How to Save a Life(57)

“What does that mean? What is the center? Is it a center? A literal building, like the CDC?”

“I can’t see all of it. Right now I just have bits and pieces. The rest will come as we go along.”

“How do you know?”

“I just do,” he said, a small, unhappy smile on his lips.

I stared a moment more, then hung my head in my hands. “Do we have to go north? What about the Grand Canyon?” Let’s go someplace real, I thought.

“We can’t go there,” Evan replied. “That’s home, and we can’t lead them home.”

I sat back, at a loss for words. Lost in a fog of confusion, a push-pull of hope and logic, fantasy and reality.

Evan leaned in. When he spoke, his voice was low, pitched for my ears alone. “Listen to me, Jo. Four years ago, I told you things I’d never told anyone. I trusted you and you believed me. You told me you believed me. Do you know how long I’d waited to hear that from someone? Being with you and being accepted for once in my goddamn life… Because of you, I felt like I finally had a chance at a normal life. My version of a normal life. And I carried that feeling through my entire sentence. It was how I survived.”

“I know but—”

“So here we are again,” he continued. “I’m telling you secrets, telling you weird, personal, f*cked-up crazy shit and it feels just as real and right as…taking a deep breath. Going north is something we need to do. For both of us. And no, I can’t see the whole thing but I can feel how it’s real and important. Life or death. You will be safe and I will be free. And I’m asking you to believe in me again and come with me.”

Tears threatened again but I brushed them away. I believed him four years ago. I accepted him. But were those words easy to say because they had no bearing on my life? Because I was in love and willing to overlook anything?

This is the true test. Do you believe him or not? Do you accept him or not? Because if not, cut him free. Right now.

Evan mistook my silence for rejection. He nodded, and sat back, mustering his dignity in the face of my disbelief.

“I get it,” he said quietly. “I do. And I’m sorry. I told you because you deserve the truth and I don’t want to hide any part of myself from you. But I’ll do whatever you say, Jo. Take you wherever you want to go. Back to Dolores, if that’s what you want. Tell me where you want to go and I’ll take you there.”

I looked across the table, to Evan with his handsome face wearing a gentle expression that hoped for everything but demanded nothing.

Where did I want to go? A question with no geographical answer. North, south, the center or the f*cking moon… When all the confusion and doubt and shame were swept away, the deepest truth of my heart sang the exact place loud and clear.

I let out a shaky breath. “Take me with you.”





Evan paid our bill and we walked back to the motel in the stifling heat. I peered up at him through my hair now and then, stealing little glances. He was more handsome than I remembered. More masculine, strong and rugged. He’d taken off his denim jacket and carried it in one hand. His t-shirt stretched over muscle and bronzed skin, as if he’d spent a lot of time working outdoors. He seemed taller too, or maybe that was from me walking hunched over with crossed arms.

Evan’s stride was confident and his eyes alert. He was like a bodyguard escorting me. I started to relax. He didn’t need to take me somewhere safe. I felt that way just walking beside him.

You’re doing it again, I warned myself. You jumped at the chance to live with Lee because that felt safe too.

I grimaced under my curtain of hair. Evan was nothing like Lee. To even compare the two of them felt dirty.

By the time we reached the motel, the doubts were creeping in, eating away my certainty. Was this the right thing to do? Or was I being a love-struck idiot, waylaid by the clear blue of Evan’s eyes.

I should’ve slept on it. I should’ve told Evan I needed more time…

“Second thoughts?” he asked as he unlocked our door. I stared back helplessly and his eyes clouded. “The last thing I want is for you to be afraid of me.”

“I’m not,” I said, and that was the truth. “But can we just…go. Drive, I mean.”

We packed up our two bags. He tossed his in the back and I kept mine on my lap in the cab of the truck. We pulled out of the parking lot and headed south on Highway 34, leaving Terrell behind.

“Why south? I thought you said we had to go north.”

“We need to throw them off the scent. We’ll go about fifty miles south, as if we’re heading for Mexico. Then you need to call someone in Dolores on your cell. They’ll triangulate the signal and pinpoint where you’re calling from.”

“Done a lot of research on this, have you?”

“We watched a lot of CSI in the rec room.”

“A show about cops catching criminals?”

“How Not to Get Caught 101,” Evan said with a grin.

Something solid and petrified deep inside me began to crack. It’s so easy to be with him.

“I could call my friend Del,” I said, “but I don’t want to get her in trouble. I could call Patty, I guess. But what do I say? I left Lee and I’m fleeing to Mexico? Not very subtle.”