Page 38 of Ruthless Sin
I keep driving and do not look.
The third sign is at the light before the Pontchartrain.
Her hand lifts off her thigh.
I do not know what is going to land. I do not let myself guess. The shoulder check. The mirrors. The sedan behind us, one of ours. The Algiers Bratva property to my right we have been watching for months. The route home and the contingencies for it going bad. The pistol under the dashboard. The other pistol in the door.
The light goes green.
Her hand lands light.
The pads of her fingers on my right forearm where the sleeve has been pushed up to my elbow since I started the car. Her fingers are cool against my skin, the heel of her palm just above my wrist, just below the watch, and the sedan and the route and the man in Houston and both pistols fall back to the edge of the cabin.
The blood drops out of my head and goes south. I am hard against the seam of my slacks.
Madonna.
Two fingertips and a thumb on bare forearm and I am gone.
The SUV drifts two inches before my hands find the lane.
My foot is on the gas and I do not remember pressing it. The SUV is already moving.
I keep my arm still under her hand. I keep my eyes on the road. I drive.
She does not take her hand back.
I do not know which exit I am supposed to take.
I have been driving this route for months and I cannot remember which exit I am supposed to take. The street signs are in a language I read three of and they have stopped being any of the three. My hands take the exit. I do not know why. I let them.
She does not take her hand back and her fingers do not move. Her hand is on me, nothing more. She does not press or squeeze or stroke.
I keep my foot on the gas. My eyes on the road. I do not look at her or at her hand. I do not do any of the things I want to do.
The sedan behind us peels off at the bridge. The civilian sedan picks us up two blocks later. The route holds.
The gate of the compound comes up at the end of the next mile.
The guard waves us through without looking. The gate closes behind us.
The SUV stops at the front door.
She lifts her hand, opens her door, and gets out, Sofia behind her with the notebook against her chest. She doesn’t look back. She walks to the front door of the compound and the two of them disappear into the house.
The door closes.
The skin where her fingers were is still warm. I look at my own forearm. I want her hand back. It is going to stay warm for a long time.
I sit with the engine still running. The cicadas are loud through the cracked window. The shadow of the magnolia branch on the dashboard shifts a finger-width, then another, and the light bleeds from gold to a deeper gold. The cicadas change pitch.
I have not moved. My hand is on the gearshift where it always sits, and the plastic is warmer than it should be. That is the sun. The shadow shifts again and the light moves with it.
I put the SUV in park and turn off the engine, but I cannot make myself open the door. I sit with the cicadas going and the sun bleeding orange across the dashboard, my hand still on the gearshift.
By now she is upstairs with the door closed and the wall at her back, the same as after every drive.
She is in there. All right.
