Page 49 of The Highwaymen

Romeo's eyes glittered with sadistic glee as he savored the anguish twisting my face. “Ah, don't look so sad, amigo! I'm going to give you lovebirds a chance to really express your... devotion. You see, I’m a romantic at heart. Ain’t nothing that gets me more in my feels than a good old-fashioned tragic love story.” He gestured languidly with the knife, encompassing Stu and me in its deadly arc. “So that’s what you two are gonna become. You two are going to fight, right here in this lovely patch of desert. A duel to the death, mano a mano, for my entertainment. And to make things interesting, I'll even let the winner walk away. Scout's honor.”

I gaped at him. He couldn't be serious. This had to be some sick power play, a mind game to torture us. But the cruel mirth dancing in his eyes told a different story.

Stu met my eyes. “No,” he said. “I won’t fucking do it.”

Romeo cocked his gun and pressed it to the back of my head. “Yes, you fucking will or I’ll blow his brains out right fucking now and then I’ll take my time with you. I always wanted to skin a man.”

My mind reeled, scrabbling for a way out of this nightmare, but the cold press of the gun muzzle against my skull scattered my thoughts like frightened birds. Romeo's finger tightened on the trigger.

“Wait!” Stu's voice cracked out like a whip, stilling Romeo's hand. “I'll do it. I'll fight.”

I stared at him in mute horror, uncomprehending. He met my gaze steadily, something like regret flickering in them. No. No, he couldn't do this. He couldn't make me...

“Stu, don't...” My voice broke, shattering like sugar glass. “Don’t make me do this.”

“It's this or we both die.” His words were leaden with grim acceptance.

Tears burned my eyes, blurring my vision. This couldn't be happening. The desert spun around me, the stars wheeling overhead in dizzying arcs. I wanted to scream, to beg, to rage against the twisted unfairness of it all, but my throat closed around the howl building in my chest.

The zip ties bit into my wrists as Romeo's men cut them free, the sudden rush of blood almost painful. They did the same to Stu, shoving us roughly to our feet to face each other.

Romeo held out his knife between us. “Make it look good, gentlemen. I want a real fucking fight. I want entertainment! Fail to entertain, and you both die. Make one move I don’t fuckin’ like, you both die. Try to run…You. Both. Die. Understand?”

Stu's eyes met mine, icy blue and unfathomable in the harsh glare of the headlights. I searched their depths for some flickerof the connection we shared, that dark understanding forged in blood and brutality. But his gaze was shuttered, unreadable.

“May the best fucking man win,” Romeo shouted and dropped the knife into the sand between us.

The knife tumbled endover end, glinting silver in the stark headlights as it fell in slow motion toward the sand between Jamie and I. Time seemed to stretch and warp, seconds distending into eons.

I watched it spin, my mind detached, thoughts syrupy and strange. This couldn't be real. This had to be some surreal nightmare from which I'd wake at any moment, Jamie curled warm and blood-spattered against my side in a seedy motel bed.

But the night wind pricked cold and sharp against my skin, carrying the alkaline tang of creosote and the gun oil reek of Romeo's men. The achein my jaw where a fist had cracked against it throbbed in time with my pulse. No, this was no dream. This was a waking nightmare.

My eyes flicked from the falling knife to Jamie's face, ghostly pale in the harsh light. Tear tracks cut through the blood and grime on his cheeks, eyes wide and staring, almost feverishly bright. His chest heaved with panicked breaths, the delicate skin of his throat working as he swallowed convulsively.

Christ, he was just a kid. A vicious, feral creature, to be sure - I'd seen the unholy glee in his eyes as he shoved a blade between a man's ribs, felt the heat of his arousal as the arterial spray painted us both scarlet. But beneath the blood-soaked bravado, he was just a scared kid desperate for someone to understand him.

The knife seemed to hang suspended in the air for an eternity, tumbling lazily as the universe held its breath. In that drawn out moment, a kaleidoscope of memories flickered through my mind.

I saw Jamie that first night at the truck stop, lips wrapped around his cigarette, the wariness in his eyes, thehunger.

I relived every frenzied coupling in the cab of my truck, his lithe body undulating against mine, pale skin painted in gore and bruises. Every whispered confession of dark urges, every throaty cry of release as we lost ourselves in the maelstrom of blood and lust.

But other moments flickered by too, no less visceral. The way his nose scrunched when he laughed, carefree and boyish, at some dark joke. The soft vulnerability in his eyes when he spoke of the scars, both physical and intangible, left by a lifetime of hurt. The surprising gentleness of his artist's fingers tracing my battered knuckles, the reverence in his gaze as he knelt in front of me.

In the face of death, I realized with startling clarity that I didn't want to lose him. Somewhere along the road, between the truck stops, thekills, and seedy motel trysts, I’d come to care about Jamie in a way I hadn’t thought possible.

I’d fallen in love with this feral, murderous boy, or at least as much as a monstrous thing like me could love.

The knife struck the sand with a soft thud that seemed to reverberate through the night, snapping me back to the grim reality at hand. I met Jamie's panicked gaze, seeing my own anguished resignation reflected back at me.

Time resumed its normal flow, and we moved as one, diving for the blade glinting in the dirt between us.

My fingers closed around the hilt a split second before Jamie's, wrenching it from the sand in a spray of grit. He collided with me in a tangle of desperate limbs, scrabbling for the knife, blunt nails gouging my skin.

We tumbled to the ground in a graceless sprawl, kicking up a cloud of dust that coated my tongue with grit. Jamie landed on top, knees digging into my ribs as he clawed for my knife hand. I bucked him off, rolling us over until I had him pinned, the knife's edge hovering a hair's breadth from the rabbit-quick pulse in his throat.

For a suspended moment, we stared at each other, chests heaving, breath mingling in the scant space between us. The naked fear in his eyes cut me to the bone, the plea in them unmistakable. He knew he was outmatched in strength and size. He knew he would lose this fight.

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