Susan Phillips - The Great Escape

She gave a stiff smile. He popped the top, sprawled on the blanket, and tipped the longneck to his mouth. He was a friend of Ted’s, wasn’t he? So he had to be safe—despite his threatening appearance and boorish manner, despite the beer and the frayed bumper sticker.

GAS, GRASS, OR ASS. NOBODY RIDES FOR FREE.

“Have one,” he said. “Maybe it’ll loosen you up.”

She didn’t want to loosen up, and she had to pee, but she hobbled over anyway and took a bottle to keep him from drinking it. She found a spot on the far corner of the blanket where she wouldn’t brush against his long legs or breathe in his general air of menace. She should be drinking Champagne now in the bridal suite of the Austin Four Seasons as Mrs. Theodore Beaudine.

The biker pulled a couple of cellophane-wrapped sandwiches from the grocery bag. He tossed one in her general direction and opened the other. “Too bad you didn’t wait until after the big wedding dinner to dump him. The food would have been a lot better than this.”

Lump crab parfait, lavender grilled beef tenderloin, lobster medallions, white truffle risotto, a seven-tier wedding cake …

“Really. How do you know Ted?” she asked.

He ripped off a big corner of his sandwich with his teeth and spoke around the wad in his mouth. “We met a couple of years back when I was working a construction job in Wynette, and we hit it off. We see each other when I’m in the area.”

“Ted hits it off with most people.”

“Not all of them good guys like him.” He wiped his mouth with the back of his hand and took another noisy swig of beer.

She set aside the beer she wasn’t drinking. “So you’re not from around here?”

“Nope.” He balled up the cellophane sandwich wrapper and flipped it into the weeds.

She hated people who littered, but she wasn’t going to mention that. Devouring his sandwich seemed to require all his attention, and he didn’t volunteer any more information.

She couldn’t postpone a trip into the woods any longer. She took a napkin from the grocery bag and, wincing with every step, limped into the trees. When she was done, she returned to the blanket. He chugged some more beer. She couldn’t stomach her own sandwich, and she pushed it aside. “Why did you pick me up?”

“I wanted to get laid.”

Her skin crawled. She looked for some indication that this was his crude attempt at a joke, but he didn’t crack a smile. On the other hand, he was Ted’s friend, and as odd as some of them were, she’d never met any that were criminals. “You’re not serious,” she said.

He skimmed his eyes over her. “It could happen.”

“No, it couldn’t!”

He burped, not loud, but still disgusting. “I’ve been too busy for women lately. It’s time to catch up.”

She stared at him. “By picking up your friend’s bride while she’s running away from her wedding?”

He scratched his chest. “You never know. Crazy women’ll do anything.” He drained his beer, burped again, and tossed the empty into the bushes. “So what do you say? Are you ready for me to take you back to Mommy and Daddy?”

“I say no.” Despite her growing apprehension, she wasn’t ready to go back. “You haven’t told me your name.”

“Panda.”

“No, really.”

“You don’t like it?”

“It’s hard to believe that’s your real name.”

“No skin off my nose whether you believe it or not. I go by Panda.”

“I see.” She thought about it while he ripped open a bag of chips. “It must be nice.”

“How do you mean?”

“Riding from town to town with a made-up name.” And a big blue bike helmet to hide beneath.

“I guess.”

She had to stop this, and she gathered her courage. “Do you happen to have a cell I can borrow? I … need to call someone.”

He dug into his suit coat pocket and tossed her his phone. She failed to catch it and had to fumble in the folds of her robe.

“Good luck getting a signal out here.”

She hadn’t thought about that, but then her ability to think logically had deserted her hours earlier. She hobbled around the clearing on her now-torturous heels until she found a spot near the riverbank where she picked up a weak signal. “It’s me,” she said when Meg answered.

“Luce? Are you all right?”

“Matter of opinion.” She gave a choked laugh. “You know that wild side of me you’re always talking about? I guess I found it.” Nothing could be further from the truth. She was the least wild person imaginable. Once maybe, but not for a long time.

“Oh, honey …” The signal was weak, but not weak enough to mute her friend’s concern.

She had to go back to Wynette. But … “I’m—I’m a coward, Meg. I can’t face my family yet.”

“Luce, they love you. They’ll understand.”

“Tell them I’m sorry.” She fought back tears. “Tell them I love them, and I know I’ve made a horrible mess of everything, and that I’ll come back and clean it up, but … Not tonight. I can’t do it tonight.”

“All right. I’ll tell them. But—”

She disconnected before Meg could ask her any more questions she had no way of answering.

A crushing fatigue swept over her. She’d slept badly for weeks, and today’s awful events had used up whatever energy she had left. Panda had disappeared in the woods, and as he came out, she decided to let him get drunk in peace. She gazed at the blanket spread on the hard ground and thought of the narrow, comfortable beds in the private presidential quarters of Air Force One and the blackout shades that covered the windows with the push of a button. She gingerly lay back on the farthest edge of the blanket and gazed at the stars.

She wished she had a biker name to hide behind. Something tough. Something strong and menacing. Everything she wasn’t.

She fell asleep thinking up biker names. Snake … Fang … Venom …

Viper.

THE DAMP MORNING CHILL AWAKENED her. She eased her eyes open to see straws of peach pushing through the low clouds. Her body ached everywhere; she was cold, dirty, and as nauseated now as she’d been when she’d fallen asleep. This was the first day of what should have been her honeymoon. She imagined Ted waking up, thinking the same thing, hating her …

Panda slept next to her in his wrinkled white dress shirt. He lay on his back, his wild, irresponsible hair in chaotic twists and snarls around his head. Blue-black stubble covered his jaw, and a dirty smudge marred his blunt-tipped nose. She hated being so close to him, so she came awkwardly to her feet. His suit coat slipped off her and dropped to the blanket. She winced as she wedged her feet into her stilettos and limped into the trees. On the way, she spotted six empty beer bottles tossed in the weeds, sordid symbols of what she’d gotten herself into.

Ted had rented a honeymoon villa on the beach at St. Barts. Maybe he’d go by himself, although what could be worse than a honeymoon for one? Not even waking up at the side of a river in the middle of nowhere next to a surly, hungover, potentially dangerous biker.

When she came out, he was standing by the river, his back to her. Last night’s fantasy of Viper, the tough-talking biker girl, faded away, and it seemed rude to ignore him. “Good morning,” she said quietly.

He grunted.

She quickly looked away, afraid he’d decide to pee in the river while she watched. She yearned for a hot shower, clean clothes, and a toothbrush, the exact comforts she would have been enjoying if she’d walked down that aisle. A pot of coffee. A decent breakfast. Ted’s hands on her body, coaxing those delicious orgasms from her. Instead she was surrounded by empty beer bottles and a man who openly admitted he “wanted to get laid.” She hated the mess, the uncertainty. She hated her panic. He still hadn’t turned, but she didn’t see him fumbling with his fly, so she risked a question. “Are you … going back to Wynette this morning?”

Another grunt.

She’d never been comfortable in Wynette, although she’d pretended to love it as much as Ted did. But whenever she was there, she could feel everybody judging her. Even though she was the adopted daughter of the former president of the United States, they made her feel as if she weren’t good enough for him. Of course she’d proved them right, but they hadn’t known that when they met her.

Panda continued to stare at the river, his long body silhouetted against the limestone cliffs, his shirt a mass of wrinkles, the tail hanging out on one side, everything about him disreputable. Her shoes were torturous, but she wanted the punishment of pain, so she didn’t pull them off.

He abruptly abandoned his lookout duty to stalk toward her, the heels of his boots grinding into the dirt. “Are you ready to get back to your screwed-up life?”

More than ready. She was done with postponing her responsibilities. Even as a fourteen-year-old, she’d been responsible. How many times over the past seventeen years had Nealy and Mat told her they couldn’t do their jobs if she weren’t such a good caregiver to her siblings?

She’d worked hard at her own job, too. At first she’d used her bachelor’s degree in social work to counsel troubled teens while she got her master’s in public policy. But after a few years, she’d left the casework she loved and begun using her famous name for the less satisfying—but more impactful—task of lobbying. Thanks in part to her, important pieces of legislation had been passed that helped disadvantaged kids. She didn’t plan to give up her lobbying work after she was married either, no matter how tempting. She’d fly to Washington for a few days every month and do the rest of her job from her Texas base. It was long past time to face the consequences of what she’d done.

But her stomach didn’t agree. As the churning got worse, she hurried into the woods and made it into the trees just in time to throw up. She hadn’t eaten in so long that it was painful.

The spasms eventually stopped. He barely looked at her as she came out of the trees. She stumbled toward the river, her heels catching on rocks, then sinking into the sand. She knelt beside the water and splashed her face.

“Let’s go,” he said.

She rested back on her calves, river water dripping down her cheeks. Her voice came from a place far away, a place she hadn’t inhabited since she was very young. “Did you leave many of your things in Wynette?”

“What do you mean?”

“Clothes? Suitcase?” Your Mensa card?

“I travel light. A pair of jeans, a couple of T-shirts, and a box of condoms.”

People were always on their best behavior with the president’s family. Hardly anyone other than Meg or one of her father’s seven sisters ever told her a dirty joke or made even a vaguely crude reference. People’s stiff courtesy had always annoyed her, but now she would have welcomed even a little of it, and she pretended she hadn’t heard. “So there’s nothing I couldn’t compensate you for leaving behind?”

“What are you getting at?”

Her family knew she was safe. Meg would have told them. “I really can’t go back to Wynette while the press is still there.” The press wasn’t her main concern, but she wasn’t telling him that. “I’m wondering what your immediate plans are.”

“Getting rid of you.” He rubbed his stubbly jaw. “And getting laid.”

She swallowed. “What if I make it worth your while?”

He dipped his eyes to her breasts, which her extravagantly expensive French bridal bra had improved. “You aren’t my type.”

Ignore him. “I meant, what if I make it worth your while not to do either?”

“Not interested.” He whipped the blanket off the ground. “I’m on vacation, and I’m not spoiling another day. You’re going back to Wynette.”

“I’d pay you,” she heard herself say. “Not today. I don’t have any money with me, but I’ll take care of that soon.” How? She’d have to figure that out. “I’ll cover gas, food, all your expenses. Plus … a hundred dollars a day. Agreed?”

He balled up the blanket. “Too much hassle.”

“I can’t go back now.” She unearthed a shred of the bravado she’d possessed in such abundance as a teen, before the weight of her responsibilities had straightened her out. “If you won’t take me with you, I’ll find someone who will.”

Maybe he knew she was bluffing because he practically sneered at her. “Trust me. A chick like you isn’t cut out to spend eight hours a day on a bike.”

“Maybe not. But I can manage it for a day.”

“Forget it.”

“A thousand dollars, plus expenses.”

He carried the blanket over to the saddlebags and stuffed it in. “You think I’d trust you to pay up?”

She twisted her hands in front of her. “I’ll pay. You have my word.”

“Yeah, well, Ted had that, too, and it didn’t turn out to be worth much.”