Free I See Me by Meghan Ciana Doidge Page B

withdrew his hand. I was suddenly very pleased that I had chosen to keep it free of the barbed wire, which also started at my wrist and wound up my arm.
    “You got somewhere to stay?” he asked.
    “Always,” I answered, glad my voice wasn’t as shaky as my insides.
    I took a second bite of my pie, already knowing I was going to invite him back to the Brave.
    “Good,” he said, and he meant it for me rather than himself. As if he was glad I wasn’t living on the street, even though he’d only just met me.
    “And you?” I asked. “Got somewhere to stay?”
    “Never.” He answered without concern, or sadness, or self-pity.
    “That works,” I said, not really knowing what I meant.
    “Yep,” he answered. Then he finished his pie.
    ∞
    “There should be lights,” I said as I stumbled up the two steps into the Brave. “Somewhere in here.”
    We’d walked back to the rest stop parking lot without really discussing it, without Beau even asking where we were going. It had stopped raining by the time the waitress informed us that the diner was closing. I probably should have been concerned about bringing a stranger back to the Brave — especially a man of Beau’s size — but I wasn’t. I knew a predator when I saw one. Unfortunately, most foster kids were pretty savvy that way, pretty early on.
    “I can see,” he murmured behind me.
    It was seriously pitch black in the interior of the motorhome, even with the exterior lights still illuminating the public washrooms behind us. Completely blind, I reached for the countertop I was fairly certain was a couple of steps off to the side. I stumbled over some of the clothing I’d left in the middle of the kitchen-area floor.
    Beau grabbed me by the elbow, so that I only listed deeply to one side rather than doing the face plant I’d thought was coming my way. As soon as I had my footing, he let me go.
    I hunkered down, still blind, and started gathering the items strewn across the floor and shoving them back into my suitcase underneath the kitchen table.
    “You don’t have to do that for me,” he said.  
    “I’m not.”
    Even without being able to see him, I could feel how he completely filled the darkness behind me. Knowing that the interior height was approximately six-foot-five, I guessed that Beau could just stand up straight inside, maybe with a couple of inches clearance. Yes, I’d practically memorized the owner’s manual while waiting to buy the Brave.
    I heard him close and lock the exterior door. “You can park here overnight?”
    “Yeah, but there’s no water hookup or electricity, so I’m running off storage tanks and the battery.”
    A light flared behind me. He’d found a large flashlight somewhere, though how he’d seen it in the dark, I didn’t know.
    “Cool,” he said, looking around with the light. “I’d like to check the engine for you tomorrow morning.”
    “Yeah,” I said, straightening up after wrestling the suitcase back underneath the table. “You think you’re staying until morning, hey?”
    A slow grin spread across his face. “I’m not going anywhere until you kick me out,” he said. “I think you’ll find me useful.”
    “Can you cook?”
    He laughed, low and deep. A curl of desire ignited in my belly. Again, though I’d never felt such a thing before, it was unmistakable.
    “I can.”  
    He set the still-lit flashlight on the counter, facing upward so it illuminated the ceiling. Then he dropped his backpack on the bench seat of the dinette and took a short, deliberate step toward me. “I can drive. I can fix the engine. I get paid well to fix engines, actually. I can carry heavy things for you.”
    “I don’t really keep many heavy things around,” I said, aware that this was the beginning of some sort of mating dance and relishing every minute of it. What someone who looked like him was doing in my RV, I had no idea. But I also felt no need to question it. Not right now, at least.
    “You