Carla knew immediately when they had crossed the border into Utah. The landscape changed as if a line had been drawn across the dry red desert sands. There were still mountains trailing along beside them, their snowcapped peaks at odds with the fiery red rocks surrounding them.
Wind and water and eons of changing temperatures had shaped them into unusual formations like a sculptor molding a lump of clay. The blue sky overhead seemed enormous and almost unreal as she stared up at the wispy white clouds hanging there like bits of cotton. She tried to imagine objects or people in their shapes, but her mind could only conjure one: Joel.
She held on tighter to him, pressing herself as close against him as she could to shield against the onslaught of the wind, but even more, to feel his presence, his heat, enveloping her. It was heaven, pure and simple, and she swore she could feel Joel’s rumble of agreement against her.
Carla let the magic of the moment, the strange serenity, that sense of connection that called to her wrap around her and, for a long moment, she imagined that it was just the two of them. That they weren’t being followed by cars full of weed, that they weren’t on their way to meet a drug dealer, that she wasn’t on her last dime and just days away from losing her house, her job, everything. In her mind, they were just riding, feeling the joy and freedom of being on the back of a motorcycle with nothing separating them from nature, or the world around them.
The crackle of the police scanner jarred her from her fantasy and her ears pricked as the voice came over the black speaker box. They both seemed to hold their breath as the operator spoke but it was a call for a local domestic dispute in some small neighboring town. Nothing related to them.
They had been riding for over an hour, and had been running the police scanner nonstop since they first left the safe house. Joel had said that Hot Wheels, Tucker, and Sparkplug all had one too. Every time that voice floated brokenly over the spotty reception of the scanner Carla and Joel both tensed. She could feel it in the way his muscles bunched and hardened beneath her. The way her heartbeat started to race at the first crackle indicating someone about to speak over the line.
This time was no different, her heart had jumped at the first sound. What was different was when Sparkplug threw up one hand, signaling for them all to follow him over the shoulder. One by one, the motorcycles and car pulled over, curious gazes all on Sparkplug as Hot Wheels and Tucker stepped out of their respective cars and walked over to the group.
“What’s up, Spark?” Hot Wheels said, her pale green eyes worried as they met his, “We all heard the same report. It was a domestic dispute. Nothing to do with us.”
Viper nodded agreement, looking annoyed at being forced to stop.
“Yeah, but the town they mentioned, Kellisburg, we’re driving straight towards it. It’s a little flyspeck town, no more than three or four hundred people. That’s why I figured it would be fine to drive through it. But if there’s gonna be cops there it’s too risky. Strangers are going to stick out like a sore thumb. We’ll have to go another way.”
“Can we go around them?” Tucker asked slowly, his deep voice thoughtful and serious. Sparkplug started to shake his head, then stopped abruptly.
“You still got that map?” the man asked, directing the question at Hot Wheels and she hastily jogged back towards the car, grabbed a large folded piece of paper, and ran back to hand it over to him. Their fingers brushed and they shared a long, intense look until Joel roughly cleared his throat. They both jumped apart and Carla glanced curiously from one to the other, her suspicions from earlier growing.
There was definitely something going on there, but that thought was pushed to the back of her mind as Sparkplug started speaking again.
“Well, there is a way around them but we’ll have to ride through here,” he pointed a large, tattooed finger at a route far more treacherous looking than the one they had already planned and Joel whistled through his teeth as he mentally traced the obstacles, the pitfalls they would encounter.
It was a steep, roundabout climb full of switchbacks and gravel roads that would be hazardous for the cars and downright deadly if they slipped out on one of the bikes. Joel glanced from the map, to the man holding it, one dark eyebrow raised in question.
“You sure about this? Is this the only way?”
“Yeah, it’s the only way. Otherwise we have to backtrack all the way to the border and get on a different highway.” Sparkplug gave him a serious look, “We can make it. It’s only another hour after the turn off here.” He pointed again at a spot on the map several miles still ahead of where they were stopped.
“Alright,” Joel finally said after a lengthy silence, “we can’t go back. That means we can only go forward. Sparkplug, you lead the way. Then Tucker and Viper. Me and Carla will ride next, and then Hot Wheels last. Remember everybody, keep your bugs on and check in every thirty minutes. We can’t have anybody running out of gas or something out here. Got it?” Everyone nodded, check the little ear buds in everyone’s ear. For Sparkplug and Joel, it was a speaker and microphone wired into their helmets. Something like a fancier walkie-talkie. But it kept everyone connected, and if something happened and they had to split up, it would still allow them to communicate with each other.
After everyone had done a quick check of their bugs, they all headed back to their respective vehicles, taking off in the order Joel specified with Sparkplug in the lead. There was a new tension in the air and it made Carla’s neck prickle in unease. It felt like a storm was coming even though the sky around them was still nothing but bright, clear blue.
“Hey bluebird,” Joel said over the intercom, his voice ringing loudly in her ear, despite the wind and the sound of the engine drowning out all else.
“Yeah, Joel?” she answered, yelling because she was still unused to the ear piece and how sensitive it was and Joel flinched a little in her arms as her words exploded in his ear.
“You don’t have to scream, sugar,” Joel said teasingly and Carla blushed as the muffled chuckles from everyone listening in came over the bug. She shifted uncomfortably but didn’t say anything else as she waited for him to speak.
“Listen, Carla,” Joel finally said again, his voice intimate this time and it was like it was only the two of them wrapped up in their own world. “I want you to hold on real tight, okay? And no matter what happens, don’t let go. Just trust me. You can do that right?”
His words washed over her and she did as he bid, holding him even closer in her arms before she answered.
“I can do that,” she was careful to speak softer this time, “I trust you.” As soon as the words were out of her mouth, it hit her. She meant them, every single one. She knew she could trust him with a bone-deep certainty and she had said it without any sort of hesitation. He must have sensed some of what she was feeling too because he half turned to her. The brief look he sent her was full of heat and emotion and words that neither of them could speak out loud. Especially not with half of the gang listening.
But that look was enough. It was enough to carry her through into the foothills of the Utah mountain range, up the narrow road as it grew ever windier, twisting and turning back and forth on itself in a dizzying maze as they neared cliff edges and jagged rock formations.
That single look in his flashing silver eyes was enough to fill her heart to near bursting, filling the rest of her right along with it with a warmth that washed over her in wave after wave and, as she clung to him, she hoped he could feel it too.
As the winding curves took them deeper into the Utah mountains, her thoughts drifted to just how much her life had changed since that fateful day they had first met. Just how scared and uncertain she’d been as she’d driven that big semi-truck full of weed she’d planned on stealing, only to turn around and have it stolen from her.
But the anger and helplessness from that moment had faded so quickly as he’d kept her safe, and then later as she’d come to know them not as ruthless members of a biker gang but as people. People with hopes and fears, goals and aspirations and love just like her.
Love, what? her mind stopped cold at the thought, everything inside her going still as the truth of it sank deep. But we barely know each other, the rational part of her brain tried to argue, but Carla was certain that she knew Joel better than anyone else, that he had opened up parts of himself that he never shared with anyone else. And she had done the same.
Even Elle, her best friend over the past year, wasn’t as close to her as Joel had become in the last few weeks. There was an instant comfort between them, as if she’d known him her whole life and her heart responded wholly, and undeniably.
“Shit! We got a problem.” Hot Wheels’s sudden curse jolted her out of her thoughts and they were all on instant alert.
“What have you got, Wheels?” Joel asked harshly over the speaker.
“We got a tail,” her voice sounded panicked as she spoke and Carla arched her neck around to try and see, but the car was blocked by Hot Wheels’s and she couldn’t make it out.
“What’s the make and model?” he asked suddenly, softly, and Carla’s stomach clenched. She knew the answer even before Wheels said it out loud.
“It’s a tan Toyota four door. That’s all I can tell.”
“Maurice,” Carla whispered as nausea threatened, bile rising in her throat. She didn’t know how, but she knew that her boss had somehow tracked them, somehow found them. Again.
“Are you sure Carla? Are you positive it’s him?” Joel’s question was deadly serious and she remembered his threats against them. Carla craned around once more, squinting backwards to make out the car. It was closer now, just close enough for her to make out the round, pudgy face and dark beady eyes. Eyes that burned with hatred, and malice, and victory.
“Yeah. It’s him. It’s definitely him.”
Joel was silent for a long, tense moment before spitting, “Well, fuck.”