Tikka Chance on Me Page 4

  I tried to throw myself into work. Helping out around the restaurant. Logging into my online course module to see just how far behind I was in my business homework. But how could either of those things hold a candle to what I’d done with Trucker the night before? To how he’d kissed me and held me and made me come?

  “I lost sight of everything except being near you. Talking to you. Having you.”

  What had felt strange and claustrophobic and like too much just hours ago suddenly made perfect sense. He’d lied to me—to everyone—about why he’d returned to Eastville, but he’d never held anything else back. I’d always known that he wanted me. That I wanted him, too. And now it was all I could think about.

  I hadn’t been this passionate about something in years. Once upon a time, I’d wanted to be an anthropologist. To travel the world and study indigenous cultures—especially some of the Adivasi communities in India. I’d committed to that, even with all the partying. But then I came home. I gave up. I stopped dreaming. It was seriously gross and antifeminist to credit a man with me coming alive again, but I couldn’t deny the truth. Trucker Carrigan had changed me. I didn’t think it was arrogant to say that I’d changed him, too. He had a duty to his agency. I had a duty to my family. But we’d both lost our heads for each other.

  And if he wasn’t careful, he could lose his life. No amount of burying myself in work was going to make me forget that. Trucker was putting himself in danger on a daily basis. Even more danger than I’d previously considered! The threat to him would only be gone when he was gone...which meant saying goodbye.

  I was so confused, so discombobulated, that I almost broke two water glasses in a row during the Taj Mahal’s daily lunch buffet. And I accidentally refilled a chafing dish labeled for butter chicken with lamb vindaloo—a firing offense, for sure. Both lucky and unlucky for me, I was related to the management and in no danger of losing my job. Just my mind.

  I couldn’t even text Trucker to ask if he was okay. Because, despite all the sex, we’d somehow never gotten around to exchanging phone numbers. I seriously doubted he was on social media, but found myself checking anyway when Dad sent me outside with a stern “You’ve done quite enough for now, beta.” Nope. No Trucker Carrigans on Facebook or Insta or Twitter. No Tyson Carrigans either. Smart. Having no digital footprint meant he had nothing to erase when he dropped out of sight. When he left me.

  I slumped against the exterior of the restaurant, smartphone hanging limply in my fingers. What had I gotten myself into? And how was I going to get myself out of it?

  ***

  The Eagles were set to move a large shipment of AR-15s and M16s— all with the serial numbers filed off—in two days. After months of haggling with suppliers and buyers, they had a real score on their hands. A score big enough to bring them down, along with a decent chunk of the Midwest’s weapons smuggling circuit. Trucker’s operation was finally reaching its endgame. And, of course, it all had to happen after one of the best nights of his life. When his veins were buzzing with sex and he could still taste her, still feel her.

  What he wouldn’t give to be with Pinky in that bed—in any bed—right now instead of in the Eagles clubhouse, surrounded by a bunch of meatheads who traded in death. With her, he almost felt normal. Human. Real. Like the person he’d worked so hard to become after screwing up most of his life in this shithole town. Not like a parody of a tough guy. The kind of asshole who thought shotgunning beers and gunning motors was the absolute pinnacle of life. These bearded bullies who voted red and hated anyone who wasn’t like them. He was honestly amazed that a handful of the Eagles had elected to join him on excursions to the Taj Mahal. He wasn’t naïve enough to think it was because they were expanding their cultural horizons. It was more that Mrs. G’s food was really good—and that they could pay for it out of the club’s coffers.

  Coffers that the Eagles were now hoping to fill with even more ill-gotten gains.

  Fuck. Trucker forced himself to pay attention. To listen. He had to filter all this intel back to his contact tonight so the unit would know exactly when to move in. He could not afford a single mistake.

  Maybe you already made one. No. Hell no. Opening up to Pinky had been the right call. There was no way he could’ve let her go on thinking that he was like these men. Smith—the self-styled “president” of the gang who was crowing about their arms deal right now—was straight out of Central Casting. His dark, unwashed, hair and beard hadn’t been cut in years. White supremacist tattoos covered 90 percent of his visible skin, which was a leathery orange from sun exposure. SPF 60 was not a thing in the Eastville Eagles. Neither was kindness. Or respect for women. There were a handful of “old ladies” that orbited the club, and Trucker would’ve felt sorry for them, tried to reach out them despite it not being his place or his business, except they were just as terrible as their men. The kind of white women who called the cops on black people for existing and voted assholes into office—if they voted at all. Pinky was their polar opposite. And he wasn’t his cover. He wasn’t.

  He’d been afraid, before, that he’d been under too long. That he couldn’t see the difference between the Eagles and himself anymore. But he’d seen the difference last night, reflected in a pair of big brown eyes.

  He was not the kind of man who would smuggle weapons. Not the kind of man who burned down minority-owned gas stations or started bar fights for fun. He didn’t relish hurting people, killing people. It didn’t fuel his masculine ego. She fueled his masculine ego. The sounds she made when he fucked into her. The way she clung to him when he ate her out. There was no greater high, no bigger score for him, than making love to Pinky Grover.

  “Hey! Trucker!” Smith barked his name. “You in?”

  He looked up, grimly. Two days. “Yeah. Yeah, I’m in.”

  Chapter Eight

  Three days. The most excruciating three days of my recent life. What if he hates me now? What if he regrets it? What if something happened to him? My imagination had begun to run wild. So wild that Dad and Mom had given me time off from the restaurant and emergency-hired a few Eastville locals to fill in for me behind the bar and waiting tables.

  “You are no good like this,” Mom had chided. “Burning out like those Amrikan girls.”

  I had no idea what being American had to do with burnout, and I just barely resisted asking if these were the same American girls who engaged in shameless bathroom graffiti. Desi Mom Logic was one of those things you just didn’t question. Especially if it netted you free time.

  Unfortunately, free time to wonder about Trucker Carrigan was the last thing I needed right now. I’d caught up on all my coursework—God, business classes were mind-numbing. I’d cleaned my room twice—and it was already pretty spare to begin with, since my parents had turned it into a guest room when I went away for college. I re-alphabetized my books. Organized my closet. Spent hours on social media. Deleted old contacts out of my cell phone. And I replayed every moment I’d spent with Trucker. Every laugh. Every kiss.

  And then the ground fell out from beneath my feet.

  I got word of the bust late that afternoon on that third day, courtesy of Asif, when I came in to distribute the staff’s payroll checks and pocket my own. Technically my parents didn’t have to pay me, but I was glad they’d chosen to throw some cash my way. That joy was short-lived, thanks to my least favorite coworker. He looked full-to-bursting with news—like a poori before it deflated.

  “The Eagles have flown!” he said, leaning halfway over the bar as I sorted envelopes. “Hawa,” he added smugly, waving one hand to signify the wind.

  I stood there for a full minute without quite understanding what he was getting at. The Bollywood song piping through the restaurant speakers—background noise I’d long since gotten used to—was suddenly too loud in my ears.

  “They’ve flown?” I repeated numbly, accidentally crumpling my own check. “What do you mean? They’re gone?” I could guess what he meant. But I wanted to hear it. Need
ed to hear it.

  “To jail!” Asif crowed, his eyes shining with glee. “Those that are alive, that is. It was a big mess. Police. Agents. Everything. Veeru in the kitchen heard it from Rafi and Javier.”

  Rafi and Javier were line cooks at the diner in town. All local gossip and breaking news tended to spread via the service industry—and usually during their Thursday night after-hours poker games. My father had allegedly started the tradition in the 1970s, but he denied all knowledge now.

  Did he know about this? Did everyone? Was I somehow the last to know that our local motorcycle gang had been part of some explosive cinematic standoff? “There was nothing on the news,” I pointed out. “No alerts.”

  Asif smoothed his hands over his blue blazer, puffing out his chest and making me think of desi flatbread again. “It was all hush-hush. Late night. I am sure the big city news trucks are coming even now.”

  It occurred to me that Asif could be making it up. But all I had to do was confirm with Veeru Uncle, who’d been working at the Taj for twenty-five years and had taught me all the Punjabi swear words my parents had withheld. And besides, my bones told me it was the truth.

  Trucker’s assignment had ended last night.

  Maybe his life, too.

  Fuck. No. No, he couldn’t be dead. Wouldn’t I know? Wouldn’t I feel it somehow?

  I caught myself against the wells as my knees buckled.

  And then I pulled myself up and reached for my car keys.

  I had no idea where I was actually going when I peeled out of the Taj Mahal’s parking lot just minutes later with my paycheck shoved into the back pocket of my jeans. I only knew that I had to go somewhere. Toward trouble. Toward Trucker. Toward answers.

  ***

  Tyson “Trucker” Carrigan was dead. Cut down by a hail of bullets in an ATF raid. “No great loss,” the people of Eastville would probably say when they got official word. “We always knew he’d amount to nothing.”

  Lucky for him, and with no thanks to the good citizens of his hometown, Tyler Barnes had risen in that dead man’s place. He still wasn’t sure how he felt about it. The new name. The new identity. It didn’t fit right. Like the wrong pair of jeans or a loud polyester shirt. He didn’t care so much about losing what was on his birth certificate. Those names meant about as much as the daddy he’d never known and the mama who’d died bitter and alone while he was in boot camp—glad to be rid of him. But “Trucker”? He’d given himself that name when he was fourteen years old. He’d embraced it, broken it in, lived in it. Now the government had taken it away.

  Who was left behind? A clean-shaven stranger with hair newly dyed brown. At some point in the last twelve hours, he’d donned nondescript khaki pants and a nondescript button-down shirt and moved into a nondescript motel room. The few personal items he’d been able to safely smuggle from his apartment were stashed in a—yes, nondescript—duffel bag. Fortunately, most of his real stuff was in a storage locker near the Detroit field office. Most of it. Because there was “real stuff” he carried inside him every day. Did he still like comic books? Could he still go to blockbuster movies? And eat Indian food? Was that allowed? His handler hadn’t exactly had the time to give him the full 411, not with clean-up of the drop site and the clubhouse still ongoing.

  Charlie had spared a minute for one thing, though. Because Bureau guys knew everything, didn’t they? “You can’t see her again. You have to let her go.” The agent had actually had the gall to look sorry about it. “You knew the rules going in. This ID has to burn. And that means all of it. Even the girl.”

  “The girl.” He’d read Charlie the riot act for that. “She’s a person. I know she’s just a face in some pictures and maybe a voice on a tap for you, but she’s a person and she deserves respect.” She had a name, too. Pinky Grover. And he was never going to forget it.

  Like he wouldn’t forget her taste. Or her scent. Or how she rode so tight on his dick. She was the one good thing about this godforsaken hellhole he’d grown up in. The one person he cared about leaving behind forever.

  “You have to let her go.”

  Let her go? How? How could he do that when he’d barely gotten to hold onto her in the first place?

  Trucker kicked the nightstand in frustration. Then he kicked the bed, too, because he’d thought of himself with the wrong name. You’re Ty now. Tyler Buchanan Barnes. The brass had actually asked him for his preferences. Names he could easily remember. They hadn’t blinked at his suggestion of middle and last name. Not a single MCU fan in the bunch, apparently. But Pinky would probably find it hilarious. She’d say something like, “From Cap to the Winter Soldier, huh? Subtle.”

  Damn, he already missed her. And being cooped up in a motel room—not the same one they’d spent the night in, thank God—was clearly starting to get to him. He’d been ordered to lay low until the agents on scene could close everything up, handle the media, etc. That could be another day or two. Then he’d be hustled out of town. Sent off for a thorough debriefing and some mandated R&R. Fuck it. He grabbed the keys to his rental car and slammed out of his temporary prison.

  He had no idea where he was actually going. Today, tomorrow, or next year. Hell, he wasn’t even sure who he was supposed to be today, tomorrow, or next year. All he knew was that he couldn’t leave Eastville forever without saying a few private goodbyes.

  Chapter Nine

  I’d known that trying to drive out to the Eagles clubhouse was a bad idea. It was an unwritten rule for most people in Eastville: Don’t go into Eagles territory, especially if you happened to be a person of color. There were a few dive bars in the area that were off-limits to me for that reason as well. But what I hadn’t anticipated was the police barricade right outside the turn-off to the compound. Of course. It was an active crime scene or whatever. They weren’t just going to let anybody through. I practically kicked myself as I maneuvered the car through their detour. Worrying about Trucker had clearly deprived me of common sense.

  But being with Trucker had given me so much. In such a short time. He’d reminded me of what it was to want things. Of what it was to dream. Everything I’d said goodbye to when I came home...he showed me that I hadn’t left it behind in the city. It was all still with me: the desire for fun, the desire to learn, the desire for travel. He took me a million places with just his mouth and his hands. I couldn’t lose that, couldn’t lose him, just yet.

  And I couldn’t go back home just yet either. So, I pointed my car toward the Royal Drive-In Cinema. It was fifteen miles in the opposite direction of the Eagles home base. Quicker if I took back roads instead of cutting through the center of Eastville. I turned up my music and tried to drown out my what-ifs and worst-case scenarios, just focused on getting to my destination in one piece. “Best place to get lucky besides a store parking lot,” Trucker had called it. Maybe, just maybe, I’d get lucky, too.

  Absurd, right? Thinking that I might feel closer to him in a place we’d never even been together? I’d probably have better luck at Walmart. Or the Pineview Inn—which, despite its name, had no views of pine trees. But all I really wanted was one tiny sign. A little feeling of hope. Something to tell me that he was still alive. My parents were devout Hindus who prayed at our house shrine once every morning and once in the evenings when they got home from closing up the Taj. I sometimes sat in, playing the dutiful daughter, mouthing mantras I had no real connection to. I didn’t really believe in God or Fate or mystical forces. I considered myself too practical, too cynical, for that sort of thing. Except for right now. With my hands clenched around the steering wheel and my foot hot on the gas pedal, I was clinging to the most basic bit of faith. To an unshakeable belief that Trucker Carrigan wouldn’t dare leave me without saying goodbye.

  ***

  He took the scenic route through Eastville. Passing the high school where he’d caused so much trouble. Doing a loop around the ramshackle three-bedroom ranch house where he grew up—miraculously still standing. When he’d come back to
join the Eagles, he’d expected to find it razed for some cookie-cutter two-story monstrosity. But no. There were the front steps he’d smoked his first cigarette on. There was the tree he’d fallen out of when he was nine. His childhood hadn’t been terrible. Just...neglectful. His mother hadn’t wanted kids...or maybe she just hadn’t wanted him. And they’d gotten along as best they could with the occasional help of his grandparents and a few aunts. Mama raised him. He raised hell. And the contract between them ended when he turned eighteen and enlisted. When his family forced him to leave. When he found a new one in the military. Sometimes it was as simple as that. Sometimes it wasn’t.

  The Taj Mahal’s parking lot was filling up for the evening rush when he drove by it at a slow crawl. He imagined Mr. and Mrs. G in there, bustling around. Pinky, too. They were the kind of family that didn’t cut ties. That would be bound by blood and tears forever. Pinky couldn’t just walk out the door with a jaunty salute and a “see ya.” She would always be pulled back. She would always be called home.

  By now, she probably knew about the ATF raid. Gossip lit through a small town like a wildfire, after all. And even if fifty percent of it was wrong, fifty percent of it was usually right on the money. So maybe she’d been informed of the shoot-out. The arrests. The bodies. And maybe she’d heard he was dead.

  The thought sent nausea rolling through his gut. “You knew the rules going in. This ID has to burn. And that means all of it. Even the girl.” It was protocol, right? He was disappearing anyway. If Pinky thought he was dead, it simplified everything.

  Except it didn’t.

  Because he wasn’t the kind of person who broke women’s hearts and didn’t look back. Not anymore. He’d worked hard to leave that reckless, selfish, kid in his past. And what kind of man would he be if he let Pinky believe a lie? Loyalty. Honor. Respect. Integrity. Every value the U.S. Army had drummed into him, demanded of him...would turn to ashes if he let her burn on Trucker Carrigan’s funeral pyre.