Those days were short-lived and another lifetime ago. Some days I wonder if Gypsy Red would be happy for me, that despite all the bad, I’ve somehow managed to make a life for myself.  And that’s the thing…things have been quiet too long. I have this feeling that I can’t shake; something bad is about to happen.

Running my finger over Gypsy Red’s stomach, the door opens. I look up and my chest seizes, I can’t breathe. I fall to my knees clutching the photograph to my chest, gasping for air. The room tilts and my vision blurs.  If this is it…the end of my ride, I pray—–I pray that my maker takes me home. Takes me to an open road with Gypsy Red waiting for me, where we will finally get to be together.

I sway to the side and my vision grows black. The image of my one true love is burned into the backs of my eyelids.

**

Red hair glistens in the sun, as the woman walks to the gate, big black sunglasses hiding a majority of her face. My breath catches in my throat. My mind wanders back in time, forty years or so to be exact. A frozen place in time when the sun hugged the moon. Only it was dark and she was illuminated by the moon. A beacon burning bright, my Cara Marie, my Gypsy Red.

“The fuck you want?” The woman asks in a husky voice, thick with a southern accent, interrupting my daydreaming.

“Have an appointment,” I tell her gruffly, flashing a wad of cash in her direction and drop the bag I’m carrying at my feet. Pisses me off the bitch is wearing glasses, keeping me from gauging her expression.

“You armed?”

“I’d be a dumbfuck if I wasn’t.” I fold my arms across my chest as her lips curve into a smile so familiar it makes my heart ache. Pain sears from the middle of my chest. The flames of Gypsy Red’s memory burning me from the inside out.

A buzzer sounds and two armed guards step through and pat me down, removing the gun from my boot and the knife from my pocket.

The sun gleams in my eye and I blink. Suddenly, I can’t remember where I am or what I am doing here.

I am thrusts through the gate and it closes behind me.

“I’ve been waiting for you,” she says with a wide smile and a hairline scar above her lip catches my attention.

“Gypsy,” I choke out her name as she removes her sunglasses.

“Hey, stranger. Long time no see.” Her fiery eyes burn into me, and I am down on my knees wrapping my arms around her waist as tears fill my eyes.

I’m not an emotional man, but Goddamn all I can do is hold her and ask her if she’s real. She sure as fuck feels real beneath my touch. Warm, soft, feeling like heaven.

“I’ve missed you, baby,” I cry against her stomach as her fingers stroke the top of my head and caresses my jaw. “How?”

“Come with me.” She smiles once more but it’s a sad smile.

Rising, I take her hand in mine, and I have to stop for a moment to savor the curl of her fingers in mine. Taking a deep breath, I breathe her touch in. I can’t form a coherent thought. All I know is I have the love of my life in my arms and I ain’t ever letting her go. I don’t care how or why…none of that matters. We’re together now.

She leads me to a house, I can’t tell what the place looks like. My eyes are only for the redheaded siren who holds every piece of me. She stops at a mirror and our reflection gazes back at me. She looks the same as I remember, only her stomach no longer holds our daughter. She hasn’t aged a bit. I look like a filthy old fucker next to her. I snort and she laughs as though she can read my thoughts.

I watch as she waves her hand over the mirror and suddenly images…fragments of my life flash before us.

“What is this?”

“This is your life. Every bad thing you ever did.”

My breath catches in my throat as I see myself as a boy holding the tire iron I killed my own mother with. Gypsy squeezes my hand as the face of every man…woman...faces of those I have killed stare back at us.

They fade into oblivion.

“You did a lot of good too, Jack.”

I look to her and those eyes that have haunted me to the core. A tear slides down her cheek and I capture it with my thumb.

“You were an amazing father. I’m so proud of you. You did good, baby.”

She motions for me to look and images of Baby and Sarah flutter by. My girls. An ache rips through my chest, Goddamn I miss my girls.

I shake my head. “No, I was a lousy shit. Didn’t deserve either of them girls and I failed. I failed them. I failed you.” Pulling her hand to my mouth, I kiss her knuckles.

Her lips curve upward and she shivers.

“You didn’t. I’ve talked to Sarah. She told me how good you were to her.”

“Whatta ye mean, you’ve seen Sarah?”

“She’s here, but you can talk to her later.”

“She’s here?” I look around confused as fuck.

This house we are inside of, it’s dark, the only light is the flame of a single candle burning on the table under the mirror.

“Grim… I—you…we’re dead.”

Jerking back from her I shake my head. She can’t mean what I think I heard. “No,” I say, denying it, but I feel it in my bones. The words she speaks are true.

“Is this…Heaven?”

She shrugs. “I don’t know.”

I chuckle.

“What’s so funny?”

“I guess the man upstairs did hear me. I told him if it was my time, to take me to you.”

“Oh, Jack.” She sighs and I pull her tight against me.

Her lips brush against mine and they feel all wrong… she says my name and it sounds so distant. I reach for her but can’t touch her.

I open my eyes surrounded blinded by a pinhole flash shining in my eyes.