Enzo inched his way toward the door and peeked inside. After a pause, he straightened and put his gun away.
Which meant there was no question as to whether the men might be alive. He opened the door and dragged one of the bodies out. She shut her eyes, didn’t need to see more images that would remain seared in her mind.
She kept them shut until she heard the thud of the second man being heaved onto the ground.
Her gaze went to the blood splattered on the back window. She would have to stare at it for almost two hours before they reached the farm. How was she going to keep her mind off that?
Enzo pulled off his shirt. She blinked. Yes, she’d really just seen him take off his shirt, revealing his tan muscled chest and back. She wasn’t having some sort of shock-induced hallucination. He climbed into the cab and wiped the back window with his shirt. Each stroke erased the reminder.
Her mouth dropped open. How had he known the blood bothered her, that she needed it gone? Tears came to her eyes again, this time in gratitude, in amazement.
When he’d finished, Enzo emptied the contents of a water bottle onto his shirt to rinse it out, then put it on the seat to dry and backed the truck out of the ditch. The front fender bent inward, dented, but besides that, the truck seemed undamaged. He twisted in his seat to check on her and pulled onto the road.
His backward glance reminded her there were other reasons for cleaning the windows. Most likely, he’d done it to see out of the glass, not because he was thinking of how the blood would bother her. She felt an unjustified disappointment at this realization.
She followed after him, picking up speed.
His voice came over the truck speaker. “Since I have this thing at my disposal, as soon as we get a safe distance from the city, I’m going to use it to tell you every joke I know. Most of them won’t be good, but they’ll give you something else to think about.”
She smiled. He was thinking of her after all.
17
Charity and Enzo didn’t encounter any other problems on the road. When she got near enough to the farm that she had phone coverage, she called her mother and, in a mostly coherent manner, related what happened.
She had to tell her parents the story twice. Her father generally only listened to news reports while winding down for the night and hadn’t even heard about the border skirmish.
“I had no idea the roads would be dangerous,” he said. He didn’t say more on the subject since the government could listen in on phone conversations. But his tone of voice told her that he’d had no foreknowledge of what would happen.
That didn’t seem like a good thing. If the visions failed to warn him of danger, they could all wind up dead. Did the lack of a vision mean she was supposed to have done the safe thing and stayed with Enzo in the city? Trying to guess the logic of visions made her head hurt.
When Charity pulled into the farm, she felt a sense of déjà vu. Her family stood in front of the bunkhouses waiting for her, just like they’d done after the run-in with slavers. Zia looked worried.Milo seethed. Even that was the same. Though what his anger was directed at, she couldn’t tell.
Enzo’s truck reached the group first. He got out to talk to them. Milo’s sternness disappeared. He and her father seemed to be thanking Enzo for keeping her safe. Her father looked as though he was barely restraining himself from hugging Enzo.
Charity pulled up behind them. Before she’d even parked the truck, her mother rushed over. When Charity got out, her mother threw her arms around her. “I’m so glad you’re okay. I’m so glad you’re okay.”
“I never want to go shopping again.”
“You don’t have to. After this, I’m not letting you out of my sight.”
While Enzo and Gregor examined the front fender of the new truck, Milo shot Enzo a suspicious look. It vanished by the time Enzo straightened, but Charity saw it.
Well, yes, there was alsothatto discuss. She’d known she would need to have a conversation with her family about Enzo as soon as he’d fired into the brown truck’s window. Enzo had not only known what to do to protect them, he’d managed to shoot through a small space in an even smaller amount of time. Two shots. Two men dead.
How likely was it that Enzo really was a data entry clerk?
The family wasn’table to meet privately for a council until the evening. Before lights-out, they all climbed into the van and drove to the back of the property. The buildings might be bugged. Their van was the most secure location. Charity and Gregor sat in the middle seats while Zia and Milo claimed theback row. Her father took his usual spot in the driver’s seat with her mother next to him.
“Things are getting more and more lawless,” her mother said. “It’s too dangerous to keep living as harvesters. Haven’t we done enough recruiting? Now that Enzo has shown up, there’s no reason for us to stay out here. We should just take him with us and go to New Salem.”
“Enzo might consider that kidnapping,” her father said. “We have to wait until we’re sure we can tell him about New Salem, and he chooses to go.”
Milo grunted. “Don’t tell him anything yet. He’s hiding things. I asked him at dinner where he learned to shoot so well, and he wouldn’t tell me the truth. He said it must have been luck or the grace of God.”
“Perhaps it was,” Charity’s mother said.
Milo coughed in disbelief. “I’ve heard a lot of sermons. I don’t recall Reverend Russell ever saying God would help you shoot people.”