“I know he would have,” Tria admitted. She looked away from me and back toward the trees. “He wasn’t always like this, but he’s gotten worse even in the short time I’ve been gone.”
“It’s that dude who runs the place, isn’t it?” I questioned. “Leo?”
“Keith’s father, yes.”
“He’s an asshole.”
“He’s…dedicated,” Tria said.
“So are all zealots.”
“Hmm.” Tria took my hand and led me back to where all the cars and trucks had been parked. It was nearly empty now—just a couple of cars and a few younger guys hanging out in the clearing. We climbed into the hatchback with Steven and headed back to the area that, around here, passed for civilization.
Steven dropped us off outside Brandon and Nikki’s house, then puttered away in his piece-of-shit Gremlin, which I couldn’t believe still ran at all. The damn thing had a fucking loud muffler, that was for sure. I rubbed at my ears a little as we went up the steps to the front door.
It was dark inside, and Tria decided to just ease the door open, thinking they might have been exhausted and just gone to sleep. I figured they had gone to bed but probably weren’t sleeping.
I was a little closer to the truth than Tria.
The telltale sounds were obvious to me as soon as we stepped into the main room of the small house, but Tria apparently didn’t get it at first. There was some grunting and some squeaking coming from the couch, and I was pretty sure the dark pile near the plastic chair was a bunch of clothes, but Tria stepped a little farther inside anyway. I just waited to see how she was going to react, a bit of a grin on my face as I watched her.
“Screw low sperm count,” I heard Brandon exclaim all of a sudden. “If I just fuck you like this every hour on the hour, eventually some of the little fuckers have to get up there, right?”
Nikki made a noise that was somewhere between a moan and a giggle. I craned my neck a little, but I couldn’t see anything other than his feet dangling over the arm of the couch as the two of them giggled somewhat rhythmically.
“Shit!” Tria whispered as she grabbed my arm and hauled me back onto the porch. Her eyes were wide as she quickly looked from the now closed door and back to me a few times. “They’re doing it on the couch!”
“Well, yeah,” I said. “That’s pretty obvious.”
“What are we going to do?”
“Take pictures?” I said with a smile.
“Liam!”
“Kidding!” I held my hands up in front of me, palms out, and took a step backwards.
“Do we just…wait?” she asked.
I reached up and scratched the back of my head, then glanced over at the motorcycle.
“Maybe we should just go,” I suggested. I pointed a thumb toward the parked motorcycle.
“All my stuff is still in there,” Tria said. “Including all the money.”
“I guess we wait it out then.” I sat down on the top step and pulled out my pack of Marlboros, knowing we were going to be there a while. There was no way I would be able to convince her to leave without the Haversack of Hades. I leaned back against the supporting post, and Tria positioned herself between my knees so she could lean her back against my chest.
To be totally honest, I probably wasn’t up for a long ride right then, either. The whole day had been completely and totally surreal, and I still wasn’t one hundred percent sure I wasn’t dreaming. I was, however, extremely glad it was over. I was definitely going to do my best to get Tria out of this hellhole at the first light of day.
I was never one to break up a sacred fuck-fest and run, but I had been an uninvited guest here for too long, anyway.
Chapter 3—Unpack the Stuff
Tria lay her head against my shoulder and relaxed against me as I exhaled smoke off to the side so it would stay out of her face. I snaked my free arm around her stomach, and she gripped my forearm with her slender fingers.
“Are you going to tell me something about yourself tonight?” she asked.
“No,” I told her with a firm shake of my head. “I was kind of thinking it was your turn.”