“Leave it,” I suggested. “We’ll buy whatever you need when we get where we’re going.”
She tilted her head. “How are we getting where we’re going?”
I pulled a set of keys out of my pocket and showed them to her. “Lynn procured a car for us.”
She eyed the key chain. “A Tesla? You don’t seem the Tesla type.”
I shrugged. “I’m not. Which Lynn knew. He found me something I would likely never be caught dead in. Anyone who is after me will know I’d never get into something like that willingly, too.”
“Well,” she hesitated. “I still need my clothes. And my phone. And my computer. I’m like three days behind schedule on my work. I know that I fucked up and led people right here, but I’ll just disable the Wi-Fi card. I’ll do it all offline, use a jump drive, and upload it from a coffee shop or something. Or, get Hunt to do it. I don’t know. He said he could. Whatever. I just really need to get this to them. They’re counting on me.”
I nodded once. “Okay then.”
Fifteen minutes later, we were both standing next to the fuckin’ Tesla.
“Did you know that Elon Musk did not start Tesla?” Belle opened the door, tossed her crap into the back seat, and then slammed it closed.
I sighed in resignation, opening the door much more carefully than her seeing as my headache was still very much there.
“I didn’t,” I admitted. “I always assumed it was him.”
“Most do,” she confirmed. “And did you know that, regularly, only six parts on a Tesla need replacement?”
I grunted out a, “No shit?”
“The four tires and the two wiper blades. The rest are made so efficiently that it’s very rare for anything else to need replacing,” she murmured. “I read an article once about this. They said even the brake pads don’t really wear down because the Tesla braking system is regenerative, turning the electric motor into a generator to recharge the battery. They last a really long time.”
“Huh,” I said as I started the car.
“Wow.” she paused. “You know, I’ve never really heard one. I’ve seen one, of course, but I’ve always just assumed that they would sound like a regular car. This is eerie.”
It was.
It didn’t even sound like it was turned on.
But the damn thing was responsive, I’d give it that.
My eyes scanned the surroundings as we drove, and despite the tenseness of the situation, we ended up talking about completely random shit to pass the time.
That was until she started to edit.
Then I lost her to her work.
Every once in a while, she would spout out random bits of knowledge that I was beginning to really adore.
“Cherophobia is the irrational fear of being happy.” Belle paused. “The reason I told you that is that in this book, there’s a girl that’s scared of loose or detached hair. I was trying to find a phobia that didn’t sound so… weird. But still be cool.”
My lips twitched. “It’s kind of sad if you’re afraid to be happy.”
She looked over at me. “It sounds like you,” she countered.
I snorted. “Maybe. Maybe not. I just don’t want to be falsely happy. I want to be truly happy. That means that I don’t go faking being happy just because seeing me happy will make other people feel better. That doesn’t mean that I’m not happy. It just means that I would much rather live my life for myself. Not anybody else.”
She hummed, seeming to agree with my words, and fell back into silence as she went back to her work.
Fifteen minutes later, she paused mid-keystroke and looked at me. “Did you know that in Sweden, they notify blood donors when their blood is used?”
My brows went up. “I think if that were the same here, then more people would be willing to donate blood.”