This is a birthday story for revoinfinite, happy birthday to you! Her prompt for this story is fabulous and I love the inspiration I found in that prompt about a mission in the Gulf of Mexico and a small village near the beach. Thank you so much for that! I wish you a very happy birthday and a lot of love, Love from Love
With Charlie's birthday two weeks away and her life filled with the absence of hope and the reality of war , she feels no desire to celebrate that day. She is given an out when she learns that Bass and Miles have been called away to the Gulf of Mexico for a mission to infiltrate a small patriot camp. After insisting they bring her with them, they make the trek south and over a week later, end up in a small Mexican village within walking distance to the beach...
The scent of the ocean in her hair
Chapter 1
In a quiet kitchen and with a past behind them filled with who they were and what could have been, Miles has to look away.
He can't look at her. She is still looking at him with eyes he knows so well. Years of forbidden want that should not have been there, years of fucking in cheap hotels behind Ben's back and a life filled with sharp edges are occupying the space between the both of them.
'What do you want me to say, Rachel?' Miles' voice booms through the kitchen. Guilt and irritation and not knowing what the hell to do are burning in his chest.
'I need you to tell me that the one child I have left is not leaving today. With you...' Her voice is dangerously steady. She pauses when she is looking straight at him. ' ...and with him.' There is blunt coolness is those last three words.
'Rachel, she needs this. I can't stop her.'
'You mean you do not want to stop her.' Rachel's voice is filled with anger.
Her words hurt more than he can or wants to admit. Because he would burn this world to the ground for Charlie. He would do it all again. For her.
He knows she needs her space. She is so much like him. He made a mistake when he let her go out there on her own once, after he brought Rachel back to Willoughby.
He knows it was Bass who made sure he could pull her into his arms again that day she showed up in Willoughby months after he watched her leave. He won't let her go. Not again. If she needs to be out there, he will be right there with her.
When he looks at Rachel, there is more accusation and the faintest wave of loathing in her eyes. She is shutting him out. He knows, right there and then, that this conversation is over.
'We will be back in two weeks.'
He wants to tell her he will look out for Charlie. But if he still has to convince her of that, than he has no idea in hell what he is still doing here. He doesn't know how many times he can have the same conversation.
She doesn't say a word when he leaves the kitchen.
The soft sounds of small town life fill the stables behind the Porter house. A crossbow leans against the wooden frame of the door.
Charlie is saddling her horse. The leather of the saddle feels smooth under the palm of her hands. Behind her, she can hear Monroe enter the stables. She doesn't turn around.
She can feel his tall body behind her, while he is saddling his own horse. When she turns to check on her weapons, two knives, her gun and a crossbow that is there with her every time it is her and the road, he is closer than she thought he would be.
The bare skin of her arm brushes against his tanned skin. She can feel the rough fabric of the deep green cloth he keeps wrapped around his wrist against hers. It is only a subtle change in his shoulders and breathing when she is close to him, but she has noticed it.
Miles is still inside, arguing with her mother. Charlie had left the kitchen fifteen minutes ago. She knows why her mother had looked at her with disbelieve and shocked hurt in her eyes when Charlie had told her that she would not be home for her birthday. Five more days and it is there and she will be twenty five and all she knows is that she wants to be everywhere but here when that happens.
After too much loss and hope that became a thing of her past, after Jason and long bloody battles, after everything, she does not want to celebrate.
She needs the road.
Her mother made a choice, years ago on a narrow path in the woods. In nightmares she still yells for her mother to come back. The arms of a father now gone around her small shoulders, keeping her in one place, preventing her from running after her mother who had left her. She could have stayed. She didn't.
It has been painful, to slowly allow herself to truly feel the magnitude of that decision. It still is. Because it was a decision. Her mother had walked all the way to Philadelphia. Away from her. Away from the life they could have had. Away from the truth.
And when she did, a part of their mother daughter bond had been broken into small pieces. Pieces too small to ever find again and put together, there where they belong.
She can't be here to celebrate a birthday she does not want to celebrate. She can't make her mother understand she needs space that is waiting out there for her. So she had walked outside and to the stables to make sure she, her horse, her weapons and their supplies were ready. Away from the argument and the wall of always being right that is her mother.
It should surprise her more that she is able to tolerate Monroe's silent presence so close to her. It should surprise her even more that at moments like these, he always seems to be around. Keeping his mouth shut and with his eyes there, waiting for her to meet, just like on this afternoon when she is carefully checking her gun and ammo. It should surprise her. It doesn't.
'Ready?' His voice is deep.
She just rolls her eyes at him and his inability to keep out how much he craves to fight again. To be out there again with Miles.
Bass looks at her. He can see the tension in her shoulders. He watches how her fingers wrap around her crossbow before she moves it over her shoulder. Hell, that crossbow of hers. She told him once about that night she had almost managed to kill him. On a night when Miles had fallen asleep and they had shared hours before sunrise where they both had been unable to sleep.
He had been surprised as hell she had been willing to talk about it. But he had kept his mouth shut and had let her talk. She had told him how close she had been to killing him with that crossbow, right outside his trailer in New Vegas.
Half the continent had wanted him dead. Miles had tried. But Charlie, Charlotte...she had pulled that damn trigger. It is the deadly force of that strength that is so her, that makes him look at her every fucking time he knows he shouldn't.
It is like she can read his damn mind, because her blue eyes meet his. The afternoon sunlight is falling on her hair. And fucking hell, the distance between them is heavy with whatever the fuck has been happening between them from that day she told him he was nothing in an empty swimming pool outside Pottsboro.
Charlie moves her hair over one shoulder to let a slow Texan breeze move over her skin . Little drops of sweat move from neck to her shoulder. She ignores his eyes she can still feel on her.
She guides her horse out of the stables, knowing Monroe is right there behind her. They wait in front of the porch for Miles.
The sound of Miles letting the kitchen door slam shut behind him breaks the late afternoon silence. There is deep misery in Miles' eyes. Misery that finds its way to her heart quickly. Misery she can't ignore.
He won't meet her eyes when he walks to his horse. Normally, Monroe would be Monroe. Aching to throw something in Miles' face after one of the many arguments between Miles and her mom.
But after she watches Miles, she watches him. He is clenching his jaws when he looks at Miles. She notices a shift in his eyes and there are no biting words about Miles playing house with her mom. Not this time.
When they finally leave and Miles and Monroe are riding in front of her, the light of the sun is hitting the hilt of Miles' sword. Charlie notices movements of the curtains of the kitchen window. She turns around one more time.
Her mother is standing there. Watching Miles. Monroe. Watching Her. She can see the disappointment and rejection radiate of her. Seeing her mother standing in front of the kitchen window, makes her remember her mother on another day.
And the memory of the day she had to go, months after the tower, suddenly finds her. And for one moment, the afternoon changes into another day. Into a night where it had been her and her crossbow against her shoulder blades and the decision to disappear for a while.
She remembers her mother's quietness on that night. She remembers how hard it had stung when her mother had not said a word when Charlie told her she had to go and be on her own.
She remembers Miles' embrace, telling her to keep her stupid to a minimum. She remembers how she had felt him swallow, so close to her temple with his wide arms around her, holding her so close to his chest that she had been unsure if he would let her go. Unsure if she could let go of him.
His arms around her and his wide chest against her body had almost made her stay. She remembers how she had taken in his scent, with her nose buried in his neck. She remembers her tears. Tears she had not allowed herself to cry.
It feels like another life. Charlie looks away from her mother when the memory slowly fades. She focuses on the rhythm of the road that is waiting for her and the mission that is waiting for them in Mexico.
She did not know it then, but when she had left Miles behind that night, she had left to walk straight to Monroe.
And now they are both here. Those two men. Riding right there in front of her. Wide shoulders. Dark hair, swords and guns and messy curls and a leather jacket.
And another fight ahead.
Author's Note Happy Birthday to you again! I hope you, and everybody who is reading this story, enjoyed the start of this story. Love from Love
