Brain Storm, Cat Gilbert [read books for money TXT] 📗

if anything happened to him, we’d all be up the creek. We decided to stop in Greenville, about an hour outside of Dallas. I called Trinity’s cell to let her know about the paper, and we agreed to meet up at the Chili’s at the Greenville exit.

I watched the first stars come into sight as darkness fell. Last night, I had been looking forward to this evening, knowing that when it finally arrived, it would be over. We’d either have succeeded or not, but, at least, the dread that had been suffocating me would be gone. Sometimes it seemed like that was how I lived my life. Waiting for the current trial to pass, relief when it did, frustration when the next one reared its ugly head. Living from one problem or challenge to the next. Wishing tomorrow would just magically appear so today would be over. Wishing my life away. One of these days, I promised myself, I was going to live in the moment. Enjoy what life had to offer. Have no worries or responsibilities. Someday, maybe, but it wasn’t going to be tonight.

“We need to talk about what happens after Dallas,” I said to Mac.

“Okay.” Mac settled down into his seat, shifting his position so he could look at me better. “What’s your take on it?”

My take on it? That was easy. I’d gone over it at least a dozen times in my mind.

“As I see it, it boils down to three problems. First, someone, or perhaps multiple someones at the Agency are after me. Second, we don’t know who they are, or how high up this goes. Even if we find out who the bad guy or guys are in the Agency, if we don’t know who they’re working for, we’ve accomplished nothing.”

“That’s two big ones, all right. What’s the third?”

“Me. I’m every bit as dangerous as the guys who are after us.” I held up my hand to stop him from disagreeing with me. “I know what you’re going to say. So far, we’ve been lucky and relying on instinct has worked in our favor, but it’s only a matter of time before we get in a tight jam, and I lose it. I feel like we’re playing Russian Roulette, only I’m the gun.”

“So what do you want to do?”

“What do I want to do? Run. As fast and far as I can. That’s what I want.” My voice was calm, half joking, but I could feel myself getting angry. I didn’t know how or why this was happening, but it had ruined everyone’s life. Now I was responsible for them. So would they be safer with me gone? Would my responsibility to them be any less if I wasn’t with them? Frustration and resentment at the situation rolled through me as I sat silently looking out the window, avoiding Mac’s gaze. Then I remembered it didn’t matter what he saw or heard. There was no way to mask my emotions from him. If I felt them, Mac could feel them. I looked over to see if it was affecting him, but he seemed okay.

“You can’t do that.” He said it so quietly that I had trouble hearing it, but the fact was, I did, and it sent my hackles up another couple of notches.

I turned away from him again with a mumbled, “Yeah, right.” and was thrown against the door when he swerved off onto the shoulder and stood on the brakes.

“Okay. You want to run, Taylor. Here’s your chance.” He tossed the keys at me as he threw open the door and got out. Before I could blink an eye, he was walking down the highway, leaving me sitting there in the passenger seat, keys dangling in my hand.

I just sat there, stunned, as he walked away. I couldn’t believe he was doing this. He’d been shadowing me for seven years and now, just like that, he was willing to just walk away? There was a full moon and between that and the passing headlights, I was able to make out Mac’s shape for a while. I kept my eyes on him, fully expecting him to turn around at any minute, but he didn’t. As I watched, he became nothing more than a dark shadow on the horizon and then suddenly he disappeared, swallowed by the darkness.

It was over. I was finally on my own. As the feeling of freedom washed over me, I looked at the keys resting in my hand and realized Mac had given me much more than a chance to run. He’d given me the right to choose. I’d been carried along for the past few days on a whirlwind of events and now, for the first time, the choice of what to do next was mine and mine alone.

I opened the door and got out, taking in a deep breath of the country air. The light scent of fresh cut hay was barely noticeable over the stench of cow manure. After a few minutes, my nose recovered from the assault and the smell ratcheted down from overpowering to bearable.

There was a break in the flow of traffic and in the silence I could make out the sound of cattle grazing nearby. Leaning back against the car door, I thought about what it was I really wanted to do, now that I had the choice.

Mac had forced me to face a few things, not the least of which was that I had been running away for quite some time. Now that I thought about it, I’d been running since the key incident. I was just doing it mentally, lying to myself and everyone else. I’d allowed myself to be driven by fear. Fear of the thing inside me and what it could do. Afraid of hurting someone I cared about by accident, or making the wrong choice and getting one or all of us killed. Running away from the truth.

I’d deluded myself into thinking that there was some way out of the mess. That I could find a way to keep everyone safe, and happy. Retain some semblance of the lives we once lived and all the while I’d been tilting at windmills. I was kidding myself. There was no running away from this. Not for me. And Mac knew it. He’d felt it in me when I didn’t even know it existed. Strange feeling knowing there is someone out there who might know you better than you know yourself. He’d given me the chance to get out, and I wasn’t going to take it. He’d known that I wouldn’t, even when I didn’t. When he said I couldn’t run, I thought he meant that he wouldn’t let me. Live and learn.

Shaking my head in disgust, I pushed away from the car and kicked at a clump of grass. All this inner angst had been for nothing. Things would have been so much easier if I had just looked at the facts and accepted them at face value. I still had questions, but I knew the answers would come. The important thing was that the decision had been made. I knew what had to be done. Now I just had to figure out how to make it work.