Page 185 of Crucible
Thorin, Khalil, and Seth stand out like three tall, menacing, sexy, sore thumbs.
I, Aurelia George, for the first time in over a decade, am a non-fucking factor. Of course, they don’t know it’s me under the disguise, but I have a feeling it wouldn’t make much of a difference if they did. This feeling of being invisible is strange but freeing.
Seth looks back at me as he leads the way. Khalil is next to me while Thorin guards our backs. “Got your list, baby?”
“Right here.” I pull out the list I quickly scribbled together before we left the cabin and wave it in the air.
The house stuff is easy, but I have no idea what I need to start a garden. Khalil says they already have most of the supplies from his previous attempts. All I have to do is decide what kind of garden I want and purchase the seeds.
I’m downright giddy at the thought of doing something of my choice besides singing, but I don’t let it show. Three weeks is not nearly enough time to exorcise my uncle completely, so I’m still very much afraid of him finding a way to snatch this small slice of happiness from me, too.
“The market is this way—”
“We need to make a pit stop,” Thorin interrupts Khalil.
Seth, Khalil, and I stop walking.
“Where?”
“Here.” Thorin grabs my hand and pulls me inside the store we’re standing in front of before I can see what it is.
I’m thrust inside a store that reminds me of a REI, only a fraction of the size, dim lighting, and the overbearing smell of weed.
“Welcome to Ran—” Coughing interrupts the greeting, and my gaze follows the sound to the counter where an Asian kid around eighteen years old is pounding his chest while smoke expels from his mouth with each cough. He’s wearing a black polo with the store’s logo on the front and a beanie pulled low over his head. “Dall’s,” he finishes. “Call me J.R.” Another cough follows. “Randall is my father.”
“Hi, J.R.!”
My mountain men shoot me dirty looks, and I realize a second later that I’ve already broken the first rule.
But you know what’s even weirder than the mask?
Not speaking when spoken to.
Being a bitch will draw even more attention than the mask and have me sticking to people’s memories like glue.
Thorin tugs on my wrist, leading me through all the racks of clothing, ski equipment, and camping gear to the back wall where the shoes are. In front of the mirror dividing the wall of shoes are two plaid ottomans that have seen better days.
“Sit.”
I take a seat and look around. “What are we doing here?”
“You need new boots. Something better for the terrain. I’m tired of watching you split your feet open with those pitiful excuse for boots you’re wearing.”
“I’ll have you know these areDior.”
“Well, then you should have left them at the D-oor.”
“Oh my God.” I snort and slap my hands over the mask where my mouth would be. Thorin pauses his perusal of the hiking boots to look back at me quizzically, and I drop my hands to tease him. “Did Thorin Thayer, full-time grump, and part-time asshole, make a joke?”
He rolls his eyes and turns back to the boots with a ghost of a smile. “I joke.”
“You do not.”
Khalil sits on the second ottoman and tugs my right foot into his lap. I try not to gape as he works the laces free and tugs off my boot.
“What size shoe do you wear, songbird?”
“Seven,” Khalil and I say at the same time.
