42. Lily

42

Lily

Oh Christ , Lily, why did you say that?

I hate heights. I have a thing about it. Even indoors, in a tall building, if there are floor-to-ceiling windows I have to stand like ten feet back from the glass. I’d just been trying to get us off the subject of New York. I’d pretty much just stuck my arm out at random and said, “ Hey, that looks like fun.” I was lucky I hadn’t pointed at the burrito eating contest.

But anything was better than talking about my past. So I grabbed Bull’s hand and damn near skipped towards the line for the Ferris wheel. “I don’t, you know,” I told him as we approached.

“Don’t what?”

“Don’t think it’s silly. I love it.” And I squeezed his hand. It was true—I did love it. The sun felt amazing on my bare arms, like I was sucking up all my vitamin D for the entire year. I was only just starting to realize how starved of fresh air I’d been, cooped up in the bus. Fresh air and life. Sure, the fair was incredibly country and kind of cheesy, but it was real. Real people with real lives, not the shadows and ghosts I hung around with, with their dual identities and fake passports. I didn’t know anyone, but Bull knew everybody and introduced me to them all. Proudly. And that made me feel amazing. I remembered how good it felt to smile.

I want to bottle this, I thought. So I can drink it when I’m back on the bus on my own.

I suddenly realized what I was thinking and the shock of it made me stumble, pulling on Bull’s hand. If it had been any other guy, we both would have gone down in a heap. But this was Bull and I might as well have pulled on a bulldozer. His warm, strong grip held me up until I got my feet under me, and he just gave me a puzzled smile. I gave him a sheepish grin and we joined the line.

I’d been assuming it was going to end.

I’d been assuming that this was just temporary, that sooner or later I’d go back to my old life—on my own, with no one to protect me, no one to love me...no one even knowing I existed.

I squeezed Bull’s hand. The hell with that. I’d found something good and I was going to cling the hell onto it.

A nagging voice in my head told me that, if this was really going to work, I’d have to share everything with him. Everything. Including my past.

No. No way. Not that. My stomach twisted into a cold knot. It could still work, right? I could just keep that one secret, that one part of me—maybe the most important part—hidden away from him, but be honest about everything else.

“I’m allergic to radishes,” I blurted.

He blinked at me several times. “Okay,” he said slowly. “Duly noted.”

“When I was six, I lied and said the dog knocked a can of paint all over the rug, but really it was me.”

Now he turned to me, concerned. “Lily, what’s—”

He stopped when he saw my face, eyes wide and desperate.

It wasn’t going to work. There was no amount of trivial shit I could tell him that would make up for lying to him about the big one. If I really wanted this to work, I had to level with him about my uncle. But I couldn’t. Once he knew I was running, he’d want me to stop. And there was only one way to stop—to go back to New York and testify. To revisit everything I’d locked away in a dark corner of my mind and confront the monster I’d escaped. And even if I could face doing that, I’d have to go into witness protection. I’d never see Bull again.

No. Fucking. Way.

“Nothing,” I told him. I took a deep breath and pushed the nagging voice in my head deep, deep down inside. “I was just being silly.”

He nodded doubtfully and I squeezed his hand.

The guy running the ride showed us into a car and put the safety bar down across our laps. I’d been so distracted by what was happening in my head that I’d forgotten to be scared. As the car lurched into the air, rocking forward and back, I made up for lost time.

“Wow,” said Bull happily. “This is really...yeah.”

He was obviously loving every minute of it. I gave him my best grin. “Yeah. Awesome!”

We rose higher into the air. The ground fell away, the people becoming toys and then blobs. The wheel suddenly seemed much, much bigger than it had from down below and we weren’t even a quarter of the way around, yet.

“Look,” said Bull. “You can see the greased pig pens.”

I followed his finger and saw dark blobs in cowboy hats chasing after a smaller pink blob. Then I was looking down on top of tents and my stomach lurched. I clung onto the safety rail, knuckles white.

“You okay?” asked Bull. His voice was oddly tight. I guess he was worried about me.

“Fine,” I said. “Just excited.”

We reached the top of the circuit...and stopped. My eyes bulged. Bull and I looked at each other.

“That’s normal,” he told me.

“Right. Yeah. You’re probably right.”

“To give us time to enjoy the view,” he explained.

“Yup.” I made a show of looking around, a delighted, fake smile pasted on my lips. I pointed at a stall. “Look—deep fried iced tea on a stick.”

He’d almost looked as if he’d gone pale, but it must have just been the light. This was Bull, after all. “Yeah,” he said. “Have to try that.”

I could feel the panic starting to build. My feet wouldn’t stay still on the floor of the car and, every time the wind rocked us, my grip on the safety rail tightened until I thought I was going to tear right through it. Bull, meanwhile, had one hand lazily resting on his hat to make sure the wind didn’t take it, while the other arm was wound around my waist.

Quite tightly around my waist, actually. I guess he wanted me to feel safe.

I turned to him suddenly. “Kiss me,” I said.

He licked his lips. “‘Scuse me?”

“Kiss me! I mean, I want to kiss you, right now.” Any excuse to shut my eyes .

He leaned across, pulled me along the seat to him and—

Suddenly the world became still and warm and glorious. His lips were like givers of life, sending energy and comfort flooding through me. I gave a contented little sigh. The wind must have died because the car seemed to stop rocking altogether and hung dead still.

His tongue played with the join between my lips, meeting my own tongue there and dancing with it. I groaned softly against him and opened and then we were twisting and moving, luxuriating in it. It was very different to how we’d kissed before, a kiss that was all about security and warmth.

Someone coughed, right in front of me. I opened my eyes to see the guy who ran the ride, and the people waiting to get on. How was that possible? Weren’t we still at the top?

The guy swung the safety bar out of the way and we guiltily broke the kiss and stood up.

“Unless you want to go round again,” offered Bull.

“No, no. Someone else should have a turn.”