Take You Away: A Novella by Ember Casey

WARD
     
    I never thought I’d be so happy to see a fucking gas station.
    At first I think my brain’s just screwing with me. After all, we’ve been in the car for fifteen hours straight and I’ve downed so many energy drinks that I'm shocked I haven’t started hallucinating yet. We’ve seen nothing but empty highway for almost sixty miles. And my gas gauge has been on empty for the last fifteen. We passed a single rest stop a while back, but that's it. I was beginning to think we’d be stranded out here until that neon light lit up the sky, like a damned angel with diesel prices dangling out of her ass.
    Ol’ Stella just barely makes it up the off ramp. There are funny noises coming from beneath her hood as I roll into the station, and she’s sputtering by the time we’re at the pump.
    "There, girl," I say quietly, patting the dashboard and yanking out my keys. "You did it."
    I glance over at the passenger’s seat. Addison— Louisa —is curled up, her head resting against the window. She’s completely oblivious to the fact that we almost had to get out and walk those last few miles, but that’s fine with me. I’m supposed to be her knight in shining armor, not the idiot who wasn’t paying attention to the fuel levels.
    She’s been asleep for the past hour. Maybe more. She’s drawn her knees up to her chest, and she looks so small, so vulnerable, curled up like that. Almost like a child.
    I can’t help myself. I reach over to her. Her hair has fallen across her face, and it’s curlier than I’ve ever seen it. She must have been pretty vigilant about straightening it back at Huntington Manor. Now that it’s her natural texture—even though it’s still not her natural color—I feel like a complete idiot for not recognizing her.
    Louisa Cunningham. I’m still trying to process the fact that this tiny, confusing, intoxicating girl is the daughter of the late Wentworth Cunningham. How did I end up like this with her?
    I push her hair behind her ear. She stirs slightly but doesn’t wake up. Even in sleep, she looks so sad. So lost. And fuck, if I don’t want to help her. How does she do this to me? Part of me feels completely helpless, looking at her. And the other part would fight my way to Hell and back just to help her escape those shadows I’ve seen in her eyes.
    She shifts again and murmurs something in her sleep. I pull back my hand. I don’t want to wake her. Maybe she’s finding some peace in her dreams.
    Quietly, I climb out of the car and push the door to behind me. At this hour, we’re the only ones filling up.
    Or maybe everyone else just knows better than to stop at this shithole.
    The fluorescent lights flicker overhead, and there’s graffiti everywhere—and not the kind people generally consider "art." I glance over at the little convenience store, and the attendant’s watching me through the cloudy window. Probably making sure I’m not going to add to the vandalism. Or, more likely, making sure I don't pump and run. I bet he gets a lot of those out here. I wouldn’t be surprised if he has his hand on a shotgun beneath the counter.
    Instinctively, I glance down at Louisa through the car window. She hasn’t moved. Good. I don’t want her to wake up and freak out. She doesn’t belong in a place like this. A place with profanity spray painted on every surface and condom wrappers blowing across the cracked concrete. Hell, I don’t even want to be here, and I grew up surrounded by this sort of shit.
    I sigh and swipe my debit card at the pump. It’s declined, even though I’m sure I still have about five hundred dollars in my account. I try three times, just to be sure, before I'm forced to stumble inside.
    The bell on the door gives a depressing clunk clunk as I step inside. The convenience store reeks of cigarette smoke. I try not to breathe in.
    "Thirty dollars on Pump Three," I say.
    The man looks me up and down. One of his eyes is bigger than the other, and there’s a nasty