Crystal Queen, page 6
part #0.50 of Rolson McKane Series
But I couldn’t tell him that I’d seen it happened, that I knew the man who’d done it. He’d hit the roof. He’d tell my dad. He’d make my life a living hell.
And I’d become that delicate little flower he’d always thought I was. He hadn’t seen me in Savannah, hadn’t seen me in Atlanta. He didn’t know the things I’d done to survive, and he certainly wouldn’t appreciate them.
It was the fundamental problem with our relationship. Rolson would always see the girl I was in high school, never the woman I became. No matter how many shades of rebellion I took on, he’d never be able to get over that day he first kissed me.
But he had to know something.
He could know about Jerry, could know the basic details. That would put him on my side, to see I recognized I’d made a mistake by running away from him.
Rolson doesn’t need to know the rest, I thought. He just needs the basic facts.
And I drove into the night, stopping once to sleep in a bed well off the interstate. I ventured twenty or so miles out of the way so I could actually allow myself the sleep. Being that far off the beaten path gave me some comfort, but I knew no amount of distance would keep me safe from Limba Fitz.
I used some of the money Jerry and I shared to buy a change of clothes from a Love’s Truck Stop, and when I got to the motel I could barely, I showered and changed and then curled up with the case, holding it to my chest like a teddy bear.
Tucked into bed, I dreamed of a man washing out to sea and wondered if that was my brain making amends with the death of Jerry. When I awoke the next day, the whole of my attention was focused on one Rolson McKane.
I put on make-up for the first time in what felt like forever and looked at myself in the mirror.
It wasn’t easy. The meth had eaten away at me like Lyme Disease, and I couldn’t picture what I used to look like.
Hope you’re ready for me, Rol, I thought.
Then I got into the car that wasn’t mine and sped south, where the railroads met the pines. I had a pocket full of crystal and no desire to smoke it. Down near Macon, I threw it out the window and hoped I wouldn’t turn the car around and try to pick through the weeds in the median for something to smoke. I had a long way to go, but I was getting there, mile by mile.
I just hoped all the people I had left behind would still be there for me when I got home. Most of all, I feared change, and if things weren’t the same with me as they had been when I left, how did I expect them to have remained the same in my absence?
I just needed to get home. I just needed to get home and clear my head. Sober up — get completely clean — and then give myself time to think. I couldn’t stay forever, but I could get a sense of where I was headed.
But then, just as I began to contemplate what lay ahead of me in Lumber Junction, I received a text message on Jerry’s phone. I nearly swerved off the road when I read it.
Consider last night a going away present, it said. Just wait until you get where you’re going, and I’ll be the welcoming committee, too.
If I hadn’t needed the damned thing, I’d have thrown it out the fucking window.
Then, I got one more message from him and flung it onto the interstate, anyway.
I’m happiest hunting, it read. So thank you for this opportunity.
Game on, I thought, and then I pushed the car as hard as it could go, headed straight for my home town.
MEET ROLSON MCKANE
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ABOUT THE AUTHOR
T. Blake Braddy is the author of the Rolson McKane Series. The books in the series include: Boogie House, The Devil Came Calling, and Dirt Merchant. The fourt and final Rolson McKane book, Six Feet South, is due out in 2018.
T Blake Braddy, Crystal Queen
