And Preston deserves more than my tentative, pieced-together kind of love.
As I study him, I try to remember what he looked like before, in the family picture I saw at Lindsey’s house. Was his face as beautiful as the rest of him? I can’t recall. The scarred face and mask I’ve known for so long replace the image when I try. He’s not that boy anymore, anyway. He’s the man in the mask, the Phantom.
He climbs in the passenger side, startling me back to reality, reminding me I never moved out of his seat after starting the car. I was too busy watching him.
“Want to drive?” I ask.
“No,” he says. “You need to drive tonight.”
“Okay,” I say, giving him a funny look. He doesn’t explain, though, so I back out of the garage. “Where to?”
“Get on the highway,” he says.
I obey, and a few minutes later, we’re heading back toward Faulkner. He tells me to get off on the exit before that, though, and then get right back on, heading north this time. “Are you just taking me in a circle?” I ask. “Where are we going?”
“Do you trust me?”
“Umm… Right now?”
“Yes.”
“Less than I did a few minutes ago.”
“We’re going back to where I found you.”
“What?” I ask, shooting a startled glance his way. “You better be kidding.”
“I’m not.”
“You’re insane,” I say. “There’s no fucking way I’m going back there. Ever.”
“Pull off right here,” he says. “This is where I tracked Duke’s Hummer.”
“Nope,” I say, keeping the truck at a steady speed as we pass the rice paddies. “I don’t even like looking over there. No way in hell am I voluntarily going in.”
“I’m not going to force you to go,” he says. “Which means you’re going voluntarily.”
“Never gonna happen.”
“I’m going in with you,” he says. “You know I’m not going hurt you.”
“I realize that,” I say. “But I’m not Royal. I’m not that masochistic. I’m not going to go back to the place where I was destroyed. No matter what happens for the entire rest of my life, it will never be worse than that night. Nothing can be worse. I could get hit by a car, and then shot in the face, and hung from a bridge, and it would still be better than what happened in that swamp. Don’t you get it, Preston? Dying would have been better.”
“Are you pissed that I saved your life?”
“No,” I say. “But it still would have been easier to die.”
“Try again,” he says, reaching over and laying a reassuring hand on the back of my seat. “Just keep driving until you’re ready to stop.”
I pull off at his exit, then swing around and go south again. I don’t know why. I could drive in circles all night, and I’ll never be ready to go back there.
“This is pointless,” I say as we pass the rice paddies again.
“Places only have as much power over you as you let them,” he says.
“Try telling that to Royal.”
“That bridge has power over Royal because he lets it, because he isn’t willing to let go. That’s where his sister disappeared, and that’s his way of holding on.”