Page 257 of Off Limits: The Firsts

Then the realization that I have no other options but to deal with him and his creep factor.

The needle hits eighty.

Nothing will ever be enough to outrun that feeling I get every time someone expects me to bend to their will. To be subservient. To play the victim.

Never again.

No way. No how. Screw that.

The long road is stretched out before me. Just fields, grape vines, trees, and flat asphalt, making me feel as if I were the only person on the face of the earth.

Hitting the outskirts of town, I push the envelope of safety, but when you jump out of airplanes for a living, that envelope is harder to breach than for most.

With each mile I put between myself and the restaurant, I feel the stress begin to shed. The pressure of making sure all my documents are in order so I don’t lose the loan because of some stupid mistake eases. And with the clearing of my mind comes the clarity.

Despite it being so much easier to pick up and move when people started asking too many questions about my past, I let Desi talk me into coming back to Sunnyville. My need to put away the nomadic life I have been living and settle down to plant roots for myself was just a thought back then, yet, I’d been willing to try.

Then I found Blue Skies, which was in desperate need of some TLC, and decided that the girl, who liked to go where the wind blows her, suddenly wanted something permanent. A business. A fixture. Something to be proud of.

My desire to own Blue Skies and make it one hundred percent mine had made me stay to fight for something.

And fighting is what I’m doing.

The sirens come out of nowhere. Blue and red lights flash to tell me my fun—my reprieve—has been compromised and is about to be shut down.

“Shit.” I pound a fist against the wheel, knowing this will be my second ticket in six months. The monetary fine. Points on my driving record. The increase in my insurance. All the consequences ghost through my mind as I pull to a stop and wait for Officer Asshole to walk up to the driver side and read me the riot act. I may even pull up the hem of my shorts some so when he’s met with an eyeful of tanned and toned thighs, he might be distracted.

It’s worth a shot.

“License and registration, please.”

I look up to the gravelly voice standing outside my window and am met with my own reflection in his mirrored lenses. “Hi, Officer. How is your day going?” I’ll try sweet-talking. I’m not good at it, but at least I’m not going down without a fight.

“License and registration, please, ma’am.”

“What seems to be the problem?”

“How about going ninety in a fifty mile an hour zone.”

“Oh. Was I really going that fast?” I feign innocence.

“Are you in a hurry?” I stare at him doe-eyed, unable to make my synapses fire so I can come up with some kind of brilliant excuse. “That’s considered reckless driving. Endangerment of others. Should I go on?”

With each offense my eyes are seeing dollar signs that my wallet doesn’t have.

The radio handset strapped to his shoulder sparks to life, and he responds in some kind of code that sounds like a foreign language. “No, Officer. The thing is I left my house in a hurry—”

“I think we’ve established that fact.”

I look in my rearview mirror as another police car pulls up behind his, and my palms grow sweaty. Am I that dangerous that they need two units to handle this call?

“Anyway, like I was saying, I left in such a hurry that I didn’t grab my wallet. I don’t have my license.”

He angles his head, and even though I can’t see his eyes behind the lenses, I can feel them dressing me down. “Then your registration?”

“This isn’t exactly my car.” I hear the door of the second unit shut behind us.

And the award for Flake of the Year, ladies and gentlemen, goes to Emerson Reeves.