Page 24 of Small Town Hunter

“Thank you.”

“You’re welcome.”

I know I have to thank him properly, without attitude. “Look, Mister Crash–”

“Crash is fine, for the love of sweet suffering Jesus.”

I ignore his blasphemy, though he’s making it difficult. “What you’re doing for me is more than my own flesh and blood would, and I very much appreciate it,” I say instead.

“You have pretty manners,” he says, “But not a particle of sense. Deal,” he says, holding out his hand. I shake it, and he holds onto me for just a second longer than necessary. When I pull away his face is all red. “I didn’t say I was taking you to California, mind. We didn’t shake on a deal or nothing.”

“I know,” I say quickly. “If there’s anything you need from me…”

“I don’t need anything from you.” His eyes linger on me for a second before he turns back to the desk. “I need to get to work…check on a few things.”

“Can I fix you some dinner?” I offer, because that’s what ladies always do to return a favor to somebody. Bake a pie, roast a chicken…

“Fix dinner with what?” he asks, and I feel stupid.

“You can get me something from the vending machine,” he suggests, passing me some money.

I don’t really want to leave the room, but a coke would be nice.

The Serenity Motel is dead quiet and the vending machine is basically on the other side of the building. Again, I feel like I’m coming out of my body. I’m here, in this motel, instead of on the Reverend’s private jet heading to our honeymoon in Montego Bay.

I can’t wait to touch you, the Reverend had panted, pushing his hand up my dress one night he came for those “visits”. His finger hooked in my panties and he pulled hard enough to rip the elastic. I felt a cold horror. I pushed him off and ran into the garden and didn’t come out until he left.

The next day my father called me into his office. I hardly ever saw my father; he never paid me much mind at all. Rarely did I enter his office. I looked around for my mother or anybody else but it was only the two of us in the room.

I knew he would listen if I begged him.

“Daddy, please — ”

In a calm voice he said I was going to marry the Reverend no matter what and that was the end. I noticed his fists were raw on the knuckles. He was still beating on Mama; and that was why she was so often out the house with “wedding preparations”.

It was that moment I nearly lost hope.

Whatever my father said was law.

I blink, coming back to reality. But this place doesn’t feel real at all — that carpet, those old windows, the cobwebs tracing maps between rays of sunlight in the rafters, it’s all unfamiliar to the clean, pristine suburban house I left. Maybe I’m not alive. Maybe the train really did hit me. I could be dead, in purgatory.

I make my way back to the room Crash paid for. The girl working at the front looks up from her phone and squints at me. I hastily turn away, passing a tall redhead man and a black lady with dreadlocks. They must be travelers, because I don’t recall seeing a woman with hair like that in Tippalonga. She’s holding a baby.

“We need to leave,” the lady says.

“There might be more than just him. I don’t know how many Roman sent,” the man replies.

“We need to just go, Sebastian. We should goright now.”

“I’m not putting Skyla in danger,” the man snarls. “We wait for the new car. Bolting like hares won’t save us.”

“And what about — ”

“Hush, Dee, alright?”

“Don’t tell me to hush!”

Their voices fade. It’s strange but I feel like the man looks like Crash. They’re both tall and built the same way.

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