Page 10 of GAF Factor

“What women? In what world are there women who are watched constantly by their boyfriends and unable to leave for fear that they might break a nail?”

Okay, maybe I was exaggerating a little, but that’s what it felt like. And even as we reached the stop sign at the end of the road, I could feel their eyes on us, waiting for the car to explode or a rogue bullet from a hunter to fly through the window and kill us.

“I imagine this is what it’s like to feel hunted,” Riley muttered.

“Will it go away?”

“Not likely. But the good part is that?—”

When she didn’t finish, I turned to her, waiting for the rest. “The good part is what?”

“I’m thinking. I’m sure I’ll come up with something.”

I rolled my eyes and relaxed in my seat, trying to enjoy the sun on my face. It was cold outside, but I was alive. That was something. As we pulled away, I saw a gray car idling down the road by the curb. And as we drove away, it followed us, never getting too close.

Walkingaround the flea market for two hours wore me out. I shouldn’t have been surprised. The doctor told me it would takesome time to feel one hundred percent again. Still, I had hoped I would feel better on my first day out.

“You know, you used to be more fun when we would go to these things,” Riley pouted.

“What can I say, getting kidnapped and freezing in a shipping container took some of the joy out of my life.”

“Yeah, you need to work on that. You’re killing my buzz,” she chuckled.

“I know,” I sighed heavily, staring up at the sky. “It looks like it could snow.”

“Hush! It’s too early for that.”

“It felt like it was snowing in the shipping container,” I grumbled.

“Is that what we’re going to do? Every time we talk about the cold, you’re going to turn the situation into the shipping container?”

I turned to her in mock shock. “It’s been three days!”

“Yes, and it’s every bit as annoying now as it was in the hospital.You have no idea how cold it was. My fingers were frozen.And my personal favorite.I’m pretty sure my pee froze inside my body.I mean, come on. How long am I going to have to hear about your horrendous ordeal?”

“Probably until the day I die. I’ll be laying on my deathbed and I’ll sayDo you remember that time I almost died in the shipping container? This is like that.”

“Unless you die in a fire. That would be the complete opposite.”

“I choose not to die from the elements. Just a nice heart attack or car bombing will suffice.”

“Or a shove down the stairs,” she suggested. “You never know, I might get tired of living in the smaller room and decide to off you.”

“Just make sure it’s a good one. I don’t want the police showing up and thinking it’s a boring murder.”

“I’ll make sure it’s extra gruesome.”

“I would appreciate it,” I smiled, feeling a little lighter than I had when I woke up this morning.

This was what Riley did for me, always helping me make light of the situation when things threatened to drown me. But it wasn’t just the near-death experience that was weighing on my mind, and based on the way she kept trying to say something, only to stop, I knew she wanted to ask about it.

“Go ahead.”

“Oh, thank God! What is going on with you and Kavanaugh? I swear, the man is all up your ass, but won’t actually touch you. He hasn’t kissed you once. And then there was that whole cryptic thing about him coming home because you had a fight. I mean, whatever happened with that? Did you make up through Morse Code while you were in that container? And what does this mean for IKE? Are you really telling me that you spent four days with that sex god and just dropped him?”

She clamped her mouth shut, shooting me a pleading look out of the corner of her eye.

“I don’t know what’s going on with Kavanaugh. Our fight seems…distant or something. Like I shouldn’t be mad about it in the big scheme of things. It’s just this minuscule thing that happened, but at the same time, my head is telling me to keep my distance.”

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