His arm brushed against mine, his clothes rustling. He pulled something from inside his coat, something that gleamed dull and dangerous in the deep darkness. He held it up and checked the magazine, slid it back into the base, loaded a bullet into the chamber, then settled back in the seat, his face turned toward the street. A sheen of sweat gave definition to the determined angle of his jaw. His eyes glimmered with a determined light that was comforting until a tremor passed like quicksilver along his jaw. He swallowed and shook his head, then rubbed his eyes like they hurt him. Or he couldn’t see.
The hand holding the gun quivered, then started to shake. He rubbed his face.
The van idled closer to our hiding place.
He shuddered, his body hunching over as if in pain. “Sorry—”
He slumped against the door.
The hand holding the gun went slack.
The thunk of it against the floor coincided with the arrival of the van at the foot of the driveway.
3
My life started to flash before my eyes, but I got bogged down coming up with explanations for some things that God might not understand. Above the frantic thump of my heart I heard the hum of an engine. The metallic creak of an opening door was followed by the scrape of cowboy boots against pavement.
I abandoned explanations and went for the gun.
As I groped across his unconscious body, snowflakes drifted down, settling on my exposed neck like tiny, icy fingers that turned into rivulets trickling down my back. Fear made a knot in my stomach above the spot the gear shift was digging into.
If I got out of this alive, I was never driving manual again.
I scrabbled harder, pushing my face into Kelvin Kapone-with-a-K's side, groping along the side of him and the car’s floor. So intent was I on weaponry, at first I didn't register the wet warmth against the side of my head where it pressed into his stomach. Even before I lifted my head for a look, I knew what I’d find. He wasn’t the type to pass out from fright. The hot chocolate I had swilled earlier signaled an urgent request to—like Elvis—leave. Talk about coming to a sticky end.
The sudden blast of light was startling, painful after the near black I’d been straining to peer through. Had a heavenly apparition appeared to save me?
Only if the angel was disguised as a skinny, bald guy in a bathrobe holding a shotgun. He peered into the dark outside his stoop, his hands working the firing mechanism. Cowboy boots didn’t linger to see if the bald guy was serious. He just scuttled back down the driveway.
I wanted to enjoy the moment, feel the relief, but my companion was bleeding to death all over my sister’s car. Despite my lack of a Florence Nightingale gene, but for the honor of my sex, I mentally ran down the list of what I was wearing that could be converted into a bandage. Bra was out. Dispensable, but minuscule. Non-absorbent sweater. Take too long to get down to my panties because of tightness of jeans. That left my thermal top. I eyed him for a few seconds before turning my back on him and shedding the woolly sweater, then the top. Between the chill of the night air on my semi-bare upper body and fear, my teeth were chattering up a storm before I got my sweater back on and turned toward my patient.
It didn’t take long to apply the starkly white thermals to his manly, bloody chest. I had to use my chin to hold the top in place while I shoved both my arms and its sleeves behind his back and knotted them. Despite the seriousness of the situation, I felt ridiculous crouched over the gear shift, chin deep in blood, hugging an unconscious man so I could tie my underwear around his mid-section. Dignity has been mostly missing in action in my life. I write about a roach. I live with my mother. But that doesn't mean I've given up all hope. There’s a sliver of it down there somewhere.
He started to stir while my arms were still wrapped around him and I felt the sliver leave, too. I opened my mouth to babble an explanation, but only managed a squeak before he reciprocated the wrapping of arms and upped the stakes by nuzzling my neck with his mouth. I would have struggled, but I was so shocked. Then, well, the feel of his mouth on my skin, his warm breath stirring the tendrils of my hair felt—good. Besides, if I struggled it might loosen the underwear. Not struggling was the righteous thing to do.
It was darn near noble.
His mouth shifted half a tantalizing inch and I had another thought. Could this be research for my novel?
“Ummmm,” he murmured, the pleasure sound came from deep in his throat, “you taste good.”
“Really?” Trembling heat from his mouth tangled with trailing chills from the snowflakes drifting through the sunroof onto my exposed neck. It would have been better without the gear shift digging into my bladder, but sin—research I corrected—had a price tag.
Sweet…research.
He found a sensitive spot just under my ear and proceeded to nibble there, overpowering the effect of the flakes and the gear shift. My bones dissolved, like an Alka-Seltzer in water, swirling around, tickling my insides with aching pleasure. His mouth moved higher, tasting and tantalizing, on a collision course with my mouth. I pursed my lips in preparation. It seemed like the charitable thing to do.
Instead of lip locking, he looked up, taking away the warm and letting the chill back in. I un-pursed my lips and looked up, too. A fat, wet snowflake landed in my eye.
“It’s snowing.” His voice was a husky murmur, setting off a landslide of shivers along my spine.
“Yes.” I blinked away the water blur. He was quiet, but I could feel his mental wheels starting to
