I turned toward the window before he saw my face.
The pines flashed past in strips of gold and dark. My dead car was gone behind us. Crystal wasn’t in his truck.
Dex caught me.
I stayed still, watched the road ahead, and waited for my next chance.
Chapter Two
THE WOMAN IN MY PASSENGERseat had been quiet for almost four miles.
That worried me more than the talking had.
The truck rolled down out of the timber, engine low, tires humming over the county road as the last of the evening burned out behind the ridgeline. Cooler air pushed through the vents and carried the smell of sap, sunbaked asphalt, and hot metal off the hood. Beside me, Crystal Kemp sat with her restrained hands in her lap, her pale hair tangled from the chase, one boot planted like she’d use it on my dash if the right opportunity presented itself.
The warrant photo hadn’t prepared me for her.
In the photo, she’d looked like the kind of woman people underestimated on purpose. Pretty. Polished. A little soft around the eyes. A bookkeeper with a clean face, a clean record until the charges, and the kind of good-girl stare that made men in courtrooms say she must’ve gotten in over her head.
The woman beside me had already tried to run, lie, flirt, joke, kick me, and make me laugh hard enough to hate myself for almost doing it.
I could believe she’d commit a crime.
I was having a harder time believing she’d run from one.
Flight wasn’t her instinct. Fight was. It was in the way she held still like stillness was temporary, in the way her chin stayedlifted, in the way every answer came sharpened at both ends. She’d pick the locked door just so she could swing it open and hit whoever waited on the other side.
I shouldn’t have wondered what that energy would do if she aimed it somewhere besides escape.
I did.
My cock pushed hard against my zipper, and I tightened my hand on the wheel.
Professional work at its finest.
Crystal turned her head against the seat and looked at me through the half dark. “You always get this quiet after kidnapping women?”
“Recovery,” I said.
“You keep saying that like repetition makes it less felonious.”
“You keep saying kidnapping like it changes the warrant.”
“I’m exploring branding options.”
“You’re exploring whether I’m distracted.”
Her mouth curved, slow and dangerous. “Are you?”
I kept my eyes on the road.
That was the safer answer.
The county route cut across the slope in long, dark bends. Pine trunks flashed through the headlights. The sky ahead had gone deep blue over the mountains, with one narrow strip of orange still burning low behind us. The temperature dropped fast once the sun disappeared, but the inside of the truck held the day’s heat and the too-close smell of dust, leather, and woman.
Crystal shifted in the seat. The faint sound from her lap stayed small, but my attention went right to it anyway.
I’d already checked the fit twice. She wasn’t hurt. She had enough movement to drink water and not enough to get both hands on the wheel.
