Page 11 of Danger Close (Mourningkill #3)

Glad for the Company

Teri

The air felt good upon my flushed skin, but not on my joints. My knees shivered against the autumn cold, and every old injury flared. That was another thing I could thank Ray for. The aches and pains in my body that were further exacerbated by stress.

Pain was in the mind, and some days, my mind was weak. Like today.

I felt stripped bare, naked before the world’s prying eyes, and I had been found wanting. Insecurity, self-loathing, pain… those were all there, swirling in my gut. My usual cocktail of emotions.

I pulled up the collar of Cobra’s jacket, taking it to my nose, trying to draw strength from the scent of amber and coffee beans. I’d have to walk out of here, somehow. I didn’t know where I was. I had no phone, no wallet… But I could find my way.

I was good at persevering, no matter what the cost. I just could not be here, where I was clearly not wanted.

As humiliated as I may have been, I was content.

In my determination to never be like my mother, I had gone full circle and become a person my own daughter despised as well.

But unlike me, Trinity was not alone. She was surrounded with people who cared about her, who took her side. She had a safe place to land.

I was glad – yes, glad – that I had seen her happiness with my own eyes.

“Good evening,” an unfamiliar, low, drawly voice called out from the darkness. I froze. The voice continued, “It’s a cold one out.”

My hands clenched into a fist, ready to fight. I always had to be because I never knew where Ray’s men were. His friends as he liked to call them.

“I’m Greg Vedder.” The stranger had a slow, midwestern twang. From where, I could not tell.

His quiet footsteps on the gravel marked his approach.

“You’re Trinity’s mom, yeah?”

He stepped from the shadow cast by the large barn. Bathed in silver moonlight, I realized that he was a handsome young man, with sand-colored skin, and long shaggy hair that reached past his chin. His flannel shirt sleeves were folded up his forearms. He carried a stack of wood over one shoulder.

“How did you guess?” I asked, curiously. No one had known I was coming. That much was clear. So he couldn’t have been warned of it.

My instincts were shit. No one with my history with men could pretend to be a good judge of character, however, this boy’s demeanor instantly had me at ease.

I lowered my hands, wondering who this stranger was, and how he was related to those inside the Victorian farm house that was in desperate need of a handyman.

“You look like Taz,” Greg said, walking past me to a small overhang that housed a pile of firewood beneath it. Then, he amended his statement. “Well, actually, you guys stand alike.”

What a curious thing to say.

“I was wondering if you were coming to the wedding.” He harrumphed and tossed the logs off his shoulder, onto the wood pile with a clatter.

A large axe dangled from a utility belt on his hip. I should have been terrified. An axe murderer on a dark farm in the middle of nowhere? I wouldn’t be surprised if that was how my life ended. I was bound for an unlucky and undignified end.

“You may be the only one,” I grumbled. “I wasn’t invited to the wedding. My daughter didn’t tell me.”

He tilted his head, his shaggy, dark hair falling in front of his forehead as he eyed me curiously. His beard was closely shaved, his eyes a light color, but I couldn’t pick out the exact hue in the white wash of the moon.

“So, how’d you get here?” There was no judgment in his question. He was just curious.

“By car,” I said cryptically, not sure how much I should reveal of my current circumstance.

As foul as being kidnapped was, a part of me did not want to make Cobra look bad. A feeling I was all too familiar with, since I had felt the same with Raymond. I felt nothing but shame for my circumstances. For allowing such miserable things to happen to me.

“I don’t have the key. I thought to maybe walk to a bus stop, or…”

I couldn’t even get on a bus without a wallet, could I? Merde!

He looked at the driveway in front of the farm house, the lights from the inside casting harsh shadows onto the clearing in front of it. Cobra’s Audi was right in front of the porch, looking far too luxurious for the cozy, rural surroundings.

“Well, you won’t find any within fifteen miles of here,” the boy, Greg, said. “I can call you a taxi, but it’s going to have to come out of Sharon Springs, or maybe even Clifton Park, so you’ll have a bit of a wait. I can give you a ride into town if you like.”

“Oh,” I said, my shoulders slumped. “I don’t have my phone, so I don’t think that would be possible. In fact, I don’t even have my wallet…”

I hadn’t meant to say the last part out loud but there it was.

The boy scrutinized me, his eyes narrowing.

“Well, it’s 1845,” he said looking at his watch, speaking in military time. “Which means that you probably haven’t eaten since Mamma Mack puts food on the table at 1900, on the dot.”

He tilted his head one way, then another, as if he was contemplating something. His charming, unkempt hair swayed back and forth with the movement giving him the look of a golden retriever.

“You aren’t scared of me, so that’s good.” He let out a small sigh, stood up straight and lifted a muscular arm to scratch the back of his neck. “I was going to hit town for dinner.”

He looked over at the farmhouse for a long moment. I wondered why he wasn’t joining everyone else at the large dining table. “Mamma Mack” was cooking enough to feed a small army.

“We have nothing fancy around here, but the food isn’t bad at the bar. Care to join me?”

I almost scoffed in surprise.

“I don’t know if, or when, I could repay you—”

“No need.” He waved me off. He dug into his pocket and fished out enormous keys, a Swiss Army knife dangling from the end of it. “I’ll be glad for the company.”

What a curious young man.

I found that I liked him a great deal. I wondered, maybe ridiculously, why my daughter wasn’t marrying this one. He was certainly just as handsome, and seemed to be gentler than that Kai Griffith… Not that I spent enough time in his presence to form any real impression.

Maybe I was being na?ve again. Fifty years old, and I still hadn’t learned to see past a pretty face that gave me a kind word.

I hadn’t had much in the way of kindness lately. Maybe I was due?