“The window squeeze might have killed the mood anyway,” I said, stifling a big yawn.
“You should catch a nap.”
“Sitting up like this?” I asked, shaking my head.
Caymen folded forward, grabbing one of my bags and placing it on his lap, then patting it.
I didn’t want to nap.
But I wasn’t going to turn down the chance for a little physical contact.
It had been a rough few hours.
So I went ahead and lay down.
It wasn’t the most comfortable thing in the world, with half of me on the hard ground. But coming from someone who spent a lot of time sleeping in cars while we traveled for my father’s work, it wasn’t bad.
It helped that Caymen’s fingers started to rub little circles on my scalp.
Before I knew it, my heavy eyes were sliding fully closed, and I was out cold.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
Caymen
As soon as I saw where we were heading, I knew the only option was the park where I’d grown up.
It was just secluded enough. And once you drove in past the privacy fencing, it was pretty easy to hide a car from the road.
If the guys pulled in, yeah, they’d see it. But there was no reason to assume they’d find us in the office building. They were more likely to think we were in one of the trailers. People around there didn’t take too kindly to strangers showing up at their doors and asking questions. Someone would come out with a gun and chase them off. Then, once my brother and Coast were in place, we would be safe to leave.
That didn’t mean I was feeling any good kind of way about being back.
I was surprised how much my guts seized up and my shoulders tensed. It had been a long time since I was a little kid at the mercy of my parents, but there was still a knee-jerk panic response to being in the neighborhood again.
I still remembered the last time I’d needed to hide in the office supply room. I’d been sixteen, going on seventeen. Gettingbigger, but still nowhere near as strong as my lifelong roofer father.
He’d woken up after a night at the bar (and, one could imagine, shooting or snorting whatever he could get his hands on) and found his wallet empty of the cash my uncle had just paid him.
Instead of assuming he’d blown it all on the bar and drugs, he blamed me.
He’d come at me too quickly to avoid him.
He grabbed me by the throat and pinned me to the wall, screaming in my face, last night’s stale beer on his breath.
“You think you can steal from me, you little shit?”
He yanked me forward then slammed me back against the wall, my head hitting hard enough to make my vision spark for a second.
I’d been too fucking pissed to think beyond it.
I reached down, grabbed the bottle of vodka on the end table, and cracked him on the head with it.
He stumbled back, swearing. And I ran for my fucking life. Knowing full well that he would have killed me if he found me in that kind of rage.
I hauled myself in the window and didn’t leave until it was time to pick up Dixon from the bus stop.
I took him to the park, stole some food from a local deli, and didn’t go home again until our parents took off to some party or another.
