Page 100 of Truck Up
Disappointment washes over me when I pull up to the cabin to find it empty. I was looking forward to holding Amelia. She’s the only person who can dissipate this tension inside me.
Pulling out my phone, I shoot off a quick message.
Christian
Where are you?
Angel
At your Grams. Are you back?
Christian
Yeah, just now. Sit tight. I’m coming to you.
Angel
Okay! I can’t wait to see. Miss you!
Christian
Miss you too.
I toss my truck in reverse and speed down the driveway. I don’t turn around until I hit the road. It’ll take me about twentyminutes to get to the homestead from here, and that’s twenty minutes too long.
My need for Amelia is crippling. Even though I was only gone one night, it felt like an eternity. Now that she lives with me, I have no clue how I lived apart from her for so long.
I break countless traffic laws as I speed through the back roads. My only saving grace is that I don’t run into any other cars on my way there. One of the many perks of living in the middle of nowhere is no one else lives there either, and I never have to worry about cops. There’s not enough going on out here for them to patrol the roads.
I make it to the homestead in record time and run inside. I’m immediately hit by the sound of female laughter. Heading to the kitchen, I stop in the doorway to assess the situation.
Amelia is sitting at the table with Grams and the other women in this family. They’re all here—Sophia, Charlotte, Lina, and Clara. Even Rayne, Garret’s secret ten-year-old daughter that we all found out about recently, is here.
Glancing around, I don’t see any of my brothers.
“Christian!” Amelia jumps up and rushes to me. When she wraps her arms around me, I sag. All the tension I’ve held inside me over the past twenty-four hours vanishes.
“Fuck, I needed this,” I whisper in her ear. I hold her so tight, I start to worry I might hurt her. When I loosen my hold, she squeezes me tighter. She needed this closeness just as much as I did.
“You okay?” she whispers back.
“Yeah, just exhausted.” I don’t want to release her, but I’m acutely aware of the number of eyes on me. Something horrible happened to one of our own and they want the answers that I have. “Where are my brothers?”
“They all went out to Posey’s,” Sophia says. “I think Liam was hoping to find Edge. We invited Lia over for a girl’s night in. Didn’t think she needed to be alone.”
“Everybody’s been worried.” Lia squeezes my hand and leads me to an empty seat at the table. “There have been rumors, but no one really knows what happened.”
“There are always rumors.” I grumble.
“Oh, let those assholes talk,” Grams says. She gets up and heads over to the refrigerator. When she returns, she hands me a beer. “Are Hannah and Cameron okay?”
I nod and then take the beer from her. I take a long pull and relax even more in the chair. It feels so good to sit, relax, and simply be for a few minutes. “Thanks, Grams.”
She pats my shoulder and spins around. “I’ll make you something to eat. You look hungry.”
“You don’t have to do that. I ate earlier.” I insist.
She waves me off. “Probably nothing good. We’ve got leftovers. This will only take a moment.”