Page 51 of Violent Skies

“Maybe…” she shrugs, dropping the box. “Maybe I watch too much T.V.”

I laugh at her joke.

“Thanks, I should get back to…” I can’t remember the name she gave me.

“Taylor,” She narrows her eyes at me.

“Yeah…” I back from the room, pausing in the doorway. “I’m Murphy…” I give her my name without thinking and then curse myself.

“Mak…” she blurts, stepping forward and shoving her hands in her pockets. “Well, Makenna.” She removes one as she corrects herself. The way she talks with her hands is cute. She’s cute. “But everyone calls me Mak…” she says. “Actually they don’t. I call myself Mak… They call me Crusoe or Creepy Morgue Girl when they think I’m not listening…” she scowls. “Makenna. My name’s Makenna.”

“It was nice to meet you, Mak.” I say the nickname and she beams back at me. I commit that look to memory and duck from the room into the dark hallway, completely oblivious to my phone vibrating in my pocket as I sneak from the police station to my car.

Locating Murphy was the easy part. Once he answered his phone, he filled us in on what he found out and Jesse told us that the tattoo looked Samoan based on the lines and geometry of it. The shithead proved useful after all. We got Birdie as comfortable as we could. Cress joined Jake, Jesse, and Rafe in the kitchen and I can hear the chaos of her trying to wrangle them all long enough to make food to eat. I’m about to go help when my phone rings.

Unknown:

Topplers Creek, 2AM, 10k.

It’s a race. In two hours, I look down at my watch and it blinks midnight back at me. The creek is a nasty route. The corner at the bottom of the hill breaks into a row of rocks and below is the nastiest looking creek in all of Arizona. It’s not deep, but they constantly find trash and bodies in it. And it smells like rotting sewage.

I push my phone away, standing just out of their view to observe the smiles on their faces as Cress teaches Jesse how to cut an onion. It should make me honest, give me a reason to be forthcoming about everything, but it only drives my need to protect them more. I take one more look at Cress and she feels it because she looks over her shoulder at me with a lazy smile. One I haven’t seen in a very long time.

When she turns away I take the chance to slip out to the garage. I pull on my jacket and swipe the keys to Rafe’s car, hoping to be gone before anyone notices, but of course Murphy is standing there, judging me.

“Shouldn’t you be upstairs coddling Bird?” I ask him and he crosses his arms. Turns out Murphy knew she was going to that race but he was late. He should have been there, and I’d never hold that against one of them, but I know he feels how upset I am because he’s looking past me out into the night.

“You shouldn’t go alone,” he says. “Isn’t that what all of this proved?”

“I’m just going to pick some shit up from Bobby and I need to grab some things for Birdie. Everything we have is expired.” I lie smoother than I ever have and Murphy still sees right through it.

“At least turn your location on,” he says, his eyes drifting to the pocket holding my phone.

I nod, able to oblige his worry, but it’s not going to keep me from going. With Birdie down an eye for who knows how long… someone has to keep racing. “We either kill them, pay them, or lose the garage and everything we worked for here. We can’t stop moving, Murph.”

“I know.” He responds quicker than I expect him to.

“Then what are you asking?” I wait, itchy to get going but unable to move until he gets it off his chest.

“Just play by the same rules you set for us,” he says, throwing a shaky hand through his shaggy hair as he asks.

“I’m trying,” I lie. In reality, the rules are set to help me keep them safe. If I follow them we’re all in danger. “I need to go.”

“Just be careful. Please?” he asks, clearly very shaken up after Birdie.

“I will be.” That’s the truth, even if Murphy doesn’t believe it. “Location is on,” I tell him, digging out my phone and doing it in front of him so he settles. “Go eat, keep an eye on Bird, and if anyone shows up—”

“I’ll call.”

“Good.” I turn back to the car and when I look up Murphy is gone. The streets are already pretty dead and with over an hour to kill I find myself wandering. Before I even realize where I’m going I’m pulling into the driveway of Cress’s house.

It’s been a while since I’ve been here and I don’t know what I expected, but it isn’t this. Everything feels grey. The last time I saw this place it was a thing of dreams; a white picket fence picked perfectly for Cress. Kids were supposed to fill this house, laughter… a family of Koa’s construction, one to replace the one he already had.

I cut the engine and pocket the keys but don’t move from the seat for another couple of moments. This place is haunted—that much is sure. I’m not even inside and I can feel his eyes on me as I wander around the back, swipe the spare key from under the plant on the step and through the screen door into the kitchen.

I don’t know what I’m expecting but a spotless kitchen isn’t that. From the photos Birdie took and the story that Cress told…this place should be a mess. The chairs are upright, there’s no glass on the floor, and even the magnets holding up the pictures are back on the fridge. I make my way through the house, looking over the pristine condition of everything. The picture frames on the wall hold memories of our past. I’m erased from every single one of them.

It shouldn’t sting, but it does.