Nowhere But Here (Thunder Road #1)(80)

“What?” Eli asks.

“Nothing.”

“No, you were going to say something, what?”

My mind is completely blank. What can I say? What should I say? “I don’t like pulled pork. I don’t like any pork actually. It’s tough and it’s stringy and it’s a pig and...well...pigs gross me out. Which means I don’t like bacon either, so...yeah...that’s it.”

Eli blinks as he tries to understand any of the hot mess that just fell out of my mouth. He pulls on his earlobe and his face contorts as if he’s trying not to laugh. “You ate an entire pulled pork sandwich in Nashville.”

I did. “You were superexcited about me trying it and I didn’t want to hurt your feelings. I feel like that’s all I do—hurt you. I don’t want to, but I do. Even when I’m not trying to, it still happens.”

“Emily.” He lowers his head so that we’re eye to eye. “You don’t hurt me.”

“Yeah, I do. Every time I look at you, I see that you’re in pain.”

He shakes his head. “You don’t cause that. It’s something I did to myself. But thank you.”

My forehead furrows. “For what?”

“For telling me something about you.” And he leaves off how he didn’t have to ask a million questions to learn it or how he appreciates how honest I was. Hating pork, it’s simple really, but to Eli, it seems like a lot.

Crap, now I really feel bad. I’ve been here over a month, I’ve known him for seven years and pulled pork is the first real truth he knows about me. Eli and I...maybe we also need time.

A knock on my open door and Oz enters the room. “Cyrus is asking for you, Eli.”

Eli glances over at me as if he’s weighing telling Oz no, but then Oz adds, “I’ll stay with her.” He rests a hip against the door frame of my room with his hands shoved in his pockets and eyes me in a way that suggests he’d like my help.

“I’ll be okay with Oz.”

Eli’s eyebrows pull together in worry, but he quickly stands and kisses the top of my head. He then goes to Oz, cradles one hand around the base of his neck and says, “I owe you.”

Oz nods, Eli leaves, and we study each other. Men in black vests float like ghosts along the hallway. For as many people as there are in the house, there’s only a low mumble of conversation. An occasional distinct voice here and there. No panic. No hustle. No phone call to 911 or distant wail of an ambulance.

Oz watches me as if my gaze on him is the sole thing keeping him upright. Through my window, the clubhouse is lit up and beams of motorcycle lights flash into my room as more people arrive. The roar of engines the lone sound that resembles the actual chaos inside me.

“Why aren’t they taking her to the hospital?” I whisper.

Oz’s head falls back until it hits the door. “Because Olivia has made it clear that she wants to stay here.”

“What? But she needs help. She needs a hospital. She—”

Oz cuts me off. “She wants to die here.”

My mouth drops open, but no sound comes out. Dad’s mentioned this before. Hospice, I think? It’s care for people who are dying. For people who have exhausted all medical options. “But she seems so...alive.”

“Get some jeans on,” he says. “Then meet me outside.”

“Don’t you want to stay? If she’s dying, don’t you want to be here?”

“Do you?” he asks.

No, I don’t and from the way Oz’s blue eyes are begging me to move, I guess he doesn’t, either.

“Where are we going?” I inquire.

Oz glances down the hallway toward Olivia’s room. “Away from here.”

Oz

MY MOTORCYCLE RUMBLES beneath me as Emily and I race along the road away from Olivia’s. Just like we raced out of the cabin as the guys from the club asked if we were okay. Just like we raced past my mother as she tried to talk to both of us. Emily opened the door to her bedroom, I offered her my hand and we ran.

Wind whips through my hair as we head deeper into the woods. The road narrows and we pass the clearing of land where I should be living now.

This was supposed to be our last year in the trailer. We were supposed to build a new house. Just like Olivia was supposed to be better with this new treatment. Just like how the treatment before was supposed to defeat the cancer.

My life has been full of supposed-to-bes and I’m tired of nothing working out.

From behind me, Emily edges closer. Her arms tighten around my waist as her fingers clasp over my stomach. Her body is wedged into mine with her head burrowed into my back.

Emily’s frightened and that causes me to fly faster into the night. It could be the bike, but I don’t think it is. She loved it when we first rode. She was flying in the seat, but this time she’s trembling.

I let go of a handlebar and lay my hand over hers. A silent gesture to reassure her that she’s not alone.

Emily

THE VAGUE MOONLIGHT disappears and a cooler patch of air drifts along my arms. The night grows darker and clouds drown the light from the moon. The fierce wind that had woken me up earlier tonight returns and batters me, slapping my cheeks.

A chill within me forms ice in my bloodstream. I was so cold in that hole as a child that I shook uncontrollably and I couldn’t stop. My teeth chattered and my fingers became numb. I thought I’d never be warm again. That I’d be frozen forever.