Charlotte

At one o’clock in the morning I locked up the Red Cardinal and got in my car. I was exhausted, overworked, hurt, and heartsore. But a long, mindless shift of serving drinks had given me time to think.

Both of the men in my life—Jeremy and Ben—thought I was bossy and pushy. Okay, I could maybe accept that. It was just that since the panic of our family implosion, I’d put my head down and charged forward. I couldn’t help it. There was no time to fool around with people’s feelings. Things had to get done.

So I wasn’t going to apologize for the way I was. But what I could do was explain. Maybe things weren’t irreparable with either man. I could fix this, like I fixed everything else.

I was lost in this train of thought, heading down Douglass Boulevard, when I noticed lights in my rear view mirror. Two lights, but not from the same vehicle. I had two motorcycles behind me, riding my tail.

Maybe it was a coincidence. I made a left, and they followed. I made a right, and they followed again. They didn’t speed up, and they didn’t slow down—just stayed right on my tail, the two of them side by side, wherever I went.

I was being tailed by the Lake of Fire.

They weren’t being discreet. This wasn’t a spy operation. They wanted me to know they were there, that they wouldn’t be shaken off. And whenever I stopped the car and got out, they would…

They would what?

My blood shot through my veins like someone had spiked it. I drove, taking some of the bigger roads around the airport, going nowhere, buying time while I tried to think. I didn’t want to go home. I didn’t want to go to Jeremy’s—I’d just bring them to his doorstep. I could go to a police station, but what would I say? The bikers would just drive off if I did that, and pick me up some other time. Because they were trying to scare me—I knew that much. I needed some way to get them to stop.

Really, when it came to it, there was only one person to call.

Even though it was nearly one thirty, Ben answered on the first ring. “Charlotte?”

He sounded a little rough, like he was in bed, but he didn’t sound like he’d been asleep. He also sounded so good, his voice coming through the Bluetooth sound system in my car like he was right here, that I felt my heart flip. “I know it’s late,” I said as I kept driving. “I’m sorry.”

“Are you okay?”

“I’m fine. I just finished my shift at the Red Cardinal.”

“Listen,” Ben broke in before I could say anything else. “I’m sorry about earlier. I was way out of line, yelling at you like that. You were just trying to help. And I should have called you earlier, but I’m a chickenshit. This isn’t news.”

Despite the situation and the lights in my rear view mirror, I felt myself smiling. “It’s okay,” I told him. “I was out of line, too. I could have at least asked.”

“A locked archive with fireproofing and climate control—my father’s files are better off there. So you were right, anyway. And there’s one other thing.”

“Ben,” I said gently, trying to cut him off.

“Devon’s marrying Olivia next month,” Ben said. It sounded like something he’d gone over in his head at least once before bringing it up. “It’s just going to be Devon and Olivia, Max and Gwen, and Cavan and Dani. And me. I want you to come as my date.”

I would have closed my eyes if I weren’t driving. What a stab in the heart he was sometimes. “It’s nice of you to ask me.”

“This isn’t me trying to fuck you,” Ben said in his blunt way. “It’s just a date to a nice wedding. You wear a dress, I wear a suit, we have a drink, we go home. Strictly business.”

It did sound nice. But the words came out of their own accord, from somewhere deep inside me. “Does it have to be strictly business?”

There was a pause, long enough for me to go through two traffic circles at the airport and turn back the other way. The motorcycles never left my mirrors. “Charlotte,” he said, his voice deadly serious, “it can be whatever the fuck you want.”

My hands went tighter on the wheel. “Okay,” I told him. “I accept. But that isn’t why I called you at one thirty in the morning.”

“What is it? Is something wrong?”

“I don’t know. Maybe. When I left work, two bikers got on my tail, and they haven’t left. They’re riding my bumper right now.”

“Fuck,” Ben said, alarmed now. “They try anything?”

“Not yet.”

“What are you doing?”

“Driving,” I replied. “Around and around. I just went around the airport and came back the other way. I don’t really know what to do. I don’t want to go home.”

“Do not go home,” Ben said. “Don’t go anywhere but my place. Come here right fucking now.”

I felt my stomach squeeze. “Ben, I can’t do that.” What if there was a problem? What if they hurt him?

“Yeah, you can,” Ben said. “Dealing with these assholes is what I do, so let me do it.” He gave me an address. “Can you GPS that?”

I did. “I’m ten minutes away.”

“Ten minutes,” Ben said. “I’ll be ready.”