Page 12 of My Violent Valentine

He pushes the button on the key fob and the lights on a red Bronco light up as the SUV gives two short sharp beeps.

“Oh this is discreet,” I say.

“Do you want me to paint it before we leave?”

I just laugh and get in the car.

We’ve been driving for fifteen minutes when I finally feel warm enough to take off my coat. I stuff it in the backseat. Brian has been totally focused on the road this whole time, and the only sound has been the windshield wipers trying to stay ahead of the snowflakes pelting down. It’s warm enough now for them to melt when they hit the glass.

“Can I listen to my playlist?”

We’ve never gone on a long road trip together before, so it’s theoretically possible he might murder me before we’re done because I am an antsy traveler. And I’m going to have to pee every two hours like a chihuahua. I’ve decided not to inform Brian of any of these things yet. We can just let it be a fun discovery on the trip.

“Sure.”

I hook up my MP3 player and press the play button.

“What is this?” he asks as a song called Killer begins to play.

“My villain playlist. Just go with it.”

“Oh, this is going to be a fun trip.”

“Yep.”

“Did you bring my music?”

I pull the Chopin CD out of my bag. “Right here.”

We don’t ever talk about this, the fact that he pretty much has to have this music. Just in case. It’s one of only a few vulnerabilities I’m aware of. No one else knows what this music means to him, or how it helps him when things get bad. Anyone who has heard him listening to classical music at night when he runs on the treadmill probably just thinks it’s a creepy Brian thing—like he’s some kind of civilized killer. They don’t understand that he actually needs it.

“So what’s up with the tarot card?” Brian says out of nowhere.

“I’m sorry, what?” Of course he’d bring this up when we’re miles away from the house, in the middle of frozen nowhere with only the heat from his SUV protecting us, so I can’t just dramatically fling myself out of the Bronco and walk home to avoid this conversation.

“The card. You took it as a trophy, right?”

“Uh...” I say. I look out the window because Brian is really good at telling if somebody is lying. I found the death card peaking out from under the blankets and hoped Brian didn’t see it, but even then I knew somehow he had.

“I saw it on Groundhog Day, Mina.”

“What? How do you remember it was Groundhog Day, and what is it with you and the fucking groundhog?” These words sound mad, but I’m not mad, more surprised. I seriously cannot believe he’s been holding this in for nine days. When he didn’t mention it for a day or two, I thought maybe I was wrong and he didn’t see it. But nope. He was just waiting for his moment.

“Did you just take the one card?” he asks.

“Ummm, no. I took the whole deck.”

“Why?”

“Because they were beautiful.” It’s not a lie.

He takes one hand off the wheel and skims the back of his fingers down my cheek. “I get that.”

We drive for another five minutes with only my villain playlist filling the car when he says, “Learn anything worth knowing?”

“I don’t know what you mean.” I say. Is he actually open to this?

He shrugs. “I think we’ve both thought about that tarot reading more than once since Christmas Eve. The Lovers. The Devil. The Tower.”

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