Total pages in book: 79
Estimated words: 78329 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 392(@200wpm)___ 313(@250wpm)___ 261(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 78329 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 392(@200wpm)___ 313(@250wpm)___ 261(@300wpm)
Once upon a time, I’d already be pulling my boots back on. We’d find a bar. Find noise. Find a woman who didn’t ask questions and didn’t expect answers. It was easier that way.
Temporary.
Numb.
Smoke jerks his chin toward the door. “You coming?”
For half a second, the old instinct rises. The itch. The familiar script.
Then I look down at my phone. Danae’s still there. Breathing quietly on the other end. Waiting.
“Nah,” I say. “I’ll be here you need me.”
Smoke blinks like he didn’t hear me right. “What?”
“I’m good.”
He studies me a long second. “Since when?”
Since Arkansas. Since her. Since I figured out I don’t want to be the man who runs from something real.
“Just good,” I repeat.
He shakes his head like I’m speaking another language. “Suit yourself.”
The door slams behind him.
The room goes still.
Danae doesn’t say anything at first.
“You still there?” I ask.
“I am.”
I lean back on the thin motel pillow and close my eyes.
“He okay?” she asks carefully.
“He’s Smoke.” That answers enough.
“You used to go with him,” she states. It’s not an accusation. Just an observation.
“Yeah.”
“And now?”
I stare at the ceiling again. “Now I’d rather hear your voice.” Silence.
Then a soft exhale that sounds almost like relief. We talk a little longer. About nothing. About everything. About how distance feels different when you know where you’re headed.
When we hang up, the room feels smaller but steadier.
I set the phone on my chest and listen to the hum of the AC. Outside, a motorcycle engine revs somewhere in the parking lot.
Not mine.
I don’t need to chase noise tonight.
I close my eyes and picture Arkansas highways instead. Long stretches of road leading somewhere that feels less like escape and more like arrival.
For the first time in a long time, I don’t feel like I’m running. I feel like I’m choosing.
And that might be the biggest change of all.
Morning comes too damn quiet. I wake up staring at a ceiling stained the color of old nicotine and regret. For a second, I don’t remember where I am. Then the hum of the motel AC and the empty bed across from me snap it back into place.
Tennessee.
Transport.
Smoke.
Danae.
I roll onto my side and grab my phone off the nightstand. 6:12 a.m. Too early for her to be off work. She’s up, though. Coffee in hand, getting patients situated, charts updated, and shift change approaching. Checking on her grandpa as she can. Moving through her morning like she always does—steady, responsible, selfless to a fault.
I type out a text before I can overthink it. Morning, darlin’. Call me when you get off. Missing you already.
I hit send.
The message goes through.
I toss the phone on the bed and sit up, rubbing a hand down my face. Something feels… off. Not loud. Not obvious. Just a thin thread of tension winding tight in my gut. I can’t explain it.
I stand, stretch, and head to the bathroom. When I come back out five minutes later, I check the phone again.
Nothing.
I tell myself I’m being stupid. She’s probably doing bedside reports or something. Probably just hasn’t looked at her phone yet. Smoke stumbles in twenty minutes later smelling like cheap perfume and stale whiskey.
“Morning,” he grunts, dropping into the chair by the window.
I glance at him but don’t say anything. He doesn’t ask if I slept. I don’t ask where he ended up. My phone stays silent. By the time we’re packed and walking toward the bikes, the unease isn’t subtle anymore.
It’s a pulse I can’t steady, this worry creeping in. It’s after seven now. Sometimes she does end up staying over, but it isn’t often. I call her.
It rings. And rings.
And rings.
Voicemail.
I don’t leave one. I hang up and try again.
Same thing. I stare at the screen like I can will her to answer.
“She good?” Smoke asks, lighting a cigarette.
“She’s not answering.”
He shrugs like that’s the end of it. “Maybe she’s busy.”
Maybe. But Danae always answers. Or she calls back. Or she texts. She doesn’t just… disappear. We mount up anyway. The job’s still in motion. Cash to collect. Road to cover.
But when the engines roar to life, the sound doesn’t settle me like it did last night. It amplifies the worry.
We ride.
Wind in my face. Miles burning beneath me. Tennessee giving way to open stretches of highway. I call again at the first long straightaway.
Voicemail. I don’t say anything this time either. By the time we pull into a gas station two hours later, my nerves are strung so tight I feel like I could snap. I cut the engine and immediately pull my phone out.
Three missed calls.
Raff.
And two texts. Both from Raff.
Where are you?
Call me ASAP.
My heart drops so hard it feels like I missed a step on a staircase. I don’t even tell Smoke. I just hit call.
Raff answers on the first ring.
“Miles.” The way he says my name tells me everything.