Page 316 of Nobody's Girl

“I’m making scrambled eggs,” Laura says as she gets up. “Come to the kitchen after you get dressed.”

I hurry to clean myself up and get dressed. I want to talk to Ally before I see Eden and maybe reveal more than I should.

As I head down the stairs, I can hear Laura talking in the kitchen. “How could I not like it, Al? It’s beyond perfect. Breakfast is almost done. Kyle’s coming down any minute. I saw Eden go out the door to the garage. You wanna go get him?”

I put the truck keys the foundation gave me in my pocket. I give my pocket a jangle to be sure they’re in there. Rocketing through the living room, I make it out the front door without Laura seeing me.

Ally’s car is gone, which means Eden went somewhere in it. I jog around to the garage and see Ally running her hand along the side of my new truck.

“Hey, Ally, I was just thinking about you. Thank you for giving me the best present anyone could ever give me,” I say, remembering one of the things I said to her in the dream I had about making love to her.

She blinks in rapid succession, then says, “I didn’t buy it, Kyle. I just told them what you might like.”

I take her hand, pulling her towards the driver’s side door of the tall truck. “Come on. I’ll give you a real quick ride,” I say and then take her by the waist, picking her up into the driver’s seat, just like I used to.

She scoots over, just like she used to, as I climb into the driver’s seat. “It’s so nice, Kyle. I haven’t been in it yet.”

She starts to scoot all the way over, but I grab her arm, stopping her from moving further from me. “Look, Ally, it has satellite radio. How cool is that? What am I saying? Your car has that too. I’m not used to all this yet.”

She begins to fiddle with the radio like she always does. “How did you like driving my car here from New Orleans?” she asks.

I look over her shoulder as she finds some crappy hard rock station. “Oh, it’s a damn cool car, Ally. But it ain’t no truck, girl.”

I start the engine and it’s loud. She looks at me with the excitement of a little kid. I back out of the garage, then drive down a dirt road that runs around the privacy fenced yard to the back of the property.

We come out of the tall pine trees to find a pasture with an old barn and a pond. “Check this out, Ally. We can have horses, and cows, and whatever we want.”

Ally looks down. “Eden told me we would be going back to New Orleans this morning. For some odd reason he went to town to get something first, but he told me to get dressed before he left. I guess we’ll be leaving soon after he gets back.”

I wonder why that is? The plane spotting them, maybe.

I pull up in front of the old barn, then jump out, holding my hand out to Ally. I’m careful not to let her body run down mine as I place her on the ground. I lead her to it. It’s a little dark. There are a couple of large stalls and a few doors. I open one of the doors up.

I pull the door open and we see a quilt lying on the old wooden floor. I look around the dark little room and see a candle half burned and an empty bottle of bourbon. My mind is reeling now. I feel hot at my memory of Ally in my dream and us on that blanket.

“I just remembered I was supposed to get Eden to come in and eat breakfast. Laura’s going to kill us,” Ally says as she turns and heads back to the truck.

She grabs at the door handle to climb back into the truck, but can’t reach it. I place my hand on her waist. “Turn around, Ally. I’ll lift you up.”

As she turns to me I can see it in her eyes. I send her a scene from my dream and she closes her eyes, dropping her head to rest on my chest.

“You too, huh?” she asks.

I hold her hand, and we share the dreams we’ve had. They’re exactly the same.

“Why do you think this is happening?” I ask.

“I’ve no idea,” she says and looks up at me. “Last night, when I had the first dream, Eden was a physical part of it. It was awful and he was hurt.”

She touches my hand again and I see what happened between them. I feel sick at my stomach. “We need to stop this if at all possible, Al.”

Let’s get back to the house. I really don’t want Laura to be upset with us for missing her first breakfast in her new house,” she says.

I lift her up and place her on the seat of the truck. She slides all the way over.

I look over at her and can’t help but to feel awful. “Eden knows it’s not really happening, Ally. I’ll have a talk with him.”

Ally’s car is still not back when I pull into the garage. “Laura is probably fuming by now,” I say.