Free In Love and Rescue: When love is the perfect rescue... by K. Alex Walker

waiting for him in the kitchen. They ate breakfast while Ivor regaled them with stories of the early days of him and Eva’s marriage, her correcting him on the details along the way. There was a bit of sadness in Ivor’s heart as he thought about Larke and Desmond leaving. It had been such a long time since he and Eva had any guests and when they finally did, it happened to be with a pair that he’d grown fond of in such a short time. He wished with every fiber of his being that they got home safely.
    After breakfast, Eva gave them a brown paper bag filled with food, but as Desmond and Larke headed for the back door, Ivor stopped them and handed Desmond his keys.
    “Keep going down the road and you will come to a place where the road divides into two. Go right and you will get where you need to be.”
    Desmond and Larke exchanged confused looks. “You’re not coming?” Larke asked.
    “No, we’re goin g to stay here,” Eva answered.
    “Delgano will be back,” Ivor decisively added. “And wh en he comes back, I will handle him.”
    Larke’s eyes widened in shock. “No, you can’t. That man has absolutely no scruples.”
    Eva rubbed her hand soothingly before pulling her into her arms and kissing her on the cheek. She then went over the Desmond and did the same.
    “Go,” she urged. “The sun is almost up.”
    Larke tried to protest again but Eva s ilenced her and ushered the two out of the door and into the waiting truck.
    “How will you get yo ur truck back?” Desmond asked.
    Ivor gently pushed the door shut. “Let me worry about that. Go now.”
    As he started the ignition, they could see a line of cars coming around the hill in the distance. Ivor turned and looked at the line, then sent Desmond a nod, confirming that it was Gano returning with his troops.
    With a final wave, Desmond drove off and Larke watched the couple in the mirror until they were no longer in sight. Closing her eyes, she silently thanked them for everything for that they’d done , and prayed for their safety as Gano and his gang pulled fully into the driveway.
     
     

     
     
    Chapter Four
     
     
    The road was unforgiving. Violent winding twists and turns sent them both slamming into the side of the truck and bouncing so hard that they flew out of their seats. The diverging roads that Ivor had mentioned were even more treacherous, pouncing upon them so suddenly that Larke thought the pickup would overturn as Desmond abruptly rounded the corner of the right-handed path.
    Neither of them spoke during the entire ride as they thought about Eva and Ivor nobly remaining behind to make sure that they’d made it to safety. Desmond tou ched his pocket a few times to make sure that the box was still there as it would serve as a memento of Ivor and what a real man was actually like. Ivor had taught him much more than they both probably even realized, and it gave Desmond insight into a world that before had been foreign to him: a world where happy marriages existed and people could actually enjoy spending their lives together. Where compromise was real and agreements could be met. Where one person did not have absolute power over the other and households could carry on without fear, and a world where it was possible to fall in love and remain in love, even through disagreements and struggles. None of those things had been remote possibilities before meeting Ivor and Eva. He’d always assumed that happy marriages were façades and that people were truly hiding misery behind their plastic smiles. At least, that was the way regarded it until he saw the way Ivor held Eva in his arms the night that they danced.
    They drove about five miles down the path before the road began to even off. The brilliant harbor peeked between the trees and Desmond pointed to a fisherman’s boat in less than perfect shape bobbing in the water. There were areas where the white paint had been completely stripped from the wood and on the side, the name was handwritten