“Shit, that’s awful.”
“Yeah. I mean, we weren’t that close, but it doesn’t stop me from missing them sometimes.”
“Course,” he says.
It’s quiet again. I run my hand over my stomach, feeling small movements. She’s pressing on my bladder again, her favorite thing to do.
“You good?” Cody asks.
“Yeah. Just have to pee.”
“Well, we’re almost home,” he says, shifting in his seat and stretching one arm across his chest with a yawn.
My eyes catch his waistband. “Is that a gun on your hip?”
He doesn’t even look down. “Yup.”
“You just…wear it all the time?”
“Yup.” His lips pop theP.
I blink. I’ve never been around guns before. It feels…weird. Not in a scary way exactly, just unfamiliar. Like it doesn’t belong this close to me. Like it’s part of a world I’ve never stepped into.
I watch the way his tattoos flex when he adjusts his grip on the wheel before glancing over at me.
“Glove box has one too,” he adds. “Rifle behind the seat. Got more at the house.”
“Oh. That’s…a lot of guns.”
He laughs and shakes his head like that’s the farthest thing from the truth.
“They scare you or something?”
“I don’t know, maybe a little. I’ve just never been near them.”
“Well. Rest assured, unless someone pulls the trigger, they don’t go off.”
“Right.”
“You’re not, like, anti-guns or something, are you?”
“No.” I snort.
“Okay, good.” He laughs too.
I stare out the window, silent for a minute.
“So it’s just you and three dogs? No girlfriend or wife?” I ask softly.
He’s quiet for a second too long.
“Nope,” he says finally, but it’s dry. A little tense.
I turn toward him. “That sounded like a lie.” I laugh.
“It’s not.”
“Well, you sound pissed about it,” I retort.
