Du Rose Blaze

Chapter Eight

Chapter Eight

Roller“I need coffee.” Logan stepped from the truck and stretched, pointing his fingers towards the matte azure sky.

Hana pouted and jumped from the runner board, not waiting for him to open her door. “I need the bathroom,” she announced, seizing her chance to dash across the busy car park. She lurched into the nearest stall, hissing in annoyance as her sleeve became entangled with the latch. Then she crouched without touching the walls and buried her face in her forearms like a child. The pose lasted thirty seconds before her thigh muscles atrophied and she rose with an equal measure of difficulty and disappointment. “You never could pull off a spectacular sulk,” she rebuked herself with a sigh.

Hana used the toilet and washed her hands at the sink, primping her hair and dragging her feet to avoid Logan’s scrutiny. As the hands of her watch stole away the minutes, she felt the vibration of her phone in her jacket pocket. Other travellers milled around her, coupled with the jarring clang of the toilet doors as women moved through their ablutions like automatons. Hana lurked by the hand dryers and tugged her phone free.

‘Got you a coffee to go. Waiting in the truck.’

Logan’s thoughtfulness stung her. She sensed the familiar dance begin, the unconstrained notes already chiming in her mind. He’d recognised the storm brewing in her heart and chosen to bide his time until the complaints spilled from her lips like a burst dam. Then he’d deal with the fallout in his gentle, authoritative way.

Hana washed her hands again and exited the bathroom, knowing he observed her crestfallen trudge from the service station to the truck. She slammed the door behind her and sank into her seat, reaching for the cardboard cup in the holder.

As her hand curled around the warm surface, Logan’s fingers arrested the movement. The sun’s rays refracted through the windscreen and bleached the colour from his skin, revealing the myriad fine scars. Hana’s chest tightened and the list of petty grievances pushed from behind her lips.

“It’s still hot.” Logan released his grip and lifted a napkin from the dashboard. “Use this.”

Tears prickled the backs of Hana’s eyelids and the damn burst as she accepted his offering. It wasn’t just a scrap of flimsy tissue in that moment, but a truce flag. “I didn’t want you to see Caroline. Ever again.” Her lungs shuddered and her breath hitched, as her misery lowered a blade onto the last strings of her composure. “She’ll never give up on you. She told me that every time I took Edin to the prison.”

Logan said nothing, but his grey irises absorbed Hana’s tumult. They morphed from a stormy sea to a gunmetal hue. “I know.” His admission stripped away the remains of her weak resolve and she dropped her hand into her lap. “She phoned me after her appeal failed yesterday. I sent her call to voicemail.”

“You knew how she felt and yet you let me keep driving up here for her a***e?” Hana shuddered, the motion starting at her shoulders and ricocheting through her torso to end in the depths of her roiling stomach. Pique entered her tone.

Logan threw back his head and laughed. “I don’t stop you doing anything, Hana. It’s best to oversee your madness and wait until you run aground.” He sighed and his dark fringe bounced with the movement of his lashes. “You’re just like Sacha; all misguided loyalty and grand plans. She’d gallop anywhere without thought about how she’d stop when she got there.”

“Thanks.” Hana wiped her nose with the edge of her sleeve and grimaced. “You loved Sacha,” she murmured, reaching for the hidden compliment instead of the rebuke.

“I also despaired of her.” Hana experienced the force of his perceptive gaze as he turned to face her. He raised an eyebrow and dipped his head. “How many times over the years have different people wanted to put a bolt through her brain?”

Hana gasped, and a flush crawled up her neck. “That’s just rude!”

“Drink your coffee.” Logan jerked his head towards her cup. “Do you think we should drive to Tama’s house first, or to the fire station?”

Hana reached for her cup and pursed her lips. “I don’t know.” She sipped and her eyes glazed as she turned her thoughts to Logan’s wayward nephew. “We might find him hiding out at home, but we don’t have a key. The fire chief didn’t seem to know much, only that he hadn’t fronted for work and didn’t answer either his phone or his front door.”

Logan slugged the last of his coffee and held onto the cup, tapping the fingers of his other hand on the steering wheel. “Yeah, she said the same to me. Know any cops?” He narrowed his eyes to slits and squinted sideways at her.

Hana avoided his gaze and busied herself with her drink. When she didn’t respond, Logan dipped forward to study her expression of guilt.

“Right.” He exhaled. “I guess we’re on our own, then.”

Hana nodded. “I tried to speak to him, but he assumed the worst as soon as I mentioned Tama. Maybe you could try?” She issued the question without enthusiasm. Logan had long since abandoned any hope of establishing an amiable relationship with Bodie. They avoided each other, circling Hana like moons, sharing the same orbit but destined never to engage.

Logan dumped his cup in a nearby dustbin, stretched again, and then started the diesel engine. As Hana mirrored him in fastening her seatbelt, she imagined them as paragliders leaping in tandem from a high ridge and diving into the thermals. “Where are you, Tama?” she whispered beneath the rumble of the engine. “Did you leave us any clue?”