Light bounced from the rearview mirror blinding her as the car was hit from behind. Both she and Ryan lurched forward, and her hands gripped the wheel as she struggled to keep the car under control. The vehicle that had trailed behind from town was now right behind them.
Her gaze flicked to the mirror. The lights were growing larger. The vehicle was coming closer. It was going to ram them again. Idiot. Maybe it was some drunkard on the way home from town.
Metal screeched against metal, and their car jolted forward again. She felt the car slide a little on the icy surface of the road.
Ryan swore as he twisted around in his belt. Vicky eyed the mountain road ahead. It was dark, there were no streetlights this far out from town. Their headlights cut glowing swathes across alternate stretches of snow and heavily forested mountainside, ice slurries slowly turning to big fat flakes. She couldn’t tell what kind of car it was behind them, all she could see were headlights in her mirror. And they were coming closer—again.
Chapter Twenty-Five
She pressed her foot down on the accelerator, and their car shuddered across the ice, tires slipping as she prayed for traction. The car heaved as the tires finally gripped the road.
But the vehicle was right behind them, bearing down on them.
They were coming up to a bend in the road. If the vehicle nudged them, even just a little, it could send them flying off the edge and down the mountainside. She sped up, trying to increase the distance between the two cars.
Ryan had one arm around the backrest of his seat, the other along the dashboard, and he stared out of the windshield. “Careful, Vic,” he said, his tone calm.
“I know.” Yeah, she knew. If they took the bend too fast, they’d skid and go over the edge. If they were too slow, and got hit from behind, they’d skid and go over the edge. Either way, it would be painful.
“Hang on,” she cried. She shifted down in gear and took her foot of the accelerator, but didn’t brake as she entered the bend. The car drifted a little across the road, and she gritted her teeth as she held on to the steering wheel, praying.
The downgrade in gear was enough to slow the vehicle enough to take the bend. She sighed in relief as they cleared the curve. She lowered her head, eyes alternating between mirror and road, trying to keep her rear fender out of reach of the vehicle behind them.
They were approaching another bend. She tried the same maneuver, tried to get a little further ahead so that she had time to slow.
This time she pumped the brake, just a little, as they entered the turn, easing off almost immediately. The vehicle raced up and clipped the bumper. Vicky screamed and Ryan yelled as she felt the tail of the car spin across the road. The car shuddered as the rear wheel on the passenger side left the surface of the road, spinning across a rough shoulder.
Vicky fought her natural instinct to slam on the brakes and yank on the wheel, even when she felt the slight dip in the car as the rear passenger wheel left the edge of the road, skidding across air.
Her grip tight, she gently nudged the steering wheel, her foot coming off the accelerator pedal until she could see the middle of the road again.
“Damn you,” she yelled at the rearview mirror. This wasn’t an accident. Someone was deliberately trying to run them off the road.
“Sonovabitch!” Ryan roared as the vehicle nudged them. Both cars were tearing up the straight stretch of road, trying to jockey for position.
“There he is, coming up on your right,” Ryan called. Vicky swerved, blocking the path of the vehicle. If the offending car managed to creep up the side it wouldn’t take much effort to ram them off the road.
For several hair-raising seconds, both cars navigated the bends and straights with the intensity of a Formula One race. The car shuddered with each hit from the vehicle. Perspiration ran down Vicky’s forehead, and she blinked furiously, trying to keep it out of her eyes.
The vehicle hit them again, this time aiming its force at their rear right wheel. Vicky wrestled with the wheel as Ryan swore.
They were coming up to yet another bend. Okay, this has gone on too long, you bastard. Firming her lips, Vicky sped into the turn and gently braked, ignoring Ryan’s yell as the car started to slide. This time she swung the wheel in the direction the car was turning, foot easing down on the brake, and she pulled up the handbrake at the same time. As though in slow motion she watched eddying snowflakes, then trees and a wall of rock swerve across the windscreen. It was almost graceful, like a ballet, she thought as the car spun, tires screaming, her muscles bunching with the effort to keep the car controlled as it swerved in a one-hundred-and-eighty-degree arc.
And then they were facing the direction from which they’d come, headlights bearing down on them directly through the dark and snow.
“Uh, Vicky,” Ryan called.
“Come on, you son of a bitch,” she growled, and threw the car into gear, tires screaming as she released the handbrake.
“Vicky!”
She pressed her foot on the accelerator, and roared as the car launched forward.
“I hope you know what you’re doing!” Ryan yelled, and braced himself against the dashboard.
Tires screamed, and a horn blared. The vehicle swerved to avoid them, tearing around them at the last moment.
Shift down. Brake. Turn wheel, lift handbrake. She didn’t have time to think it, her body acted autonomously as she turned the car around again as the other vehicle drove off the side of the road and down the mountainside. Branches and leaves flew up in its path, and then there was nothing, just empty road.
Vicky stared out of the windshield, eyes wide, grip tight.
Ryan also stared out the windscreen. “Are you okay, Vic?” he asked, his voice low and rough.
She had to consciously relax her hold on the steering wheel, force her shoulders to drop. “Yeah, I’m okay.” Her hands were shaking, she felt like she was going to pee, but she was still in one piece.
Ryan nodded. “Good. You did good.” He pressed the release on his seatbelt and thrust open the passenger door. He swore as he got out, a word so rude it almost shocked her. Almost.
Icy wind carried in drifts of snow and ice. She repeated the word as he slammed the door and stormed over to the side of the road, his hands on his hips, his dark jacket draped like wings, snow falling around him to pile at his feet. He stood for a moment, his dark figure illuminated like an angel of darkness standing on a cloud, then he launched himself over the side of the road, disappearing from view.
“Ryan!” Vicky screamed.
* * *
Gavin sat at his desk, toying with his silver-plated pen, waiting. It wasn’t long before there was a discrete knock at his door. Finally.
“Come in,” he called, tilting his head back against the leather cushion of his office chair. He watched as the woman opened the door and entered his office. She smiled.
“I came in as soon as I got your message,” she said, her voice soft, throaty.
“Where’s your partner in crime?” he asked. He slipped the pen next to the letter opener in their caddy. He watched with satisfaction as her smile faltered. Gotcha.
She frowned as she closed the door behind her. “I don’t understand.”
He watched as she walked up to his desk. She was an attractive woman, there was no denying it. Her calm smile and friendly manner had masked a very clever little criminal. But she wasn’t clever enough to fool him. He’d had his suspicions about her and her partner almost immediately. Their history had checked out—on file. He’d made some calls, though, asked more intrusive questions. It had taken some digging, but he could finally prove they weren’t who they said they were.
His lips lifted in a smile. “I know.”
Her frown deepened. “You know what?”
“I know you and your partner are fake
s.”
She looked taken aback for a moment, and he could see the wheels turning in her head. Her brow arched as she trailed a neatly manicured finger along the edge of his desk. “Is that so?” she asked, her lips lifting in a secretive little smile. She wasn’t going to deny it. She knew he was too smart for that.
“Yes.” His groin tightened as he watched that pretty little nail trail. She was a beautiful liar, and she’d been caught out. “I guessed something was off when you insisted on all communication through email and phone...I thought the conference calls we had were a nice touch, though.” He shook his head, half in admiration. She and her partner had gone to great lengths to create an elaborate lie. He wondered how far she was prepared to go to keep her secret. Arousal spiked through him as he watched the scarlet nail lightly scratch his blotter. He’d planned to reveal their duplicity, make the appropriate noises when the cops came in, but maybe he could have a little fun, first. “Where is he?” He’d expected her partner to accompany her.
She peeped at him from under her lashes. “He’s...busy. Why don’t we settle this between you and me?” She lifted a hip to rest on the side of his desk and leaned over. His gaze dropped to her cleavage. She’d unbuttoned the two top buttons of her blouse. His eyes narrowed. As though she’d planned this. But he was the one in control, not her.
“And what do you think you can offer me?” he asked dryly.
She smiled slowly, all seduction and secrets. “Silence.”
He frowned. “Silence? Why would I be interested in that?”
She made a pretty moue with her lips. “Oh, perhaps because I know you like to...listen.”
Gavin’s features froze. She knew? She knew about that?
She winked. “See, you’re not the only one who likes uncovering secrets,” she whispered. She rose from the desk and walked around to his chair, pushing him back so that she could slide in between his thighs and lean back against the desk.
How the hell had she figured that one out? Nobody knew, damn it. Anger rose in him, like a kettle on a slow boil. He could feel it building inside him. This—his woman thought she could blackmail him? No, he was the one in control, damn it. And he wasn’t about to fall for her siren ploys.
“I don’t think so,” he said quietly. No. He wasn’t about to let her have that power over him. He’d get rid of it all. By the time the sheriff arrived up here, he could bury everything. His word against hers, and he was a psychologist, damn it. He could be convincing. She sighed as she leaned back, her palm resting on his desk at the edge of his blotter, her pinkie finger gently tapping against the rim of his silver-plated stationery set.
He set his features into a serene mask. “I’m afraid that’s not enough,” he said, smiling coolly at her. She leaned closer, flashing that distracting cleavage again. He gazed down at the expanse of creamy breast revealed by her opened blouse. He caught a glimpse of white lace.
“Are you sure we can’t work something out?” she breathed suggestively as she fingered the collar of his shirt. His breath shortened as his cock throbbed, and he shifted his hips forward on the chair.
He’d let her “work something out.” Then he’d call the cops. “Keep talking,” he said, his smile growing broader.
Her eyes narrowed, just a little, before the smile again bloomed across her face. “Why don’t I show you, instead,” she murmured. “Lean back, close your eyes.” She trailed her hand down toward his fly.
He did as she told him, feeling the light touch of fingers dancing down his zipper, then a hot piercing force exploded in his chest. He opened his eyes, crying out in pain. His eyes moved past the letter opener buried in his chest to the woman who now leaned over him, her eyes cold and glittery as she pulled the blade from his chest.
“You should have taken my first offer,” she told him, before she plunged the blade anew. He watched, mouth agape as a blood trail streamed across those pretty white breasts. His blood. He tried to fend her off, but his arms defied his reflexive command, sluggishly moving on the arms of his chair instead of blocking her next strike, and her next.
His head rolled back, too heavy for him to hold steady. His heart pounded in his ears. Dum da dum. Dum. Da. Dum. Dum. Dum. His last thought as his pierced organ struggled in his chest was that he’d been wrong. She’d been in control the whole time.
“You should have taken my silence when you had the chance,” she whispered in his ear, and his breath rattled in his chest. He couldn’t even move his head to look at her.
“Instead, I’ll take yours.”
His vision cloudy, it dimmed to final black as she walked out the door.
* * *
Vicky bolted from the car and ran across to the road’s edge, heart pounding. Oh, God, Ryan! She skidded to a stop, pebbles and clumps of snow falling over the cusp of the road. Snow fell softly, dampening her uncovered head and eyelashes. Deep, dark furrows clearly showed the path the vehicle had taken, and several trees had been knocked over as it had barreled down the side of the mountain.
She blinked against the snow. Ryan, where’s Ryan? What if he’d been killed? The possibility that she’d lost him forever was almost crippling. Desolation, sharp and swift, cut straight to her gut, and she doubled over, desperately, frantically peering through the darkness, trying to see past the bright tracks from her own headlights. There. Something dark moved close by, and she tracked the movement through the pine trees and underbrush. Ryan was steadily making his way down to the wreck, skidding occasionally in the snow.
“Ryan, wait!”
“Stay there, Vic,” he yelled back.
She dithered for a moment. Should she wait up here, or get down there with her partner? She rolled her eyes. What a question.
“Screw it,” she muttered, and stepped over the edge, her booted foot sinking into several deep inches of snow. She swore at the shock of icy wetness that crept through her jeans, and the resulting twinge in her knee.
I hate the cold.
She stared down further to the wreck. It was a crumpled mess, and flames licked from the undercarriage, creating an eerie glow against the snow. And Ryan was heading straight for it.
“Wait up, Ryan.”
He continued to make his way down the mountain, disappearing from view behind the occasional pine tree in the process.
She started to clamber down, picking her way carefully through the darkness. She was climbing over a fallen tree when the car exploded.
The noise startled her, and she fell backward as a ball of swirling spheres of golden-red flames tinged with black clouds roiled into the air. A faint wave of heat hit her, quickly replaced with an icy wind, as though the atmosphere was reacting to a vacuum.
“Ryan!” she yelled, panicking. Where was he? She’d lost sight of him. “Ryan!” Had he been close to the wreck when it blew? Was he hurt—oh, heck, was he dead? For a moment the possibility of Ryan’s death loomed, like a mountain of desolation. No, please, no. She didn’t want to lose Ryan. She levered herself up out of the snowy bank, hands shaking as she again hauled herself over the fallen tree trunk.
“Ryan!” she screamed.
Chapter Twenty-Six
“I’m here, Vic,” he called up to her. He was already on his way back. Her shoulders sagged with relief, and she took a deep breath, trying to calm herself. Thank God. He was alive.
She waited for him to get close. “Are you hurt?”
He shook his head as he stepped over a broken branch and came up to her. “No, I’m good.” His hair was wet, little balls of ice clinging to spiked tendrils, as though he’d run his hands through it in frustration.
She punched him in the arm. “What the hell were you doing?” She’d come so close to losing him. God, what if he’d died? She swallowed. She didn’t want to think about that.
“Ow. Damn it, Vic, I was doing my job. I wanted
the bastard who tried to run us off the road.”
“You could have been killed.”
“But I wasn’t. I knew what I was doing, Vic. Someone tried to run us off the road, and under the circumstances, chances are it was the Maxwells.” He shrugged. “As it is, we’ll never know for sure. I didn’t get close enough to the car to see who was in it before it blew.”
Damn it, he could have been killed. She didn’t want to concede he had a point, she still had adrenaline and a good dose of panic coursing through her veins. He’d scared her, badly. She wasn’t in the mood to concede a damn thing. And it was freezing, damn it. Her gloves were in the car.
His words slammed home a reality check for her. Someone had been in that car when it went over the edge. Someone had just died.
She covered her mouth with her hand. “Oh, heavens, I’ve just killed someone.” The ramifications of her actions rammed home. She’d killed someone.
Ryan shook his head. “No, Vic. That person was trying to kill us, remember? They were ramming our car.”
“But it was my actions that drove him or her over the edge. My actions that resulted in his or her death.” She took in a deep breath as bile rose in her throat.
Ryan put his hand under her chin and forced her to meet his gaze. His eyes bore into hers. “This isn’t your fault, Vicky. That person wanted us dead, or at least hurt very badly. I consider what you did as self-defense, otherwise it would be us smoking out that ravine. Suck it up, Buttercup. Not your fault.”
She nodded weakly, but still couldn’t quite shake her shocked conscience.
He placed his hand on her shoulder. “If anything had happened to you...” He shook his head. “I wanted to get my hands around his neck, Vic.”
And then he goes and says something like that. That moment, that brief blip in time when she’d thought she’d lost him, emotion had swamped her. She could understand the desire to strike out, to protect, to defend. She could also understand it was necessary to discover the identity of the driver.
For Her Eyes Only (McCormack Security Agency) Page 22