Madalynn realized she liked Cash during that ride in Robin's car.
Whether it was companionship, alliance, or even love, she didn't know, couldn't tell at the time, not at first. Yet she did know her heart ached at the idea of leaving him behind, to handle Starkweather alone where anything could happen.
He could die doing this, die in that mansion, die at the hands of the sadistic fucker who ruined their lives, who got off to the violence he forced them into and the thought made her sick, made her stomach drop.
She should have went with him, should have told him no the mere second he told them to leave, should have put her foot down like she would have any other time and stubbornly followed him into the fire- and yet she didn't, she went with Robin, saw the stern look in his eyes and said nothing; and now she has to live with that fact, live knowing she turned tail and fled to Liberty City.
Some kind of partner she is.
The buzz of the car's engine hummed in her ears like white noise, filling the space of the car which remained otherwise quiet. Neither one of them had much to say, to busy trying to survive, to make it out of Carcer alive.
The reporter could sense something was off, however; could see it in Madalynns eyes, the way she stared off blankly out the windows with that glazed over look. Like she regretted something.
Like she regretted leaving. Leaving him.
Perhaps I'll timed, but Robin considered the girl enough of a friend to ask despite the fact.
"You miss him, don't you?"
The words could have very well been a sleeper agents activation phrase, the way Madalynn's head perked up ever so slightly, turning to face the journalist with an expression that seemed shocked, almost offended- like she couldn't believe the audacity of her.
Madalynn shifted uncomfortably in her seat, gaze flickering between the window and Robin's hand gripped firmly onto the steering wheel.
Miss him, James Earl Cash, the death row inmate she had watched kill countless people in that film, countless people before his arrest, all without remorse, without regret, just calculated precision and a blank expression, mere survival.
The idea of missing someone like him is preposterous. He's scum, human trash, the type of people she despises, the type of people she wouldn't hesitate to have thrown behind bars for the rest of their lives.
Or, at least, she would have said that in the past. Something she thought before they met, before he saved her life, before she patched his wounds, before they traded tactics and theories between hushed whispers in the shadows, before they ventured the death circus together-
Before he took her hand in his, fingers treaded between one another, the callouses of his fingers scratched against her palm, swallowing her hand whole, warm and comforting despite the amount of blood caking the skin.
"I shouldn't have left him." Her voice wavers, "I should have went with him, only God fucking knows what's happening back there right now and I should be there to help him! I..." 'I care' 'I love'.
Robin stays silent, eyes lingering on her, watching, analyzing; then she smiles.
Without a word, she twists upon the wheel, jerking them around, wheels screeching against the asphalt below and next thing she knows they've turned right back around, right back into Carcer.
Madalynn gawks at her, shoving herself forward and toward Robin, eyes wide with fear and concern, staring like she sees a ghost. "What the hell are you doing!? You have to take that evidence to Liberty City, Carcer isn't going to do anything but-"
"Oh shut up! We're going back. Or, you're going back." She smiles, smiles with that knowing gaze. "You need to go rescue your man, before he gets himself killed."
