Ruthless: Contemporary Military Romance (4 page)

CHAPTER SEVEN

In the morning, she wasn’t feeling better. That was no surprise, really. What was surprising was that her intentions had not changed from the night before; now more than ever, she knew that she couldn’t stay in Lincoln. Holly had never been one for dramatic actions, but the more she thought about it, the more she realized she truly had no choice. Simply put, it was fight or flight. Holly had tried fighting, and that had not worked. Her only choice now was flight. If she stayed, she would die. She wanted to choose life instead.

So Holly packed a bag. She went downstairs. She had breakfast with her parents, both of whom greeted her as though nothing had happened. She went along with it, because
something
was about to happen, and that knowledge made the pretense bearable. She finished her meal. She got up. She kissed her mother on the cheek and then her father. She went outside to the garage. She got into her car and checked that the bag she had hidden earlier was still in the backseat. She drove the car out of her father’s ranch and then out of the town of Lincoln. She left it in the parking lot of Austin’s bus station.

Holly shouldered her duffel back and walked up to the counter. She asked the woman there when the first bus out of the city was due to leave, and where it was going. She was told it was going somewhere in Oregon—in fact, the woman said a specific name, but Holly didn’t know the town, and she didn’t care; Oregon was far enough to start.

Holly bought a ticket. She climbed onto the bus and found herself a seat, and then she settled down to wait for the bus to take off. All the while, her heart was hammering within her chest. She sneaked looks out of the window, terrified that somebody might be coming for her.

When she finally realized that nobody had realized what had happened and nobody would be coming after her just yet, she didn’t know whether she felt more relieved or disappointed.

Finally, after what felt like hours, the bus lurched into motion. Holly watched as they pulled out of the station and then out of Austin. She couldn’t suppress a sense of elation mixed with a good dose of panic. She had traveled before, of course, but never alone—and certainly never by bus. Besides, what really mattered was the nature of the voyage. This wasn’t a holiday. It wasn’t even a leisurely trip. Holly was running away. She felt a shiver run all the way down her spine at the realization.

I’m running away,
she thought, repeating the words over and over in her mind in order to make them sink in. She could hardly believe what she was doing.

“Anyone sitting here?”

Holly looked up. A young man with a rucksack slung over his shoulder was standing over her, eyeing the seat next to her hopefully. She threw a quick look around and realized for the first time that the bus was indeed packed.

“I won’t bite,” he said.

“Oh, it’s not that,” Holly said quickly, not wanting to be rude. There was a lost look on his rugged but handsome face that told her he had seen enough rude to last him a lifetime. “I just hadn’t realized the bus was so full. Please, sit down,” she said, motioning to the empty seat beside her.

The young man sighed in relief and flashed her a smile. It was a pleasant smile, if strained.

“Thanks,” he said.

He tossed the rucksack in the luggage compartment above and took his seat. Their journey had just started, but he looked exhausted already.

“You look like you need some sleep,” Holly blurted out. She didn’t know why she was actually saying that out loud, but she couldn’t stop herself.

The young man gave her a tired smile. “I do, huh? Well, I guess you’re right, I could use some sleep.”

“Rough night?”

“Rough year.”

Holly cringed. Everything about the man spelled out the word, “jaded.” “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to pry.” She hesitated visibly, and then said, “My name is Holly.”

Matt nodded. “Pleased to meet you,” he said. “I’m Matt.”

They shook hands and then lapsed into the silence of two strangers each headed out on their own paths. After a moment, Matt asked. “Where you headed?”

Holly eyed him carefully. He didn’t look like the stalking kind—then again, she thought, they never do. Still, despite his rugged and disheveled appearance, there was something about him that told her she could trust him with information.

“Nowhere,” she admitted.

He arched an eyebrow in surprise. “Seriously?”

“Yeah,” she said. “Seriously.” She thought it would feel foolish to admit that out loud, but she found that wasn’t the case at all. It just felt a little bit desperate.

“Well, that’s a coincidence. I’m headed nowhere, too.”

CHAPTER EIGHT

He was an interesting man, Matt. No last names were exchanged, and he didn’t seem to mind—in fact, it seemed to come naturally to him. Holly wondered if maybe he wasn’t running away, too. Except of course he was; no one who wasn’t running would ever give “nowhere” as their destination.

One day and half into the journey, Holly was still feeling very much out of her depth. She didn’t feel like she belonged with these people on the bus, who either knew exactly where they were going or had absolutely no idea. Holly was somewhere in the middle. She knew where she wanted to go, she just wasn’t sure how to get there.

New York, she thought, was no longer an option; both the art schools and the city living itself were too expensive to even begin to contemplate without the financial support of her family. But maybe there were other valid art schools somewhere in the country that she could afford. Maybe there was some place where she could find a job and make a decent living while she pursued those dreams she had never been allowed to even have. She considered buying a map of the U.S.A. and begin figuring out some sort of pattern. She resolved to do that once they’d get to Oregon. In the meanwhile, she would just have to do her best not to panic.

Matt’s presence was helping her with that. He didn’t talk much, but he gave her a sense of safety that she just couldn’t shake. She couldn’t quite explain it. She just felt like she could trust him implicitly. He was very rough around the edges and looked like life might have dealt him some very ugly cards, but there was a strong hint of kindness in his green eyes that just couldn’t be ignored.

He read a lot, picking up a paperback at pretty much every gas station the bus stopped at. He was currently engrossed in the pages of a thick Stephen King tome.
Nightmares and Dreamscapes
it was called. Holly tried very hard not to read over his shoulder—something she thought was an incredibly rude thing to do to someone—but it was pitch black out, she couldn’t sleep, and Arizona was boring at night. Matt read under the dim light of the small overhead light.

He looked up, and Holly started. She had thought he wouldn’t notice her, taken as he was by whatever story was claiming his focus.

“Sorry,” she muttered, looking away in embarrassment. “I’m bored, that’s all.”

“Would you like one of my paperbacks?” He didn’t seem to be teasing her; he was genuinely asking her.

“No, thank you,” she refused politely. “I wouldn’t be able to concentrate.” She hesitated, reluctant to disturb him any further, but then she decided that she really was too bored for pleasantries. “You, on the other hand, seem to read a lot. You’ve bought his yesterday and you’re already halfway through, and we’re talking about a tome of…how many pages?”

“Nine hundred and twenty-three,” he said.

Holly cringed. “Yikes.”

“You don’t like big books?”

“I do. I just don’t think I could stomach nine hundred pages worth of horrors. There’s enough of those in real life.”

Matt smiled. “Ah, but these are fictional. That’s the beauty of them. They’re make believe horrors; you close the book and they’re gone. It’s not that easy with real life terrors.”

Holly bit her lip thoughtfully. “I suppose,” she said. “You’ve seen plenty of those, haven’t you?” Her eyes widened as soon as she realized what she had said. “Oh my God!” She cried. “I’m so sorry! That was very nosy of me. Please, don’t mind me.”

Matt, however, looked unfazed. “It’s all right,” he said. “I don’t mind. And to answer your question, yes, I’ve seen plenty of horrors in my time.” He seemed to battle with a decision, and finally he said, “Would you like me to tell you about some of them?”

Holly stared at him. She really had not meant to pry, and she sure didn’t meant to force him to recount some of those real life horrors. But there was something in his eyes, some ancestral need to tell about those monstrosities to a living soul, for a change. Holly had the feeling he didn’t get to do that very often at all.

“Sure,” she heard herself say, despite her reservations. “As long as you promise to hear my horror story after.”

She had no idea where
that
had come from, but once she had said the words, she realized that she needed to talk to somebody almost as bad as Matt seemed to.

Surprise flashed briefly across his handsome features, but then he nodded with a smile. “Deal.”

They shook hands on it.

Holly settled more comfortably in her seat and prepared to listen.

“Are you sure you want to hear this?” Matt asked after a moment. “You won’t be able to close the book on this one, you know?”

“I know,” Holly said. She caught his green-eyed gaze and held it. “Hit me.”

And he did.

CHAPTER NINE

Matt’s story was truly a horror story. It began in a simple enough way, like quite a few stories begin.

“I’m running,” he said simply. “Yesterday I packed my bag and left my sister and her husband behind. I left her a note pinned to the coffee maker. She has brain cancer, you see. My sister, I mean. She came home from the hospital a couple of weeks ago, after she finished her last round of chemo. The doctors are hopeful that the cancer may enter remission.”

“That’s good,” Holly said. “Isn’t it?”

“I guess. I don’t really feel like getting carried away just yet, just in case something goes wrong.”

Holly nodded. “I understand. What are you running from?”

“I don’t know,” Matt said after a moment. “Myself, probably. I was becoming a burden to my sister, and I really didn’t want that. I need to get my shit together before I can have a shot at normality. It’s just…after my latest tour, everything is a little bit harder than it used to.”

Holly frowned. “Tour?”

“I’m a veteran.” Matt reached underneath his T-shirt and pulled out a chain from which dangled five military plates.

Holly eyed them in disbelief. “Five?” she said, stunned. “You’ve done five tours?”

Matt nodded. “Two in Iraq, three in Afghanistan.”

“How old are you?”

“Twenty-five.”

Holly stared at him. “How old were you when you left?”

“Eighteen.”

“Are you kidding me?”

Matt smiled bitterly. “Believe me, I wish I were.”

“I don’t understand,” Holly said after a moment. “How could anyone willingly go back there?”

Matt shrugged. “There’s something about warfare that keeps my demons at bay.”

Holly said nothing. It was the strangest sentence she had ever heard, and yet it oddly made sense.

“When I fight, I’m fighting my demons too,” Matt explained, “while not having the time to think about them.”

“So you’re not some kind of war fanatic?”

Matt laughed. “No. I’m just somebody who’s been at war too long and has no idea how to function in the peaceful world anymore.”

“And that’s why you ran?” Holly asked. “To figure out how to function?”

“Exactly.”

“It must have driven your parents insane to have you off to war for seven years,” Holly mused. She couldn’t even begin to imagine the anguish that Matt’s family must have experienced to have him overseas, knowing that even once he came home he would want to go back.

Matt’s handsome face darkened horribly. “My parents ceased to have a say on my life a long time ago. My father ran off when I was just a baby, and I later learned he died in a car crash. My mother spent the better part of my childhood giving all of her attentions to heroine. She eventually died from an overdose. My older brother inherited her addiction and died in the very same way. It’s just my sister and me. Well…half-sister. Mom remarried. He left, too. My sister and I were passed around from foster home to foster home. I don’t know how she grew up to be so well adjusted.”

Holly took the words in one by one like white-hot bullets. Her eyes had widened gradually throughout the tale. Matt had not turned his back on his family, like she had begun to think based on what he was telling her; in fact, quite the opposite happened.

“I’m sorry,” she said when she could find her voice. She didn’t say anything else, because really, what could she have come up with? There weren’t any words.

Matt shrugged. “She did splendidly for herself. Becky, I mean, my sister. She teaches fourth grade and married a college professor who treats her like a queen. She’s very happy. I just hope she can win this final battle.”

Without thinking, Holly reached out to cover Matt’s hand with hers. He looked down in surprise, but he didn’t recoil from her touch. “I’m sure she’ll be fine,” she offered. “Your sister sounds like a strong woman.”

“She is,” Matt confirmed. “She’s the strongest person I know.”

“I’m sure she misses you, though,” Holly said after a moment. “You need to find your bearings so you can get back to her.”

Matt stared at her. For a moment, Holly thought she might have gone too far, but then he broke into a full smile. He had dimples, which she had not noticed before—mainly because he had never smiled like that in all the almost forty-eight hours they had been together.

“I’ll make sure to do that.”

“Good,” Holly said. And then she realized her hand was still on his, and she retreated quickly. She flashed him a shy smile, hoping that the barely-there light in the bus wasn’t enough to show that she was blushing.

Silence fell over them, and it was a companionable kind of silence, the kind that disconcerted her to find with a man she barely knew.

“What about you?” Matt asked after quite a few minutes. “What’s your story?”

Holly cringed. “Really, I don’t think it can compare.” She felt foolish to even have referred to her own personal background as to a “horror story.” Compared to Matt’s, hers was a fairytale.

“It’s not about comparison,” Matt said. “It’s about getting these loads off our chests.”

Holly hesitated. She
did
feel the need to confide in someone. She just felt very ridiculous doing so with Matt, who knew the ugly side of the world in ways Holly couldn’t even come close to understand.

“You’ll laugh,” she said.

“No, I won’t.” Matt’s green eyes were staring at her very seriously. “A problem is a problem, Holly. And whatever problem prompts someone to run off
is
a problem indeed.”

Holly gave him a small smile. “All right then,” she said after a moment. She took a deep breath. “My father wants me to get married. “