Page 5 of Quarter Miles (Runaway 3)

Get over Cash or go somewhere he’s not.

Carol had good intentions and I believed that she was looking out for me. She didn’t want me to suffer here while he moved on with his life. I didn’t want that for myself.

But it was a stark reminder of the truth. I wasn’t a Greer. I was the guest in the family photo.

Cash was the Greer, and she wasn’t losing her grandson.

My truck was waiting outside the lodge, parked in front of a hitching post we used for space markers. I climbed inside and sucked in a deep breath, fighting the urge to cry.

Part of me wanted to shove my head in the dirt and pretend like this wasn’t an issue. After all, I’d been practicing that move for years. I could go about my work, enjoy my simple life and drown the feelings I’d been harboring for a decade in work and denial.

But that wasn’t working out so well for me, was it? I’d arrived at a crossroads and maybe after eight hundred and thirty-one miles, I’d know which path to take.

I sucked in another deep breath, then started the truck and reversed out of my space. The gravel road that wound from the lodge to the highway was damp from last night’s rain shower, and the grass along the drive glistened. My tires didn’t kick up the normal cloud of dust as I drove, giving me a clear view of the imposing lodge through the rearview mirror.

Its logs had been stained a dark, reddish brown. The towering peak of the eaves was nearly as tall as the hundred-year-old evergreens that clustered around the structure.

That building was home. It was my sanctuary. And with every turn of my wheels, I felt it slipping through my grasp. As the lodge grew smaller and smaller in the distance, I was more and more certain I wouldn’t see it again.

“You’re being silly,” I singsonged to myself, aiming my gaze straight ahead.

This was only a vacation. I’d be back in two weeks or less, my feelings for Cash under control. Plus, I had a ten-thousand-dollar check in my pocket.

The frugal girl who’d once begged for spare change demanded it go into savings. But the woman who rarely splurged on herself pictured spa treatments and monogrammed robes and a shopping spree.

A wave of excitement rushed through my veins, swirling with my nerves in a heady mix of anticipation.

Oregon, here I come.

I’d be on my way as soon as I picked up the car.

Eight hundred and thirty-one miles. And twenty-five cents in my pocket.

Maybe Carol had been onto something. I had no schedule. Though I wasn’t going to spend three or four weeks on the road, maybe I needed to force myself to spend two. Fourteen days was plenty of time to get to Oregon and hop on a plane home. It was plenty of time to spend an extra day or two exploring.

The coin in my pocket begged to be flipped.

Heads left. Tails right.

I smiled, anxious to pick up the Cadillac and sit behind the wheel. One more stop, then I was gone.

One more stop, then I’d take this trip by quarter miles.

Chapter Two

Katherine

I pulled into Gemma and Easton’s driveway just as my beautiful, pregnant friend came out the front door.

“Morning,” I called as I got out of my truck.

“Hey.” She waved me up the porch. “Easton should be back soon with the car.”

“Where did he take it?” I was anxious to get on the road.

“To fill it up.”

I frowned as I reached the top step. “I know how to get gas.”