Rubi chuckled, giant body juddering as I squirmed to get away from him, then changed my mind cos this fucker was comfortable. “Can’t lie, you’re one of the best. But I’m still sorry I gave you chaos when you needed calm.”
“What about you?”
“Eh?”
Rubi’s arm was a big pillow. I enjoyed it a second longer before forcing myself away from it with monumental effort. “What do you need from me?”
“Fucked if I know, mate.” Rubi stretched his arms over his head. Then he seemed to remember something and fished an orange from his pocket. “I’d feel better if you ate this, though. Then I can at least tell Vicky you’re getting your vitamin C.”
He tossed me the fruit. Heavy and caked in wax, it was nothing like the oranges I’d grown to love on Satsuma Island, but I appreciated the sentiment, even if the scent that assaulted me the moment I pierced the rind made my heartache ten times fucking worse.
I passed Rubi a segment.
He chewed with the same misery I felt.
I ate the rest and slumped back on the bench.
Love sucks.
It didn’t. If this trip had taught me anything, it was that love was fucking life. But Viktor didn’t call me back, and fretting over that killed any inclination I had to take a nap before we hit the road again.
I took a shower instead and my mood remained foul, but Rubi’s persistence in pushing fruit and water on me, and the radio chatter he struck up in lieu of harassing me from the passenger seat, kept my looming headache at bay enough for me to safely drive. Couldn’t say what that fucker talked about, but for the six hours he kept it up, I was more grateful than I’d ever tell him.
It was dark again by the time we called it a day. By then we’d had news that Mateo had lost his appendix but none of his attitude.
“Worse patient thanyou,” Rubi confirmed through the radio. “Which is like saying Ebola is worse than the plague.”
I didn’t answer, too caught up in wedging the Rattler into a space at a truck stop we’d already graced with our chaotic presence a fortnight ago. Back then, being away from Viktor had left me all kinds of fucking manic, and I belatedly understood Rubi a whole lot better. Now, I was just tired, and I latched onto the crackle of the radio as if it was my only tether to reality.
“Hate to say it, Roo, but your parking is still shite.”
I gave up on straight lines and grabbed the mic. “Fuck off.”
Rubi said no more and his silence got under my skin. Like I wanted to seek him out or some shit, and I had definitely not signed up to become co-dependant on that big bastard.
I shut the Rattler off. More quiet swamped me and I didn’t like it.
Fuck this.
I hopped out and stomped to where Rubi had managed to park Bertha in an actual bay.
He lumbered down from the cab, rubbing his temple with hair that made mine look tidy, glaring at his phone. “Fucking colder than a well digger’s arse out here. You get hold of Vik yet?”
“No.”
His frown deepened. “Riv ain’t picking up either.”
Honestly, it wasn’t unusual for River to not answer Rubi’s calls. I’d never seen that brother not lose his phone at least once a day. But Viktor always answered mine, and the blank screen of my own phone was giving me nightmares that hadn’t gnawed at me since the last time I’d been this wired and tired.
“He does not sleep much, until he does, and then it is my greatest fear that he will not wake up.”
“Something’s going on.” Rubi broke into my festering thoughts, still knee-deep in poking at his phone. “I don’t know where anyone is.”
“Like who?”
“Riv. Saint.”
“When do you ever know where Saint is?”