Free Iron by Amy Isan Page A

scribbles some things on her notepad and goes into the kitchen.
    I lean forward and close to Logan. “I didn’t know you knew Spanish.”
    A grin. “Why’s that surprising?”
    “It just isn’t something I expected.”
    “There’s a lot you don’t know about me, Cassie,” he says. He looks out the open door to the street as a car glides past and then he looks back at me. “Same for me with you.”
    “Maybe we can change that while we’re here,” I say. I inch my foot forward and tap it against his boot, and give him a smile. He smiles back and I just want to kiss him. That stern look he gives me is enough to make my heart melt. I don’t even know why. This can’t be normal, right?
    Is this what other people feel like when they’re...? No, I don’t know him well enough to use that word.
    After some time passes, with me admiring the interior and Logan most likely admiring me, our food comes out. The old woman holds each plate with an oven mitt. She places the dishes in front of us and slides them forward and says something in Spanish. After she leaves, I stare at my food. It looks delicious. Something like an enchilada but with some eggs on the side. Nothing like I’d ever seen or eaten before.
    “What’d she say?”
    “She said, basically, ‘enjoy, lovebirds,’” Logan says.
    I flush and pick up my fork and start eating. It isn’t like any Mexican food I’ve ever had before, it makes the stuff up in Phoenix seem like cheap trash in comparison. Each bite is steaming with flavor and before I know it my plate is clean. Logan wraps up slightly after me and laughs a little after he swallows his last bite, as his eyes move from my plate to me and widen. “Hungry, huh?”
    I nod. He stands up and walks up to the counter and talks with the old lady some more, before handing her a wad of cash. I have no idea how much it is, but even from where I’m sitting I can tell it’s more than generous. Especially since her reaction is one of overwhelming thankfulness. He waves for me to follow and we head back outside through the open door.
    “Come here,” Logan says as we head down the sidewalk. People are all over the place now, mingling up and down both sides of the street. I wrap my hands around his arm and follow his lead back to the alleyway where our room is. We stop just outside the graffitied door and he climbs onto his motorcycle and starts it with a howling roar.
    “Are we going somewhere?” I ask.
    “I’m going to teach you how to shoot,” he says. I look toward the door to Damian’s place. He practically reads my mind as I meet his eyes again. “The guns are in the saddlebags.” I climb on the seat behind him and scoot forward until my legs are embracing him, and he tickles the throttle a couple of times. He walks the bike around and then jets off down the alleyway, kicking up papers and splashing into the small puddles as we depart. I dig my feet into the pegs and hold on tight.
    . . .
    As we ride through the city streets and pass slow cars on the shoulder, I think about how stunned I was at Logan’s bilingual tongue. He’s right. I don’t know a lot about him, and he doesn’t know a lot about me. Despite that, he saved my life more than once and now we’re stuck together. That has to be a sign, or something, right?
    We pass outside the city limits and head out into the Mexican desert, and it’s much of the same like Southern Arizona. Less red crags and more sagebrush, though. The wild life scatter around us as we break off the road and travel down a beaten path, until we reach a long hilly area. Some wood and sheet metal are set up in a haphazard way, and I get the feeling Logan’s been here before.
    He stops his hog short and we skid across the dirt ground. He shuts his bike off and kicks the stand down, before reaching down and opening the saddlebags to retrieve the revolver. I stand up and wait, straightening my hair by running my fingers through it. I swallow hard. I’m already