10. Dusty

Before I can react, she’s gone.

Just like that.

I stand, shellshocked, and drop back onto the desk with a huff.

A laugh, a little crazed, bubbles up from my chest.

I didn’t even get her name.

That figures.

Fate wasn’t giving me a win tonight. Fate was fucking with me.

God damnit.

I find my shirt on the ground and slip it over my head. Wondering if it would be too pathetic to chase after her, I push back into the bar and find Tia waiting for me with her hands on her hips. “Do I need to get the bottle of Lysol?”

I give her a sheepish smile, the one that works on her every time. “Probably a good idea.”

“You rapscallion.”

I chuckle, strolling past the bar. “Rapscallion?”

She whips the bar rag at me and I just barely dodge its vicious snap. “Get out of here before I start throwing bottles.”

I hustle out, but I can hear her chuckling behind me.

At least some people find me amusing.

I hesitate on the street. The dance is still going in full effect. It’s almost bizarre to see everything carrying on like the world didn’t just implode down to one perfect, tantalizing fuck.

I scan the street, eyes searching through the crowd, but I already know I won’t find her.

A strange feeling of loss swells in my chest.

But that feeling bleeds into other empty crevices in my soul. Takes up residence next to everything else I’ve lost. My parents. Gus.

Now my home and my livelihood.

I turn away from the ruckus of the street party and make my way through the dark towards my truck. Climbing into the cab, I sit in the dark for a few moments, letting it bury me. It can suffocate me for all I care.

But after the count of five, I draw in a deep breath and carry on. That’s what we Larson men do. We push forward. Hopeless, stupid, dogged. You go until you can’t. That’s how it works.

Turning the key in the ignition, I glance at the clock.

It’s only ten o’clock. Sienna isn’t due back home until eleven.

I know I still have a little weed stashed away somewhere.

Throwing my truck into gear, I back out of my spot. “Fuck it.”

Smoke it if you’ve got it.

I drive down the old highway, the same one I’ve driven a thousand times before, and yet, something about this night feels different. I’ve felt this way before, unsettled. Like I’m sailing down a knife’s edge, not knowing which way I’ll fall.

Like when my dad died.

And then when my mom got sick.

With both parents gone, that left Sienna and me against the world. I was seventeen and didn’t know shit about raising a seven-year-old girl.

I heave a sigh. This is why I don’t usually take the lid off this box. One depressing thought leads to the next and they just keep coming like a clown trick, one after the other.

I pull into Gus’s farmyard and slow down.

There’s a strange car there. A little black sedan with city plates.

Maybe Juice and his cousin stopped by after all.

Juice is fine, but his cousin set off all kinds of red flags. Can’t say I’m happy about that shady fucker knowing where my sister and I live. I crane my head. That car isn’t swanky, but it looks too nice for a guy named Skunk.

I climb out of my truck, curiosity and wariness surging through my veins.

And then there she is. My mystery woman.

Hope blooms in my chest. Foolish, happy hope.

She followed me home, after all.

I don’t even have time to wonder about the logistics of that result before she frowns at me. “What are you doing here?”

There’s a nervous edge to her voice.

I’m freaking her out.

By being home.

The moment hangs between us, crystalizing into something hard.

And that’s when Ed comes charging out, barreling into the night like he always does.

Eighty pounds of stinky fur, big green eyes that can steal your soul and whatever food you happen to be eating.

He waddles in a chubby boy circle, doing the happy dance he does every time I come home. Tail wagging so hard, he has a hard time standing upright. Labs ain’t the smartest dogs you’ll ever come across, but they sure know how to bring the happy.

But then he spots her.

Ed and I must have similar taste, because I can just see his little doggy face light up.

He loves a good stranger.

And this one is particularly beautiful.