Page 11 of Truck Stop Tempest
Head down, he came closer. Closer.
See me.
A large gust blew hair across my face, temporarily blinding me, stinging my eyes, sticking to my lips.
I freed my face from one obstacle, only to be blindsided by the dark eyes that greeted me an arm’s-length away.
“What’s wrong?” Tito asked, foregoing pleasantries like, Hello, or Hey, or What’s up, Tuuli?
Breathless and acutely aware that I should not have been the winded one, I mumbled, “Um. Nothing. Why?”
Tito pulled up the sleeve of his shirt and looked at his watch. “You’re out early.”
“Early? I don’t understand.”
“Church,” he snapped. “It doesn’t end for another thirty minutes.”
His clipped tone made my head spin. I couldn’t grasp what he was getting at, so I said, “Oh.” I’d intended to elaborate, but he didn’t give me a chance.
“You okay? Did something happen?”
“I’m fine. Why?”
Tito invaded my personal space, not touching, but enveloping me in his body heat nonetheless. “You’ve been crying.”
“Oh. That.” I waved my hand back and forth, the international gesture for, oh, it was nothing. “Girlie stuff. That’s all.”
An exhausted breath escaped his lips. His shoulders dropped along with his chin, and he stepped back, shaking his head as if disgusted with himself.
“Are you okay?” Drawn to him, I inched closer. Somewhere between you’re out early and girlie stuff, it dawned on me that he knew when church ended. Meaning he’d paid attention. Meaning he’d maybe, possibly, although I couldn’t understand why, timed his run so that he would bump into me again after the service ended.
“Me?” He smirked. “Yeah. Fine. Fine.” Hands shoved deep inside the front pocket of his pullover, legs set at a wide stance, head cocked slightly to the side, he asked, “Why aren’t you taking the bus today?”
The heat of his gaze burrowed straight through me, striking body parts unfamiliar with that level of burn. I trembled, my nerves under rapid fire.
Above his head, a squirrel ran across the telephone wire, giving me an excellent excuse to avoid the weight of his stare. “I needed to walk.”
“With no coat, again,” he said, looking over his shoulder, no doubt to see what had caught my attention.
“Oh, yeah. Forgot to grab it this morning.”
“I’ll walk with you.” Tito turned and nudged me with his elbow. “I’m not much in the mood for a run today.”
That small, thoughtless gesture, that tiny nudge made ridiculous things happen to my insides. Everything encased inside my skin started to buzz like I had been a house with no electricity, sitting in the dark, cold and quiet, and my power had just been restored.
Tito flipped the switch.
Even though he scared me, I didn’t fear for my safety. He scared me because Tito seemed the type of person that would challenge me, rile me to the core, and I would either shrivel and die under the pressure, or grow wings and soar. He terrified me because, for some odd reason, Tito felt like a test.
A life lesson I didn’t want to fail.
I’d failed miserably.
The prior evening, and again that morning, I’d convinced myself to stay away from Tuuli. Talked myself out of running the route that led past the church or timing my strides to happen by as she headed to the bus stop.
Somewhere along the line, however, my head and feet suffered a major miscommunication, and my legs led me straight to where I knew she would be.
Hell wasn’t hot enough for bastards like me.