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“How would you know how to do CPR?” Van complained, and the fact that they were suddenly bickering like an old married couple made her breathe so much easier.
“I know you have to at least let a dude get his seatbelt off,” Hale replied. “I think I hit my head on the steering wheel. Damn sedan. Did it hit anyone else? Is Mel okay?”
“I’m fine.” Her dad seemed to have calmed a bit. “You did a good job handling the road.”
So no one was going to have to tranq her father. That was one bit of good news. Van eased out of the truck, his arms still inside as he helped Hale out.
There was the tiniest bit of blood on his forehead where he’d hit the steering wheel. She moved to him, checking him over. “You need to sit down. The paramedics will be here in a couple of minutes.”
“I’m fine. Just woozy,” he said, looking back at the SUV. “Damn it. It was paid off.”
“The car can be replaced. You can’t, and you probably have a concussion.” Van stepped in, taking charge. “Sit down like Elisa asked and wait for the paramedics. This is the second time you’ve nearly given her a heart attack.”
She was pretty sure she wasn’t the only one who’d nearly lost it.
Hale frowned. “Well, it wasn’t like I was trying to.”
“But you are now,” Mel pointed out as they could hear sirens in the distance. “Let’s both sit in the warmth of the patrol car and wait for the EMTs. I can show you where I stash stuff in the back seat.”
Wait. What? She shook that off as she saw Nate’s SUV coming in from the other side. It looked like the ambulance was coming from the lodge, but Nate had driven up the mountain from Bliss. “Hale, I’m glad you’re all right.”
That didn’t seem like the thing she should say, but she couldn’t lose it. The need to cry was right there, but she had to shove it down deep.
Don’t you fucking cry. Don’t let anyone see how weak you are.
She was the authority figure here, and she couldn’t scream and cry that she’d almost lost him.
He moved back, getting into her space. “I am. I’m fine, baby. I’m glad you’re here and I’m glad Mel’s okay because we’re going to be moving into his bunker soon.”
“What?” He’d really hit his head. “You definitely have a concussion.”
“Also, you’re going to inherit a fortune in Leahan gold,” Hale promised.
“It’s Leira Seven, and it’s not gold. It’s more like pasta,” her dad corrected. “See, their entire financial system is based on this wheat-like substance…”
Hale touched her shoulder. “I’m okay and you can do your job, and we’ll do the whole holding each other thing when we get home.”
She felt her walls threaten to shake. She couldn’t lose it in front of her brand-new boss. “I can’t…”
He leaned over and briefly brushed his lips to hers. “You are perfect. Do your job and I’ll be a good patient. But we need to talk because I don’t think this was an accident.”
“Why?” Van was still pale.
“I think someone screwed with my tires in the hopes that this would happen,” Hale replied gravelly. “This was never about you. It was always me they were after. Now the only question is why.”
“We can’t know this was intentional,” Van argued. “And I drive that car, too. This absolutely could be about me.”
Her dad was leaning over the passenger side back tire. He felt around it, his arm going to the back side. “It feels like someone knocked a nail in. You can’t pick that up on the road.”
“Tires get damaged by nails all the time,” Van replied.
She went to look at what her dad had found. She followed his lead and felt around the back. “He couldn’t have picked that up on the road. It’s in the side, and it’s perpendicular. Someone put that in. Someone back at the lodge.”
A big SUV with Bliss County emblazoned on the side came to a stop, and Nate got out, looking over the assembled party with a frown. “Damn it, Hale. Who’s trying to kill you?”
Wasn’t that the question of the day?
Two hours later Elisa was finally coming down from the adrenaline high and able to think straight. It didn’t hurt that Gemma had put a big mug of coffee in her hands the minute she’d walked through the station house doors.
“You’ve never seen that woman before?” Nate was staring down at the picture of the woman she’d found earlier in the day. He stood over Hale, who was sitting at the conference table where Nate held shift meetings.
The paramedics had cleared him, and the people doc had come by the station moments before to check their work. She couldn’t believe she was already calling Caleb Burke the people doc, but here she was. Bliss had a people doc, and Noah Bennett was the animal doc, though he could be used in a pinch. Strangely, it was all starting to make sense to her, and she didn’t blink at some of the Bliss weirdness now. Like she was becoming a real citizen.
