Hating Beauty (The Vegas Titans Series Book 6) (14 page)

Chapter Nineteen

Knox Cole

Just Outside Bum-fucking God Damn Nowhere, Ohio

Sure, call me an asshole. Call me a
dick. Call me a loser, a jerk, a user.

She loves me, and I didn’t say it
back.

I know, I know—I’m an asshole, a
typical womanizer panicking at the first glimmerings of genuine feeling or
intimacy—unable to be emotionally present and blah blah blah. I get it. I’m not
an idiot. I know how women think…sort of. Well, most women.

Not Tatiana—I mean Rusudan—her I
can’t figure out. She’s constantly blindsiding me, confusing me, amazing me, scaring
the shit out of me. Just when I think I’ve got her figured out she lays
something entirely new and unforeseen on the table, like this love business.

And I have no idea what she’ll
think of me when she wakes up tomorrow.

But others, other women, they’d say
I’m being a withholding, cold, selfish prick for what I did—or didn’t do—last
night after she said she loved me. They’d say I’m totally game until someone
needs me, until the L-word gets tossed around, and then I backpedal the fuck
away faster than Lance Armstrong with both nuts. That’s what anyone would think
about me about right now, right?

Because I didn’t say it back.

Well if you think that’s bad, how
about this next choice of mine: abandoning Tatiana—I mean Rusudan—when she’s
asleep in the hotel and hitchhiking the hell out of here, taking the first available
ride to anywhere else.

Yup, I must be an asshole. Dick.
Loser. User.

I know that is what would flash
through a “decent” person’s mind at this point. Even I am tempted to pronounce a
grim judgment of my character as I finish writing my goodbye note for Rusudan and
place it on the pillow beside her, where I am supposed to be.

Then I move quietly toward the door.

I can’t help but look back at her
one last time, sleeping. She’s so…god…I don’t even know the word. Beautiful.
Complicated. Dangerous. Even in sleep her face is impossible to read, as many
characteristics mixing in her features as she has aliases. Her lovely face is a
conflicted canvas where youth, passion, mystery, strength, and determination
vie for top billing. She’s like watching a thunderstorm, constantly changing,
powerful, surprising.

It doesn’t matter what name I call
her—her essence is what gets to me. She’s so fragile and so strong at the same
time. I’ve never met anyone like her: anyone so fascinating, infuriating,
confusing, and impressive. It’s not that I don’t want her. Obviously I do—when
was the last time I slept with the same woman twice? I’m just afraid. So
afraid.

I just…I can’t…I don’t know.

I can’t.

What else would you call me but the
worst, lowliest coward for abandoning her at this moment? I get it. I do. Here
I am walking out on her when she’s confessed she loves me, when she needs my
help finding her sister, when Breslin’s after her, when she’s so close to
either despair or triumph.

I admit it looks bad.

But you know what? I am not being
an asshole. How do I know? Because at this very moment, the moment when I click
the bedroom bungalow door silently shut behind me and trudge toward the highway,
I am actually being a fucking stand-up guy. I know that leaving her will increase
her chances at a happy, healthy, non-murdered-by-Breslin life.

I know it is the right thing to do.

I left her the address where I am
positive she will find her sister, or at the very least the next clue. I left
her the car and the keys. I left her duffel bag with all her money untouched,
in spite of our initial agreement that she pay me double for turning against
Breslin for her.

I’ve left her every chance of
success—and actually, my leaving will give her better odds. See, if I turn up
somewhere else it will throw Breslin off her scent. I can distract him. If I
stayed with Rusiko I’d only increase the chances that Breslin would track her
down and ruin her chance at a happy ending with her sister, which is what I
know she really wants.

I am doing this for her, not
because she freaked me out by saying she loved me. I am doing this for her, for
her own good.

See? Stand-up guy.

I slip out the door into the dark
early morning, leaving Katja/Jana/Tatiana/Rusiko/Mystery Girl, knowing I am
doing the right thing, damn it.

Let’s not forget that I am bad news
for women. If I stayed I’d only hurt her. I am doing this for her. I am doing
this for Rusiko.

I am doing this for her.

I am doing this for her.

If I keep saying that, maybe it’ll
make it true. Maybe it’ll do away with this dull throb of guilt I am feeling.
Maybe if I keep whispering it like a mantra; I can absolve myself of whatever
might or might not happen to her after I leave her alone, asleep, innocent, and
in love.

Shit. Who am I trying to convince,
anyway? It doesn’t matter in the end: regardless of motivation, I just know
that I have to get the hell out of here. I have to clear my head, think of what
to do now. I still have to survive too, and I can’t afford this swirl of
feelings and thoughts that I have no clue what to do with.

I still have to take care of #1.

I still have to outsmart one of the
richest and most twisted guys in the country.

To be completely honest, as the
cool morning air outside washes over my skin, I feel a wave of relief. The
crunch of the gravel under my feet is like the rhythm of freedom. Now I only
have to worry about saving my own skin. On my own again, the only person I can
fuck over is myself. On my own again, I can’t hurt her any more than I already
have.

And I can live with that.

I don’t know where I am going as I
wander towards the highway, thumb in the air. The world has divided itself into
two places in my mind: with Mystery Girl, and away from her. Even though every
fiber of my being wants to stay
with
her, I know I have to get away.

It’s so early that only the
semi-trucks are out on the road. I manage to get one to stop, and when he asks
me where I am going I just say “wherever” and hop inside. The truck smells like
beer and the seat is covered in dog hair, but it’s my ticket out. With a squeal
of breaks and the rumble of 600 horsepower, I am on my way to nowhere.

Luckily the driver doesn’t ask me
any questions, just continues muttering gibberish and code into his ham radio.
He’s probably talking to a call girl, for all I know or care. At last he’s
leaving me alone.

Jesus, I miss her already.

I’ll just have to suck it up. I
watch the hotel fade away in the side-view mirror and try to ignore the hollow
feeling in my chest, the nagging doubt that I am actually making a huge
mistake.

Nah.

I’m doing this for her.

I close my eyes and let the
distance between us increase. I don’t need to watch the road; I can feel the
miles building up like a lump in my throat.

What next?

Probably I should put a few hundred
miles between myself and Rusudan, then I should find a phone booth somewhere
and call Breslin—give the bastard some cookie crumbs to lead him in the wrong
direction, keep her safe.

Probably I should get myself to
South America somewhere, learn Spanish, hide out. I’ve heard good things about
the ex-pat community in Panama. Colombia’s supposed to be up-and-coming too. Actually
it doesn’t matter where I go. Breslin’s web is huge, but if I could get out of
the country maybe I’d have a better shot. Maybe I’d live to see 30. Where did
Rusudan say she was from? Georgia? I could start over somewhere, change my name,
change my mind. Be a better man.

The kind of man who’d deserve her.

Fuck.

Just like that, my entire brain
centers on Rusiko again.

Try as I might, I can’t stop
thinking about her face asleep back in the hotel, so peaceful. I hate knowing
that I will be just another thing she’ll have to survive, another person she’s
loved and lost. But I haven’t defeated my own demons, so how could I possibly
help her with hers? She told me so many things, so many big hard things.

She needs someone else. Someone
better.

Now will be my chance to prove
myself, though. I’ll lead Breslin off her trail, and then I’ll work on myself.
I’ll sort through the shit I’ve avoided for years. I’ll scour my soul until I’m
clean. I’ll be ready the next time there’s a Rusiko. The next time there’s a
chance to do the right thing.

Right. As if there could be another
Rusiko. As if I believe in second chances.

When the hell have I ever had a
second chance?

I think back to my glory days, when
I was riding high on success and damn near famous. The Rager, they called me in
the ring—Afghanistan War Veteran, former Army Ranger turned UFC contender. Ladies
wanted me. Men wanted to be me. God, it was fun shooting up through the ranks
from challenger to champion. The world was my fucking oyster. Everything was
available—women, money, fun. Not even the war nightmares brought me down, not
even the night sweats or the antidepressants. Not even the booze and the
amphetamines. No, in the end, it was my own fucking idiocy. With everything at
my fingertips, I had to choose to self-destruct and have an affair with a
politician’s wife. It all came out in the papers, the way everything does, and I
lost most of my sponsorships. Got arrested a couple times. But that wasn’t what
ruined me. No press is bad press, after all, and it was my temper that got me
in the end.

It wasn’t until I lost my cool that
I lost it all.

I’ve replayed that fateful fight in
my head so many times, my last fight, when I beat media golden boy Terence “El
Torro” Ruiz to death on national television. I know exactly which punch did it,
exactly the moment that I could have gone another way.

But I chose the hard fall to
nowhere. The gutter.

Instead of a second chance, Breslin
came. What he offered was not redemption, it was stasis. It was treading the
morally ambiguous waters of the underbelly, hiding from the light, burying the
truth that I was guilty as deep down as I possibly could. The truth was that I knew
I had done wrong, that I was capable of more, capable of changing for the
better. I hadn’t lived up to my potential and I never forgave myself.

Rusiko is the first person that
seems to know that I am capable of more, and it’s fucking terrifying. I’m not
in the habit of believing in myself anymore.

Now the dawn is breaking over
eastern Ohio, and I blink my eyes open to stare into it steadily. We’re almost
back to Pennsylvania. I’m well on my way to facing my self.

This time it’s different. I’m ready
to look into the light without flinching. She’s given me that, Rusiko, and I
owe it to her to follow through, to change.

I promise, Rusiko. I will be
different.

I’ll be better.

I will do the right thing.

I am here in this stranger’s truck
facing a new dawn, because I refuse to kill the light in that girl’s eyes,
because I refuse to let her think I am some kind of hero. I refuse to use her.
I refuse to lie to her. I refuse to slowly disappoint her over time, as my
fucked up past and messed up mind take their toll, letting her down and
puncturing her dreams, until I’ve sucked her dry and used her up. I refuse to
make her life worse than it already is.

I refuse to be that guy again,
destroying everyone and everything around me. I refuse to open myself up to
someone like Breslin again, creating a vacuum for darkness to fill. I just
refuse to be that weak, that shortsighted ever again. She’s already changed me,
I can feel it. I am ending this vicious cycle.

Actually, the cycle is already
broken.

I broke it when I set her free.

Now the driver raises his voice and
I realize he’s talking to me.

“Need a rest stop,” he grunts.
“Won’t be long.”

I grunt back a monosyllable,
man-language for acknowledgement.

As he pulls the truck onto the exit
ramp I settle in and close my eyes, figuring I’ll use the stop to nap. Maybe I
can sleep until he kicks me out somewhere. Maybe I can sleep off my fixation
with Rusiko, sleep off my shame.

I hear his door open and feel the
truck cabin shift as his hefty weight clumsily exits. I can hear muffled sounds
of the highway in the background, and it’s starting to lull me to sleep when I
feel the cabin shift again and sense a presence beside me in the driver’s seat.

But instead of the sound of the
ignition starting, I hear the cocking of a gun.

Even before I open my eyes, I
understand what’s happening: the radio. The driver was on the radio talking in
code. There must have been some alert out, some price on my head, and he must
have called it in.

Breslin really is an indefatigable
bastard.

I should have seen it coming:
should have expected this, should have been keyed up for a struggle.

But I’m rusty and bone-tired, so
instead of risking a badly aimed accidental shot, I deliberately wake myself up
and blink down the barrel of the Glock 43 pointed at my nose. My eyes flicker
up to the face of the man holding it and I can’t stifle a chuckle.

“Hey there, Ox,” I grunt. “Fancy
meeting you here. What’s a good little boy like you doing in a truck stop like
this?”

He snarls like a Neanderthal. It’s
like having a conversation with a Rottweiler, but I press on. I never did know
when to shut up.

“How’s Rex, his shoulder healing
ok? This is the first time I’ve seen you without him, you must feel damn near
naked. What’s new in your life, besides the bruises I gave you? Don’t know if
you heard the Breslin house of cards is crumbling down, I’d start sending out
my resume if I were you. Man, that’s a shiny new gun. Going-away present from
the boss? You know they probably won’t let you take it with you to Attica. You
could always try hiding it up your ass.”