As Cara reached for the BMW’s door handle, she felt a soft touch on her elbow.
“So this is it?” Jeffrey asked.
She paused, turned, and flashed him a smile she was sure looked genuine. “I can’t imagine what I would have done without you. Thank you so much for driving me all the way.”
It was the first truly honest thing she’d said since he insisted, “Tell me all about yourself,” forcing her to launch into an embellished version of her mother’s life, making it her own. This included a childhood in St. Louis, a move at eighteen to the Sacramento area, the mismatched marriage that quickly ended, a series of brief, bad relationships, and the toxic situation she was escaping in Oakhurst, where she’d gone for a mental reset. Cara claimed she was headed to live with her half sister and thatbecause she was a massage therapist she could easily find work anywhere.
Jeffrey looked at her soulfully. “I feel like we’re just getting to know each other. We still haven’t talked about how long you’re planning to stay in Sacramento. I get up there sometimes and I’m always looking for a good masseuse.”
What a dummy she was for inventing that particular profession.
The single friends she once had all swore by a safe word—Holmes—a play on the desire to get home and a veiled reference to the 1970s porn star. A text including the name Holmes in any context was a plea to disrupt the date with an urgent message. If Cara had any friends, she’d have sent it in all caps. But she wasn’t on a date and had only chatted so relentlessly with Jeffrey to keep him from checking his phone or turning on the radio. He’d badly misinterpreted why.
“I’d love to talk more, but?—”
Jeffrey pointed through the windshield to a bar with a neon Bud Light sign, now apparent as the reason he stopped a block short of the train station. “The least you can do is buy me a drink before you head off.”
“I don’t drink,” she said, reaching for the handle again.
“Cammie.” He leaned toward her. “Camille.”
Cara’s back was pressed against the door.
“You can’t deny our vibe,” he wheedled. “I mean, there were two other people getting gas back in Oakhurst, but you askedme.”
“You had a friendly face.”
“I’m not a one-night stand kind of guy, if that’s what you’re worried about.”
“Not at all,” she said, with complete sincerity.
“Well, it seemed like you might be. I mean, considering what you said about the string of toxic relationships you’ve had.” He smiled. “Not that I’m judging.”
“I really do have a bus to catch.”
“I’m sure they go to Sacramento every hour—I’ll look.”
As he picked up his phone to do just that, she reached for her bag of snacks. “Thank you, but I’m really just going to?—”
Dropping his phone, he gripped her forearm hard and pulled her toward him. She smelled his stale breath and the cloying tang of overworked Speed Stick.
“I’ll settle for a kiss goodbye,” he said.
She pushed him away with both hands, then pulled the door open and half-fell out onto the sidewalk.
“Tight-ass bitch!”
He reached across to slam the door closed, then peeled out of the parking lot, taking her snacks with him.
The Cara she used to be would never have taken a ride from a stranger and would have been horrified by the whole encounter. But as she walked to the station, her only real regret was that she hadn’t eaten her M&Ms along the way.
FORTY-FIVE
JORDAN
Only an innocent person would fight this hard to evade capture.#TeamCara
—@lizlemonade
