The Hostage Bargain by Annika Martin

Author:Annika Martin
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2014-11-11T16:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER FOUR

We spent a number of hours in the van listening to the audiobook Odin had picked out for the road—evidently my badass Peter Pans favored sci fi tales. The fun space adventure story evened out the harsh edges.

We stopped at another lonely gas station where we picked out candy.

I grabbed a Kit Kat and took it up to the counter.

A voice from behind me: “Hey.”

Zeus.

My heart skipped a beat. I turned to find him scowling at me, standing a bit too near, using his intimidating bulk—unfairly, I thought. “What?”

He plucked the Kit Kat bar from my fingers and looked at the code on the back of it. “Come here.” He went back to the chocolate area and I followed. He put my candy bar back and picked one from the back of the display and examined the wrapper. “Gas candy can get really old.” He handed it to me. “This one’s fresher. Okay?” He said the okay like I was about to argue.

Was this an apology?

“Got it,” I said softly, nodding slowly, like he was a wild animal and any loud reply or fast movement might spook him. “Thanks.”

“And FYI, I wouldn’t’ve shot you in the head. The idea was to separate you two.”

I tried not to smile.

“What’s so funny?”

“That you just said ‘and FYI, I wouldn’t have shot you in the head.’ Not the kind of thing you hear every day. But it worked,” I said. “The ol’ bullet piercing the skull speech.”

“Yup.”

“I guess it was pretty awesome in hindsight. At the moment however…”

Just the corner of his lip tipped up, a half smile. Then he closed his eyes, a beat longer than a blink, and it was as if that blink washed the smile right off, letting the pain back in. He turned and sauntered to the counter.

Well, at least he didn’t hate me. He just wanted me gone.

Not like I had a choice. After the Omaha job I’d go back to the farm, but I would leave again, as soon as possible. And on my own steam, too. Though when I tried to imagine what sort of life I might make, I couldn’t think of one better than this—being with these lost Peter Pans with their road trips and the hotels. And the sex. And the connection, the sense of being on the edge of the whole world.

And being Isis.

Thor snoozed as soon as we were back on the road, splayed sideways, head on the door, legs on my lap, and I laid my hands on his legs, enjoying the solid feel of him. Our strange familiarity. His pant leg had bunched up just enough so that there was a gap between his cuff and the top of his sock, and I moved one of my hands there, enjoying the feel of his calf covered by pale, whispery-soft hairs.

It was strange to feel this sense of domination over his sleeping body, though in truth, I felt a bit like small prey, enjoying the body of a sleeping lion.

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