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It wasn’t even nine and the heat was already rising in shimmering waves from the distant road. Lou leaned back against the frame of her front door, the first coffee of the day in hand and an unlit cigarette balanced on her lips. She felt like shit. Like someone had packed her skull with dry wool and then taken a jackhammer to it. Despite brushing her teeth twice now her mouth still had the gritty taste of the previous night’s drink coating her teeth and tongue. The cigarette and coffee were either going to make her feel amazing or she was going to hurl all over her porch.She flicked open her lighter and went for it, firing up the cigarette and taking a long drag from it. It burned all the way down to her lungs and her stomach roiled, but she didn’t throw up. She blew the smoke out with a victorious little grin. She’d take the bike out. She had shit all else to do today and the weather was its usual strain of unbearable hot and dry. She took a swig of coffee and continued to stare out over the dry desert scrub.
/\/\/\
Her baby - the bike - an old beaten Triumph Bonneville T100 that she had rescued from the side of the road nearly ten years ago and nursed back to health - was waiting patiently for her in the garage. Next to her baby was an old Honda waiting to be fixed up. She was gonna be a beaut when Lou finally finished her but she’d run out of money so it would have to wait. She hit the switch for the garage door and pulled her helmet on. She swung her leg over the Triumph and kicked off, sending up a cloud of dust as she rumbled out into the arid air.It took a full twenty minutes down what passed for the road that lead from her home before she hit actual tarmac and only then did she finally feel the last vestiges of the previous nights drinking session fade away. The sky wasn’t clear; on the horizon she could see the swell of clouds that promised a desert storm but that didn’t stop the heat that felt like it rose from beneath rather than came from above. She gunned down the road, straight as an arrow, past the shrub and dust, nothing for miles around. Another twenty minutes she saw a blip on the road, shimmering in the late morning heat: a person walking of all things along the side of the road. Lou went right past them, debated just carrying on, and then decided against it. She pulled over, kept her engine running just in case it was a meth zombie. Looking back over her shoulder she saw that the person had stopped walking and had turned to face Lou. It was a woman, dressed to the nines in a slinky black dress that might as well have been painted onto her body. Lou frowned through her visor. It certainly wasn’t the strangest thing she had ever seen while out on her bike but it definitely wasn’t normal. The woman was on the taller side of average, long brunette hair hanging down past her shoulders. She had her shoes in her hand, a real fancy looking pair of Louboutin’s with killer heels, the red of the soles flashing like a warning. She’d ripped the dress she was wearing and had wrapped her feet up to protect them from the heat of the road. Not a complete idiot then.Lou swung her leg over her bike and took a few steps towards this woman who looked like she’d just come from a party. The woman swayed slightly on her feet, didn’t quite stumble, clearly dehydrated and over-heated. She was covered in sweat and dust, her shoulders and face reddening in the sun. She moved one of her shoes to her other hand, altering her grip so that she held them both in a way that they could be used as a weapon, the heel deadly sharp. That was fair and sensible. In her black leather jacket and her helmet Lou knew she cut a dangerous looking figure. She reached up to undo her helmet and pulled it off, shaking out her hair and revealing that she was a woman and not some man.Not that that should stop this strange woman from being on guard. Lou had met plenty of dangerous women over the years.“You lost?” Lou called. She moved slowly towards the woman, keeping her hands visible to show that she didn’t have a weapon.“What kind of accent is that?”Lou stopped. What the fuck kind of question was that? She cocked her head to the side and considered this strange woman wandering alone along the desert in a fancy frock, her heels in hand. She jerked her thumb over her shoulder towards her bike."I got water if you want some.”The woman paused briefly, her head turned away and her jaw clenched. Not someone who was used to accepting help from strangers. Lou could understand and respect that. Finally she nodded and hobbled towards Lou. Lou turned and moved back towards her bike, glancing periodically over her shoulder at the woman. She didn’t think she would try anything, but if she did then it wouldn’t be the first time in Lou’s life that she had been left for dead on the side of the road. She retrieved a bottle of water from her saddle bag and handed it off to the woman.Close up she could see more of the damage the sun had done. Her lips were dry and cracked, and the corners of her mouth raw; her shoulders clearly burned around the edges of her dress and the bridge of her nose too. But it could have been worse; her skin was red but not blistered. Beneath the damage this woman was a knockout. High cheekbones, deep, dark eyes that shone with intelligence, and she held herself with utmost confidence, like she knew she was the one everyone was looking at. Get her inside, get her cooled down and hydrated and she’d probably be fine.She tipped the bottle back and drank the water in long gulps.“Whoa, slow down. You’ll hurt yourself gulping it like that.”The woman stopped drinking with a wet gasp. “Jesus. Fuck!”Lou smiled. “Feel more human now?”She wiped the back of her hand across her mouth and took another, slower, drink. “You have a phone?”Lou shook her head.The woman stared at her. “You’re out in the middle of the desert without a phone?” she asked incredulously. Lou cocked an eyebrow at that. “You’re out in the middle of the desert without a phone, water or most of your clothes. Think I’m doing better than you.”“Fair point.” She tipped back the rest of the water, her throat bobbing as she swallowed. She dropped the empty bottle to the ground and held out her hand “Ocean.”“Shark.”“What?”“Oh, are we not playing that word association game?”“My name,” she clarified. “It’s Ocean.” She waited for a reaction, like her name was supposed to mean something to Lou. “Debbie Ocean.”“Good for you Debbie,” Lou said cheerily. “I’m Lou.”“Lou what?”“Just Lou for now.” She nodded her head towards her bike. “Can I give you a ride somewhere? My place isn’t too far and there is a phone there.”Debbie chewed on her ruined lip. “Sure. Yeah. Don’t suppose you have a spare helmet?”Lou shook her head. “Sorry. I got some sunglasses though so your eyes won’t get all fucked up. You ever been on a bike before?”“Yeah. Boyfriend in high school went everywhere on one. It was a heap of shit compared to this.”Lou was about to put her helmet back on and get on the bike when she paused. She considered Debbie and then handed her the helmet. “You wear this; I’ll take the glasses.”Debbie looked for a half a moment like she was going to protest but she took the helmet and put it on, wincing as it rubbed against her raw skin. Lou got on the bike and Debbie slid on behind her, her arms easily snaking around Lou’s mid section. Lou fished out her sunglasses and popped them on. “Hold on,” she told Debbie. She kicked off and turned the bike around, heading back down the road towards her house.
/\/\/\
Lou didn’t get many visitors. That was half the point of living way out in the middle of nowhere. The unfortunate consequence of not having many visitors was that she had a real bad habit of just leaving her shit lying around.She scratched the side of her head with her keys as she surveyed the place. The couch was buried beneath piles of thankfully clean clothes that she hadn’t sorted yet. Her small coffee table had books and plates piled up on it. There was an open bag of tools with its contents spewing out smack bang in the middle of the room. Boxes lined the wall from where she still hadn’t fully unpacked despite having lived here for nearly a year now. Shit, had it really been that long? One chair remained clear except for her guitar enthroned upon it.She cleared her throat. “Yeah. Sorry about the mess.”“It’s fine.” Debbie moved past her, peering round the place, her curiosity naked and unashamed. “Nice place you got here. Cozy. Lived in.”“Phone’s through in the kitchen.” Lou tossed her keys down on the table and pulled off her jacket. She crossed the room to the kitchen and beckoned Debbie to follow her. The kitchen was only marginally better than the living room. Thankfully there wasn’t any old food lying around; she was always careful about leaving food lying around; the ants were hard enough to keep out she didn’t need to leave them any incentives to invade. The nicest thing she could say was that at least the mess was clutter and not dirt.She pointed to the old corded phone on the wall.“Wow. This is a relic.” Debbie grinned at her. She went to the phone and picked up the receiver, holding it to her ear. She laughed. “I feel like I haven’t heard a dial tone in years. You know I had to explain to someone not that long ago that we used to just remember phone numbers? Friends and family, all those numbers we used to have to learn off by heart. She didn’t believe me.”Lou found herself smiling. “Kids these days. It’s a bit of a technological black hole here, you don’t remember the number then you’re not making the call.” She’d smashed her old cell phone with a hammer when she’d first moved out here. If someone wanted to get hold of her they’d have to put in the actual effort to do so.She turned back towards the living room intending on giving Debbie some privacy. Or at least the illusion of privacy. “Give me a shout when you’re done.” She slipped through the door, letting it fall close, and stepped to the side and leaned against the thin wall. She could hear Debbie muttering to herself. A full twenty seconds passed before whoever Debbie was calling answered.“Rusty!”She sounded relieved. “I wasn’t sure this number would… No… No… I need to speak to Danny.”Lou picked at her nails while she listened in. For someone who was out wandering the desert in an evening gown Debbie cut a remarkably calm figure. There was a slight edge of impatience to her tone now, but it erred towards genuine annoyance with no hint of panic. This was a remarkably self-assured woman.“Just put Danny on. Rusty! Don’t you dare -” There was a brief pause. “Shit. Shit. Shit!”Lou pushed open the door and looked back inside the kitchen. Debbie was staring down at the phone in her hand, teeth bared. “Everything alright?”“If by alright you mean I’ve just been fucked over.” Debbie put the phone back on the receiver and leaned back against the wall. She tipped her head back, her hair spilling over her bare shoulders. She blew out a breath her features relaxing.“There somewhere I can drop you off?”“You got a car?”Lou shook her head. “It’d be on the bike. I got a spare helmet and jacket.”Debbie cocked her head to the side, her eyes narrowing suspiciously. “Why’re you helping me?” “You prefer I leave you to die? Cause that’s what would have happened you keep wandering the desert like that.”“Someone else might have picked me up.”“Maybe. Maybe not.” Lou shrugged slowly. “Some of the people that drive through here you don’t want to be picked up by.”Debbie exhaled. “Yeah, I know. That’s why they didn’t bother to follow me.”Lou frowned. Who the hell was “they”? And what had she got herself into by picking up this woman? You got all kinds of different people who lived out here in the desert. Idiot kids driving through, trying to find themselves in an empty spiritual journey; there were drug dealers, meth heads, and those who didn’t want to be found. And then there were those who came out here for something worse, where they could hide what they were doing in the unforgiving vastness, where the sounds of their evil had no meaning because there was no one around to hear it. Lou knew fine well what some people liked to do out here in the desert. In the year that she had lived out here she had seen some dark shit that she’d rather not think about.“Tell you what. How about you get yourself cleaned up? I’ll lend you some clothes, make you something to eat, and then you can get some sleep. Tomorrow we’ll look into getting you where you need to go.”Debbie raised her eyes to meet Lou’s and Lou could practically see the cogs and gears turning in Debbie’s head. Weighing up Lou’s offer against her other options, suspicious of the kindness being offered her. She seemed like the kind of person who was used to everything coming with a price. “You own a gun, Lou?”“Nope, I do not.”“You’d think a woman living out here alone would want a gun.”“I didn’t grow up around them like you Americans. They make me uncomfortable.”Debbie’s eyes brightened. “Where’d you grow up?”“You want this shower or not?”Debbie raised her hands in a conciliatory gesture. “Sure. Show me the way.”Lou led the way and Debbie followed behind her silently. Lou didn’t look back but she knew that Debbie’s analytical eyes were taking in the place; looking for hiding places, escape routes, stashed weapons… Maybe just piecing together whatever information about Lou she could. She hadn’t been shy about showing that she had an inquisitive nature.The bathroom was small and clearly not the kind of place that Debbie was used to going by her raised brow. Lou fished out a clean towel from the cupboard and handed it over to Debbie.“There’s a shower head in the tub. Feel free to use whatever products there are.”“Should I be worried about using the water?”“It’s on a timer. You only get ten minutes and it cuts out. It’s clean though if that’s what you’re worried about.”Debbie snatched the towel from Lou’s hand, her lips curling into a small smirk. “It wasn’t. I just didn’t want to leave you without any. Can’t be much of it to go around here.”She moved over to the small tub and peered in it like she was looking down a deep well. Lou leaned against the door frame and watched her. As tired and banged up as she was Debbie was something else to look at. She clearly took good care of herself. There was actually a decent tone of muscle to her back and biceps, and despite the blemishes left by the morning sun Lou could tell her skin was usually clear and healthy, lightly tanned. She let her eyes wander down to Debbie’s long, lean legs, admire the definition of her calves as she leaned over the tub. Debbie looked back over her shoulder. “Give a girl some privacy?”Lou started. “Sorry.” She stepped back out the room and pulled the door closed. Fucking moron, standing there and staring. She ran her hand through her hair. What the hell was she doing? It didn’t take a genius to know that Debbie was clearly in some shit. The kind of shit that Lou worked very hard to keep out of. She should know better than to let a pretty face distract her. She blew out a breath before knocking on the closed bathroom door. “There anything you can’t eat? I can whip up some eggs and bacon.”“Yes to the eggs, no to the bacon. I don’t have any food related allergies.”“Right.” Lou backed away from the door. She could hear the water running now as well as Debbie moving about the room. Back in the kitchen Lou inspected the contents of her fridge and was hit with the fact that she really needed to do some shopping. With a sigh she grabbed the carton of eggs and the red pepper and an onion. Omelettes were quick and easy and who the fuck didn’t like omelettes? She set some water heating for coffee or tea as well.Just as she was part way through making the omelette Debbie appeared in the doorway wrapped in the towel Lou had given her, long wet hair hanging down her shoulders. “How ‘bout those clothes you promised me.”“Shit. Right. Just gimme a second.” Lou flicked off the heat and went out into the living room to rifle through the pile of clothes on the couch. She pulled out a pair of yoga pants and an old cotton button down, neither flattering but both would be comfy. She handed them over to Debbie. “Or you could just rifle through the heap there and find something that’s more your style.”“This’ll do.” Debbie smiled warmly. “Back in a bit. Food smells good.” She disappeared back into the bathroom leaving Lou standing in the living room scratching the back of her neck. She went back to the omelettes.Less than five minutes later Debbie re-emerged from the bathroom, dressed in the clothes Lou had given her, her hair wrapped up in a fresh towel. “I borrowed some moisturiser.” She pointed at her face. “If I’m lucky I won’t peel.”“Here. Sit.” Lou pulled out the old chair for the far too small table she had in the kitchen. She put down the plate and a knife and fork, then a fresh bottle of water. “You want coffee too? Or I got some tea?”“Coffee makes me jittery.” Debbie slid into the seat and picked up the fork. “What kind of tea?”“I got an English breakfast, Earl Grey, Lady Grey, uh… A couple of fruit ones, green, chamomile.”“Chamomile sounds good.”“Chamomile it is.” Lou pulled out the box she kept her tea bags stashed in and rifled through until she found the right one.Behind her Debbie snorted. “You just lift these from hotels?”“Maybe.” Lou smiled. All her tea bags were individually packaged, bright, colourful, and some even with the name of the hotel she took them from on the packet. “Just means they stay fresh.” She dropped two bags into two mugs and poured hot water over them, dropping a spoon into one and then depositing them on the table. She sunk down into the free seat, slouching, but careful not to let her long legs get all caught up in Debbie’s.Debbie sliced off a piece of omelette with the edge of her fork, pierced it and eyed it warily before popping it into her mouth. Her eyes widened. “Oh, wow! This is good.” She dug in, eating quickly and barely chewing. “This is really good,” she said round a mouthful of food.“Nice dress like you were wearing you’d think someone would have taught you not to eat with your mouth full,” Lou chided. Debbie made a show of chewing and swallowing before speaking again. “You make a good omelette, Lou.”“It’s pretty hard to fuck up an omelette.”“Tomorrow I will make you an omelette and we can revisit that statement.”Lou laughed softly. Debbie finished her omelette and pushed her plate away. She pulled her mug towards herself and took hold of the spoon, turning it slowly. “So Lou, what do you do?”“Odd jobs.”“What kind of odd jobs.” Debbie’s tone was light, and she smiled as she spoke, but Lou knew better. “What needs doing.”“Mysterious,” Debbie teased. She fished the tea bag from her mug with the spoon and dropped it and the spoon on her plate, where it clattered loudly. “What you doing out here on your own?”Lou bristled. Debbie’s tone sounded far too much like an interrogation for her liking. Trying too hard to be friendly, to just sound interested, but she could hear the suspicious edge underneath.“Really? If anyone should be asking questions it should be me. I’m not the one who got left for dead in the desert.”“Don’t be dramatic. I had car troubles.”That statement just reeked of bullshit. Lou exhaled through her teeth. “Listen, Ms Ocean, I don’t care what you’ve got yourself caught up in. You can stay here tonight. Tomorrow I’ll take you to wherever the hell you need to go and that will be the last we see of each other.”Debbie dropped her gaze. Her lips thinned as she looked down at her own hands wrapped around her mug. Clearly she was used to getting her own way; of people answering all of her questions and doing her bidding. “You should get some rest. You don’t look like you’ve had the easiest night.” Lou stood up, her seat scraping noisily against the floor. “You can take my bed. I’ll just get the sheets changed.”Lou didn’t look back.
/\/\/\
Once Debbie was settled Lou got round to actually doing something constructive with her day. She cleaned the living room; actually put away her laundry and put away the books. She did the dishes and gave the bathroom a quick once over. She left her guitar on the arm chair where it lorded over the newly tidied space. She even swept the excess dust up even though she knew it would all just blow back in the next day.Once finished she put her hands to her hips and surveyed her work. The place almost looked liveable. She went to her bedroom and peeked in. The AC was whirring noisily reminding her that she needed to take a look at it. Despite the noise it made Debbie was crashed out in her bed, her legs were tangled up in the sheets and her long hair cascaded over both pillows like rivulets of spilt ink. Her breathing was heavy, long slow and deep, but she didn’t snore, despite sleeping with her mouth open.Lou quietly stepped back and closed the door, careful not to wake Debbie. She made sure the front door was locked and then went to the garage, grabbing her jacket, helmet and gloves on the way. Car troubles, Debbie had said, and that meant that there was a car sitting by the side of the road.She took off faster than normal, eager to get back. Debbie was probably going to be out for hours, her exhaustion having finally caught up with her, but Lou definitely didn’t want her waking up and realising that she’d been locked in.Back on the road she passed a truck heading in the other direction and overtook a car. She passed by where she’d picked up Debbie and carried on. It was another thirty minutes until she came across a car run off the road. She slowed down and pulled over. The car was quite a way from the road, way out in the desert dust, which probably explained why no one had stopped to investigate it yet. Lou didn’t like riding her bike over the grit and sand but she wasn’t going to leave her by the side of the road, so she turned off and carefully made her way over to the abandoned car, silently apologising to her baby for the dust and promising that she would give her good once over later.She cut the engine and swung her leg over and off, walking the last twenty feet to the car. Once close enough she pulled off her helmet and let out a low, impressed whistle. It was a Lexus, and a very nice - not so shiny anymore compliments of the desert - new Lexus at that. Either Debbie had a shit ton of money at her disposal or someone very rich was missing their car.The left side was badly scraped, the dark paint job giving way to silver beneath; it looked like another car had gone into the side of it. The rear bumper was bashed in pretty good too. Lou circled the vehicle. One of the back windows was smashed. The underneath was caked with sand, all caught up in the tires and beneath the car.“What the fuck you been doing, Debbie,” Lou whispered. She peered in the car through the broken window. Glass littered the leather seats but there were no personal effects. She tried the driver’s door and was surprised when it opened. The car was out of gas, which wasn’t surprising. Debbie must have driven it dry. She probably hadn’t even checked to see if she had a full tank before setting off. Slipping inside Lou sat down in the driver’s seat. She dropped her helmet onto the passenger seat and looked out of the dust covered windshield, piecing together what must have happened.Debbie was running from something, or, much more likely, someone.She had stolen this car and driven out into the desert with no other plan than to get away.She had been followed. She had maybe been run off the road.Whoever had done it had left her out here to die.But if they wanted her dead why hadn’t they finished the job? Once she was out of gas there wasn’t any way for her to run. A woman wearing heels like the ones Debbie had been carrying and wearing the slip of a dress she was in wouldn’t have been able to run far or fast.Lou flexed her fingers over the steering wheel. Having Debbie in her home was dangerous. But she couldn’t just drop Debbie off somewhere and turn her back knowing that someone out there meant to cause Debbie harm. She blew out a long breath. She was making too many suppositions; she needed to get some real answers.She stepped back out of the car and headed back towards her bike.
/\/\/\
Because the universe hated Lou and wanted to make her life as quietly difficult as possible Debbie had woken up while she was gone. Lou stepped through from the garage into her house, into the blessedly cool air generated by her sputtering AC, to find Debbie wielding a wrench and waiting for her.“You gonna hit me?” Lou asked. She pulled off her gloves and jacket, setting them down on the side. She had nothing but regrets for leaving her helmet in the garage. “You’re a shitty house guest.”“You fucked off and locked me in.” Debbie’s voice was tense but she managed to keep the volume low, which Lou was thankful for. She might not have had any neighbours for miles around but her morning headache was creeping back in.“I didn’t want anyone breaking in.” Lou shrugged. She went into the kitchen and pulled open the fridge, all too aware that Debbie was following her and still had the wrench. She grabbed a bottle of water and closed the fridge. Calmly, she took the cap off and tossed it onto the counter before turning to face Debbie. She had thankfully lowered the wrench. Lou took a long slow drink of water as Debbie glared at her. “I went out to see if I could find your car.”Debbie twitched. A crack in the control she was trying to project. She licked her lips. “You find it?”“I did.” Lou took another sip of water. “You ran it pretty far off the road. Nice car like that’s not made for off-roading.”“Yeah well,” Debbie said quietly. “I didn’t have much of a choice.”“Do I want to know?”“Probably not.”Lou nodded. “But do I need to know?”Debbie’s gaze dropped. “I don’t know. I don’t know if anyone’s looking for me. And frankly this here is about as far to nowhere as I could possibly get. They’d have to be pretty determined to find me out here.”“You still want me to take you to…” she gestured vaguely with her bottle. “Wherever tomorrow?”“Sure.”“It’s a long drive to anywhere from here so we’ll set off first thing.” Lou took another swig from the bottle. “Put down the wrench. I’ll make us something to eat.”
/\/\/\/\
They passed the evening in relative silence, a quiet truce that suited them both. Debbie found a book to read and curled up on the couch seemingly engrossed in it. Lou set about doing whatever she could to keep herself busy. When night rolled in she settled down on the couch next to Debbie, exhausted. Normally this would be the part of the night where she got completely shit faced but that wasn’t happening with her house guest.“You play?”Lou turned her head to face Debbie. “Huh?”Debbie pointed at the guitar on the armchair. “Do you play?”“A little. I used to be pretty good but I broke my hand years back and it’s not as easy as it used to be.”Debbie didn’t even so much as blink. “How’d you break your hand?”She’d been caught palming cards in the wrong casino.“Fell off my bike,” she lied smoothly. She lifted her left hand and held it before Debbie’s face, wriggling her fingers. “It’s okay but some of the chords hurt to hold. Fingers aren’t as articulate as they used to be.”“Does it ache when the weather changes?”“It does.” She shifted on the couch, turned so that she could face Debbie. “How about you? Any broken bones?”Debbie laughed quietly. “No, I’ve been pretty lucky. Only scrapes and bruises for me.”“You strike me as someone who is very good at talking her way out of dangerous situations.”“Sure, but sometimes people just don’t want to listen.” She closed the book and carefully put it down on the table. She pulled her legs up onto the couch and underneath her, placing her hands in her lap. It made her look smaller than she was. “What are you doing out here?”“Living.”“There are a lot of easier places to live than out here in the desert.”“True.” Lou leaned back, lifted one leg to rest her foot flat against the couch, the other leg stretched out on the floor. She yawned loudly. “The price you pay for peace and quiet.”Debbie hummed, she sounded amused. “Sorry I interrupted your solitude.”“I just like it is all. The quiet. The way I have to work for simple things. I don’t plan on staying out here forever but I needed a break from people.” That was a little more honest than she had meant to be. She was quickly finding that Debbie was too easy to talk to.“I get that. I mean I wouldn’t pick the middle of the Mojave -” She cut off with a frown. “This is the Mojave desert, right?”“It is.” How could she not know that? It was a hell of a drive to get out here. How could she have possibly driven all this way and not known where she was?Debbie pulled her sleeves over her hands. She wore an old hoodie of Lou’s that had been worn once and then stuffed into the back of her wardrobe. She watched Lou, her eyes roaming from her face down her body and following along the leg that was sprawled away from the couch. Her gaze returned to Lou’s and she smiled, long and slow and inviting. Lou swallowed.“What do you do for fun out here, Lou?”“Try to survive the heat.” Debbie’s lips parted. She touched her top lip with the tip of her tongue. “How’s that working out for you?”It had been working pretty well until Debbie had showed up.Lou coughed, forced a smile. She lowered her leg to the floor and sat up straighter, angling herself from Debbie. It was a tempting invite, but fucking Debbie would be a worse idea than picking her up in the first place had been. “Don’t do that,” she said. She rubbed her hand along her thigh. “You don’t need to do that.”“I’m not doing any…” Debbie trailed off. “You expecting visitors?”“What? No.” Lou turned round to face the front door. Through the windows she could make out approaching lights. Her blood ran cold. “Debbie, go shut yourself in the bedroom.”“What?”Lou stood up, kept her back to Debbie. “Just do it. I’ll take care of this.”“They’re probably looking for me.” Debbie moved up to stand next to her. She tugged on Lou’s arm, urged her to look at her. “Thank you for what you’ve done for me. They were always going to catch up with me. You don’t need to do anything else.”Lou looked into her eyes. She hated the acceptance she saw there. “Bedroom. Lock yourself in and don’t come out until I tell you to.”“Lou you don’t have to do this.”“They don’t know you’re here.” Lou moved from Debbie and kicked open the bag of tools she had on the floor. She pulled out a tire iron and hefted it in her hand. The lights had stopped moving but were now bright enough that Lou knew that the car had pulled up to a stop just outside. “Now Debbie.”Debbie pulled in a shaky breath, nodded, and went. Lou didn’t move until she heard the bedroom door close.Keeping the tire iron in hand but out of sight she opened the front door and peered out. “Can I help you?”Two men had exited the car and were busy nosing around her property. One of them, a proper smarmy looking bastard with his hair slicked back, moved a few steps towards Lou. “Can’t imagine you get many visitors out here.”“You imagine right.” Lou glanced over at the car. Another Lexus. Wonderful. “You lost? It’s not much of a road but if you go back the way you came then you’ll hit the road in about twenty minutes follow that and you’ll eventually hit the interstate.”“Not lost. Looking for someone.”Lou’s gut tightened. “In the desert?” She forced a laugh. “Good luck with that.”“A woman, she drove out here sometime last night.” He tucked his hands in his pockets and smiled up at Lou. “You have anyone stop by for gas or water? There’re not a lot of places to stop out here.”“I have not. Just me and the dust.”He nodded, looked back at his little buddy who was still eyeballing the area around her home like Debbie would pop out of the ground if he just scrutinised hard enough. “Could I trouble you to use your facilities?”Lou rolled her eyes. Like he couldn’t just piss comfortably on the side of the road. But it would look suspicious if she refused, like she had something to hide. She stepped back and waved him in. “Sure.”“Thank you.” He hopped up onto her porch and into her home. He glanced down at the tire iron she held and raised an eyebrow. “I hope that won’t be necessary.”“Last person I had outside my door at night was a meth head.” “That’s unfortunate.” He held his hand out to her. “Claude Becker.” He also said his name like she was supposed to have heard it before and care.“Lou.” She gave his hand a quick shake. It was warm and baby skin soft. She walked towards the bathroom. “This way. There’s limited water so don’t spend an age washing your hands.” He looked like the kind of prick who didn’t ever wash his hands after pissing or shitting.He slipped into the bathroom and closed the door behind himself. Lou waited, watching the door, her eyes flickering to the closed bedroom door and willing Debbie not to do anything stupid. She heard the toilet flush and he stepped out, flicking water from his fingers. “Thank you for your help.” He moved back towards the front door and stepped outside, but paused. “If you do come across this woman could you give me a call?” He pulled a card out from his blazer pocket and handed it to Lou.“She your ex?” Lou joked weakly.“Yes. She’s also a thief.” He nodded at Lou once more and hopped down from the porch towards his car. “I’d be grateful for any information regarding her whereabouts. But be careful. She’s a lot more dangerous than she looks.”Lou waited on the porch until Becker and his associate got back in their car and drove off in a cloud of dust. She waited until the lights of the car were specks in the distance before she stepped back into her home, then she closed the door and turned every damn lock she had. She leaned against the door, panting. “Debbie!” She turned on her heel and marched towards the bedroom, banged her fist on the door. “Open up, it’s me.”She heard the bolt slide across. The door opened slowly, Debbie peeked out, her head low and her shoulders high. “He gone?”“Yeah,” Lou said. “He’s gone for now. What the fuck did you do?”
----- CHAPTER BREAK -----
The Lexus hadn’t moved an inch. A thin layer of dust covered it dimming its glossy sheen. Sand that had been blown in on the morning breeze gathered in miniature dunes against the tires. There were no signs of further human contact since Lou had been here the day before. Becker and his goons must not have found the car. Her tracks, both from the tires of her bike and her own feet, were still etched into the sand. Lou hefted the full jerry can with one arm, leaning away from it to brace for the weight. She dragged her feet, kicking up the sand and dust, destroying the marks she had left the previous day. She unearthed a little bush that was trying its damndest to live with the toe of her boot, exposing its roots to the sun and then crushed it beneath her heel. Debbie waited behind her, keeping watch from Lou’s Triumph and squinting in the morning light. She wore borrowed clothes; from Lou’s old leather jacket down to her underwear. Her hair, clearly very used to being well maintained, was beginning to curl, the ends twisting and flicking up. Debbie didn’t fidget, just watched Lou impassively as she worked. Her gaze didn’t make Lou nervous the way Lou figured it made most other people. She could feel it hot between her shoulder blades but it was a welcome weight, comforting the same way a hug that had a bit too much squeeze in it could be.She stopped just in front of the car and surveyed the area. She and the car were surrounded by creosote bushes, all swaying in the slight warm breeze that blew across the sands. Past the car and into the distance she could see swirls of dust, the rise of the basin and rock formations where the land gave up on being flat. She hefted the can, her arm shaking slightly and her right hand complaining at the weight with a bone deep ache, and turned back to the car. Lou intended that if Becker did find his Lexus than all he would come across was a wreck. There was no way it would trick him into thinking Debbie was dead, but it might slow his progress, and - fuck it - it meant he wouldn’t get his fancy pants car back and sometimes you have to take the small petty victories.She opened the back door and poured gasoline over the leather upholstery, sloshing it carelessly over to the front seats and console. She tipped some over the hood and roof before tossing the can into the vehicle. She looked back at Debbie, who stood still as if she were carved from stone, a watchful sentinel to Lou’s minor act of vandalism. “Why do I feel like you’ve done this before,” Debbie called over.Lou flashed her a grin. “What, you haven’t?”Debbie dipped her head, looking very much like she was holding back a smile.Lou pulled her lighter out and flicked it open, the flame dancing to life. It always looked super fucking cool to casually toss your lighter onto the car and walk away from the rising flames, but Lou liked this lighter so that wasn’t going to happen. Instead she fished some paper that she’d brought just for this occasion out from her jacket pocket and twisted it until she had a nice tight taper. She lit the end and carefully deposited it through one of the open windows, dancing back quickly as the gas caught and car went up. She sauntered back towards Debbie. The car’s tank was empty so there was little chance of an explosion but that didn’t mean she wanted to be standing close to it when the flames really got going.“Was this necessary?” Debbie asked.“Baby, you deserve fireworks.” Debbie tilted her head back, the smile that she had been holding back breaking free. “You call these fireworks?”“Well.” Lou turned back to the car, squinting. It was really going now, the flames flickering higher. “I mean it’s not like it’s your birthday.”“I want big explosions for my birthday.”“Whatever you want, darling.” They watched the car smoulder, standing shoulder to shoulder. The heat hadn’t reached them yet but it would soon. Plumes of smoke rose into the air, a dark beacon that would undoubtedly draw someone to it. That was half the plan. Have someone find the car, have someone look into who owns the car, and finally have someone question Claude Becker why a car registered to him burnt up out in the desert. Debbie would be long gone and safe by the time the authorities really looked into it. But it was something that might cause Becker trouble. If everything went to plan then Lou would never know how it all panned out. One of the door windows cracked from the heat, it sounded like a gunshot echoing through the arid air. Lou sighed. “You want to get breakfast?”“Sure.”
/\/\/\
It had been difficult to sleep last night. Lou had sat up on the couch long after Debbie had retreated to the bedroom, had kept the tire iron close by just in case. Eventually she had fallen into a fitful sleep, her neck stretched over the armrest and her legs hooked over the opposite one. She had woken up to find Debbie standing over her, haloed in the first morning light.“It’s nearly five. How far is Barstow from here?”Lou had pushed herself up to a sitting position, neck and back complaining from the awkward position she had slept in. She rubbed her eyes and held back a yawn. “What?”“Barstow. How far is it?”“Good few hours. That where you want to go?”“Honestly I just know it’s somewhere out here. You take me there I can make my own way.”Lou blinked blearily up at her. Why was it that she hadn’t had a single drop of alcohol last night but still felt like shit? She swung her legs down from the couch, folding herself over, arm wrapped around her stomach. Had Debbie said it was five? Who got up at this time of the morning? Why did this time of the morning even exist? “Lou.” “Closer places than Barstow.”Debbie had chewed on her lip, not meeting Lou’s gaze. “It needs to be Barstow.”“What about your ex?” Lou asked. She rubbed her hand over her knee and looked up at Debbie. “I’ll figure something out.”Lou had precisely zero doubts about that.
/\/\/\
It wasn’t much of a plan - drop Debbie off in Barstow, continue on with her life - but Lou was at a loss over what else to do.About an hour down the road they found a diner and Lou pulled in. It had been a long time since she’d driven so long with someone on the back of her bike and her arms hurt from holding herself far too tense, her shoulders burning. The awkward position she had slept in last night didn’t help. Thankfully Debbie had experience of being on the back of a bike; she wrapped her arms around Lou’s waist, pulled herself up nice and tight, her hips tucked up against Lou’s arse, and stayed still. The road was straight as an arrow and boring as fuck to drive so there was little worry of her tipping them off or having Debbie attempt to lean into the turn. When she was younger and a much more inexperience driver she’d had girls on the back who grabbed her elbows or her shoulders and thought they needed to lean into turns. There had been more than a few near misses. Of course when she was younger those near misses had been the best kind of aphrodisiac. Nothing like nearly being splattered beneath a sixteen wheeler to get the blood pumping and the libido surging. She was too old for that shit now and thankfully Debbie knew what she was about, and the only thing Lou needed to tell her was to tap twice if she needed her to pull over.Lou parked up the bike and waited for Debbie to get off before she dismounted.Debbie pulled off her borrowed helmet and shook out her long hair. “I think that’s the first time I’ve ridden on the back of a bike and not hit my head off the driver’s.”Lou fiddled with the strap for her helmet. “Those other drivers were shit,” she said once free from her helmet. “Or they were going for a boob jam and that just makes them a different shade of shit.”“Boob jam, huh?” Debbie repeated with a smirk.“Come on.” Lou jerked her head towards the diner. There were two cars parked outside and a truck. One of the cars was covered in stickers, old and new alike, faded and peeling, damaged by the sun and the sand. Lou swallowed the noise of disgust rising up her throat. Serial tourists were the worst.They headed inside out of the morning sun which was just starting to really fire up. Pretty soon it would be unbearably hot and Lou would be wishing that she was lying on her couch in her underwear listening to the AC sputter and sweating out her hangover rather than leather clad and on her bike. A fan whirled lazily up on the ceiling, turning slow circles and barely shifting the air. A plump waitress worked from behind the counter; she squinted at them suspiciously as they looked about at the seating options. A lone man at the counter, two younger men at one of the tables, and a family that were probably the serial tourists. Lou made a bee line for a table as far away from everyone else as she could manage. The table and chairs were fixed to the ground and Lou had to slide in, her jacket pulling on the cheap plastic seat cushion covers. Debbie sat opposite her; she unzipped her borrowed jacket and rolled her shoulders, shucking it down her body. She picked it up and carefully folded it length-ways before laying it down, treating it like it was actually worth something. She sat on the seat next to it, plucked the menu out of the cheap metal holder and scanned it.Lou used her teeth to pull her gloves off and dropped them on the table. She ran a hand through her hair, ruffling it. She glanced at Debbie as she looked over the menu, her perfectly shaped brows drawing together as she scrutinised the options. Lou had always got a kick out of seeing a woman wearing her clothes, a young dumb tingly feeling in her pants, and even though Debbie’s wearing the now was entirely innocent and born from necessity, it still gave her a thrill. It clearly wasn’t her usual style but she pulled off the distressed t-shirt and jeans look. Her loose hair curled about her shoulders, thick and unruly. A thick tendril hung across her face, over her nose and cheeks that shone pink from yesterday’s exposure to the sun. “You gonna look at the menu or stare at me all morning?” Debbie said not looking up from her menu.Lou smirked and pulled her menu to her, glancing down at it. She hadn’t eaten yet; her breakfast had consisted of her customary cigarette and a coffee. Her stomach was well used to her occasional neglect so didn’t complain. Half the menu contained bacon; she looked over the top of the card at Debbie whose frown had increased in severity. People sure did like meat for breakfast.“Looks like I’m having eggs again,” she murmured, lowering the menu and pushing it away with a single finger.They ordered and waited in silence until Lou’s coffee and Debbie’s water turned up. Lou wrapped her hands around the mug ignoring the fact that it was too hot and her hands already felt like they were cooking.Debbie leaned back in her seat, smiling. She smiled more with her eyes than she did with her mouth, little crinkles appearing at the corner of her eyes as lit up. Her expressions were carefully controlled and microscopic; just the barest movements of muscle, utterly inscrutable. Lou imagined that even people who thought they knew Debbie well would struggle to decipher what she was thinking or feeling from her expressions. She yanked a napkin from the holder and set it in front of her, folding over the corners. “Where abouts in Australia did you grow up?”“Finally placed the accent.”“It took me a while; you have an American twang that threw me. The dehydration and the heat didn’t help.” She inspected the glass that had come with her bottled water, scrutinising it for defects or dirt. Satisfied, she unscrewed the cap on the bottle and poured the glass just over half full and set it on top of her napkin. She looked up at Lou. “I’m guessing you’ve lived over here for a good few years.”“You a detective now?”“Just curious.”Lou lifted her coffee and blew on it, taking a tentative sip before answering. “I’ve lived over here since I was nineteen.”“More than a few years then.”Lou threw her a look of mock offence. “You saying I look old?”“Not at all. But - and I’m real sorry to have to tell you this - you’re definitely not passing for in your twenties. If that’s what you're hoping for.”Lou laughed and shook her head gently. “My twenties is definitely not a time I want to revisit.” In her twenties she had been the kind of idiot that had let a pretty face sway most of her decisions. She flicked her thumb contemplatively against the sharp plastic corner of the menu. She’d like to think that in her forties she was smarter than that, but recent events were proving otherwise.“So why’d you move stateside?”There was no harm in telling her why, but if Debbie was hoping for a remotely interesting story then she was in for severe disappointment. Lou exhaled and put the menu back down; she reached for her mug, hooked her finger through the pathetically small handle and pulled it towards her. “My mum died and there was nothing left there for me after that. My dad lived over here so I came over. Chance to reconnect or something like that.”“That’s sweet.”“He was a drunk.”“Not so sweet.”“Eh, mum wasn’t exactly a saint herself.” She had been worse than her father; at least when drunk the only person he had hurt was himself.Debbie carried on smiling that soft little knowing smile that Lou was beginning to really enjoy. “You didn’t tell me what part of Australia.”“Melbourne.” Lou sipped her coffee. It was rank but better then the shit she was brewing up at her place. “Where in Melbourne?”“Do you know Melbourne?”Debbie shook her head. “So I could say anywhere and you’d be none the wiser.”“You could.”“Berwick. What about you? Where’d you grow up?” “All over.” Debbie plucked another cheap napkin from the holder. She placed it flat on the table and folded it over and over, then unfolded it. “My parents moved around a lot. Because of my dad’s…” she tilted her head, considering. “Job.”Lou knew better than to ask what Debbie’s father had done for a living. Debbie didn’t share the same sentiment. “What did your dad do?”“Robbed liquor stores.”Debbie blinked. “Was he good at it?”“Not especially.” Lou shifted in her seat. There was something about Debbie’s that made her want to satisfy her curiosity. Anyone else and she would have told them to get fucked and not given up a single detail about her past. After parting ways with her father she had carefully crafted an air of mystery around herself; the less people knew the better. People who knew too much were dangerous, able to hand her over to the police or sell her out. But something about Debbie, about the way she phrased the questions or the expression on her face, made Lou want to talk, made her want to open up in a way she had never previously in her life.“You rob stores too?” Her tone was teasing. Maybe she thought Lou was joking about her dad.“I drove the car.”Debbie made an impressed noise. “A getaway driver. How fortuitous for me; I have a lot of stuff that I need to get away from.”Lou shifted in her seat, angling her legs away from Debbie. The hard plastic seat under the cheap faux leather cushion was starting to make both her back and her arse ache. She shouldn’t have told Debbie about her dad and what she used to do with him. Should have kept her mouth shut. She looked up at Debbie who was silently watching her; she could see no judgement in her eyes. Lou cleared her throat. “So, you vegetarian?”Debbie shook her head. “I’ll eat Chicken or fish. Just not a big fan of red meat.”“Does pig count as a red meat?”“Why wouldn’t it?”Lou shrugged. What the hell did she know about livestock? All meat for her came packaged from the store. The conversation stalled there and they were left looking at each other over the table. The corners of Debbie’s mouth were still quirked in a small, amused, smile, her eyes lit up with interest. The silence was weirdly comfortable, something that Lou wasn’t used to. Historically silence had been a prelude to something awful happening and as a consequence she had never been entirely comfortable in it, always seeking to find noise to drown out the quiet. In the past she had found people to fill it with chatter, with excitement and passion; with music, the roar of her bike, anything to stack up against it. She’d had to teach herself to be calm in silence. Moving out here had been a harsh learning curve, and the first few days a special kind of hell. But she had persevered and found a kind of peace in the muted sounds of the desert. She broke their eye contact, tried not to think of it as losing an impromptu staring contest, and let her gaze fall down to Debbie’s hands, resting on the table top. Her long fingers were busy folding a napkin repeatedly in different ways, the corners this time, all four, one after the other, down and back up, wrinkling the material, then the whole thing diagonally across, in half and unfolded once more. Her movements were slow and measured, not a nervous habit, or at least not one that was tinged with anxiety. It was calming. Something that Debbie had probably trained herself into doing. Better to calmly repeat a gesture than to pick at her skin or bite her nails. Lou wanted to cover her hands with her own, to still these gestures and cradle this small controlled habit with the comfort of her own hands. The waitresses finally arrived, looking harried despite the lack of clientele, or perhaps because of it. She had a chewed pencil tucked behind her left ear and her hands shook as she put their plates down. Lou looked up at her. Her hair was coming down from the bun, grey peeking out from the roots, loose wispy strands crowned her sweat slicked hair line. Her mascara, put on too thick, was blotching at the corner of one eye. She barely looked at them as she dropped the plates and turned to leave. “Well that was rude.” Debbie’s eyes followed the waitress as she hurried back behind the counter where she started furiously wiping it down.Lou shrugged. “Given the arseholes she usually has to serve I’m not going to hold the attitude against her.”She picked up her fork, gave her stack of pancakes an experimental poke, and more squashed than cut a bit of pancake off, tentatively eating it. Debbie picked up both knife and fork and dug in, happily piling forkfuls of scrambled egg onto a slice of toast before shoving an impressive amount of it into her mouth. “It’s not half bad,” she said around the mouthful.“Seriously, did no one teach you table manners?”“Excuse me.” Debbie pointed at Lou’s elbows that rested on the table with her fork. “Elbows missy.”Lou put her fork down on the plate, and leaned back into the cheap faux leather seat. She stretched her arms out across the back of them and smiled at Debbie, not even caring if her legs were invading Debbie’s space. Debbie rolled her eyes at her and carried on eating. Lou had known Debbie for just over twenty four hours and in that time she had come to appreciate that Debbie really liked to eat. From yesterday’s omelette to the sad little meal of vegetables and rice they’d shared last night to this morning’s breakfast, Debbie seemed to take great pleasure in shovelling food into her mouth. Debbie pointed her fork towards Lou’s barely touched pancakes. “Most important meal of the day.”“Pretty sure that’s a lie made up by women’s health groups.”“C’mon, you can’t exist on coffee and cigarettes alone.”“Watch me.” But Lou picked her fork back up and tucked back into her rubbery pancakes. She was barely a quarter of the way into them when Debbie pushed her own cleared plate away. Lou swallowed her current mouthful of pancake. “Did you even taste that?”“It was good. For the record, your omelette was better.” Debbie sipped her water. Lou speared a rogue blueberry that was making an attempt at escape from her plate and popped it in her mouth. She settled the fork down and pushed the plate away. “Seriously?” Debbie scoffed. She pulled the plate towards her and picked up the fork. “No wonder you’re so skinny.”“I’m not skinny.”“Yeah, you are. I’ve been considering undoing the button on these jeans all morning.”“Don’t let me stop you.”Debbie practically wiggled her eyebrows at Lou.Lou shook her head and laughed. “I’m going out for a smoke.” She pushed herself up, knees nearly banging off of the table. Her leather jacket caught on the cheap plastic-leather covering on the seat. It made a loud ripping noise as she stood, and she accidentally kicked Debbie as she attempted to wrangle her legs out from the too tight space. Debbie pretended not to notice, focusing on finishing off Lou’s breakfast and Lou didn’t apologise. Once stood up Lou stretched, flexed her shoulders back, and craned her neck until it gave a satisfying pop. She headed for the door, passing beneath the piss poor fan and out into the blistering morning heat. What kind of idiot wore leather in this? She pulled her cigarettes out of her jacket pocket, fished one out and lit it, and quickly turned to head to the side of the building so she could stand in the shade. She stuffed her cigarettes and lighter back in her pocket and turned to look over where her baby was, still gleaming proudly in the sun, the most beautiful thing for miles around. She took a long drag on the ciggie, felt the warmth of it swirl into her lungs, calming her down, and blew out a long steady stream. She kicked a stone across the parking lot, sending up a trail of dust after it as it skittered away. She turned and made her way further along the side of the building. There were probably rules about customers going round the back of the diner but it was too hot to even begin to give a fuck. Sweat was already gathering in the small of her back and she just knew that it was going to roll on down to the crack of her arse and her mood would turn distinctly shitty with it She slowed as she heard the back door of the diner bang open. There was the muffled sound of voices, hushed tones that didn’t want to be heard. She pulled another drag and slunk closer, keeping close to the wall. She couldn’t see, didn’t dare poke her head round the corner, not with the smoke she was pouring out. “I don’t know who you’re looking for.” The waitress? Lou frowned. She dared to move a little closer, careful of the noise her boots might make on the rough tarmac.“A woman. About five seven with long dark hair.”Lou’s stomach dropped. Her cigarette slipped from between her lips and fell to the ground. Slowly, so slowly and carefully, she put her heel over it and ground it to ash and mulch. She flattened herself to the wall and edged closer, not daring to breathe.“Look we have a lot of people come through here. I can’t be expected to remember all the faces.”“You would remember her. She is very beautiful.” His accent - Eastern European maybe? Lou stepped back. She didn’t have much time. She turned and, as quietly and quickly as she could, made her way back to the diner entrance. She had to slow her heart rate, tell herself not to run. She turned through the door way and looked over the empty table they had been sat at. Debbie wasn’t at the table. Why the fuck wasn’t she at the table? Her jacket and the rest of Lou’s gear was still there where they had left them. Lou swore under her breath and went over to the table; she dropped money for their food and a healthy tip down, and gathered up her gear. Arms full, she made for the toilets, the logical place for Debbie to be. They were tucked round a corner from the counter, out of sight for the rest of the diner but with a clear beeline for the exit. Debbie stepped out of the toilet door just as Lou approached. She looked up, her eyes widening. Lou tossed her jacket to her and held out her helmet. “Put these on. Now.”“What? Lou?” Debbie pulled on the jacket but left it undone. “We have to leave.” Lou turned and made her way towards the exit; not bothering to see if Debbie was following.“What is going on?” Debbie hissed.They made it outside, and Lou was momentarily blinded by the sun. She squinted, knew in her mind where she’d parked but faltered, as her vision cleared she spied from the corner of her eye a man in a black suit. She spun, grabbed Debbie by the front of her jacket and dragged her round the corner of the diner, into the shadows. She pressed her against the wall. Debbie’s eyes widened. Not by much, she was a master of micro expressions, but enough that Lou could see the surprise there. She held her forearm across Debbie’s chest, pushing her back against the wall, as though she could push her into it, obscure her from danger.“Lou?” Debbie whispered. “We have to leave.” Lou kept her voice low. She was so close to Debbie, her face inches from her, could feel Debbie’s breath against her face. “A man, not the one from last night but a different one, is here looking for you.”Debbie’s expression softened and Lou felt her chest rise and fall. “You don’t have to do this.”She wore the same acceptance in her expression as she had the previous night when Becker had come to the door. Something in Lou trembled to see it; quaked in anger. She looked away from Debbie, to where her bike sat in the sun. “Put your helmet on. Make sure your hair is tucked up in it.”“Lou.”“Do it.”“Lou.”“Debbie,” Lou answered in warning. The acceptance in Debbie’s expression was morphing into something like pity. Pity for Lou and her efforts. Pity for Lou and her caring when she shouldn’t. Pity had always pissed Lou off. She ground her teeth together and stared at Debbie, knew that her icy blue eyes could make even the most self-sure person falter. Finally Debbie exhaled and nodded.“I will. Just…” Her eyes flicked down and back up; she tilted her head, eye brows raised. “You’re gonna need to get off me.”Lou looked down: her arm still pinned Debbie to the wall, and she was leaning so close into her that her whole body was practically pressed against her. Debbie’s lips quirked, nearly a smile. Beneath the pink shine of sun damage Debbie’s cheeks were flushed, colour blooming in them. Lou stepped back, grunted in way of apology. She could feel heat in her own cheeks, spreading until her entire face was aflame; she turned to that Debbie wouldn’t see it, knowing that it was a futile effort. Debbie was far too observant to have missed something so obvious. She pulled on her own helmet and then turned to help Debbie, stuffing her long hair up into the helmet so that it would be hidden. She tugged the zipper up on Debbie jacket, made sure her gloves were on, and then turned to make her way towards the bike. It wasn’t a perfect disguise but it would do. She had to trust that they weren’t looking for two women on a motorbike, that they thought that Debbie was alone. Hope that they wouldn’t look twice at them as they walked across the parking lot. Her bike felt like it was miles away and she had to resist the urge to run to it. It had been too long since she’d had to remain calm under pressure. It used to be second nature. But time and solitude had eroded that. The most dangerous thing that had happened to her in the past year was finding a half-dead scorpion in her cutlery drawer. Now she felt her pulse firing away like a jack-hammer, adrenaline spiking and the flighty part of her brain wanted to run. She forced herself to remain calm, to place one foot in front of the other. Debbie walked beside her, cool and collected and not showing any signs of the skittishness that Lou felt. She risked a glance to her right; the goon was there, he looked out towards the road and thankfully not at them. Debbie tapped her arm and Lou looked to her. They were at the bike; Debbie gave her a quick thumbs up. Lou got on first, waited for Debbie to slide in behind her, put her hands on her waist and her feet on the pegs, before she pulled her keys out and fired up the engine.
Fuck!
She’d forgotten her gloves. She stared down at her bare hands. Of all the stupid things… She looked over to the diner, her gloves were probably on the table, or had fallen to the floor while she was getting her things. The goon was turning now, looking over the parking lot.“Fuck it,” she muttered. She pulled back on the throttle and pulled out of the parking lot. She could always get new gloves. She turned onto the road and set off, forcing herself to hold steady until she was far enough away from the diner. “Hold on!” She called over her shoulder. Debbie probably couldn’t hear her. Her grip around her waist felt secure enough. Lou pulled back on the throttle, felt the bike lurch beneath her, felt Debbie’s arms tighten instinctively. She would put distance between them, as quickly as she could.For once Lou was thankful for the long, flat straight roads. More thankful still for the amount of work she had put into her baby. They were pushing one hundred and was running smooth as butter, purring beneath her, happy to finally, finally be allowed to hit the speeds she was meant to. They whipped past old telegraph poles with drooping wires, brittle bushes reaching from the sand and the distant Joshua trees. Over head clouds rolled by offering no respite from the sun as they fired down the heat shimmering road.Roughly twenty minutes along Debbie’s tapped twice. Lou eyed the speedometer: they were down to ninety, still going way too fast; if they hit a bump, a rock or a divot they were going to eat shit. She slowed, eased up, until they were down to a respectable sixty. Debbie double tapped again. She had promised Debbie that if she double-tapped the she would pullover but stopping seemed like a bad idea. She was desperate to put as much distance between them and the diner as possible in as short amount of time as available. She’d always said only a bad rider ignored the signals from their passenger. Lou pulled over; not even bothering to signal, there was no traffic here. She pulled off the road and onto the sand, churning it up beneath her wheels, determined to find some cover. She pulled to a stop in the shade beneath the rise of some weather worn rocks.Debbie rocked against her, still holding on tight with both arms wrapped around Lou’s mid-section. She had to pry her arms from around Lou before she slipped off the bike, and half walked, half stumbled away. She pulled off her helmet and let it drop to the sand, bending double, her hand resting against the rock face. Frowning, Lou swung her leg over the bike and pulled off her own helmet. She rested it on the seat and approached Debbie. “You alright?”Debbie waved her away. Maybe the danger they had just been in had caught up to her, or more likely it was the speed Lou had been going, either way she gave Debbie her space. She walked in tight circles, flexing her fingers. They were stiff from the wind and from holding on too damned tight, like a fucking amateur who had no idea how to control her bike. Her hands were trembling and she could feel her whole body want to give into shakes, the adrenaline rapidly falling away. Debbie straightened up.“You have any water?” Her voice sounded thick, like she was speaking from behind a hand closed over her mouth.“Sure.” Lou went to the bike and pulled a bottle from the saddlebag. “Here. Catch.” She tossed it to Debbie, who, surprisingly, caught it. She twisted off the top and took a long gulp. Lou shook her head; it was like she wanted to throw it back up. She went over to the rock, ran her hand over the rough stone and leaned against it. She could feel the heat baking up from the ground, cooking them where they stood. “I think we need to revisit last night’s conversation,” she said, shrugging off her jacket.Debbie was pulling off her own jacket, shaking out her arms and grimacing. “What conversation would that be?”“The one where you failed to tell me what it is you did to piss this guy off.”“And here I was hoping it would be the one about the water reclamation system.”“Funny. So how about it?” Lou squinted at her. Even sweaty, grimy and her hair all over the place Debbie managed to look beautiful. “What did you do?”Debbie drank from the water bottle. She looked past Lou over the rise and fall of sand towards the road. “I stole from him.”
No shit.
“I figured that.”“I stole something very valuable.”“His virtue?”Debbie smiled. “Not quite.” She shuffled over to Lou, kicking up sand like a child kicking leaves. She sat down heavily on the rock next to Lou, her bare arm hot against Lou’s skin. “He has an art gallery. I took a painting, gave it to my brother who fenced it. Claude took offense to that.”“Must have been some painting.”“There!” Debbie pointed at her. “Your accent came through really strong there.”Lou hummed. It had a habit of coming through stronger when she was upset or angry. But she didn’t comment on it, Debbie was just trying to deflect so she didn’t have to answer Lou’s questions. “And this guy is your ex?”“Sort of.”“He either is or he isn’t.”“Define ‘ex’.”Lou sighed. “I mean, sure, I was sleeping with him, but I wouldn’t have called it a relationship.”“Would he?” Killing Debbie over a painting? Sure, she could see that, but it still felt like an extreme reaction. Killing her because he was a betrayed lover? Absolutely. Men rarely needed much motivation to be incited to violence when their dicks were involved.Debbie lowered her gaze. “It wasn’t supposed to happen like this. I was supposed to be long gone by the time he realised the painting was missing.”“Fuck ups happen.” Lou knew that better than anyone. “What now?”“You take me to Barstow as planned and leave me there.”“What’s in Barstow? There are towns closer than that.”Debbie stared out over the horizon. Her hair was a mess, tangled from being shoved up into the helmet; it hung down her shoulders, the once carefully managed soft curls now breaking off into a tangle. “I know someone there. He might help me.”“Might?”She scrunched her face up. “He’s not expecting me. And even if he was he’s always a bit hit and miss over whether he’ll help or not. He might decide I’m not worth the risk.”“He might decide your worth more handed over to Becker.”“I don’t think he’d do that.”Nothing about this felt right to Lou. “That’s not gonna work, you can’t just hope that this man is going to help you. The guy you called yesterday - Rusty? What did he tell you to do?”“You were listening in?” her forced outrage was off the charts.Lou turned to stare at her. Seriously? As if Debbie hadn’t expected Lou to listen in on her conversation. As if she hadn’t already been completely aware that Lou had listened in. Debbie held her gaze, eyes searching Lou’s, looking for something. She dropped her gaze and sighed. “He told me to lay low and that he and Danny would take care of it.”And of course Debbie had been completely incapable of doing just that. Lou could have spent her morning sweating on her couch ignoring her impromptu house guest. Instead she had committed arson, recklessly sped on an old road, and eaten rubbery pancakes. And there might be a bargain bin goon wandering about looking for them. She should do just as Debbie wanted: taker he to Barstow - hell, not even that far - taker her to the nearest gas station and leave her there. This wasn’t her problem and from the sound of it the situation was only going to get even more dangerous. She didn’t owe Debbie anything; she certainly didn’t owe Debbie her life or her own personal safety. It wasn’t her job to keep Debbie safe -thank fuck!And yet…Here she was. Already knee deep in whatever shit Debbie was caught up in. She couldn’t just bail now. She wiped her brow with the back of her hand. Shook her head as she considered her options. “Okay,” she said. “Here’s my plan: we go back to my place and do just that. We lie low for a few days. Say till the end of the week? Maybe by then the heat will have died down. Then I take you to Barstow and we try to contact Rusty again.” She took the bottle of water from Debbie and took a swig. It was warm but given how dry her mouth felt she couldn’t give a shit. “They’ve already been to my place so hopefully they won’t be back.”Debbie clearly didn’t like the plan. She was pouting; her bottom lip jutting out as she stared at her own dust covered boots. Lou’s feet were two sized bigger than Debbie so they’d had to stuff the toes of the boot with paper so that Debbie could wear them. She rubbed her thumb along the worn cuff of her jacket in little circles as her gaze grew more distant. She didn’t have many options and was completely at Lou’s mercy. Whatever plan she came up with Lou, as her only means of transportation, had to agree to it. Unless Debbie decided to steal the bike from Lou; she could just club her now with the spare helmet and leave her for dead in the sand. It would certainly break up the tedium of life out here. “Alright,” Debbie said. “Till the end of the week and then you take me to Barstow.”“Right.” Lou finished off the water. She stared out over the desert. One week and then her life went back to normal.
----- CHAPTER BREAK -----
Lou worked the toe of her boot into the sand and unearthed a small stone. She herded it with the edge of her boot to the ever growing pile of stones and pebbles she had already collected. She stood up straight, her sunglasses slipping down the bridge of her nose, and peered at the setting sun. She hefted up her old cricket bat and rested it across her shoulder, held the pose because she had an audience. Debbie sat in silent appreciation, or more likely confusion, in an old deck chair that Lou had found in the garage. They had returned from their morning excursion tired and sweaty, worn out from the excitement. Once the adrenaline from such a close call would have fuelled Lou for days, the best buzz money couldn’t buy. Now it made her feel tired down to her bones. Debbie must have felt similar; she had retired to the bedroom and not emerged for hours, the prospect of being stuck with Lou for the remainder of the week too much to bear. At least she hadn’t trashed the place in a fit of anger. Lou had poked her head in when the silence had got too much, when she was starting to entertain ideas that Debbie might have climbed out the window and was currently running pell-mell across the desert. But Debbie had just been lying on the bed; not even sleep, just lying still and staring up at the ceiling. Lou had left her to it. They all had their ways of coping.By the time Debbie had emerged from her self-imposed time out, Lou had worked herself into a silent agitation. She had never been one to fret before, but something about Debbie made her feel that little bit anxious. She had found an old case of cheap beer and chucked them into the fridge. She had five-and-a-bit days to fill and no idea what to do with them. They all had their ways of coping and, like her father before her, alcohol was Lou’s. Her suggestion that they go enjoy the evening sun put front, as though Lou had a front garden, was not met with any resistance. Debbie had followed, accepted the offered beer, and plonked herself down into the chair, not even reacting to the way it gave way under her weight.She reached down and grabbed a stone at random. It was about the size of a walnut, worn smooth by the sand and wind. She tested its weight in her hand. She tossed it straight up, stepped back and lowered her bat so its toe hovered just above the sand. As the stone fell she struck it, felt the impact and the dull crack as the stone melt polished wood. It flew off into the distance and she lost sight of it as it was swallowed the fading light of the setting sun.“So how many points was that?”Lou turned towards Debbie. She was wearing shorts; her smooth, tanned legs were stretched out soaking up the late evening sun. She sipped her beer and peered up at Lou from behind cheap plastic sunglasses that were broken and taped back together. When searching for the deck chairs and beer Lou had found an old huge umbrella, it was ripped and the spokes were bent. She’d fixed it to an old pole and jabbed it into the sand with about as much gusto as she would were she planting a flag on a recently conquered mountain. Debbie had even sarcastically applauded her efforts. It provided inadequate shade from the sun. An upturned bucket to use as a table completed the ensemble. She could start a whole new career in make-shift patio furniture. Rich people would buy anything. “Runs,” she said, pointing the bat at Debbie. “You score runs not points. I have to run to earn, well, runs. I run from the wicket to where the bowler stands.”“What’s a wicket? Sounds like something that fixes to a gate.”“It’s where the batsman stands. I run from the wicket to where the bowler stands, touch the tip of the bat to the popping crease and if I have time back again. I do that as many times as I can before the fielders get the ball back.”“And if you don’t have time?”“Then I’d stay over there and the other batsman would be by the wicket.”“There’s another batter on the field?” Debbie huffed loudly. Her head fell back, her long neck stretched out gloriously. “This game makes no sense.”“Oh, and baseball does?”“Sure does. Makes perfect sense.”Debbie scrutinised her from behind her broken sunglasses. “Popping crease sounds rude. Like a gross game frat boys play.”Lou picked up another pebble. She tested its weight in her hand, and, satisfied, tossed it up and swung. She struck it hard as it fell back towards the earth and sent it hurtling away. “Homerun,” said Debbie dryly.Lou snorted. She walked over to Debbie and picked up her own beer and took a swig. It was warm and going flat fast, the taste bitter on her tongue. She didn’t usually drink beer. Usually it was bourbon or vodka, but today had seemed like a cheap beer drinking day. Debbie picked at the peeling label on her bottle, flicking little balls of wadding into the sand. “Can I have a go?”“Sure.” Lou held out the bat to Debbie. Debbie stood up and took hold of the bat. She tested the weight of it as she headed over to the dwindling pile of stones and pebbles. She’d fished through Lou’s clothes as soon as they’d made it back to the house, trying to find stuff that she might actually want to wear. Old button downs and shorts seemed to have won out; she’d made a little pile of clothes in Lou’s bedroom, neatly folded and stacked on the drawers. She’d found an old pair of sandals in the cupboard that Lou hadn’t even known she’d owned, and in all likelihood had belonged to some woman from her past, and now wore them, complaining that it was too damned hot out here for boots. She’d rolled the sleeves back on her borrowed grey shirt all the way up past her elbows. She bent down to pick up a stone, just folded herself in half not bothering to bend her knees, her arse pointed unsubtly at Lou. It only improved the view so Lou had precisely zero complaints at Debbie for doing this. Debbie found a stone she liked. She held it in her palm, her thumb rubbing over it in little circles. “I have no idea how to hold this bat,” she said.“If you’re gonna do it properly you need two hands. The toe, that’s the end of the bat, should rest on the ground.” She should get up and help her; stand behind her and guide her hands to where they should be, like in those creepy heterosexual romantic clichés. “Not gonna happen.” She tested the weight of the stone, shrugged, and then tossed it high in the air. It gave her enough time to take a step back, raised the bat over her shoulder like she was playing baseball, and then swung it. It connected; cracking loudly, the stone edging off the side of the bat and sailing off in a high arc to land somewhere unseen in the sand.“Nice.” Lou raised her beer in a salute. She took another drink and dropped herself into the deck chair, where it sagged under her weight and sank further into the sand. Her cigarettes and lighter were on the upturned bucket they were using as a table; she pulled one out, lit it, and took a long drag. Debbie didn’t smoke, but she had yet to complain that Lou did. “Keep it up and you can form your own team. The Desert Debbie’s, the only cricket team in California.”Debbie shook her head and grabbed another stone. “You know, I thought you were kidding when you said all you did out here was survive the heat.”“Cabin fever setting in already?”“Not yet. But there has to be more to living out here than one-woman cricket and watching you give yourself cancer.”Lou put her cigarette between her lips and smiled at Debbie. “If I live long enough for these things to kill me then I will be very surprised.”Debbie tossed the stone in the air and swung the bat. Another hit. Lou followed it’s trajectory as far as she could, the little stone spinning through the air until it disappeared from sight. She made a mental note to get her eyes tested. She really should have been able to follow that stone farther. Debbie dropped the bat and grabbed her beer. Her shoulders were held stiff, her mouth now a hard line, all traces of her earlier humour had vanished.“What’s wrong?” Lou asked.“Nothing. Just…” she trailed off and stared out over the expanse of nothing that surrounded them. “I don’t know how you can stand it. Don’t you want more? To keep moving?”“Not having ADHD helps.”Debbie turned to her, her calculating gaze not hampered at all by the cheap broken sunglasses she wore. Debbie was the kind of woman who would look confident dressed in rags; she’d be able to look at you in a way that made you feel like an idiot for not also being dressed in rags. She leaned on the bat, one corner of her mouth quirking upwards. “It seems like a waste.”Lou plucked the cigarette from her lips and expelled a long stream of smoke. That was a direct hit. Debbie was annoying in the way she could get under Lou’s skin and expose the raw tender parts of her. She wasn’t about to discuss with Debbie her reasons for moving out here. It might seem like a waste to Debbie, and it was, it really was but Lou wasn’t going to let Debbie know that. She squinted up at Debbie and even in the dimming light she could read the discontentment in her expression, the way it had morphed from challenging into disappointment. Lou’s fault for not giving her a reaction. Lou dropped the butt of her cigarette and kicked sand over it. The temperature was finally dropping off into something bearable and she knew just how to cheer Debbie up. “How about I make us something to eat?”“Sure.”She pushed herself up and shuffled to the porch. Debbie remained behind, staring out over the horizon.It was going to be a long fucking week.
/\/\/\/\
Debbie woke up at the crack of dawn. Again. To her credit she did try to be quiet, shuffling first to the bathroom, and then on into the kitchen, but Lou was a light sleeper. Something she had trained herself to be from necessity; she’d bunked down in too many places over the years where heavy sleeping meant that the nicest thing that would have happened to her was being robbed.Lou scrubbed her hand over her face, worked her finger and thumb roughly into her eyes, and rolled off of the couch. She landed on her hands and knees. Slowly, she pushed herself up; first to her knees, then she got her feet under her and stood up. Her lower back, her hip and her right knee all complained and by the time she was fully upright she was heavy breathing through her nose, her teeth clenched. Why had no one warned her that getting old hurt this fucking much? She put her hands to her lower back and pushed, trying to stretch out the stiffness.“Did I wake you?”Lou turned to the sound of Debbie’s voice. “Yes.”Debbie leaned against the frame of the kitchen door sipping a mug of tea. She’d nicked one of Lou’s old t-shirts to sleep in. It was faded from black to grey, the neck stretched out, and it hung just to the very top of her thighs. Lou dragged her eyes from Debbie’s toned legs and forced herself to look her in the eye. “You alright?” Debbie asked. The corners of her eyes were creased in amusement.Lou grunted in reply. She grabbed her cigarettes and lighter from off the table and shuffled outside. The sun was only just peeking over the horizon, the temperature close to cool as it was ever going to be this time of year. There was even a hint of a breeze that rustled her hair. Lou lit her cigarette and slumped back against the wall, her eyes falling shut, the fuzz of sleep still hazing the edges of her consciousness. She held her cigarette with the V of her middle and index finger and to her lips, not trusting herself to keep it there without mouth and hand working in tandem. She was just slipping into a doze when the door opened. She opened one eye and peered at Debbie.“Not a morning person, I see,” Debbie said. She handed Lou a steaming mug and the aroma of freshly brewed coffee wafted over to her, immediately perking her up.Eyes fully open, she pushed herself away from the wall and reached for the proffered mug, mumbling a thanks. Even to her own ears her voice sounded rough, thick with the gravel of sleep.“Don’t mention it.”Lou sipped the coffee and took a quick, sharp drag from her cigarette, letting the taste of both intermingle. Immediately she felt more alert.“Go back to sleep if you want,” said Debbie. She held her mug of tea in both hands, the string from the tea bag hanging loose down the side of the mug. There was a chip in the opposite side from where Debbie drank from. “You look shattered.”Lou shook her head. Once she’d finished the coffee and cigarette she’d be fully awake.“Seriously. I’ll be fine on my own; I don’t need a baby sitter. All I’m gonna do is read a book.”Lou wouldn’t be able to sleep through that even. And she wouldn’t survive another couple of hours on that couch. She swallowed a mouthful of coffee to save her having to voice these thoughts, and ignored the way Debbie was staring at her.“Take the bed.” Debbie’s head was tilted, the beginnings of a smile at the corner of her lips.“I’m fine on the couch.”“Seriously, Lou. It’s your bed. Just go grab a couple more hours.” Debbie took a step closer to her. “How much trouble could I possibly get in?”Lou stared at her over the rim of her raised coffee mug. Steam and smoke from her cigarette mingled together rising around her. “I dread to think.”Debbie just smiled in reply. She had an annoyingly endearing smile. “Alright.” Lou flicked her cigarette away, blew out the stream of smoke, and slunk back inside. Debbie followed behind her, perhaps making sure that Lou actually went to the bedroom. But Debbie stopped in the living room. She crouched down to inspect the bookshelf, apparently going to make good on her claim of reading a book. Lou continued on to the bedroom, pushed the door to but not closed, there was still a chance that Debbie might try something when she was out, and however small that chance was Lou wasn’t about to take the risk. Lou flopped face down on the bed, burying her face in her pillow. She had missed her bed. Had discovered a whole new appreciation for how comfortable it was. She pressed her face into the soft cotton case on her pillow and inhaled. It smelt different. She could detect traces of her own shampoo, and beneath that the tang of sweat; and beneath that still something other, something different and new and enticing. She drifted back to sleep, determined not to dream of Debbie.
/\/\/\/\
Two days passed and they managed not to kill each other. Two days of pleasant tedium where they learnt to inhabit each other’s spaces; to eat together, laugh together, learn morning routines and stave off boredom. Lou had forgotten what it was like existing with another person. She remembered other people as demanding, as taking up her time and annoying her, but this, this was peaceful. This was a calm she had missed but been seeking. It was easy to be around Debbie.It was edging into afternoon on the third day when Lou shuffled from the bedroom into the kitchen. She still spent the night on the couch, but with Debbie getting up at the arse crack of dawn she moved into the empty bed to grab a few more hours sleep and give her back some respite. The kitchen smelt like coffee and eggs and Lou was led by her nose towards it. She blindly pulled out a chair and slumped down onto it, not caring that her long legs reached out from under the table into the narrow space of the kitchen. Debbie had her back to her, an apron tied around her waist; and, even without being able to see her expression; Lou knew she was frowning down at the sizzling frying pan.“I hope you like your eggs over hard,” Debbie said over her shoulder. Sure enough the tiny crease between her brows that Lou was learning counted as a severe frown was present. She turned back to the eggs and poked discontentedly at them with the spatula.“This early in the morning I like my eggs however.”“It’s the afternoon.” Debbie stepped away from the eggs to slip four slices of bread under the grill. “Do you want bacon? I was going to make you some but I couldn’t find a second pan.”“There’s only one pan. Just shove the eggs to the side and chuck the bacon in with them.” Lou leaned on her fist, her elbow on the table. “I can’t.” Debbie turned round to face Lou. She bit her lip. “All the bacon juice will get caught up in the eggs.” She seemed unusually distressed at the prospect.“Bacon juice? What a refreshing morning beverage. Mmm, fresh from the pig.”“I could just get my eggs out first.” Debbie spun back round; she pulled a plate forward and deposited two of the eggs on it, returned the pan to the heating element and went to the fridge. She yanked open the door and peered in.Lou eyed the grill. “Your toast is burning.”“What?” Debbie looked up.“Your toast.” Lou stood up and went to the grill. She pulled it out and flipped the bread over, put it back under and turned down the heat. She pulled over the empty plate and scooped her own eggs out of the pan, and carefully deposited them on the plate. “You should have started with the bacon.” She put both the plates in the oven and turned it onto the lowest setting. She turned up the heat on the hob and settled the frying pan back over it. “Pass me the bacon.” She held out her hand and Debbie slapped the packet onto her palm. “You take care of the drinks. I think there’s some cheese slices in the fridge? It’s nothing fancy but it’ll go great with the eggs.”Debbie slid the cheese slices across the counter to Lou and then went to the brewing coffee. “I was going to surprise you with breakfast. You’ve made every meal so far and I feel like I’m being lazy.”“And I appreciate it.” Two slices of bacon were sizzling away in the pan. Normally Lou wouldn’t cook them this hard, with the heat turned up way too high, but they needed to catch up with the eggs. “Really, I do.” She glanced over at Debbie, watched as she poured Lou a mug of coffee. Lou turned back to the pan, smiled as she flipped her bacon. She pulled the plates out from the oven and rescued the toast, dropping two slices on each plate. She placed cheese slices over the bread, the bacon next on hers followed by the eggs, and just the eggs over the cheese for Debbie’s. She pulled a shaker of black pepper out from the cupboard and ground each concoction with a liberal sprinkle. She turned off the oven; and carried the plates to the small table. “Voila! Breakfast is served.”Debbie brought over the coffee and a mug of what was presumably tea and sat down opposite her. Beneath the table their knees touched, the space too small even for Lou’s legs on their own.“Thank you for rescuing breakfast,” Debbie said. She picked up her knife and fork and dug in. She closed her eyes round the first bite and moaned. “Wow. I don’t know how you do it. I really thought that this would be a disaster but it tastes great.”Lou tried hers. The bacon was a little rubbery and the yolk too hard for her liking but it was edible. The jury was still out on whether Debbie was just easily impressed or she was attempting to flatter Lou. Lou washed down the food with a mouthful of coffee. She wasn’t usually hungry when she first woke up, but she felt ravenous today so even though it didn’t taste that great she was going to finish it.“What’s the plan for today?” Debbie asked, once again with her mouth full. It was a wonder that she didn’t choke on her food.Lou shrugged. “Same as every day. Read books, try not to die from the heat.”“I don’t know how you manage not to die from the excitement.”Lou sipped her coffee. “I might have a look at the AC. It’s been making a lot of noise lately.”Debbie nodded. She finished off her eggs and toast and sat back in her seat. She tapped her finger against her mug of tea, her head cocked contemplatively. “You mind if I try and call Rusty again?”Lou shook her head. “Go for it.” She forced the last bits of her breakfast down and picked up her coffee. Now she just needed to skulk outside and have a ciggie and her morning would be complete. She turned in her seat and her foot nudged Debbie’s. “Who is Rusty? If you don’t mind my asking.”“He’s my brother’s,” Debbie offered with a single shoulder shrug.“You brother’s what?”“Y’know, just my brother’s.” Debbie picked up her own mug and swallowed a mouthful of tea. “Just his man.”“His man?” Lou repeated with a raised eyebrow.Debbie laughed. “I just heard what that sounded like. Not his boyfriend, he’s his… He’s just his. I don’t know how to explain it.”Lou got it. Everything about Debbie was less than legal. She was starting to piece together the picture of the Ocean family. Not a sprawling crime empire, but a close knit family and associates, with Debbie’s brother at the head. Rusty must be his right hand man. If you couldn’t get in touch with Danny then Rusty was the one you talked to. But Rusty’s place at Danny’s side hadn’t been what she was wondering. She looked down at her coffee knowing that she shouldn’t ask. It was none of her business and it betrayed too much of what she was thinking about. It would be something to exploit about her. But the question burned on the tip of her tongue.“What’s Rusty to you?” She asked coolly, trying not to betray what she was thinking, what some small stupid part of her was hoping. She looked up to see Debbie’s reaction. Debbie raised both eyebrows, her lips twitched in that familiar way they did when she was amused.“He’s my brother’s friend. Mine too, I think. I’ve known him since we were kids. He’s practically family.”Lou hummed, nodded her head.“And I suppose, since you have such a strict definition of what constitutes a relationship, he’s my ex.”Lou had picked the wrong moment to take another sip of coffee. She choked on her mouthful upon hearing Debbie’s words. She put the mug down, her hand to her chest as she coughed. Debbie smiled at her serenely. “My definition?” Lou managed to choke out.“Sure. Claude has to be my ex just because I slept with him, so I guess Rusty is my ex too.”“That’s not what I said. That’s not what I meant.”“No?”“No. It’s to do with the length of time you were sleeping with him.”“Well, I don’t think I ever timed each individual session…” Debbie trailed off.“Funny.”“You started it.” Debbie sipped her tea. Lou’s face burned. “I didn’t start anything,” she said hotly. She pushed back from the table, her knee banging against the leg and jostling it. The corners of Debbie’s mouth quirked. “That’s not… I was just curious.”“Sure.”“I’m going for a smoke.” She stood up, grasping her mug of coffee in hand. Her face still felt hot. “Have fun!” Debbie called after her.Lou stomped through to the living room and pulled on her boots. She grabbed her cigarettes and lit one on the way out, squinting in the early afternoon sun. The difference in temperature from the inside to outside hit her like a full body slap and she nearly staggered. She scrubbed her hand over her face. Great job. Fantastic. She silently congratulated herself on her awkward blundering questions. If she had wanted to remain aloof from Debbie then this was not the way to go about it.The door opened and Debbie stepped outside. She raised her hand over her eyes and peered off into the distance. “Who’d have thought that all of this nothing could be so beautiful?”Lou took a long drag from her cigarette and followed Debbie’s gaze. The skyline was surprisingly dark; muggy greys mixing with the blues and whites, there was a storm on the horizon. She would have to prep the house for it. She exhaled a long stream of smoke and turned to find Debbie looking at her. Her thick mane of hair curled about her shoulders, more unruly than ever; her dark eyes trained on Lou. She parted her lips and the tip of her tongue darted out to touch her top lip; she sucked in a quick breath, held it, and Lou was transfixed. Debbie let the breath go, her chest falling. “You smoke too much,” She said eventually. She turned and went back inside letting the door fall close behind her.Lou leaned back against the house; her hands were shaking and her heart thudding like the oncoming thunder.
/\/\/\/\
The lights flickered just after each crash of distant thunder. Lou cocked her head to the side, listening, waiting for the inevitable.Debbie sat on the floor, her legs curled underneath her and her bare feet poking out, a book in her lap. Debbie was a voracious reader; Lou didn’t know if Debbie actually finished the books she started but every time she looked Debbie had a different one open, her eyes moving over the words, barely even blinking. In a short space of time she had practically devoured Lou’s book collection. Now she lowered the book, put her hand to the floor and frowned. Thunder rumbled, the lights flickered, and Debbie jumped, her hand flinching back from the floor like she’d been electrocuted.“You can feel it through the floor,” she said, and then laughed, sounding utterly delighted.“Yeah.” Lou shifted on the couch, her foot on the coffee table. She looked up at the ceiling. “Any minute now.”“Any minute now for what?”Lou held her finger up and smiled. Debbie’s brow furrowed, confusion etched into her expression. It started in the distance, a blur of noise like hundreds, thousands, of fingers tapping on a table top. Then it got louder. Closer, galloping towards them. Alarm registered on Debbie’s face and she pushed herself up into a crouch. It hit the roof all at once. A million tiny missiles striking, one after the other, only milliseconds between them.Debbie jumped to her feet. “Is that – is that rain?”“It is.”“It rains out here?” Debbie cried over the din. “Is it safe? The house isn’t going to fall down, is it?” Lou shook her head. She had closed the hatches over the windows and made sure that all possible entrances were sealed. The outside would be a mess come morning but they were perfectly safe in here.Debbie continued to peer up at the ceiling, arms spread and head back like she was out in the deluge. She was grinning, wide and ecstatic, her eyes lit up. Lou’s heart fluttered.Then the thunder cracked directly overhead. The whole building shook; the lights went out.“Oh!” Debbie made a noise like she had just expelled all the air from her lungs. “What happened?”“Power’s out. It’ll probably be back on by morning.” Lou sat up and shuffled to the other edge of the couch. It was pitch dark, like a hood had been put over her head. She stood up and moved to where she knew her tool kit was, skimming her feet across the floor rather than lifting them. She toed the bag and bent down. “Just wait there I’ll get us a light.” She rummaged, knew there was a flashlight in here somewhere, her hand touching and moving on from various rubber grips to metal. She found it, lifted it up and clicked it on, the LED light sharp in the utter darkness.“Jesus!” Debbie held her hand before her face, blocking out the light. “Sorry.” Lou shone the light up and away from Debbie’s face. The rain moved on, the noise dissipating.“Was that it?”“Yeah.”“That was barely two minutes.”“It just sweeps on over.” Lou brought the light down so she could see where she was walking. “There’s a lamp in the garage. You’ll be alright in the dark for a minute?”“Daddy you know I’m scared of the dark.”Lou snorted and made her way past Debbie. It didn’t take her long to find the lamp; it was exactly where she had left it. She lit it, clicked off the flashlight, and made her way back into the house. The paraffin lamp gave a much softer glow than the LED flashlight, casting shadows around the room. Debbie had settled back on the floor, picking at the hem of her shorts.“The power won’t be coming back on anytime soon,” Lou said. She set the lamp down on the coffee table, and dropped herself back onto the couch, sprawling out.“What do we do in the mean time?”“Carry on reading if you want.”Lou closed her eyes, listening. The rain was retreating, the thunder, thankfully holding off. She could hear Debbie shifting on the floor, the page of her book turning; the paraffin lamp gave off the tiniest hiss that she was sure she was imagining; her own heart, which she couldn’t hear per se, but could feel, and when she lay still like this in the dark always felt like it rode too high in her chest, could feel it beat damn near in her throat. Her eyes flickered open at the sound of movement, of something shifting across the floor. Debbie’s hand curled around her calf and moved upwards, her thumb tracing along the inside seam of Lou’s jeans.Lou looked down and Debbie froze. She was on her knees, one hand on the edge of the couch, the other paused, just over Lou’s knee. Only half of her face was lit by the lamp, cast in a golden glow, the other shrouded in darkness. Lou licked her lips.“What are you..?”Debbie stroked her with her thumb, little sweeps across the seam. “What does it look like I’m doing?” Her voice was low and soft, not a whisper but full of heat and promise, and Lou shivered to hear it.“I told you you don’t have to do that.”Debbie’s smile was just as soft as her words. “You have spent so long staring at me and trying to make it look like you’re not that you haven’t even noticed that I’ve been looking back at you.”Lou swallowed. Lou had noticed; she’d have to be blind to not see the way Debbie looked at her; the lingering gazes, the teasing smiles. But she had known too many women over the years who had been made to feel that they owed something and that the only way they had to pay what they owed was with their bodies. Lou was not, and never would be, the kind of person who did that.Debbie’s hand continued its movement, up over her knee and up her thigh, thumb still holding steady to the inside seam. Lou stayed still. Didn’t dare move. She held her breath and could feel the need for her muscles to tremble, her leg under Debbie’s hand especially so. Debbie lifted hand away and Lou exhaled heavily, relieved and disappointed in equal measure. Debbie crawled up on the couch, her knees bracketing Lou’s legs. She held the back of the couch with one hand, bracing herself. The other she tucked under Lou’s chin, lifting her head so they were eye to eye.Lou kept her hands flat on the couch, flexed her fingers, paying closer attention to the feel of the fabric than she ever had before. Her throat felt tight and her jaw ached from how hard she was clenching it; she had to force her teeth apart to speak. “If this is gratitude then I don’t want it,” she croaked.Debbie dropped her head to Lou’s shoulder and groaned. “You are so frustrating.” “I don’t mean to be.”“I don’t believe that at all. I think you’re holding back on just how frustrating you can be.” Debbie lifted her head and Lou could see the amusement in her eyes. “Lucky for you I happen to find it charming.”Debbie didn’t give Lou time to reply, she kissed her. Her lips weren’t soft, still damaged as they were by her time out in the desert, but that didn’t matter. She pressed that one whisper of a kiss to Lou’s lips and then backed off, her eyes searching Lou’s, testing the waters; an invitation for Lou to continue, to reciprocate. And Lou knew without asking that if she rebuffed Debbie now then there would be no hard feelings, Debbie would back off and they would never speak of this again, but that wasn’t what Lou wanted. She had wanted Debbie from the very first moment she had laid eyes on her and with that little taste Lou wanted more. She leaned forward, closed the gap and kissed Debbie. Debbie sank into the kiss, just melted with a small pleased noise. She kissed Lou like she was barely holding herself back. Like Lou was that drink of water she had so desperately needed. Lou put her hands to Debbie’s hips, then to her arse, and pulled her in so they fitted together. Her hand was round the back of Lou’s head, holding her in place. They kissed and kissed, all lips and tongue and occasionally nipping teeth, and then they weren’t. They rested their heads together, breathing heavily. Lou swallowed. She’d missed this. Missed the contact and feel of someone else, of being wanted and wanting someone. She still had a handful of Debbie’s arse, gave it a squeeze just because she could. Debbie’s thumb brushed against her jaw. Lou moved her hands to Debbie’s hips and pushed her up and off, sliding out from underneath her and to her feet. Debbie looked up at Lou from where she sat on the edge of the couch, silently questioning her next move. The lopsided smirk told Lou that Debbie was feeling pretty confident in what would happen next. Lou picked up the lamp and turned to Debbie. She held out her hand. Slowly Debbie took it and allowed herself to be pulled to her feet. Lou led her through the house to the bedroom. If this was happening then she was damned well not going to have sex on that couch, it had fucked her back up enough just by sleeping on it.She set the lamp on her chest of drawers, hesitated as she considered turning it off.“Leave it on,” Debbie breathed. “I want to see you.” She dropped Lou’s hand and tugged on Lou’s belt, walking backwards towards the bed and pulling Lou along with her. “I want to you to see me.” She pulled Lou’s shirt over her head and tossed it away, before dropping down to sit on the edge of the bed. She pressed her mouth to Lou’s stomach as her hands went back to Lou’s belt, undoing it swiftly and pulling it loose, the metal buckle rattling loudly in the dark room. She dropped it to the floor and popped open Lou’s jeans, tugging them down her hips. Her lips and breath were hot on Lou’s skin, chasing the quiver of muscle. Lou pushed Debbie back a little, pulled her shirt over her head and threw it away too. She pushed Debbie back on the bed, and followed after her, pushing and kicking her jeans off, silently cursing that she favoured jeans that tight. Debbie pulled her down flush to her, skin to skin, finding her lips again. It was too damn hot out here for bras, and Lou couldn’t be more thankful for that as she felt Debbie’s breasts against her own. She pushed herself up, straddled Debbie’s hips and looked down and took Debbie in. From her dishevelled hair strewn across the pillows, to her kiss swollen lips, to the flush down her neck and chest, to those fucking legs that Lou wanted more than anything to be wrapped around her. It should be a crime to look this good. “Jesus, Debbie.” Lou bit her lip.Debbie’s lips stretched back into a slow wide smile. “Like what you see?”“I do. Very much.”“For the record.” Debbie’s hips shifted up. “So do I.” She reached up, curled her hand round the back of Lou’s head and pulled her down, pressed her mouth to Lou’s, her hands slid down Lou’s body. “Like what I see...” Her lips were against Lou’s ear, her hands cupping her tits, thumbs rough over her nipples. “…what I feel.”Lou moaned. She turned her head to capture Debbie lips again. Moved from her lips to her jaw, lower to her throat. Debbie was pulling on her underwear, sliding them down and trying to get it off without breaking this contact, only managing to get them past her arse, leaving them trapped round the top of her thighs. Her arm came up, tucked under Lou’s armpit and she flipped them over. Her hair fell in Lou’s face, and, laughing, Lou moved it out the way. Debbie grinned down at her. “Don’t suppose you have a hair tie?”“’Fraid not.”Debbie shrugged. “That’s inconvenient,” she said, sounding anything but inconvenienced. She bent down, her lips to Lou’s throat, her hands roaming. Lou gripped the bed sheets. Debbie hands moved over her body, her hips, her breasts, slipping back down. She sucked a bruising kiss to the edge of Lou’s ribs, finally pulled Lou’s underwear down and Lou kicked them off, curled one leg around Debbie’s waist and pulled her in so she lay between her legs. Lou couldn’t control her breathing. It had been too long since she’d done this; too long since she’d been touched and held and teased. Debbie lips were back to her chest, her breasts, ghosting over her nipples; her hands on her hips, over her stomach, going lower, and Lou was shuddering and writhing, making small keening noises that she once would have been embarrassed to hear herself make. Debbie’s hand slipped between her legs, and the noise Lou made might have been unholy. She pushed her hips up against Debbie’s hand as it worked her. Debbie took a nipple between her lips, tugging it, her tongue laving over it. Too long since she’d last fucked; too long since sexual gratification had come from somewhere other than the ruthless efficiency of her own hand, and Lou was already close to coming. Her chest was shuddering with the breaths she was dragging in and expelling. Debbie moved up, licked Lou’s lips, and through half closed eyes Lou could see the pleased wickedness of her smile. Lou buried her face in the crook of Debbie’s neck and held onto her, not at all caring that she was exhibiting all the self-control of an inexperienced teenager. How could she possibly care when Debbie felt this good?She rocked her hips into Debbie’s hand until she couldn’t even control that anymore. Until she was pushing up hard, muscles straining, and smothering her cry into Debbie’s shoulder, clinging to her as came harder than she had in years. Debbie gently stroked her through her trembling, cooing softly in her ear. Finally she slipped out of Lou, rested her sticky fingers on her hip and smiled down at Lou. “Fuck me,” she said softly, sounding pleased and surprised in equal measure.Lou laughed breathlessly. “That was the plan.”Debbie kissed her chin. “What’s stopping you?”“I just need to remember how to use my arms.”Debbie kissed her chin again, her cheek, her nose, back to her lips, sinking down against Lou.Lou pulled on Debbie’s shorts. “Take them off,” she said against Debbie’s lips. “Take them off now.”Debbie did; pulling them and her panties off and throwing to join the rest of their clothes. She fell back against Lou, back to kissing her, and let Lou roll them over. Lou trailed her lips down Debbie’s throat, her chest. She could still feel herself trembling, but that wasn’t going to stop her from touching Debbie, from tasting her, from pulling every sigh and moan she could from her.
/\/\/\/\
After, sated and spent, their skin sweaty and sticky, and the taste of Debbie still lingering in her mouth; they lay together, matching their breathing. Lou lay on her stomach, an arm curled beneath her pillow, and her head resting on top of that. Debbie lay half across her back, her chin sharp on Lou’s shoulder. Lou’s other arm lay across the rumpled sheets. She watched as the tips Debbie’s fingers brushed against her wrist.The paraffin lamp was struggling now; the flame was guttering low and casting flickering shadows over the room. The storm was long past and outside of the house was silent. Debbie turned her head to press a kiss to Lou’s shoulder. “It was a Julie Mehretu.”Lou frowned. She felt hot and heavy, the weight of Debbie half across her back was comforting but it made it hard for her to think coherently. “The painting?”Debbie hummed. Another kiss was pressed to Lou’s skin. “I’d been eyeing it for months. Turns out Claude had some outstanding debts to pay to some less than savoury gentlemen. So to make the money he struck a deal with this guy, a casino owner. You know the type, mid-level criminal who thinks he’s a big time gangster?” Her lips hovered just above Lou’s heated skin, brushing against her as she spoke, her words muffled. “I thought he was going to sell him the painting but I was wrong.”Lou was holding her breath. Debbie covered Lou’s hand with her own, their fingers easily finding each other.“It was me he was selling.” Debbie sighed. “The painting was just going to be a gift. What really pisses me off is that it wasn’t even about me. This guy has history with my brother.”Lou’s hands curled into fists. “And you would be used as leverage against your brother.” She spoke through clenched teeth, her voice tight with anger.“Exactly.” Debbie exhaled, her breath ghosting across Lou’s heated skin. “So I got in touch with a contact, who passed on what was happening to Danny and Rusty, and we worked out a plan. We would steal the painting, tweak Claude’s nose, and sell it off ourselves. Let Claude know that he had messed with the wrong family.”“But it went wrong?”“Yeah. It went very wrong. He knew. Someone must have told him, someone we trusted must have tipped him off. He knew and he had a couple of guys waiting for me. Being stuffed into the trunk of a car is not something I ever want to repeat.” Her tone was light, like she was telling a joke, but Lou wanted to weep at the abuse she had suffered. “They drove you out here to kill you?” Her chest felt tight, her lungs compressed. She had suspected as much, and it had been her first thought when she had seen Debbie abandoned car, but now that she spoke it aloud it didn’t sound right. Becker needed Debbie alive.“No, I think they drove me out here to try and scare the shit out of me. Or maybe we were on our way to hand me over? Terry Benedict is based in Las Vegas. I’m not sure.” She kissed Lou’s shoulder again. “You have freckles,” she sighed, and her breath swept across Lou’s skin, where there was a smattering of light freckles that usually were only visible after being in the sun. “They pulled over, got me out the trunk, and had guns out and everything. I really thought that was it. And then they got into a fight. They started arguing and I made a break for it. Idiots left the keys in the car so I just drove. They followed after me but once I went off road they couldn’t find me. And I drove till I ran out of gas.”“Wow. That was a real shitty night.”“Yeah.” Debbie ran her hand over Lou’s fist, her fingertips light, gently pushing until Lou relaxed it, her fingers flaring out over the sheets. “You’ve gone very tense. You’re a lot less comfy to lie on.”“Difficult to stay relaxed after what you just told me.” She rolled over onto her back. Debbie lifted herself up, waited until Lou was settled, and then lay back across Lou, resting her weight on her elbows. She smiled softly down at Lou, her hair swept over her shoulder. Lou put her hands to Debbie’s ribs, felt them expand as Debbie breathed in; she moved her hands down to her hips, her thumbs pressed to the sharp jut of bone.“What are you thinking?” Debbie asked softly.That Debbie had fucked up far more than she had let on. That this Claude Becker wasn’t likely to give up on looking for Debbie unless he had proof that she was actually dead. He needed her or otherwise he would wind up dead. That she had invited this danger into her life and she couldn’t see a way out of it, that she didn’t want to find a way out of it unless it meant that Debbie was alive, and she was safe and that Debbie was still with her.That she wanted Debbie.“That I want to murder Claude fucking Becker.”Debbie chuckled. “No killing. That’s the rule.”“That’s a dumb rule. Some people just need to die.”“I don’t disagree.”“But?”“But we don’t kill people. And we don’t orchestrate deaths either. Indirectly killing someone is still killing them.”Lou sighed. She traced circles with her thumbs on Debbie’s hip, trying to clear her mind and heart. What would happen at the end of the week? Was she still taking Debbie to Barstow and just leaving her there? It seemed unfathomable now. She would never know what would happen to Debbie, never know if she was safe, never be able to kiss her or hold or just be with her again. How could Lou ever return to her empty life now that she’d had a taste of Debbie Ocean?“You look sad. You really want to kill him that badly?”“How can you not?” Lou pushed her thumbs to Debbie’s hips, her fingers flexing against her flesh.Debbie shrugged. “There are worse things than dying. I want him to suffer.”“Oh, I’d make sure he suffered first.”“Savage,” Debbie chuckled. She tapped Lou on the nose, grinning down at her. They stayed like that; Debbie above her, her hair falling over one shoulder in a thick curtain, their eyes locked. Lou traced circles into Debbie’s skin with her thumbs, stroked them down into the crease where Debbie’s thighs joined her hips. She dropped her gaze to Debbie’s parted lips, watched as she slowly exhaled. Her bottom lip trembled on each exhalation.Debbie lowered her head, her face tucked into the space between Lou’s head and shoulder. Lou heard her wet her lips then swallow, felt her breath hot on her ear. “You’re teasing me.”Lou smiled, slow and wide. She pressed her thumbs against Debbie’s hips again. “Am I?”“You know you are.”Lou moved her hands from Debbie’s hips, noted the small noise of disappointment Debbie made, and raked her blunt nails up Debbie’s sides causing her to shudder. She moved her hands down to squeeze her arse, back to her hips her thumbs drawing circles against her skin. Debbie’s breath was hot in her ear as she slipped a hand between their bodies, down to cup where Debbie was warm and wet. Debbie’s breath stuttered in her ear. “That better?”She felt Debbie nod her head. Lou turned her head towards Debbie, her lips pressing blindly to Debbie’s. Debbie shifted back onto her elbows, her eyes closed and brow furrowed as she worked herself back against the heel of Lou’s hand.“Lou,” she breathed, and it turned into a moan. She looked so good like this; her eyes closed and her lips parted, and her skin flushed. She pushed herself up, her hand on Lou’s chest, perched above her. Lou ran her free hand along Debbie’s thigh, curled it around her hip. Debbie’s eyes opened and she looked down at Lou, rocked back on her hand. “I thought I was imagining you when I first saw you,” she said and Lou nearly stopped her motions, but Debbie rocked on her hand reminded her of what she was doing. “Thought I was just gonna die out there. Then there you were.” Her words were heavy, laboured beneath her breathing and shaken by the tremble of her body as she quaked above Lou. “I thought… and you…” Her eyes screwed shut, her mouth open, chest heaving. Lou felt her clench around her fingers and Debbie pressed her herself harder against her hand. “… Jesus, Lou.” Whatever she had been about to say was lost as she turned her head to her shoulder and came against Lou’s hand, her whole body going taut.Lou watched with eyes wide in appreciation and reverence as Debbie came. Debbie lowered herself to lie back over Lou, her chest still heaving. “You should not feel that good.”“Did no one tell you that I-nearly-died-sex is the best sex?”Debbie laughed; she pressed a hard kiss to Lou’s mouth and rolled off of her. She lay next to Lou, their arms pressed together; they both stared up at the ceiling, their chests rising and falling in tandem. Debbie reached over and grabbed Lou’s arm, pulled it across her body and rolled onto her side, pulling Lou with her. Lou pressed up against her back, her face buried in Debbie’s hair. “Just stay like that,” Debbie whispered. “Just stay like that. With me.”She didn’t have to ask. If she’d allow it Lou was certain, in this moment, with their skin sweaty and sticky, Debbie’s hair in her eyes and nose and mouth, and their breathing matching that she would stay for as long as Debbie would have her.
/\/\/\/\
The damage to the house was minimal. Lou circled it and checked the windows and hatches, took note of where the sand was piled against the sides. Debbie followed after her and made little noises of confirmation as Lou talked about what she was looking for and what she would do to fix it. After the rain had passed over the wind had picked up and sand had been blown across the house. It was piled against one side of the house, blocking the garage door, and up on the roof.“I’ll have to check the electrics and pipes,” Lou said looking up at the roof. She flexed her shoulders back and turned her neck until it gave a satisfying pop. “But all we should need to do is clear the sand.”Debbie moved up next to her, standing so close that they were nearly pressed together. “You failed to mention that menial labour would be the price of staying here.”“Pull up a chair and watch me work if you like.” Lou turned her head to her. Debbie’s eyes were twinkling with mirth. “I’ll put on a show for you.”“Tempting.” She stepped back, her hand trailing down Lou’s arm. “I’ll take you up on the show. But later. My mom would be disappointed in me if I didn’t help. What do you need me to do?”“Grab a shovel.”It didn’t take them long to clear the sand. A couple of hours at most, but under the rising morning sun it was hard work. Lou had found them both scarves to wrap around their mouths and noses. By the time they were done, Lou jumping down from the lowest part of the roof and making Debbie do a full body cringe, they were both sweaty and dirty and put of breath.They stomped inside, kicking off their sand filled boots and leaving them out in the sun. Lou pulled off the scarf she’d had wrapped around her mouth and nose, bundled it up, and chucked it across the room. She looked up just in time to see Debbie reach for her. She curled her hand around the back of Lou’s neck and pulled her down, licking into her mouth. They staggered back against the wall. Lou’s hands pulled at Debbie’s clothes and Debbie laughed breathlessly against Lou’s lips. Their skin had a gritty feel to it, sand caught up in the sweat slicked up their bare arms and necks, and it felt better than it ever had any right to, and they should shower, go clean up first but – Debbie bit Lou’s lip, shoved her hand down the front of Lou’s jeans. “Bedroom,” Lou gasped. She pulled Debbie away from the wall, walked them back towards the bedroom.
/\/\/\/\
Lou leaned over the tub rinsing her hair. Behind her she could hear Debbie humming as she brushed her teeth. They had spent the last two days in bed, only emerging to feed themselves and use the facilities. Finally the thought that maybe they should get up and go outside had settled over them both. Lou’s hands twitched with the need to get back on her bike, to be back out on the road, even if only for a couple of hours.Debbie spat out her toothpaste and rinsed her mouth. “So what’s the plan?”Lou turned off the water and stood up. She flicked her wet hair back off her face, water running down her bare shoulders. She grabbed a towel and started drying her hair. “We hop on the bike and go for a drive. There're a few places out here that are worth looking at. You sometimes get tourists there but we should be okay.” She smiled at Debbie. “I’ll show you some giant hoodoos.”Debbie returned her smile. She opened her mouth to speak but closed it as the phone rang.Lou dropped her towel around her shoulders. “That doesn’t happen often,” she admitted. She walked form the bathroom to the kitchen, to where the phone on the wall was ringing. She reached out, hesitated. She’d been trying not to think about the fact that their week was nearly up. That she’d promised to take Debbie to Barstow. This call could be the beginning of the end. She shook her head, it was too early in the morning for such dramatic thoughts, and picked it up the phone.“Yeah?”“Miller.” Lou nearly sagged in relief at the familiar gruff voice on the other end. She didn’t know if Debbie actually had called Rusty again, but she had thought that it would be him calling. Relief ran through her to her fingertips. “Tom,” she replied. “Something’s wrong with the truck.”“Be there in a few.” She hung up without saying anything else. She lifted one end of the towel and rubbed at the back of her head. Debbie sauntered into the kitchen, dressed and make up done. Lou wasn’t anywhere nearly as put together yet. Her bare feet poked out from beneath her undone jeans that hung low on her hips, her top bare. “Change of plans?” Debbie asked. She walked past Lou, lightly pinched her side and making Lou squirm, on her way to the fridge. She opened the door and peered in.“I got a job to do. It’s nothing big, should only take a few hours.”Debbie closed the fridge door, a bottle of water in hand. She turned to Lou and leaned against the fridge. “Can I come with you?”Lou hesitated. Her first instinct was to say “God yes,” but it wouldn’t be sensible, it wouldn’t be safe. Just because she wanted to keep Debbie as close to her as possible was no reason to invite unnecessary danger into their lives.“I mean, we were going to go out anyways.”“True,” Lou said slowly. “But we were going to try and avoid people. This job is going to involve people. Well.” She cocked her head to the side. “One person.” One man who lived alone and who hated other people and only tolerated Lou because she was a halfway decent mechanic. “C’mon, Lou.” Debbie sidled up to her, hooked her finger into the waistband of her pants and peered up at Lou through her eyelashes. “How much trouble could I possibly get in?”Lou huffed a laugh. “You?” She leaned down for a kiss. “Probably doesn’t count since you’re always in trouble.”Debbie smiled. “I’ll go get ready.” She flicked her tongue against Lou’s lips and walked out from the kitchen, Lou’s gaze following after her.
/\/\/\/\
Lou wiped her hands on an old rag as she peered at the engine of Tom’s old truck. It had been quite the ride over; with Debbie holding onto her and her tools strapped to the back of the bike. They’d made good time though and Tom had lemonade waiting for them. He hadn’t said anything about Debbie’s presence, just pursed his lips and kept his opinions to himself. The truck, an old Ford F-250, was out front, baking away in the sun and hot to the touch. Tom loved his truck but he was shit at keeping her running; half the time Lou drove out here just to find that the engine was over heated.The truck was parked out in his driveway, baking away under the sun, and hot to the touch. Tom’s place was like a graveyard for old household appliances. They were surrounded by washing machines, dryers, and dishwashers; tombstones for the broken down and unwanted. He just went out, picked them up and brought them back and left them to crumble in the heat and sand. The edge of his driveway was marked out with toasters. When they’d first pulled up, Debbie had turned and marvelled at the scene laid out before her, but only raised both her brows and not said a word.“What’s the prognosis?” Debbie stood way too close to Lou, her chin almost resting on Lou’s shoulder.“Not sure yet,” Lou murmured. Everything about the engine was so shit she didn’t even know where to begin to look for the damage. “I’m gonna have a look underneath. Hand me the flashlight?”Debbie bent down to the tool bag and pulled out the flashlight; she handed it over to Lou and sauntered away, stretching in the sun. Lou watched her, shook her head to clear her thoughts, and dropped down to the ground, shuffling underneath the truck.“Don’t you need a jack of something?” “Plenty of room for me.” Lou looked to where Debbie was pacing around the truck. She was back in Lou’s boots, her footsteps heavy even though she walked in them as though she was wearing heels. Lou looked back to the truck; she shuffled her shoulders and sniffed, sighed at the smell of anti-freeze. “Think I’ve found the problem.”“That was quick.” Debbie crouched down, her hand on Lou’s knee. “You didn’t even turn on the flashlight.”Lou dabbed her fingers in the small pool that was forming by her side. She reached up above it, her fingers against the rough metal. “Radiators leaking.”Debbie Squeezed Lou’s knee. “Can you fix it?”“I’ll need to check to see how bad it is first, take the drip pan off and get a real good look at it, but I can probably seal it. Really he needs a new radiator.” He needed a whole new truck; this one was corroded and falling to bits around him. Lou shuffled back out from beneath the truck and stood up, rolling her shoulders back and grimacing. “Shouldn’t take me too long. Few hours tops.”Debbie peered beneath the truck. She looked back up at Lou. “So when you said you drove the car did you by any chance also fix up less than legally acquired vehicles?”“Possibly.” Lou held her hand down for Debbie to take and helped her up.“Where’d you learn?”Lou wiped her hands on the rag again. “First from one of the many men who passed through my mother’s life. Then from a guy my dad knew.”Debbie took the rag from Lou’s hand and wiped her own, dirty from Lou’s helping her up. “You daddy sure did make sure you know all the tricks of the trade,” she mocked lightly.“Somethin’ like that,” Lou said. She leaned back against the truck, could feel the heat of it through her jeans already, and reached for Debbie. She took hold of her wrist lightly and reeled her in, pulled her up till she was pressed against Lou and settled between her legs. She tugged at the end of Debbie’s hair. “He taught me how to fix an engine and his wife, well, she taught me a whole lot of other stuff.”“Lou, I am shocked.” She sounded anything but. Her lips curled up into a devilish smile, and Lou bent her head, pulled Debbie in and kissed her. They stayed like that for a while, lazily kissing beneath the sun, Debbie’ head tilted up, pressing her lips to Lou’s. Debbie nipped her bottom Lou’s and stepped back. “Anything I can do to help?”“How much do you know about cars?”Debbie lifted a shoulder in a half shrug. “I can drive one and use the little dipstick thingy to check the oil levels.”“I’m reassured that you know how to use a dipstick.”“Many a comment has been made about my dipstick handling prowess.”Lou smirked. “I’ll keep that in mind. How about this time you actually do stand back and watch me work?”“You did promise me a show.” She pressed a kiss to Lou’s cheek and sauntered away, giving Lou space to work. Lou turned away and busied herself looking through her kit, hiding the pleased burn in her cheeks. Lou worked and Debbie watched, perched on an old washing machine, her legs swinging. Tom brought more lemonade and Lou tried not to be distracted by Debbie with a straw in her mouth. It took several hours, including Lou taking them for an hour long drive in the truck to make sure everything was running alright. The drive was something. The sun through the window, Debbie’s hair blowing in the wind, her foot up on the dash as she watched Lou drive. It had been difficult to keep her eyes on the road and not stare at Debbie the entire time. They pulled back up to Tom’s derelict house and they both hopped out, Tom waiting for them.“Well?”“She’s good.” Lou handed him back the keys. “For now. I’ll call by tomorrow to make sure it’s taken. Really you need to get the radiator replaced. This was just a patch job.”He grunted in reply. He pocketed his keys and pulled out his wallet, counting out bills. “Here. The usual.” He handed them over and Lou quickly counted them before pocketing them. Tom stepped back. “Now get the hell off my property, Miller.”Lou nodded at him. She turned to gather her things, get the tools back on the bike and her and Debbie’s gear on, and froze. Debbie was staring at her, not as she usually did with the slight smirk pulling at the corner of her lips but with wide eyes and as close expression of shock as Lou had ever seen. “What?” She asked.Debbie’s mouth snapped closed. “Nothing.” She turned from Lou and bent to get her jacket. “Nothing at all. Let’s just get going, yeah?”“Sure.” Lou frowned. Debbie pulled on her jacket and picked up her helmet, her back to Lou. Lou fixed the tool kit to the bike and then pulled on her own jacket, flexed her gloveless fingers before pulling on her helmet. She swung her leg over her bike and settled down, waited for Debbie to climb on too. But she didn’t. Lou lifted her visor and peered back at Debbie. She stood a ways back, fiddling with the strap of her helmet, her gaze distant. “Debs?”Debbie looked up, startled. “Right.” She pulled on the helmet and went to the bike, settling behind Lou. Lou slapped her visor down and pulled away. Debbie’s arms around her waist but not squeezing the way they had on the way to Tom’s.
/\/\/\/\
Something was wrong. Something was wrong and Lou had no idea what.She pulled into her garage and only just managed to kill the engine before Debbie hefted herself off the bike, striding away. Lou watched as Debbie pulled her gloves off and then removed her helmet, shaking her hair out. She kept her back to Lou, her shoulders held high and even through the thick protective leather of her jacket Lou could see the rigid tension there.Slowly, cautiously, Lou stepped over her bike and removed her helmet. “What’s going on?” She questioned. Debbie turned her head giving a view of her profile, her jaw was clenched, her chin jutting out, her lips pressed into a tight line. “Debs?”Debbie sucked in a breath and pivoted sharply. “Your name. What is it?”“What?” Lou almost laughed, just caught herself before she did. Nothing about Debbie’s expression or manner was funny. “It’s Lou. You think I gave you a fake name?”“Your last name. Tom called you Miller.”Lou froze. Time slowed around her as she realised the enormity of her fuck up. She felt as though she’d been jabbed in the gut. She couldn’t remember how to breathe. She was an idiot. A grade A fucking idiot. Tom had always called her by her surname, of course Debbie would hear it and then she would know. She worked her jaw, trying to will out words, to explain, to lie. Miller wasn’t an uncommon name, there were plenty out there sporting it. But that wouldn’t work. Debbie knew. She lived this world the same as Lou did and she knew. Lou licked her lips, her mouth dry. “Yeah,” she said, her words a rasp above a whisper. “My last name is Miller.”Debbie nodded; there was no surprise in her expression, just a grim acceptance.“Debbie,” Lou tried.“See there was this job a while back. A series of jobs.” Debbie looked up at Lou, her eyes blazing. “Bank robberies done on motorbikes. It was pretty smart. Just have a few people rob the place then put the bags on the rider and off they went, scattered. A few motorbikes are harder to chase down than a single van or car. And these guys were good at what they did. The organisation, the timing of it all, it was art.” She sucked in a breath through her teeth. “I think everyone that was watching knew that their luck was going to run out.” Lou’s head was pounding. She could feel the air in her lungs being slowly squeezed out. Debbie was relentless; the hard expression on her face, the coldness in her eyes. Her voice was like steel, crisp, cold cutting steel.“Except,” Debbie bit out. “Except before that could happen one of them talked.”“I didn’t talk!” Lou spat. The cold of earlier that was keeping her frozen in place had gone. Replaced by anger and heat, her arms trembling and gut churning. “I didn’t do - " she cut herself off, turned away from the accusation in Debbie’s eyes. Her throat was burning. All this time. How hard she had worked to make herself invisible and to get away? All undone just because she was too stupid to drive on by a woman wandering up the road. She closed her eyes. “Debbie,” She pleaded, tried, but could hear the desperate anger in her voice. She opened her eyes to find that Debbie’s expression hadn’t softened even a little bit. Underneath the anger was panic, desperation wormed its way up her throat. It was the same kind of sick churning she had felt when she had first realised what had happened, that she was the one that was going to be blamed. “Debbie,” she tried again, forced calm into her voice, and stepped forward.Debbie stepped back, eyes flickering behind Lou to the open garage door. Lou stopped, froze where she was, her heart stuttered. Just for a second, for half a second, replaced immediately by the same resilient defiance that Lou had come to know, there had been fear in Debbie’s eyes. Real, desperate fear. If Lou had thought that the realisation that Debbie knew who she was had felt like a punch to the gut then this felt like a knife. A white hot blade up under her sternum, lodged there, burning cold. She shouldn’t have been shocked. It was fair reaction, more than fair. Someone who had taken the extreme steps to go live out in the middle of nowhere to escape her past, who had gone to those lengths, well, who knew what else she might do to protect herself. And Debbie had suffered for the desperate actions of others. It was a fair reaction. That didn’t stop it from hurting. Lou pulled her helmet to her chest, gaze lowered to Debbie’s boots. She could feel it all falling away from her; her safety, the little bit of happiness she had found with Debbie, all just sifting through her fingers like sand. She pulled in a breath, a sob. “Fuck this,” she hissed between her teeth. She spun, yanked her helmet roughly over her head and went to her bike.“Lou.”She ignored Debbie’s voice, swung her leg over and jammed the key into the ignition. “Lou. Lou!”She kicked off, pulling harder on the throttle than necessary, was lucky she hadn’t just sent the bike out from under her. She hit the old dusty road, kicking up sand behind her, and if Debbie called after her again then she didn’t hear it.She didn’t look where she was going, just kept the speed up and gunned along the old road. Her bike wasn’t designed for this. She usually took it easy until she hit the tarmac. She held too tight her knuckles white, the old injury in her hand aching. She made it to the road in record time, turned without even thinking a direction and sped off.She should never have stopped to pick Debbie up. Should have just gone on past her and left her there. She shook her head sharply. She couldn’t have left Debbie there, but she should have just taken her to the first diner or gas station. She shouldn’t have invited her into her home. Shouldn’t have shared even this little bit of her life with her.Her heart was hammering. Her pulse throbbed in her temple and she could barely see past her own anger. She blinked furiously, eyes stinging. She forced herself to exhaled, forced herself to ease up on the throttle. She fell into a more sensible speed, continued to breathe, to try and slow the racing of her heart. Minutes passed, she didn’t count them or care, just kept on driving. She let the scenery take her away, whipped past those familiar sights until the sun started to slip over the horizon, until the colours in the sky started to bleed. Then she slowed to a stop, pulling up at the side of the road.She unclipped her helmet and pulled it off, shook out her hair. Her left hand was screaming, pain flaring up from her knuckles to her wrist. She flexed her fingers, tried to work blood back into them. The empty lurch she had felt when she’d seen Debbie face was so much like the moment when she’d been taken into the dimly lit back room of the casino, when they’d held her hand down on the table, the realisation of what was going to happen even as she didn’t truly believe that it would. She had dealt with that, she would deal with this.She was good at dealing with situations. Good at making the best out of being dealt a shit hand. She looked back the way she came. She had left Debbie there, back at her shitty excuse for a home with no way to leave. She had stranded her there. Lou huffed out a breath, kicked at the ground. Good, she thought. Leave her there, leave her to rot.But she wasn’t going to do that. She took one last look at the sinking sun and pulled on her helmet, turned her bike around and headed back. Better to face this than run away from it. She’d picked up and disappeared before and she could easily do it again. Her heart thudded slowly with dread and the inevitability that this was ending, this glorious interlude to her exile.A car went past her, headlights way too bright, momentarily blinding her even through her visor. She heard the screech of brakes and wheels, the hard rev of an engine and then lights came up behind her and she frowned. She was keeping a steady speed, but if whoever was behind her thought they could drive up her arse they were about to be mistaken. She revved, prepared to leave this idiot in the dust, looked up just in time to see another blare of lights directly in front of her. She tried to swerve, was too late. She hit the car, just edged it with the back end of her bike, and heard the impact before she felt it. The bike dropped from beneath, there one second and gone the next. And then she was airborne, her heart up her throat. And then…… And then…She was curled up on the road, her knees drawn up to her chest as awareness seeped back. Slowly, slowly, she rolled onto her back; bit back a sob, fought down the panic. She struggled to unclasp the strap for her helmet, her hands shaking. She felt the shift and lurch of her stomach, managed to get the helmet undone and off just in time to roll over and retch. She heaved again, pain lancing up from her stomach to her throat. She coughed, shuddered, and managed to only bring up water and bile.She pushed herself up onto her knees. There was pain, but it was distant for now. It would catch up; she knew from experience that in a few minutes she’d be in agony. Her left arm ached dully; she cradled it gently to her chest with her right. Another sob worked its way out her throat as she caught sight of her hands; she had taken the skin off them along the knuckles and the side of her left palm. She knelt on the cold tarmac, her body beginning to quake. She closed her eyes and the world began to spin, to tip beneath her and she had to open them again.“That was impressive.”Lou lifted her head. She looked around her, tried to make sense of what was happening. She was still on the road; two cars were parked nearby, the headlights illuminating the area. Before her stood a man, tall and thin, his hair brushed back and perfectly styled stubble adorned his pointy chin. He stopped a few feet from her and smiled. “You must have gone at least twenty feet along the road, maybe thirty.”“Becker,” She managed to mumble. Her tongue felt thick in her mouth, her head still swimming, thick and heavy.“You remember me?” His smile widened. “I wasn’t sure you would. We only met briefly and, well, you did just hit your head. That helmet might have saved you from splattering your brains along the tarmac but…” he shrugged.She looked at her helmet. A deep crack ran through it, the visor was shattered. It had no doubt saved her life, but at this moment, with her head heavy and ringing, her vision swimming, she wasn’t sure she could muster the appreciation it deserved.“I’m all about motorcycle safety,” she said.Claude laughed. “Except for gloves, right?”Lou grunted. It was getting harder to keep her head up. Her hands were starting to burn, the dull ache in her arm becoming less distant. “Because I have your gloves.”She blinked. She looked down at her bare hands, at the damage done there. She had lost her gloves. She had… She forced herself to look back up at Claude.“That’s right. You left them at a diner.” He pointed to his left. “My good friend, Yuri, found them. And then I got to thinking about who lived in the area. Asked some questions, I’m sure you know how it goes. Imagine my surprise when it turned out you had a motorbike.” He stepped closer to her, crouched down and got in her face. “Imagine my surprise when I discovered that you lied to me.”“You look like the kind of man who’s used to women lying to you.”His eyes hardened. “I don’t hit women,” he said, voice dangerously low. “Especially ones who were just in a serious accident. But you do make it awfully tempting. You have something that belongs to me.” He lifted his hand and put his finger to Lou’s forehead. “You’re going to come with us. Collateral as it were. Once we’ve picked up what you’ve been hiding from me then we’ll address your lying.” He pushed at her head, his nail digging into her skin and she tipped backwards, unable to do anything to stop herself from falling. She landed on her back; her legs folded beneath her and stared up at the sky, heaving in breaths.“Pick her up!” Claude yelled. “Let's finally get this taken care of.”Lou could see the stars in the cloudless sky. Could see the ink seeping into the edge of her vision even as a man stepped into view, reaching down for her.
----- CHAPTER BREAK -----
“The strap keeps getting twisted,” April whined from behind her.Lou swung back on her stool; kept her feet planted on the cross bar and held onto the old wooden seat with one hand between her spread knees, leaning back like a cowboy on the laziest bronco that ever lived. She twirled an unlit cigarette in her free hand, her nimble fingers spinning it between them in the same way she could dance a coin across her knuckles or make a card disappear. ”Well, untwist it,” she said. She rocked the stool back down to earth, four feet planted, and stuck the cigarette behind her ear. She turned her gum over in her mouth, rolling it over her tongue, having chewed it to the point it was flavourless and hard. “Try it again,” she insisted. “Okay. Okay.” April took several audible breaths. Her approaching footsteps were heavy and uneven on the faux wood floor, her gait bouncy with nerves. Lou took up position, one arm stretched forward imitating her grip on her bike, the other tucked close. April dropped the bag over her shoulder, the strap falling dead centre on her chest, and hurried away. It was comfortable enough but Lou let out an annoyed sigh.“Don’t hurry away like that. It looks suspicious.” She lifted the bag off and held it out for April.April slunk back, her shoulders hunched forward; she took the bag, her face crumpled with worry. Tilting her head back up Lou could see that her eyes were brimming with tears. “I’m gonna get caught,” she mumbled.“You’re not going to get caught. Look. C’mere.” She waved April closer. Tentatively, April did as she was bid; shuffling closer, the old duffel bag hugged tight to her chest like a teddy, her face practically buried in it. Lou put her hand to her shoulder and April stiffened, cringing. Lou gave her shoulder a squeeze and a gentle shake. “April. Look at me.” She waited for April to lift her head, ignored the terrified look in her eyes. What the hell had they been telling this poor girl that made April think that Lou would ever do anything to her? “You’re not going to get caught. We’re not going to get caught. You take the bag from John and you walk down the steps. You walk thirty feet - just thirty feet, that’s nothing - and I’ll be waiting. Drop the bag over my shoulder and I’ll be off. You disappear into the crowd. It’s easy.”“What if I mess it up?”Lou smiled, big and reassuring. “You won’t. We are going to practice this until it is as easy as breathing. Now, come on. Let’s do this again.”“Right.” April scuttled off behind her and Lou took up position.They practised the move again, and again, and again, until April could drop the bag over Lou’s shoulder without breaking stride, until it was one fluid motion, and then they practised it some more. When they were finished, Lou finally satisfied; she kicked the bag behind the bar and helped herself to a drink. They hid the good stuff behind the cheap crap; she poured a finger of Beluga Gold Line and chucked a single cube of ice in it, before returning to the correct side of the bar and perching on the edge of one of the stools. She pulled out her phone and fired off a quick text to let the others know how this had gone, that April was good, she had worked her magic once again, and they had nothing to worry about. April lifted herself up onto the stool next to Lou; she rested her arms on the bar top, her shoulders hunched up as she fiddled with her bracelet.“You drink your vodka neat?”“Sure do.”“Doesn’t it taste bad?”“Nope.” Lou cocked her head to look at April; she was leaning her chin on her arms, like a bored student at the back of class who was wondering if she could get away with falling asleep. “Scott probably picked this up a lot faster than me, huh?” she said, her voice muffled into the crook of her elbow.“Don’t know. I didn’t work with a Scott.” She sipped her drink. “He your brother?”April’s head bobbed up and down. “Yeah. Our parents wanted us to have American sounding names.” She laughed; it was a small desperate sound that was wet with a held back sob. “How come I’m with you if you weren’t with Scott?”“They always send the new kids to me.”“Oh.” April tugged roughly at her bracelet. It was a frayed woven band that had seen much better days, the colours diminished from wear and tear. “Why?”Because she was patient. Because she was good at getting people to trust her. Because half the kids they sent her way were terrified, coerced into doing this because they were desperate or they owed money, and terrified people made mistakes. Lou had picked the riders; people she trusted who had a long history in this game and she knew were professionals. But she had no say in the kids they pulled in, the little carrier pigeons that came from college campuses and dive bars, from back alleys and broken homes. They just sent them to her and she made sure they worked. “They just do.” Lou downed her drink, the ice chinking in the glass. “Why isn’t Scott doing this?”“He broke his leg.”“Ouch.” Lou tipped the glass this way and that, watched the cube of ice slide from side to side. Scott breaks his leg so his sister gets roped in to finish his job. Scott must have really fucked up for them to do this. “How’d he break his leg?”April pulled on her bracelet again, two fingers hooked beneath the band, the fabric sawing roughly against her skin. She shook her head, eyes lowered to her hands. “He…” She sucked in a breath. “He was hit by a car. It was his fault, he just ran out in front of it.” She said it with one big rush of air like she wanted to expel the words as fast as possible. A little sliver of unease worked its way down the back of Lou’s neck. Something didn’t sound right. She would have to look into the legitimacy of April’s claim about her brother, find out what exactly Scott had done to be roped into doing this. But that was a problem for another day. Right now all she had to do was make sure April could pull off her part of the job, and part of that was reassuring April that Lou didn’t suspect a damn thing. She drained the last of her vodka and put the glass down on the bar top, slipped from the stool and gave April’s shoulder a gentle shove. “Come on, let’s get out of here. I’ll buy you lunch.” She looked like she could do with a good, warm meal in her belly. Most the kids they sent her way looked like they could do with a good meal and little kindness thrown their way; April more so than others. Something about her morose expression and the surly curl of her shoulders tickled her near dead maternal instincts, like running a current through a corpse - twitch, twitch went her need to nurture.April spun round and dropped from her stool. She grabbed her jacket and bag from where they’d been chucked over one of the booth tables and hurried towards the exit. She paused at the door and turned to look at Lou. “For a criminal, you’re weirdly nice.”“You think so,” Lou drawled. She wandered behind the bar to grab her coat, pulled it on slowly. April nodded at her. “Bit of advice,” Lou said. “Always question those first impressions. People are rarely who they seem to be.”April’s expression dimmed. She spun, yanked open the door, and escaped into the chill of the New York air. Lou took the cigarette from behind her ear and balanced it between her lips. She pulled on her gloves and made her way across the bar, heels loud on the floor. She stopped just before the door, turned to the mirror there. She flicked her fringe back into place with the tip of her middle finger, narrowed her eyes at her roots which needed to be redone and stepped outside. The air was frigid and she held back a shiver; locked the door behind her, pocketed the keys. She pulled her lighter from her pocket and lit her cigarette. April was waiting for her, hands stuffed in her pockets and breath misting in the air. “Where we going for lunch?”“Veselka.”“Cool.” April bounced ahead, her sombre mood left back in the bar. She stopped, turned and squinted at Lou. “You’re not hitting on me, are you?”“No, April, I am definitely not hitting on you.” “Good. ‘Cause you’re too -”“Old?” Lou suggested.“Tall,” April said. “Too tall for me.”“Right. The height difference is absolutely what would make my hitting on you inappropriate.” She caught up with April, curled her hand around the back of her neck and gave her a playful shove. April shrugged her off and quickened her pace, throwing Lou a quick, almost sheepish, grin. Lou shook her head, pulled a long drag from her cigarette and followed after her, heading off into the grey and the noise, her mind turning over the plan.
/\/\/\/\
The pain in Lou’s left arm had morphed from a dull ache into bright white hot agony that pulsed in time with the beat of her heart. She lay on her right side in the back of the car, her face pressed to the cool leather.Becker’s two goons had picked her up off of the ground, stripped her of her leather jacket, and one of them had wrenched her arms behind her back and secured her wrists together with what felt like zip ties. The second they had touched her left arm it had felt like they had set a flare off under her skin. She had damn neared screamed and blacked out. There was no sympathy from their quarter, just a muttered curse and her being roughly shoved into the back of the car.Lou concentrated on her breathing, in through her nose and out through her mouth, trying to keep calm, trying to stop herself from losing consciousness. She probably had at some point already, everything was moving through a haze, punctuated by sharp moments of agony. It was like trying to remember a dream as she was having it, holding onto something that was intangible; and then to have a white hot needle pushed through her temples or a burning brand pressed to her hand and arms shocking her back to reality. She had no idea how much time had passed, how far they had travelled, even if they had travelled at all. If she moved her head she could see out the window, a lovely view of the pitch black sky that was frustratingly unmoving. But moving her head sent rolling agony around her skull. The inky tendrils that had squirmed across her vision earlier had dissipated and left distortion in their wake. Her mouth and throat were dry; she had never been so genuinely thirsty in her entire life. She could wiggle her fingers and toes so that was a good sign, but moving her fingers in any capacity caused the ruined skin on her hands to stretch, made it so she could feel where she had scraped them raw. But at least her arm wasn’t so bad that she couldn’t use her hand, it was broken, but it was still usable in some capacity. Who knew how long that would last; the hard plastic of the zip tie was cutting into her flesh, her left arm already swollen and only going to get worse without treatment. The car went over a bump and Lou squeezed her eyes shut as a fresh wave of pain and nausea rolled over her. She forced her eyes open and risked turning her head, to look through the tinted windows but she couldn’t see a damned thing. The driver, Yuri or Guillermo, she had heard their names but didn’t have a clue which was which, had his eyes on the road, pointedly ignoring her. The car turned and the smooth ride turned bumpy, the feel of the car changed, going off the tarmac and onto sand and dirt. Panic lurched from the pit of Lou’s stomach. They were nearly at her house and this entire ordeal would be over. They would find Debbie there and Claude fucking Becker would win and he would have no further use for Lou anymore. She knew exactly what would happen then.She blinked furiously, trying to clear her head. She had absolutely no leverage, nothing to bargain with. Maybe if she talked fast enough she could convince Becker that she had been duped by Debbie, that she had no idea what Debbie had done and she was just a good Samaritan who had just tried helping the wrong person. But even as she thought it she felt sick with herself. She wasn’t going to do that. She had never sold anyone out in her entire life and she wasn’t going to start now. The car slowed and pulled to a stop. The engine still running, the goon stepped outside, closing the door behind him. Lou let out a long shaky breath. This was it. Was there a way she could warn Debbie? Yell or scream? But she wouldn’t be able to hear her through the door, and given how dry Lou’s throat was she didn’t think she could produce anything more than a croak. She kicked at the door ineffectively, her arm flaring in pain again. She bit down on the inside of her cheek, screwed her eyes shut. White and red flashed across the inside of her eyelids, the world tilting again and she had to open her eyes with a gasp. “Debbie!” Becker bellowed. Lou winced, head ringing. He sounded like he was trying to put on a deep, gruff voice, and if her skull didn’t feel like it was about to crumple then she would have found it funny. She strained her ears, listening. If Debbie was there then she was significantly quieter than Becker was being. That wasn’t a surprise. Lou had only known Debbie for a scant few days but she could already tell that Debbie rarely raised her voice, that she could do more damage with a quiet word than with any amount of screaming. Becker struck her as the kind of person who shrieked when he didn’t get what he wanted. Probably stomped his feet and waved his arms too, like an over-sized toddler.The door by her feet opened and Lou looked down just in time to see hands grasp her ankles. She was pulled, her body whipping off of the back seat, her sweat slicked skin ripping painfully off of the leather, out into the night air. She landed with a solid whump on the sand; the air whooshed out of her lungs and utterly blinding agony set every nerve ending she had on fire. She didn’t scream. It hurt too much to scream. She curled in on herself; her face pressed into the sand and made a hoarse guttural wail into the sand. She was a proud woman, but she wasn’t going to pretend that this didn’t fucking hurt and wasn’t worth crying over. She inhaled and exhaled sand, unable to open her eyes as a kaleidoscope of colours flashed and whirled across the canvas of her eye lids. “Get her up,” Becker said tightly.Hands grasped Lou’s arms and she was hauled up to her feet. As soon as the hands let her go she collapsed again, her long legs folding up and letting gravity take her. Her face bounced off the sand. It was like a hammer had been taken to her skull, her head felt like it was splitting open. She retched, retched again, her dry throat burning. There were colours; flashes of white and red, bright streaks whirling in her visions, spinning counter the dizzy spin that was pulling her down. “Fuck sake! Get her up!” Becker yelled. “Bring her fucking here!”The hands were at her arms again, gripping tightly, fingers digging into her bruised flesh. She was half carried, half dragged over to where Becker was and dumped on her knees in the sand. She was panting, making a noise like a wounded animal as she fought to get her breathing under control. Becket was glaring down at her, eyes narrowed and his jaw hard. He tugged at the cuffs of his shirt.“Where the fuck is she?” He demanded.Lou laughed. She couldn’t help it. It bubbled up from low in her throat, spilling out of her open mouth, chased by a sob. “Fuck if I know, mate.”“You think this is funny?” he ran the back of his hand across his nose and sniffed. “State of you you’d think you’d want to cooperate. It can get a whole lot worse for you. Tell me where she is.”“I don’t know.”Becker looked back at the house and Lou followed his gaze. The living room light was on, but everything around the place was still, and Lou knew without a single doubt that Debbie wasn’t there.“Guillermo, search the place. Yuri stay with her.”Guillermo stalked up to the house and kicked in Lou’s front door. The wood splintered, the hinges ripping off, and he stomped inside. She heaved a sigh. There was a little ache of sadness to go with all the others pains she was currently feeling for her front door and the way he so casually destroyed something she had fixed. He would tear the place apart as he searched. When she had found this place it had been dilapidated. She had spent the better part of a year slowly fixing it up, and even though she knew that it would only be temporary that she would be here, she had put a little bit of her heart into it. It had sheltered her through the worst part of her life, offered a quiet little refuge where she had slowly spiralled down wards and drank too much and forgotten how to take care of herself. It was just a building, just a thing that could be replaced or fixed, but this invasion, this little bit of violence against something she had worked on, made her ache.Becker paced, kicking up sand as he stalked back and forth, pulling on his cuffs. Yuri was the opposite, still as a statue, his hands clasped before him, calmly watching his boss pace, the house, and still keeping an eye on Lou in case she tried anything. He came to an abrupt halt, looked up to the sky, jaw working. Turning, he stalked back over to Lou and dropped to a crouch in front of her. With visible effort he smoothed out his features.“We both know that it’s in your best interest to tell me where Debbie is.” He rubbed the back of his index finger on his chin, attempted to smile at her. “I’m thinking that maybe she spun you some lies, that you’re a victim of her manipulations too.”Lou didn’t trust herself to answer. That she had considered playing this card herself just made her feel sick. She curled her lip, sneered at him. He was contemptible. Even if Debbie had been using her then she would have loathed him. He shook his head, his efforts at charm dropping as his smile slipped from his face and was replaced by an angry sneer. “You’re all the same. All of you. You lead us on and all the time you’re just thinking of ways to fuck us over. And when it all catches up to you you play the victim card.” He stood up, stalked away just as Guillermo finally emerged from the house. “Nothing,” he called out. “She’s not here.”“Fuck!” Becker screamed up at the sky, spittle flying and fists clenched at his sides. He spun towards Lou. “Where the hell is she?”“I told you, I don’t know. Last I saw her she was here.”He was breathing heavy though his nose, his face turning an interesting shade of red, a vein popping at his temple. He pointed at Lou, finger shaking. “Then what the fuck is the point in you?”It was going to happen eventually. She had no leverage, nothing to bargain with, her usefulness had run out. Would they even bother to bury her? Or would they leave her body for the sun and the wind, her bones to join the sands. “Yuri!” Becker barked. Yuri moved, quick efficient. His hand went into his jacket and Lou didn’t need to look to see what he retrieved from there. He moved behind her, and the distinct heavy metallic click of a gun echoed through the still air. All the wind left her body and she curled forward, her head hanging low. Was this really going to be it?
Think! Think! Think!
She felt the press of the gun at the back of her skull. “Back of the head, really?” She joked weakly, trying to buy time. “The exit wound will be over your face. Means that it’s harder to identify the body. It slows the process”“Oh.” Lou blinked. You learnt something new every day.“Last chance,” Becker said.Lou closed her eyes. She couldn’t think through the panic, the haze, the rolling agony of her head, the burn across her hands or the fire blazing in her left arm. She had nothing. That hit harder than the gun pressed against her skull. She had nothing. She had a shitty home in the middle of nowhere and a now busted motorbike. That was all she had to lose. There wasn’t even anyone to mourn her.“Fuck,” she breathed. And then, cutting through the haze like a torch through the fog, a word, a name, a place emerged. Her eyes snapped open. “Barstow!” she yelped. She licked her lips, tried to forces moisture back into her mouth so she could talk. This wasn’t selling Debbie out, this was buying time. “B-Barstow!”“What?” Becker turned, he raised his hand motioning Yuri to hold off on blowing her brains out. “What did you say?” Yuri pulled the gun from her head and Lou pulled in long, shaky breaths. “Barstow,” she repeated.“Yes, I got -” A phone rang. Becker’s eyes widened in surprise. The jaunty ringtone was loud in the night air and took everyone by surprise. Slowly, as though he only just remembered that he had a phone on him; Becker reached into his jacket pocket and retrieved his phone. He looked at the screen in confusion. “Wait. Wait, Yuri.” He waved Yuri down. His top lip curled into a sneer as he regarded the screen. He answered it, lifted the phone to his ear and glared daggers right at Lou. “Debbie,” he said sweetly. “What a lovely surprise. I have a friend of yours with me and we were just talking about you.”Lou stared up at him. Debbie had got away. Somehow she had managed to escape, to get to safety. She felt suddenly lighter, her chest expanding, her pain and panic momentarily forgotten. Debbie had picked up and left and now Lou, idiot of the hour, was kneeling in the sand waiting to have a bullet put in her skull, and she couldn’t possibly be happier about it. She couldn’t keep up with the way her emotions were veering from one extreme to the other. Underneath her relief that Debbie was safe she could feel the hollow left by the knowledge that Debbie had left her. Becker hummed. “I see. Where are you?” He moved closer to Lou, looked down at her, his pugnacious expression not lessoning. “She’s fine. Little bruised, little banged up, but otherwise okay. Aren’t you?” He reached forward and tugged at Lou’s hair.Lou bared her teeth at him. “Fine!” Becker rolled his eyes. He flicked his thumb across the screen of his phone and then held it towards Lou.“Debbie?” Lou said. “Hey, baby, how you feeling?” Debbie crooned softly, on speaker for them all to hear.“Fuck you,” Lou replied, not managing to muster the venom she wanted or Debbie deserved, almost making it sound affectionate. Debbie laughed, just as soft as the words she’d just spoken, soft like she had done freshly fucked in her bed. Lou pressed her teeth together, felt the lump at the back of her throat. “Did he hurt you?” Debbie asked.He’d run her the fuck over with a car. “Oh no, I’m just peachy, love.”Debbie hummed. “I’m going to take care of this. Don’t do anything stupid.”Lou glared up at Becker. He pulled the phone away from her and held it back to his ear. He smirked at Lou, his eyes never leaving her. Lou couldn’t make out what Debbie was saying but she could hear the tinny tones of her voice. “Now why would I do that?” Becker asked. His lip curled again. “Fine. I’ll bring her. At the studio. But Debbie, if you aren’t there, if you try anything, then she dies. And she’ll take her time doing it. I’m done playing around.” He hung up the phone, sniffed, and tucked it back in her pocket. “Get her up and put her in the car. She’s coming with us.” He turned back to her house. “And burn this fucking place down.”Arms roughly grabbed her again and Lou was hauled to her feet. She looked back over her shoulder as Guillermo walked back towards her house, knowing that no matter what happened next that this was the last time she would see it.
/\/\/\/\
They didn’t allow her the luxury of the back seat on the next leg of the journey. They gave her a sip of water then rolled her into the trunk, slamming down the lid and leaving her in the darkness; in the cramped space that she was too tall for; her long legs folded up, knees to her chest, arms still twisted and tied painfully behind her back. It was hot; the air thick and stuffy and she couldn’t drag enough of it in to her lungs. Worse still was the panic and her inability to keep it at bay. Normally she was a calm person, had carved herself a reputation for being steadfast and dependable, the kind of person you could trust in an emergency. Yet here she was, unable to think through the pounding of her head or the taste of bile at the back of her throat.They had done this to Debbie. Stuffed her into this same dark space, scared her, brutalised her. Thinking of Debbie brought a wave of anger to drown out the panic. That they had done this to Debbie, that they had put her and Debbie in this situation; anger at Debbie for being the reason she was here - but no, no, that wasn’t right, it was becoming harder and harder to think through the heavy fuzz that weighed down her head, she had made the decisions that had led her here. And that was its own kind of terrible, knowing that every decision she had made, every little mistake had led her to this point.She cried, screamed, tried kicking the sides of the trunk, the roof, whatever she could reach, tried to make as much noise as possible, but it was no good. Eventually she wore herself out; the heavy warm air and the pain too much, and she closed her eyes, pressed her face to the rough fabric beneath her.She must have passed out; in no time at all the car stopped and the trunk opened. She cracked open her eyes and peered up into the blandly merciless faces of Yuri and Guillermo, distorted as her vision was she would recognise them anywhere. Her head felt worse than ever; a weight that she couldn’t possibly lift, it was rolling white hot pain, pressure at the back of her eyes, pressing against the inside of her skull, threatening to crack it open. It was all made worse by the sight of Becker behind his goons; he looked suitably disgusted.“Get her up.” He waved his hand dismissively and stalked away as Yuri and Guillermo hoisted her out of the trunk. It was agony. Every muscle she possessed felt like it was being stretched to the point of tearing. She gritted her teeth, panted through the pain of it. They gripped her by the elbows, her left arm burning screaming white hot agony that pulsed, pulsed, pulsed with the uneven beat of her heart. They planted her on her unsteady feet and just held there, stood at either side of her, propping her up. She looked around blearily at her surroundings. The low roof, the amber cast of the lights and all the concrete. They were in a parking lot. Fantastic. Nothing illegal like murder ever happened in these places.Becker was already walking away. The crisp line of his expensive trousers snapping at his heels. The ground was unsteady beneath Lou’s rubbery legs but Yuri and Guillermo were professionals and kept her upright as they followed after Becker’s retreating form.From the underground parking they made it inside, the lights changing from muted amber hues to sharp crisp LEDs. Lou’s head fell forward and when she managed to lift it again she was in an entirely different place, a narrow corridor, inside and under the cool stream of an AC. It felt like she was just appearing in different places, as though she had suddenly manifested the ability to teleport from place to place, all she had to do was close her eyes and open them and she was somewhere new. A stairwell, a corridor, being pushed down onto a seat, a hand on her face moving her head from side to side, it all felt as though it was happening at a distance and to someone else, like she was experiencing it second hand or a few seconds late. She was sinking now, being lowered to the floor, her back against something hard, her eyes closed but this time she couldn’t open them, didn’t want to open them. She was floating. Her head heavy and light at the same time, her body unnaturally buoyant, like she was falling but every time she nearly hit the ground she bobbed back up. There were fingers on her face, gentle, brushing up her forehead, moving her fringe out the way. She opened her eyes and through the hazy lights she could see her mother.“It’s just a fever, honey,” she said. Her fingers continued moving, gentle and soothing. Her mum’s eyes were kind, clear and bright, not yet red rimmed or yellowing, the line of her mouth hadn’t yet learnt to be hard and disapproving, hadn’t yet learnt to speak cruel cutting words. “It’ll break soon.”Lou turned her head away, pressed her face down and closed her eyes. She could see the blue of the lights flashing behind her eyes. Feel the uncomfortable kitchen chair she sat in, her knee bouncing beneath the table. There were two police officers, a man and a woman, in her kitchen. She thought she was done for. She’d been pocketing money from the till from the bar she worked in for months now, picking the tourists pockets, helping herself to whatever she pleased. But they weren’t here for that. The man stood by the kitchen counter, arms crossed and a knowing sneer curling his lips. He didn’t care. Another dead druggie whore who left a kid behind. He’d seen it before, he’d see it again before the year was out, and his eyes told Lou that he’d pegged her for the same path as her mother. The woman was much more sympathetic; she talked in soothing tones, her eyes kind, told her it was a lot to take in and was there anyone she could stay with? Lou shook her head. No. There was no one.There was no one.She put her hands down, braced herself against the surface. It was the back of a couch, the rough wall behind some seedy club, the warming metal of the hood of a car, it was a woman between her and the surface, her lips on her throat, her breath hot in her ear, the sounds that she made and she was the first girl who had let her touch her like that, the older woman in Sydney who’d taken her into the stalls of the toilet, a different older woman in a different country leading her to the bedroom while her husband fixed the transmission on a car back in the garage; it was so many different women in so many different ways, she couldn’t remember all the names or all their faces but she could remember how they’d sound, could remember their cries and their gasps and the way they said her name, and it was the best pair of legs she’d ever seen wrapping around her waist pulling her in, and they belonged to the most glorious woman Lou had ever clapped her eyes on, the sheets rumpled beneath them, her hair spread thick and dark over the pillows, she arched her back, laughing breathlessly then moaning, and her hand was on Lou’s jaw, her dark eyes locked with Lou’s, “Lou… baby…” And it was the sweetest sound Lou had ever heard. She never wanted this to end. Never wanted to leave. Debbie’s hand on jaw moved to cup her cheek, pressed harder there, harder still. She slapped her gently. Lou looked down at her confused.“Lou…” Debbie said in those same soft inviting tones. She slapped her again. Harder. Lou’s head rolled to the side her eyes snapping open. She blinked furiously, the small room she was in coming into focus. “See, told you she wasn’t dead.”She turned towards the voice, her head rolling, too heavy to lift. Her old friend Yuri was crouched down before her, elbows resting on his knees. He smiled at Lou. “You’re made of tougher stuff than Mr. Becker gives you credit for.” He patted her on the shoulder and stood up. The room she was in was tiny and packed with canvases, boxes and other shit. They had stuffed her in a closet. She was sitting on the floor, with her legs sprawled out across the narrow space, her feet touching the opposite wall. She looked down at her hands in her lap. She could see the marks round her wrists where the cable ties had been, worse on the left wrist where the flesh had swollen and the plastic had cut into it. The fingers of her left hand were fat little sausages, bloated and purple. She could barely bend them. It hurt to try and she sniffed through the pain as she forced them to flex, open, closed, flaring them out the skin and tendons pulling painfully.“Can you stand?” Yuri asked. He had moved to stand by the door shadowed by Guillermo. “Mr. Becker has requested your presence and you need to make yourself acceptable.”She shifted her legs, pulled them up and put her right hand to the floor. The tight pulling pain across the back of her hand made her look down. The skin of her hand was filthy; streaked with dirt, the veins and tendons crawling blue from her fingers to her wrist; her nails were torn and dirty, bits of the road worked under them; and against that still was the red ruin where she’d stripped layers of skin away; her knuckles a bloody mess, a sliver of white peeking through the ravaged peak of her middle knuckle. She gagged at the sight of it. Yuri made an impatient grunt, moved into the office and bent down. He put his hands on her waist and she pushed him away, didn’t care that hurt to push him away. She had had enough of fucking men putting their hands on her. She forced her feet under her, grabbed the shelves with her right arm and hauled herself upright. “I can stand,” she said hoarsely. She was less sure she could stay upright. She was starting to tremble, a quiver in her core that sent little seismic shifts throughout her body. She was sweating, she felt too cold and too hot all at once. The world looked as though it was melting, all the edges blurring.“Good.” Yuri said with a smile that didn’t reach his eyes. “You need to get cleaned up. This way.”“Wonderful.” She took a step towards the door, begged her legs to work, to keep her upright. If she fell she knew she wouldn’t be able to get back up again. Yuri stood back for her, his arm held out. Guillermo back stood out in the hallway, his eyes cast away from her. She cradled her left arm to her chest trying to keep it elevated.“This way.” Guillermo walked off, confident that she would follow.Lou didn’t remember being dragged from the car. She didn’t remember leaving the parking lot and being taken to wherever they were now. They walked down a well lit corridor, the walls painted white and the floor imitation hardwood. Guillermo lead her to a door, stopped outside and gestured to it.“You have ten minutes. Get cleaned up.”Lou stared at him, stared at the closed door. She looked back over her shoulder, Yuri was following behind. “No. You are not coming in here with me.”“What if you try to escape?”She stared at him. “Do I look like I’m capable of running?” She was barely capable of standing.He pushed the door open, reached in and flicked on the light, and held it for her. “I’ll wait here.”Lou walked into what turned out to be a bathroom, the door closing behind her with a dull thunk. There was a toilet, a sink with a cracked mirror above it, piled boxes of soap refills for dispensers, and a mop and bucket tucked into the corner of the room. She winced at the sharp light above and moved to the sink, raised her head to stare at her own reflection. A stranger stared back at her. Her eyes looked too large in the gaunt hollows of their sockets; her skin had a grey cast to it and looked clammy, her lips dry and cracked. There was a bloody scuff by her right eyebrow, and a bruise around her eye socket and over her cheekbone, the flesh puffy and tender. It must have happened after the crash. She didn’t remember anyone hitting her, she might have fallen… She groped at the memory; she had fallen, at her house, on the sand…. She could just about remember it happening. She must have hit the right side of her face off of the ground. She leaned closer to the mirror, ignoring the way the light made her eyes hurt, the distorted squiggles that persisted at the right side of her vision. Her eyes were bloodshot, the left pupil blown wide. She lowered her head and rested her forehead against the glass. How was she going to get out of this one? She could barely stand, couldn’t possibly run, and the only bargaining chip she had was what little knowledge she had of Debbie.
Debbie…
Was she really going to put her trust in Debbie? It seemed very unlikely that Debbie was about to come swinging in to save her. It was far more likely that Debbie was gone. Lou had given her the opportunity to escape and she’d taken it. Who could blame her? Lou was the perfect distraction for Becker; while he was focused on her Debbie could put as much distance between her and him as humanly possible. Simple misdirection and Becker had fallen for it like the idiot he was. She couldn’t expect the few days they had spent together to be enough for Debbie to risk her damned life to come save Lou. She couldn’t expect those days together to mean the same to Debbie that they did to her. Debbie wasn’t a touch starved near-alcoholic wasting away in the desert. She clearly had a vibrant and full life and Lou had been an interlude to that, an anecdote to be shared at a later date when entertaining associates. And now Debbie knew who she was and thought she knew what Lou had done, and Lou could still remember the flash of fear in Debbie’s eyes, the last expression she had etched on her perfect face, and there was no reason for Debbie to do anything.
“I’m going to take care of this. Don’t do anything stupid.”
Lou laughed, a wet sounding titter muffled against the mirror. What a joke. She was on her own. Again. Like she’d always been. She’d always been good at taking care of herself. She just needed to think of a plan.The mirror was cool against her skin, she could feel herself sliding down it, feel her cheek pressing against it. Eyes closed, the feel of the sink beneath her arm as she leaned on it. She just needed to think of a plan.There was a thump against the door, a fist striking it and Lou jumped. “Hurry up!” he barked.Gritting her teeth, she lifted her head from the mirror and turned on the tap. She ran her right hand under the stream, hissed as it ran over the patch of missing skin, the water turning pink. She splashed water on her face, round the back of her neck, wiped the scuff by her eyebrow clean, or as clean as she could with just water and her shaking hands to work with. It helped; having something to do, something to focus on; that little bit of self-care that she sorely needed. She was shaking badly by the time she was done. There wasn’t much she could do for the motley of bruises that ran up her arms and ribs so she ignored them. Her legs and back would probably be a patchwork of bruises as well, but she couldn’t waste the time or energy to give them a good look. They thumped on the door again. “Fucksake,” she muttered. Cradling her left arm in her right she shuffled back to the door, tapped it with her foot to signal she was done. The door opened and Yuri and Guillermo were waiting for her. “Let's get this over with.” The corridor was long and narrow, a space filled with boxes and crates and other pieces of junk that had been abandoned. They escorted her down it, turned a corner and led her through a door into a huge room with high ceilings, faux walls and low lighting. She was in an art gallery. Yuri took the lead and Guillermo stayed close behind her. She could feel his presence, too close for comfort, no doubt to catch her if she tried to run. Most of her concentration was being expanded on staying upright. She felt dizzy again, her head swimming and each step had to be carefully taken because it felt as though the floor was moving beneath her feet. She had never actually spent much time on boats, or even gone any significant distance out to sea, but this was probably what it felt like when the waves got choppy. To add to that her arm was aching, her hands back to burning, and every inch of her hurt.There were voices coming from somewhere in the gallery, soft murmurs that drifted between the walls and canvases. “This way,” Yuri said. He ushered Lou to follow him and led her across the floor. The pieces were mostly contemporary; minimalist pieces and abstract pieces, the kind of art that she normally loved. It was the kind of place that once a upon a time she might have taken a woman on a date. An entire section was taken up by a single artists work. The sight of the too large loopy writing, clearly an imitation signature of the artist, turned her stomach. Claude fucking Becker. Of course that skinny useless fuck thought he was an artist. And of course he was the exact arrogant kind of shit who would open a gallery just to showcase his own art. The voices were louder now, the speakers closer. Lou forced her head up, forced herself to face whoever was ahead. Becker was facing towards her, his attention focused on the woman with him, his hands animated as he talked to the woman who had her back to Lou. She caught snatches of his conversation: “… really excellent pieces… the brush work was hard to replicate…I found this student, superb talent…” The woman hummed. Lou let her eyes wander over the woman, had to squint as her vision was still impaired by the haze coming over the right side. Dark hair, a beautiful black dress that was short enough to show off long legs. She closed her eyes. She would dream about those legs, they would haunt her for the rest of her life, which depending on how the next hour or so went might not be very long.“Ah, see, I told you she was fine,” Becker said.Lou opened her eyes just as Debbie turned. If Debbie was surprised by her appearance she didn’t show it. If she was at all horrified or upset that Lou had clearly had the absolute shit kicked out of her she didn’t show that either. The muscles of her face barely twitched. Just the movement of her eyes as she scanned over Lou, from her feet up to her bruised face, took in her appearance, catalogued her like she was looking over another art piece strung up on the wall, a cold detached enjoyment. Lou had seen the same expression on the faces of other people walking around art galleries; enjoying being there, enjoying being seen to be there, but not at all appreciating the work that had gone into the pieces they were viewing. And really Lou’s injuries were their own special kind of art. The kind that people looked at and rolled their eyes and muttered that they could do that, there was no skill involved, no talent. They didn’t understand that it took years of careful work to make a piece like Lou; Becker and Debbie had just added the finishing touches.“You and I have very different understandings of the meaning of fine,” Debbie said wryly. No outrage, no hurt on Lou’s behalf, nothing. “She’s alive. That’s all you asked for.” Becker tugged at the cuff of his shirt.“Good. She’s not worth anything dead.”Lou’s legs picked that moment to damn near give up on her and she would have fallen if Yuri hadn’t been behind her. He grabbed her by the arms, his grip iron tight about her biceps. She grunted at the jolt of pain to her left arm, but it was nothing compared to Debbie’s words. Nothing compared to that little blow that hit her right in the sternum, pushed what little air she had into her lungs out. She should have known not to put her trust in Debbie. Her head was spinning. She was going to be sick. What was the point in even attempting to stay upright? She wanted to just sink to the floor. To just lie down and give up. “I’m surprised she’s worth anything at all,” Becker said. He moved from Debbie and came to stand in front of Lou, cocked his head and scrutinised her.“That’s because you don’t know who she is.”“Right. And I suppose you do.”“Wouldn’t be here if I didn’t.”He laughed. “You’ll forgive me for my healthy dose of scepticism, Debbie, but I know what an exceptional liar you are.” He tapped Lou’s cheek with his fingers, swiped them across her face. “And now this one knows too.”“I don’t think you’re in a position to look a gift horse in the mouth.” Debbie’s heel clacked on the floor as she sauntered about. If Lou’s raised her head just a little, stared up with her eyes, she could just make out through the fuzziness of her vision Debbie’s legs as she walked from one art piece to another, a bored confidence, as though Debbie had better places to be and better things to be doing. She moved as if this was her own gallery and it was Becker who was the guest. “You owe Toulor for funding your little art scam - disappointing that it wasn’t anywhere near as profitable as you’d hoped it would be.”“Get to the point,” Becker growled.“You owe Toulor a substantial sum of money that you don’t have and now you’ve gone and promised Terry Benedict something that you can’t possibly deliver.” She paused, the clicking of her heels coming to an abrupt stop. “This all sound about right to you?”Becker stepped back from Lou; he wiped his hand on his pants leg and turned his back on her blocking her view of Debbie. “And I suppose you have a solution to this.”“Of course.” A pause for dramatic effect. “Better yet I have a solution to my problem.”“And what’s your problem?”She laughed a small disbelieving laugh that sounded completely false to Lou’s ears. “You’re my problem. I’m going to give you the means to get not just Toulor off your back but to also placate Benedict.”“And in exchange?”“In exchange you leave me alone.” Her heels clacked across the floor again in long strides. “Oh, and you give me the Marela Zacarías piece”“Swing? Absolutely not.”“Then we don’t have a deal.”Lou forced herself to look up. Becker still had his back to her, his hands hung at his sides, finger twitching. To her left she could make out Debbie, looking so at ease that she was practically leaning against the wall. Her head was tilted, the smallest smile gracing her lips. This was the look of a woman who already knew she had won. Becker stepped away from Lou, hands back up in the air. “You haven’t explained to me how this woman here.” He spun round and pointed at Lou. “This woman here. Is worth anything.”“Of course I haven’t,” Debbie said with the strained patience reserved for talking to idiots. Debbie would have to be pretty poor at negotiating to give up her seeming one bargaining piece at the beginning of the conversation. It was easy to see how Becker had managed to get himself on the wrong side of not one but two criminals. “And I’m just supposed to trust you?” he laughed. “What’s to stop me from just taking you? I could have you in Terry Benedict’s hands before morning. I could just have Yuri beat the information out of you.”“Well, you could try, but it wouldn’t be advisable.” Debbie sounded quietly amused at the prospect. “Do you really think I walked in here without a plan? My family is expecting me back. I have to be at a specific place at a specific time. If anything happens to me then you will have a whole lot of other problems on your plate.”Becker chewed on that, tugging at his shirt cuffs again. “Fine. But the Zacarías piece is in storage. I never found an artist to make a copy of it. It’ll take time to get it out, to pack it.”“Better get to it then.”Becker clicked his fingers at Lou. “Bring her.”She was hefted up by her arms. Her feet trailed on the ground as Yuri dragged her away, kicked at her feet to try and encourage her to put them down and walk for herself. She tried, she was ashamed of the fact that she actually tried to put her feet down to the ground to walk on her own, but the connection from her brain to her legs was fried and she couldn’t get the message down to her legs to work. They made it from the main gallery, through a door into the back before Yuri lost patience with her. He made a disgusted noise and shoved her roughly into the wall. She managed to get her arms up before she went face first into it. Her left arm flared up as she slid to the floor, knees folded up under her. She clutched the broken arm to her chest, curled her head and shoulders over it protectively. She sobbed through clenched teeth. “Get up,” Yuri hissed. He grasped at her shoulder, her hair, anything to get a handhold to yank her up.“Hey! Stop it.” Debbie’s voice was sharp, cutting. Lou risked creaking an eye open, looked past the curl of her shoulder. The back of Debbie’s legs were between her and Yuri. “You almost sound like you care,” Becker sneered.“We need her alive for this to work,” Debbie countered, calm once more as a still sea. “If this is how you treat merchandise than I am seriously wondering what state my art is going to be in.”“You know fine well I take excellent care of the art.”“Then consider her a piece of art if it helps. The most valuable piece you own.”“You still haven’t told me how she could possibly be worth anything to anyone.”“Get me my art and I will,” Debbie said coyly. She stepped away from Lou, legs flashing by, her hand reaching out, fingers stretched towards Lou’s face, but they curled back before they actually touched Lou, retracting back into a tight quivering fist. “She’s not going anywhere. Just leave her here for now and we’ll pick her up on the way back. Moving her about can’t be good for her.”“Fine. Yuri!” Becker barked. “Keep an eye on her.”Their voices faded into the distance but before they were completely out of earshot she heard them as though carried on the still air, Debbie’s voice, “You know who Willy Bank is?”For a brief moment Lou’s left hand hurt more than anything else did. She flexed it on instinct at hearing that name. She still remembered the feel of the table beneath her hand, the moment between pain when the hammer had first struck her and before the second blow landed, could still remember the disinterested look on his face. Willy bank had no interest in her. He’d already had his little revenge for what she’d done. Debbie wouldn’t get anything for trying to sell her out to Willy Bank.She tried to move, tried to get up, but Yuri’s hand was on her shoulder pushing her back down. Little pieces of information were starting to fall into place, her brain finally working through the fuzz. She needed to get up, needed to stay close to Debbie.“Stay still,” Yuri ordered. His arm was like an iron rod holding her in place and she didn’t even have the strength to even budge it. “You’ll only hurt yourself further.”True. But she didn’t want to stay here for a second longer. She tried again, tried to push his arm away and to get her feet under her. Yuri sighed, bored and annoyed; he shoved her, his hand hard against the center of her chest. That did it. She fell back, pain blooming out from her chest, spreading up through her shoulders and out through her extremities. She dragged in breaths, couldn’t, it was like pulling air through a reed, could hear the high whine of her own attempts at breathing. Yuri swore. She was scrabbling with one hand at the floor. Still trying to breathe. Everything was dark and everything hurt. She was folding up, feeling it all start to fade…She was being moved. There were arms under her armpits lifting her. She fell back again. Fingers once more on her face gently probing, stroking back her hair. She was dreaming of her mother again, of being curled up in her bed, small and safe. “Hey. Hey.” The voice was wrong, the accent, the tone… Lou forced her eyes open, felt like they were swollen shut, her vision was blurred, and Debbie’s face swam before her, never quite making it into focus.“Hey, Lou, hey,” she cooed softly, sounding far away and too close at once. “Hey baby, can you stand? I need you to get up.”Lou shook her head, tried to push this dream away. All she wanted was to sleep, to curl up and sleep and never have to get up again. She was slipping down, Debbie’s hands on her becoming less soft, less careful, gripping at her.“No. No Lou, I need you to get up.”She was finally lying down, face on the floor. She said something, something about wanting to sleep. There were fingers on her again, brushing her hair back, slowly, soothingly. “Lou.” Debbie’s voice sounded close now, so close, almost whispered into her ear. “I know you’re tired. I know it hurts, but I really need you to listen to me.”Lou mumbled, her words spoken to the floor, tumbling from her lips without thought. Debbie gasped. Her hands stroking Lou’s hair momentarily faltered.“I know you do baby, but she’s not here.” The gentle stroking of Debbie’s hand left her and Lou turned her head, trying to follow where they’d gone. “Lou, get up!” Debbie’s words were sharper now. “Come on! Use your damned legs.”Her eyes snapped open. She was shaking. Badly. But Debbie’s hands were on her, under her arm pits, hauling her up. Lou tried, put her foot down and grasped at Debbie, tried to push herself up. Debbie stood, and Lou stood with her, collapsing her weight on Debbie. “Finally!” Debbie said. “Can you walk? I need you to walk.”She took one step, and another, then another; each one heavy and awkward, costing her more effort, more pain, but Debbie was there, taking most of her weight. They made slow progress, back along the corridor, back towards the gallery. They came to a stop, Debbie hoisting Lou up, her arm tight about Lou’s waist, stopping her from slipping. She had something in her free arm, fiddled with it, looked down and away from Lou at what it was.“Is that an umbrella?” Lou mumbled into Debbie’s shoulder, her neck, unable to lift her head.“It sure is,” Debbie replied, smiling at her. She turned her head, her face centimetres from Lou’s; she lifted the umbrella up, thumb clicking the button, opening it. They were still inside… Lou frowned at Debbie, felt Debbie’s lips stretch into a grin. “Wait for it,” she said. “Any minute now.” It started all at once and without warning. A distant click then the sharp sound of something hitting the canvas of the umbrella, not droplets but the vibration of a steady stream of water.“Is that rain?” “Close enough.” Debbie breath was warm against her cheek. “Nearly there. Just a little further.”They started walking again, Debbie directing them, somehow managing the umbrella with one hand and holding Lou up with the other. Lou couldn’t tell if they were making any progress. She clung to Debbie, held her like she was the only think stopping her from falling to her death. There was the sound of water, the wet steps they were taking, the water getting deeper, running about their feet. There was shouting, lights flashing that she had to turn her face from, the feel of Debbie’s skin against her face, her hair, her arm holding her. “Oh my god! There you are.” The voice was high pitched, loud over the sound of the water, and Lou turned to it even as she winced. “Wait! You have an umbrella? Why don’t I have an umbrella?”“You know me, always prepared. Help me with her.”“Alright, Batman.” Was the snippy reply, the voice was closer now, an arm slipping round Lou’s waist, taking some of her weight. Through her barely open eyes she could see a small woman, too short to really be holding her up, pretty and drenched through to the skin, her face twisted with worry. “Come to L.A., Amita,” she muttered. “We’ll have a great time. I’ll introduce you to this guy I know. You’ll love him.”“You’re not having a great time?”“Funnily enough, no, I’m not.”“Debbie!”Lou flinched at the sound of a new voice, a man shouting at them. Her heart lurched. They’d been found, they’d been caught, panic clawed up from the deep recesses of her chest and she began to struggle.“It’s okay,” Debbie said, quickly, desperately. “It’s okay. He’s with me. Linus, come here and for once in your life be useful.”There was someone else there, another body in close to them, strong arms taking hold of her and Lou felt herself being passed over to this new person, being hoisted up, carefully cradling her to his chest. Her head rolled, water hit her face. She screwed her eyes closed, spluttered, tried to push against whoever had her, but he was too strong. “Have you got her? Be careful,” Amita piped up. “I got her, I got her.”“Come on, come on, come on,” a different voice snapped at them. “Times wasting. Jesus, she looks half dead.”It was only then that Lou realised that they were moving, that she was being carried. The rain stopped, the air changed, there were lights and noise and she didn’t know where she was or what was going on. She felt herself being dropped, the feel of leather beneath her arm, the recognisable smell of a car, and that brought panic. She didn’t want to be in a car; didn’t want to know where they would take her next. She needed to escape, to get away, to find Debbie again. Her arm screamed in protest as she tried to push herself up, her vision blurring. “Police are here. Frazier says he’s alerted his contact.”“It worked?”“Let's get out of here.”Lou was still struggling.“Lie still.” There were hands directing her, encouraging her to lie down. Fingers in her hair. Her head rested on something soft and warm, her face turned, pressing against a body, feeling the heat of it radiate through the fabric. “Lou.” Debbie’s voice saying her name, again and again, and she tried to reach for it, to hold on, but it was slipping away, sounding so very far away.
----- CHAPTER BREAK -----
As hangovers went this one might have been the worst that Lou had ever woken up with. She felt like shit. Utterly miserable down to her bones. Her face was sunlight warm, the glow of it bright and radiant through her eyelids. Grunting, she turned her head away from it, sinking further into the too soft pillow she was resting on.Her head hurt; had that stuffed tight feel like the sides of her skull would give way from the pressure at any moment. Her mouth and throat were as dry as the desert, rough and gritty, her teeth and tongue thick with a coating from the night before that told her she hadn’t brushed her teeth before collapsing in bed, and the taste of it was foul. Bile was already burning the back of her throat; nausea chasing it from her steadily gurgling stomach. To top it all off everything else hurt. Her back, her legs, deep aches in all her muscles like she’d overused them; her left arm throbbed; her hands burned. It hurt enough that she considered this wasn’t a hangover but was a fever. That this wasn’t self-inflicted but that she was genuinely ill this time.She forced her eyes open and stared blearily across the expanse of her bed; frowned, as she realised this wasn’t her bed at all. The pillows were too soft, the cases they were in a pale blue; and across from the bed there were doors to a wardrobe that definitely wasn’t hers. It took a moment for her brain to catch up, for the fog and haze to clear up, and for the fractured memories of what had happened, what she had been through to surface in her mind. With the memories came panic. It surged from deep from within, pushing against her nausea, pulsing to the beat of her trembling heart. It was a struggle to sit up; the thin cotton sheet that was covering her seemed to weigh a tonne. Her legs worked uselessly, heels digging into the mattress as she pushed her way up against the pillows. Her left arm was bound and held secure against her chest; her right hand felt like the skin would tear off as it grappled with the sheets. By the time she was remotely close to sitting upright she was out of breath; her chest tight and lungs burning. Head spinning.And it hurt. Everything fucking hurt.With effort she got her breathing under control and glanced about the room. It was unspectacular. Not some prison or lock up, not a back room that she had been stuffed in out of the way, not even a hospital; it was just a boring bedroom. Sunlight poured in from a tall narrow window that showed a view of endless blue sky and the tops of buildings as far as she could see. Besides the bed there was a small table with a bright pink plastic water bottle on it; next to that there was a chair with a well worn book, a romance, the cover depicting a busty heroine and a muscled man, his chest bare and with his arms around her lay open across the arm rest. Someone must have been keeping an eye on her. The walls were painted a warm white and on the opposite hung two paintings, stark pieces in blacks with bold lines that if she squinted might have been of a cityscape. Her left arm was in a splint and held securely to her chest in a sling, clearly to minimise movement. Her fingers weren’t as swollen as they had been and she could move them with minimal pain, flex them out and feel the pull of her tendons. There was a gel bandage stuck along the outside edge of her right palm; the skin over her middle knuckle stitched together. The sleeves of the top she was wearing only came to her biceps and she could see the patchwork of bruises that swirled over her skin, blues and purples and darker colours, even some greens and yellows. One of the many unfortunate downsides to being so pale was that she had always bruised easily, and she didn’t need to look at the rest of her body to know that almost every available piece of her would be similarly bruised and battered. She was getting too old to take bumps like this; couldn’t shrug them off like she had when she was younger. The aches lingered and piled atop one another; felt like her joints were grinding when she moved, threatening to pop. She’d be feeling this for months. She had to close her eyes against the flood of memories. The crash, her house burning, the gallery, Claude fucking Becker - Debbie.Her eyes snapped open. Debbie had been there at the gallery, she had been stood with Becker, all dressed up and looking at Lou like she was nothing, something beneath even her contempt. Lou’s eyes stung. She rubbed the heel of her right hand into her left eye, ignored the tight pain that pulled across her hand as she did so. Something wasn’t adding up. She couldn’t remember how she had got from the gallery to here; couldn't remember receiving medical attention. Someone had changed her clothes and put her in this bed. She had been looked after and cared for. But whoever it was had left. She was on her own again.The urge to run was drowning out the panic. She had no idea how long she had been here or where she was or who these people who were supposedly caring for her were. There was every possibility that they were only looking after her in the short term, that they wanted something from her. She drew her legs up, tried to get them under her to shift to the edge of the bed. If they knew what she had she had done. If they knew the right people then they could sell her out, make a decent amount of money or garner some favours. She made it the edge of the bed, put her feet down on the cool tile floor, and braced herself. There was every chance that her legs weren’t going to be able to take her weight. “Oh.”Lou froze, her shoulders hunching like a startled cat. She looked up to the source of the noise and found a stranger standing in the door way: a woman, short with dark hair, pretty, her eyes wide. “You’re awake,” she said not masking her surprise. Her eyes narrowed suspiciously. “What are you doing?”“Leaving.” Lou’s voice was a thick croak, her dry throat cracking as she formed the words.“No, no, no.” She hurried across the room, her hand going to Lou’s shoulder, holding her down. “Where would you even go? Can you even stand?”These were important questions that Lou had briefly considered. “Doesn’t matter.”“I think it’ll matter if you fall down and crack your head. Look, I get it, it’s all very confusing. Just sit back, I’ll get you a drink.”Lou peered up at the woman through her fringe. She had kind eyes, a worried crease in her brow, but there was a resolve there that told Lou that she wasn’t going to let her leave without putting up a fight. And Lou was in no condition to win any kind of fight. She nodded.“Okay.” The woman walked round the bed and picked up the bottle of water, crossed back round, popping the cap open. She pulled a straw out from the bottle and waved it in Lou’s face. Lou reared back from it but the woman just followed her, pushing it closer to her face.“I can do it myself.” Lou reached for the bottle with her right hand, fought down a wince as she stretched her fingers out, and took hold of it. The woman shrugged and let go of the bottle and as soon as she did it slipped from Lou’s pathetically weak grasp. The bottle bounced off the bed and to the floor, leaving splashes of water in its wake as it rolled away. “Well that went well.”The woman stooped to pick it up, turned back to Lou. “Let’s try that again. This time I’ll hold the bottle for you.” Her words were gentle and she was smiling, taking out any sting that might have been in the rebuke.Lou let her put the straw to her lips and sucked a line of water into her mouth. The water was cool and refreshing, easing the dry burn of her throat immediately. She sat back with a heavy gasp, licked her lips and swallowed. “You could have just told me that I wouldn’t be able to hold it.”“Would you have listened?” She said. “No offense, but you don’t look like the listening type. You look more like the type to just go on ahead and do it and only ask for help once you were neck deep in trouble. And I’m giving you credit for actually being able to accept help when it’s offered unlike some other people I know.”That was unfair. Rather than saying anything Lou leaned forward and took another drink of water. She shuffled back on the bed, ignoring her headache and other aches and pains. “Who are you?”“You don’t remember?”Lou shook her head slowly. “I’m Amita. We met at the gallery.”Lou tensed. Did she work for Becker? Was she still being held by him? She could just about remember Debbie being there. That Debbie was there to… The memory was hazy, difficult to grasp. Debbie had been talking to Becker; she had been working out a deal with him. Had Debbie been about to sell her out? No… She could remember Debbie, could remember the feel of her standing close, her voice in her ear. But she could also remember her mother, the feel of her fingers on her face and the sound of her voice. She couldn’t trust her own memories.“And I was with you at the - well,” she laughed, head tipping to the side. “It would be an exaggeration to call it a hospital, but I was with you when we took you to get treatment. Your arm is broken by the way.”“No shit. Ulna or radius?” Lou glanced down at her arm in its sling. Amita’s eyes widened, impressed. “Look at you knowing the names of your bones. Both. You need surgery but we need to swelling to go down first. The swelling was really bad, I was convinced you had compartment syndrome - that’s where -”“I know what it is.”“You’re lucky. You’ve been given some anti-inflammatory drugs, minimised the movement and the swelling is going down.”“And my hands?”Amita winced in sympathy. “Second degree road rash burns. They look worse than they are.”“You a doctor?”“No. But I’m pre-med so I’m the closet thing you’ve got.” Amita pressed the straw back into the bottle and closed the cap. She walked back round the bed to the chair, stooping to pick up the book. “You should get back in bed. I’ll see about getting you something to eat and something for the pain - “Seeing her chance, small though it was, Lou pushed herself up to her feet, clenching her teeth against the pain, her muscles and joints screaming at her. The tile was cool beneath her bare feet, her legs wobbly and she only just managed to stay on her feet, unable to stand up fully straight. She took one shaky step, another, and then another, the muscles in her legs burning.“Hey! Hey! Amita yelled from across the room. “Where are you going?”Lou had no idea; she just knew she was leaving. She hobbled from the bed, round the corner and towards the open bedroom door. Behind her she could hear Amita fast approaching, her footsteps tapping away on the tile. Her hand brushed against the sleeve of Lou’s pyjamas and Lou turned, ready to tell her to back off, to let her go. “You’re finally awake,” a voice said from behind and Lou nearly had a god damned heart attack. She swivelled round on her heel and found herself looking at a woman standing in the doorway. She stumbled back into Amita, her legs deciding that they’d had enough for today. They both went down, Amita’s arms quickly moving around her and controlling the fall so she didn’t hurt herself. She landed atop Amita with a grunt, Amita squeaking in her ear. “Sorry, I didn’t mean to startle you.” The woman moved into the room and glanced down at Lou, looking anything but sorry. She was smiling softly, her head tilted and her eyes bright with curiosity that was distressingly reminiscent of Debbie. She had dark hair, hanging loose and straight down her shoulders, a lighter shade of brunette than Debbie’s that would come up a beautiful chestnut in the sun. There were small barely discernible lines at the edges of her eyes and mouth, the kind caused by smiling and laughing. She was dressed smartly, loose slacks, a low cut sharp red blouse, with a blazer, the sleeves of which only came to mid-forearm; from habit Lou looked to her wrist and noted the watch, a beautiful little silver thing as well as a bracelet, and her hands, the only rings she wore were on her wedding finger, a tiffany cut diamond with two sapphires either side of it, and a platinum wedding band. Simple, elegant, and expensive.“Thanks, Tess,” Amita muttered. “Oh, my pleasure.” She knelt down and together she and Amita helped Lou back to her feet; they shuffled her to the bed, holding her by her good arm and with hands on her waist. Lou sat down heavily, already out of breath from her little excursion.“Where am I?” Lou asked once she had breath back. She stared at her hand on her knees, gripped the loose fabric of the pyjamas she was wearing.“You’re in my apartment,” the new woman said. “And who are you?” The woman’s eyes tightened at the corners as she considered Lou. “You don’t remember?”“Remember what?” There was panic, starting low in her stomach and squirming its way up, and Lou was suddenly very aware of her heart and the way it trembled. The woman’s smile softened. She sat down next to Lou and waited for Lou to look up at her before replying. “We met before, when they first brought you back here.”“They?”“I’m Tess.” She held out her hand and Lou stared at it, stared at her slim wrist and the watch that would be so easy to nick if her hands actually worked, at her perfectly manicured nails and the shiny rings. Slowly Tess lowered her hand. “It’s okay. You’ve been through a lot.” Amita snorted from somewhere in the room and muttered something about that being an understatement. Tess’s smile widened. “And given what you’ve been through I don’t blame you for not trusting me, but I promise you that you’re safe here; you have my word and an Ocean always keeps their word.”Lou looked up at that, the name Ocean feeling like someone had just dropped a bowling ball on her chest. Debbie hadn’t mentioned a sister, and apart from being a brunette, Tess shared no similarities with Debbie; the structure of her face too thin, the bones too delicate, and her eyes had a flare of green to them surrounding the brown that Debbie’s lacked. Lou’s eyes flickered down to the rings on Tess’ finger. Wouldn’t that be a kicker? The final push and twist of the knife. She almost wanted to laugh. Her hands were starting to shake, her eyes stinging.“You’re an Ocean?” Lou managed, forcing the words past her clenched jaw and burning throat. “I’m Danny’s wife.”Lou made a noise that was all too much like a squeak to her ears. Debbie had failed to mention she had a sister-in-law.“And you’re Lou. Just Lou. Which is mysterious,” Tess continued, her smile returning full force. “The lack of surname caused a few heated discussions. It’s good to finally speak to the reason why Debbie has been acting so…” she inhaled deeply, her eyes drifting off with a long suffering look, before she exhaled through her smile. “So very much not like Debbie.”“Debbie’s here?” Her heart flat out forgot to take several beats, and then, to make up for the skipped beats it started up again pounding so hard that it felt like it might punch through her chest. Debbie was here. Debbie was here and she’d be able to see her, to touch her, to bury her face in her neck and hair and inhale and - Lou cut those thoughts off. Debbie was here and she could get answers. She needed to focus on that. She raised her hand to her chest, pushed her palm to it, felt the hammer hits of her heart. “She is.”Lou tried to stand up. Tried to force her aching tired legs to work but they wobbled and she went back down. Tess reached out a steadying hand to grab her if she fell forward. “Hey, maybe don’t make any sudden movements,” Amita said. She hurried round the side of the bed to stand before Lou, her brow furrowed in worry. “I need…” Lou said. She needed to get out of here. To find Debbie and… She didn’t know, didn’t know what she would do or say when she saw Debbie. But she was starting to shake, infinitesimal tremors that ran up her legs and grew in intensity, making her body quake. Her throat felt tight and was raw, her chest constricted. She needed to be on her own, to get away for a moment. “Where’s the bathroom?”“Oh. This way.” Tess stood up and reached for Lou. It was pointless to fight them; so Lou let them help her up to her feet, let them crowd uncomfortably close, and between them they managed to lead her, slowly, from the bed and across the room. They went through the door and Lou blinked as the huge apartment came into view. They were up on a second floor, almost like a converted loft looking down on the long stretch of space below. “Bathrooms back here.”They turned, the bathroom door was next to the door for the bedroom that they had just exited; Lou took note of another door further down. She pushed both Amita and Tess away and staggered towards the door. As soon as she opened it the lights inside flicked on. “You need a hand?” Amita asked.“I really don’t.” Lou shut the door in their faces. She leaned against it for a moment, catching her breath. It wasn’t that she didn’t appreciate that they were trying to help, or the help that they had already given her, but she needed this for herself.There was a soft rap of knuckles against the door. “There’s a toothbrush and paste left out for you if you want to brush your teeth,” Tess said through the door.“Please brush your teeth,” Amita added.“Amita!” Tess hissed.“What? Why sugar coat it? Her breath is foul.”Lou laughed quietly, her shoulders shaking, chest trembling; it took her moment to realise that she’d started crying. She pulled in a couple of deep breaths, tried to swallow down the tears. The bathroom was small, marble topped counters with a huge sink designed like a shell sunk into it, a massive mirror surrounded by the low flattering lights that gave the impression that the room was larger than it was. The bath was free standing, with clawed feet, and long enough and deep enough the Lou would be able to stretch out in it. Lou staggered to the toilet, fumbling one handed with her pyjama pants, lifted the seat and plonked herself down, and had, quite frankly, the best piss of her entire life. Her thighs were covered in bruises from being knocked off of her bike, the left leg worse than her right. She finished up, stood, and the toilet flushed automatically. Rich people were so lazy. Pulling her pants back up, she stumbled to the sink. Just as Tess had said there was a toothbrush still in its packet left out for her. She had to open the packet with her teeth; had to set the toothbrush down on the counter to put toothpaste on it; set about scrubbing her teeth, rinsed her mouth and brushed her teeth again. The memory of the taste she had woken up with would haunt her for days. She chucked the toothbrush down where it clattered across the counter top, bouncing off the wall, and looked up at her reflection.The flattering lights of the bathroom did nothing to mask the state she was in. With no make-up on she looked every single one of her years. Her eyes were bloodshot and pink rimmed, with circles so dark hanging beneath them that she looked like she had decided to revisit her ill advised Goth phase that had lasted all of a summer. Her hair was unwashed, it hung dull and lank, the colour washed out, it’s usual brilliant platinum shine faded. By her right brow there was a graze, the skin broken and already healing; a bruise worked its way around her eye socket and down to her cheek. It was slightly swollen, the lid puffy, and she raised her hand to tentatively touch it, winced at the first gentle contact despite it not hurting at all. She pressed a bit harder, felt the dull pain and stopped. Her lips looked alright, a little dry but otherwise undamaged. The pain overall, from her broken arm to her ripped hands, across her bruised and abused limbs, was steadily increasing from an ache she could ignore to something that was starting to press in on her thoughts. She’d need some sort of pain killer soon. Didn’t want to think of what they might have given her already. That they might have given her an opioid and that she would have to explain that she wouldn’t take anything like that.There was a soft knock at the door, Tess’s voice chasing after it, amusement underlying her concern, “Are you alright? You didn’t fall down again, did you?”Why do you care? What were these women doing here? It wasn’t just that Lou had been taken to a doctor and received medical attention, it was that she had been brought back here, been taken care of. Someone had helped her into that bed; they had changed her clothes, washed her. These two complete strangers had seemingly looked after her. She scrubbed her forearm across her eyes. Crying again, her throat tight and burning. It was pathetic.“Lou?”“A minute,” she called back, hating the thickness she couldn’t mask in her voice. She turned the tap back on, ignored that it was probably not a good idea to get her bandages wet, and washed her face. She grabbed a towel and dried herself off, chucking it careless across the counter. Opening the bathroom door she found only Tess waiting for her. “Where’s Amita?”“Gone to warn Debbie.”Lou stiffened. What the hell did that mean? Warn Debbie about what?“Come on, I’ll help you with the stairs.”Tess stayed by her side, keeping a respectful distance but close enough that if Lou needed her for support she’d be there. Lou kept one hand on the wall and took the stairs one at a time, knees complaining with each step. “How long have you known Debbie?”Tess made an amused noise. “Let's see, Danny and I have been married for nineteen years, so, I guess just over twenty. But there have been some times in there where I hadn’t seen her for actual years, so it really feels like a lot less.”When they made it to the bottom of the stairs Lou had to stop to catch her breath again, leaning her weight against the wall. “I swear I’m not usually this unfit.”“It’s fine,” Tess said. “You’re not one hundred percent yet. You’ve got to be hungry so that won’t be helping, and I bet you’re dying for a cigarette.”Lou looked up at her through her hair hanging across her face. “How’d you know I smoke?”“Because your clothes smelled like cigarettes.”“Oh.” How charming. She started walking again, following slowly after Tess.“The fact that you’re a smoker is just one of the many surprises.”“It is?”“Well, yeah. Debbie hates smoking.”That brought Lou up short. She stopped, stared at the back of Tess’s head. “She does?”Tess turned. “Yes. Apart from the fact that it’s - no offense - a disgusting habit, she has asthma.”“What?” Lou said weakly. “You didn’t know?” Tess’s eyes narrowed. She stepped closer to Lou, bent her head down low, conspiratorially. “How much do you actually know about Debbie?”Not a lot it was turning out. “Some,” Lou said turned her head away from Tess’s appraising gaze, jaw clenching defensively.“How much do you know about the Ocean’s?”Was this a test? “I know that they’re criminals.”“Conmen. Hustlers and card sharks, sweet talkers and back room dealers.” Tess shook her head, smiling fondly. “They’re actually really ridiculous. And strangely good people. Y’know, when they’re not lifting your wallet. But then I don’t think you’re a stranger to having light fingers.” She leaned back on her heels, crossing her arms, regarding Lou. “I feel a little like I’m giving you insider information here but you honestly look like you need all the help you can get.” She pulled in a breath, eyes sweeping over Lou’s head. “I wasn’t exaggerating before when I said an Ocean always keeps their word. They do. If they promise you something they will do it. They have these rules.”“Like that no one dies?”Tess smiled long and slow. “You heard that one? No one dies. They won’t directly kill someone and they won’t orchestrate a death, they won’t even allow it to happen as collateral damage. You ever known a criminal to do a welfare check on a mark? The Ocean’s do. It’s not fun if someone dies. You’ve got to remember it’s as much a game to them as it is a means to make money.”“Why are you telling me this?”Tess turned her head and Lou followed where she was looking. The door to the apartment. “If you want I can give you money, get you an Uber and you can hole up in a hotel. I’ll give you the name of the doctor and you have my word that your treatment will be covered. You can leave now and no one will come after you. You can return to your life.”Lou’s head spun. What kind of life did she have to go back to? Her burned out shell of a home? She’d have to start over - again. Be back on the run.Her legs were starting to shake; she’d been standing up too long without moving. She turned back to Tess. Did she want her to leave? “Why?” Lou asked, her voice a croak. It was difficult not to feel as though Tess was trying to get her to leave, that she wanted her gone.Tess looked over her. “Because an Ocean always pays their debts, and I’m sorry for what happened to you.”“That another one of their rules?”“It is.”Lou weighed her words, rolled them around in her mind and turned them over, trying to decipher what Tess’s meaning was. Debts and promises, and no one dying, she saw how they all tied together, worse, could see how they all tied back to her. She could see why Tess would think she wanted an out and why she would offer her one. But she already knew what she wanted.“Where’s Debbie?” Tess smiled, slowly, sadly. “Come on,” she said quietly. “This way.”She led Lou across the apartment, past a long dining table and a separate area with two couches facing one another. They eventually made it to a sliding door, pushed open and covered by a thin curtain. Tess stopped, turned to face Lou, one hand resting on the door frame. Her head tilted to the side as she regarded Lou.“Here’s another rule for you to consider: An Ocean always looks after their own.”Lou hesitated, watched as Tess disappeared through the door to the outside. There was a light breeze and she could already feel the warmth of the sun, nothing like the unrelenting blasting heat of the desert. She didn’t know what would happen next. Didn’t even know if she wanted to find out. But she had come this far. She stepped through the door and was blinded by the sun, had to raise her hand to shield her eyes, squinting until they adjusted to the light. She was greeted by a rooftop garden; a small pool surrounded by a seating area and beyond that what was unmistakably the LA skyline. Her eyes went to Tess, watched as she walked up the side of the pool towards a man who held out his arm to her. She went to him, her arm sliding about his waist and his arm draping easily over her shoulder as she leaned into him. That had to be Danny. He leaned his head close to Tess, said something to her, his mouth so close to her skin, and then looked over to Lou.“We were starting to think that you were gonna sleep the year out,” he called over.Someone laughed and Lou’s eyes travelled to the noise. Another man, wearing the ugliest shirt Lou had ever seen was sat close to Danny on the edge of a sun lounger. He rested his elbows on his spread knees, chewing open mouthed on something. More of the garden was coming into focus; there was another man stood by the edge of the pool in shorts and an open Hawaiian shirt, he held his hand up to his brow as though to shield his gaze from the sun even though it was behind him. But Lou’s gaze went past him, past him to the woman who had suddenly moved closer, walked from the very edge of the garden where she’d been leaning on the railing and looking over the city, Amita stood behind her and watched it all with a smile on her face. Lou didn’t have any breath left in her lungs to breathe.Debbie Ocean looked fucking perfect. She stopped, paused where she stood, and her eyes locked with Lou’s, her brow creased. She pulled in a long, slow breath and Lou could see the expansion of her chest, the way her shoulders raised, and then the fell again as she exhaled.She looked good. Better than Lou did right now that was for certain. Her hair was pulled back in a loose ponytail, little spirals of hair hanging before her ears; she wore dark slacks and a beautiful silk shirt that fit her perfectly, cut low enough that it showed off her collarbones and her long neck. In comparison Lou looked like shit, in her borrowed pyjamas and with her bruises and abrasions and unwashed hair. But Debbie’s eyes never left her face, didn’t move from her eyes. “This is uncomfortable for everyone,” Danny said. And just like that that moment, the spell, the thing that kept her and Debbie rooted to the spot staring at each other and breathing in tandem was broken. He pointed at Debbie. “Don’t just stand there. Take you new little friend inside and, I dunno, get her some juice or something.”Debbie scowled at him, but she moved towards Lou in strong purposeful strides, and Lou almost wanted to step back in case Debbie just mowed her down, but Debbie came to an abrupt stop before her. She opened her mouth, didn’t utter a sound, and closed it. Lou should say something, she used to have lines, smooth lines and if not that then just a look, a crooked smile or a particular way of tilting her head that women were immune to. But all she could do now was stare helplessly at Debbie, at her dark eyes and her long hair that was tamed and shone in the sun. At the healthy glow to her skin and the rigidity of her posture. She looked uncomfortable, annoyed even, but so fucking beautiful that Lou ached in a whole new way to her physical pain.“Are you alright?” she said quietly, thank god quietly, because it was the wrong thing to say. Debbie closed her eyes, the crease in her brow harshening. The line of her jaw was tense, her chin wobbled and that made her bottom lip quiver. She swallowed hard, throat working, and opened her eyes. “You must be hungry,” she said tonelessly. “Come on. I’ll fix you something up.”“Sure.” Lou turned and followed Debbie back inside. As she stepped through the door she heard a male yell from behind.“It’s like she’s been replaced by a freakin’ pod person!”Debbie’s stopped, her shoulders tensed, then she set off again, stalking away quickly with no consideration for the fact that Lou was the walking wounded. Lou limped after her. They rounded the dining table and Debbie led her to a closed door that swung open when Debbie’s hand thumped into it. The kitchen was something else. Lou turned a small circle, gawping at the fixtures and the lights and the amazing oven. Debbie grabbed a glass from the shelf that was full of different kinds of glasses all different shapes and sizes, and went to the fridge, she pushed the glass to the water dispenser, kept her back turned to Lou the whole time. “You should sit,” she said, turning round and gesturing at the small narrow table. Lou pulled out a chair and settled herself down onto it, mindful of the aches in her legs, of the way her lower back felt stiff, and thankful that the chair had a pathetic cushion on it to provide a minuscule amount of comfort. She let her legs sprawl out beneath the table, it sent a sharp pain lancing up her right knee and she had to bend it. Her hip was throbbing on her left side. Apparently even sitting down was going to be an actual pain in her arse. There was a shallow bowl that looked to be handmade from carved and polished wood in the centre of the table; it was filled with multicoloured glass beads. Lou reached across to it, ran her finger around the smooth rim, poked at the beads and grunted before settling back. It was tempting to throw questions at Debbie. To demand that she fill in all the blanks in Lou’s memory. But she had already seemingly made a misstep and didn’t want to make another, so she left the questions burning at the back of her throat. She had always been patient, she could wait Debbie out. Debbie put the glass of water down and slid it across the table towards her, and retreated back to the fridge, her back to the counter, her brow still creased. She cleared her throat. “I owe you an explanation.”“Sure.” Lou sat back up in her seat. “But before that you promised me something to eat.”With a sharp intake of breath Debbie spun and yanked the fridge door open, disappearing behind it. She emerged with a small plastic carton of what were clearly leftovers. “I’d offer to cook you something but I think you’ve probably been through enough already.”“The breakfast you made wasn’t too bad.”Debbie slid the carton over to Lou and handed her a fork. “Only because you saved it.”The fork was awkward to hold in Lou’s injured hand, her finger movements restricted and her grip strength practically non-existent. Debbie watched as she fumbled with the utensil but she didn’t offer to help. That was a small mercy, she wasn’t sure she could handle it if Debbie had offered to feed her. She fiddled one handed with the lid, couldn’t get a grip on the damned thing. Debbie reached over and tore the lid off, chucked it to the side and pushed the carton towards Lou. Lou stuck the fork into what appeared to be day old kung pao chicken, her stomach rumbling in anticipation of the first bite. She hadn’t realised just how hungry she was, but then she had been asleep for… She chewed and swallowed. “How long was I out?”“Day and a half,” Debbie replied. She narrowed her eyes at Lou. “You’ve been awake a couple of times, talked a little bit, but this is the first time you’ve actually got up. You don’t remember coming here?”Lou shook her head. “Last thing I remember was being at - well, being at Becker’s gallery.”Debbie looked away. “So you don’t remember us taking you to the doctors? Any of that?”Another shake of her head. “Na-da.”“Okay. We didn’t take you to a hospital -”“Good.”“- but to a… friend? She’s not licensed, not anymore, and she runs a, uh, practice of sorts.”“Why isn’t she licensed?” Lou asked, and Debbie made a glug glug motion in reply. Lou stared. “You took me to a drunk backstreet surgeon?”“The twenty-four hour vets was too far away.”Lou wanted to laugh. It was funny, it should have been funny, but she couldn’t shake the feeling that something was very wrong. She stabbed her fork into some more chicken. She’d barely eaten any of it and she already felt full.“It’s a clean break but you’re gonna need surgery,” Debbie explained, pointing at Lou’s arm in its sling.“I know, Amita told me. The swelling was a problem, I’ve skinned my hands, I’m bruised to fuck and back, but I guess it could have been worse.”“And you had a concussion.” Debbie paused. Her tone was neutral; her expression not shifting from the frown that she had worn since entering the apartment. “You’ve been very lucky. It could have been a lot worse than it actually is.”“It feels bad enough.”“How is the pain?”“Manageable.”“You need anything for it?”“An Advil?”“Something stronger, maybe?”“No.” Lou forced herself to eat more food, forced her aching jaw to chew and her aching throat to swallow. Debbie was leaning back into the counter, one hand holding her other, fingers and thumbs fidgeting. All the treatment she’d had so far sounded very expensive, and she needed to add surgery on top of that. Lou set her fork down and pushed the unfinished food away, half expecting Debbie to pick it up and finish it off, but she stayed where she was, pressed against the counter, looking like she was trying to melt into it.Debbie opened another cupboard and pulled out a plastic tub, rooted around in it until she found what she was looking for. She pushed the tub back in and closed the cupboard door harder than necessary, turned to Lou and tossed the packet of Advil onto the table. “Why’d you do it?” Debbie asked, eyes locked on Lou.“Do what?”“Help me. Why’d you stop and pick me up?”Lou turned the fork over in her fingers as she considered how to answer the movements stiff and awkward. Finally she shrugged. “I don’t know.”Debbie shook her head, like that answer wasn’t good enough. She flicked her thumb nails together, neither one long enough that she could get a decent noise from them.“So what happened at the gallery?” Debbie finally moved away from the counter; she pulled out a chair opposite Lou and sat down, looked across at her and kept eye contact. “After you left I called Rusty and told him to come get me. I told him I wasn’t safe there anymore and he needed to some get me right now.”Her words landed like a blow to the chest. All that effort she had put into making Debbie feel safe and secure, all undone just because she’d had a temper tantrum. She was going to remember that flash of fear in Debbie’s eyes for the rest of her life.“He came and got me. He actually wasn’t too far away, but still he’d only just got there as Claude arrived. And that’s when we saw that he had you.” Debbie put her hands flat to the table top, drew in a breath. That Debbie had been there to see Lou dragged from the car, to see her on her knees and thinking that she was going to die, that she had just stood there and watched. But no, she had intervened. Lou closed her eyes, ground her teeth together. “I’m sorry,” Debbie said.“For what?”“For what Claude did to you.”It was too much. Lou’s chest felt tight. Like maybe the chicken had been a bad idea, like someone was pushing on her sternum. She shook her head.”You don’t have to be sorry for that. You didn’t do this to me.”“It was my fault. Claude was my mark, my responsibility. You should never have been involved; you certainly should never have been hurt.”But she had been and Debbie’s words were cutting just as deep as her physical injuries. They shouldn’t have, it was stupid that they were. They should have been reassuring but they were like a knife, peeling away layers of Lou’s skin. Responsibility. What an ugly word, what an ugly, heavy hurtful word.“The gallery?” Lou prompted, voice cracking in a way she couldn’t completely blame on her dry throat.Debbie cleared her throat, her fingers tapped across the table top. “There was already a plan in place to handle Claude, I just modified it and executed it early. I needed to give Claude a reason to keep you alive, he needed to believe that you were worth something to him. Rusty told me that you had a history with Willy Banks.”“How did Rusty know that?”“He plays poker. When I told him your name he said he knew you from back in the day, that you were caught counting cards or something in one of Banks’ casinos and that they…” she trailed off, looked pointedly down at Lou’s left hand. “I know you didn’t break that by falling off your bike. So I made Claude believe that Banks wants you, that Claude would be able to sell you to him and maybe have the money to pay off his own debts. It gives me a reason to be in his gallery.”“Why use Willy Banks? I already paid my debt to him. There are a whole lot of other people out there that want me dead.”“I couldn’t risk Claude getting in touch with them. When we started the scam and before he expanded his operation to LA, we were based in New York. There was too much of a risk that he would have known who to call, who to hand you over to. It would have been counterproductive to alert them. I was trying to get you out alive. And I couldn’t have him thinking he could cut me out of the deal, he needed to believe that I would facilitate it. He isn’t high enough in this world to just call up Banks; he needed someone like me or Danny to do it for him.”It was strange to think of Debbie living in New York when she had been, that they might have crossed paths and never known it. Lou shifted in her seat, her back aching. Debbie had said that she knew about the bank jobs, that she had been paying attention to them and waiting for it all to go wrong.“Okay, then what?”“We picked up Linus and Amita, filled them in on the plan, and went to the gallery. The short answer is that we set Claude up for insurance fraud. I found you, distracted Claude while Linus and Rusty set up smoke traps to trigger the alarm system and set off the sprinklers. I got Claude to open up the storage at the back so that Amita could steal the only piece he had that was worth anything. We picked you up on the way out.” Debbie laughed softly, a little “ha” expelled on a sharp breath. “You actually put up a bit of a fight. Clawed Linus right here.” She dragged two fingers down her throat. “We know a guy, an insurance investigator, and we called in a favour with him so that he alerted a colleague based here. Passed on our evidence against Claude and made sure he was caught in the act of committing insurance fraud. The case against him isn’t going to be as tight as we’d like but given the limited time frame we had it’ll do.”“And then you got me all fixed up and brought me here,” Lou finished for her. “Tess is usually a safe bet if you need to lie low for a while.”Lou nodded slowly. She felt tired, bone weary and like she wanted to just crumple in on herself. Her chest was still tight, her throat raw. She picked at the Velcro straps on her splint, caught Debbie’s eye. “That’s a lot of effort for you all to go to just for me.”Debbie exhaled. “Lou, you saved my life.”“And an Ocean always pays their debts,” Lou said bitterly. The pressure in her chest was getting to be too much; like it would rupture at any moment, just crumple in on itself and all the hurt would come spewing out.“Yes,” Debbie said. Lou closed her eyes. She swallowed and swallowed and swallowed against the lump in her throat. There it was. Laid out bare before her. A debt repaid, Debbie dutifully fulfilling her responsibilities - a life for a life. It was all business really. She opened her eyes to find Debbie staring back at her, her brow still furrowed as it had been from the beginning of this conversation. Her hands were laid out on the table, her thumbs rubbing circles into the pads of her middle fingers. All she was was an obligation, stupid to ever think otherwise, to think that she might mean more than just Debbie fulfilling her families little rules.She’d lived this world the same as Debbie, she knew how these responsibilities and debts worked, and if Debbie could consider this nothing more than business then so could she. She had always been patient, yes, but she was also practical.She laughed hollowly. “All I did was give you a ride and make you some eggs. All this - this!” she brandished her broken arm at Debbie as best she could with it confined in its sling, ignored the jolt of pain it caused. “What I did pales in comparison to all this. Do I want to know how much all this cost?”“It doesn’t matter.”“Of course it matters,” she said harshly. She knew, she knew how all this worked. That it started as a debt repaid and then it was a conversation about how they did this little bit more for you and suddenly the scales weren’t balanced at all, suddenly you owed them. That was how they got you. And Lou was tired and she was hurting and she just wanted this to be over. To go somewhere, to hide again and lick her wounds, old and new, so if Debbie could make this just a fraction easier, just tell her what she wanted and what Lou owed rather than drag it out, rather than do the whole routine where she pretended to care and that they were somehow friends, then Lou could go and find some strong alcohol and drink away the feeling that she was actually dying.But Debbie wasn’t going to make it easy.She shifted in her seat. “No, no. Lou,” she said quietly and blew out a long shaky breath. “Lou. You don’t - it doesn’t matter. I can afford it.”“I can’t.”Debbie’s head snapped sharply away from Lou. Her hands clenched and unclenched. “I don’t…” there was something a bit wild in her eyes, something desperate and as close to panic as Lou had ever seen. “It doesn’t matter,” she repeated. “I can afford it. I can.”“And what? I’m supposed to just accept this as charity?”Debbie shook her head, a barely discernible tremor. “No, Lou, that’s not… that’s not - I don’t understand!” the last words of her sentence came out in a great expulsion of air and she folded forward, her head hanging. “That makes two of us,” Lou muttered.“Was I not supposed to come save you? Did you want me to leave you there?” she looked up at Lou. “Should I have just left you at the gallery? Because Claude was going to kill you. You understand that right? And I couldn’t let that happen.” There was still that desperate look in her eyes but it had hardened now, less wild, more focused. She kept her body still, completely rigid, the tendons in her throat visibly tight beneath her skin, but her hands shook on the table top, rapidly clenching and unclenching, no napkin for her to rhythmically fold and unfold. “You don’t understand. I had to. I had to come get you.”“Yeah, I know, you had a responsibility. You had to repay your debt.” She tried to make it a sneer but she just sounded tired and hurt.“No, Lou, I mean - yes I owed you but that’s not why I did it. I had to come get you. I had to because - because it’s you.”Lou looked at her, really looked, and took in her appearance, the way she was holding herself, and it was a little like seeing her for the first time. Her hair was washed and she was in her own clothes, but the light amount of makeup she had on didn’t hide the dark circles beneath her eyes, or lesson the hard line of her mouth, the way it made the creases and lines there and by her eyes more pronounced. She looked tired, worn down the same way Lou felt. She didn’t blink as she stared at Lou. Her bottom lip quivered.Maybe Lou had this wrong. “I had to save you. It’s you and you were hurt because of me and I’m going to have to live with that knowledge.” Debbie took a shaky breath, licked her lips. She was rambling, her words tumbling over one another, escaping her lips in a rush. “I can’t undo what happened. I can’t take that back.” Lou stared right back at her. At her wide eyes and the tremor to her lips. This was worse than the disappointment of thinking that Debbie was just fulfilling an obligation - this was hope. It fluttered in her chest, bubbled up and pressed back against the tightness that was constricting her heart and lungs. It swelled until she could breathe again, until she could feel her heart not just remember that it was supposed to be beating but to try and make up for lost time. Debbie opened her mouth, her lips moved soundlessly before closing again. She swallowed, rolled back her shoulders. “I didn’t think you were real when I first saw you. I was sure I must have been hallucinating. But you were real. And those few days with you were honestly some of the best of my life. And I know that’s stupid, I know that’s ridiculous, because it was such a short frame of time and the circumstances were not ideal, but it is true and I was happy.” Her hands were fluttering restlessly on the table top. “I was happy with you and if - I hoped, thought, that maybe - that maybe - ” She cut off sharply, her jaw snapping closed as Lou covered Debbie’s hand with her right, curled it over and stilled her anxious movements and the words she was trying to get out. She watched Debbie’s hands beneath her own bandaged one; watched as they slowly turned over, palm up, to gently hold Lou’s hand. Debbie exhaled, the tension in her body slowly leaking out. Her thumb brushed across Lou’s fingers, just barely touching the edge of her bandages.Looking up Lou found that Debbie was watching her, eyes shining with unshed tears.“I’m very bad at this,” Debbie admitted quietly.“I’m very patient.”Debbie laughed wetly. “You’ll need to be.”“I’m sorry,” Lou said. Her heart was fluttering wildly in the cage of her ribs. “I misunderstood and got some things wrong. I thought that - it doesn’t matter what I thought. But in my defence I did just recently suffer a concussion.”“You did.” Debbie continued moving her thumb across Lou’s fingers. She wet her lips. “I’m sorry too. About the concussion and the broken arm. We can go over what the doctor said in more detail later. I’m sorry about your bike.”Groaning, Lou hung her head. She’d forgotten about her bike. Her baby, lying broken and alone back out in the desert, waiting to be scoured by the wind and sand. Maybe someone would pick her up the same way Lou had done.“And your house.”“It was full of junk.” “Still.” She squeezed Lou’s fingers gently. She pulled in a slow breath through her parted lips, eyes never leaving Lou’s. She lifted Lou’s hand, pressed her lips dryly to the middle knuckle over the thin line of stitches and then stood up, letting Lou’s hand go. A spike of panic surged through Lou. Debbie rounded the table and pulled out the chair next to hers and sat down, inserting her knee between Lou’s legs and pulling up as close as she was able. The corners of her lips quirked up in a familiar smile. “I just wanted to be closer to you.” Her fingers went to Lou’s face, beneath her chin, the tips running along her jaw line, thumb grazing her bottom lip. Lou closed her eyes and leaned into the touch. She’d missed this, the feel of Debbie’s fingers on her skin. It was absurd, she’d only gone a few days without being near Debbie, hadn’t really had enough time to form such an attachment to the feel of her that she should miss it when it was gone. But she had thought that she would never have this again, that Debbie didn’t want this, didn’t want her. She’d never been so happy to be wrong in her entire life.Debbie’s hand moved further back, her fingers gently scratching at Lou’s hairline at the back of her head. She exhaled, knew without opening her eyes that Debbie was near, could feel the closeness of her face tucked down and turned towards Lou’s. She blinked open her eyes and sure enough Debbie was there, her head angled towards Lou’s. She exhaled, her breath warm against Lou’s face. It was the easiest thing in the world to tilt her head and brush her lips against Debbie’s, to feel Debbie’s lips stretch into a smile and press back against her own, to welcome the push of her leaning in, her fingers flexing and tightening round the back of her neck. The kiss was soft, slow, the barest touch of their lips moving, sliding together, until it wasn’t, until Lou’s was leaning on Debbie’s thigh and gripping her pants, and Debbie had moved her hand to grip Lou’s jaw, leaning further into her, pulling and pushing and - Lou gasped, her arm flaring up in white hot agony as Debbie leaned into her, her hand landing on Lou’s elbow.“Shit!” Debbie jolted back from her, hands held up and eyes wide. “Jesus, I’m sorry. Are you okay?”“Yeah, yeah, I’m fine,” Lou panted. She curled her hand around her arm, leaned back in her seat and breathed through the pain, her whole body flushing hot. Debbie’s eyes were still wide as she watched Lou, but she lowered her hands, and slowly a smile broke out on her face, small and a little sheepish. “You sure you’re okay?”“I’m sure.” Lou grinned back at her, the pain receding back to a manageable throb. She laughed breathlessly, knew that there was sweat at her hairline from the pain. “Just maybe, in future, don’t go grabbing my broken arm. But it was good, real good, until, y’know, until it was blinding agony.”Debbie grabbed the Advil popped two out from the blister pack, tilted her head and considered, and popped out a third. She pushed them towards Lou. “I’ll try to keep the broken bones in mind. Gonna be difficult to keep my hands to myself though.” She reached up and brushed Lou’s hair back from her face, her expression softening with concern. She moved her hand gently down Lou’s right arm, careful of her bruises, rubbed her biceps, her movements a little stiff, a little awkward, and Lou wanted to laugh at the fact Debbie clearly wasn’t used to be being physically comforting, and melt for the way she was trying.“Feelings mutual.” She stared across at Debbie, moved her leg so they brushed together, not wanting to lose any available contact, slipped her foot behind Debbie’s so their heels were pressed together. And Debbie held her gaze. It was too soon to say she loved her, but it was there, humming in Lou’s chest bright and warm and bursting. “What happens now?”Well.” Debbie took hold of her hand again; thumb brushing over her knuckles, held it. “You get surgery, we hole up here until you’re healed. Make sure the charges against Claude stick. Then maybe, if you want, you come back to New York with me?”Lou did want that, she wanted it more than anything, but she couldn’t. Her heart sunk. “Debs…”“After we get your situation sorted. And we will.” Debbie licked her lips, her hold on Lou’s hand tightened. “I have a plan.”“Well, if you have a plan.”“It’s a good plan.”“I have no doubt.”“You won’t even have to get hit by a car this time.”Lou winced.“Too soon?” “It might always be too soon,” Lou said. “Okay. Back to New York. Since you have a plan.”Debbie’s mouth stretched into a wide smile. “In the short term how about we go to bed, rest up and in the morning I make you an omelette?”Lou laughed, leaned in real close, nose brushing against her and lips hovering over Debbie’s. “Deal.”