I can tell by the way her mouth tightens.
Good mouth. Full lips. Stubborn. The kind that could say mean things and make a man thank her for the abuse.
“Amelia,” she says finally.
“Amelia what?”
“No.”
I grin. “No is a strange last name.”
“It’s the last name you’re getting.”
There she is again, spine and manners tangled up with fear. She’s standing on a haunted road with a flat tire, a kid, and half her life scattered in gravel, and somehow she still sounds like she’d correct my grammar if I pushed her hard enough.
Smart woman.
Too smart to be alone on a road like this with a kid and a truck full of everything she can carry.
I glance down the road in both directions. Nothing but blacktop and trees. No other headlights. No porch lights. No help coming unless it comes wearing a cut.
That should bother her more.
It bothers me plenty.
“Where you headed, Amelia No?”
She hesitates too long.
The night seems to lean in.
“Hell,” she says.
That makes me still.
Plenty of folks say that as a curse. Around here, it’s also a destination.
“Hell, Kentucky?”
She nods.
“What business you got in Hell?”
Her fingers curl against the truck door. Nails short but pretty. One chipped. That pale missing ring mark catches my eye again. Recently gone or recently removed. Either way, it’s telling.
“I’m looking for someone.”
“Who?”
Her throat works.
August shifts in the back, whimpering now, and that sound drags her attention away from me. She’s torn between answering and soothing, between pride and desperation. I can practically see her weighing the risk of telling me the truthagainst the risk of standing here until another vehicle comes along.
Hell Road waits around us, patient as a snake.
Finally, she says, “Legendary Mike. Mike Welles.”
The name hits different.