by Dana Marton
Annie filled the bucket with water and filled the troughs, then stilled when the prickly sensation of being watched crept up her spine. She glanced toward the house. Right. She wasn’t alone.
Ed had sent the cleanup crew: two of his nephews. They were dragging a four-by-four out the back. They weren’t part of Ed’s regular crew. His regular crew was putting siding on half a dozen houses in the new development down the road, on Victoria Circle. They couldn’t take time off, not with all the rain from Rupert in the forecast. Hence the nephews. The boys didn’t have a ton of construction experience, but they had all the muscles of eighteen-year-old high school athletes, which was all the cleanup required.
And then David Durenne showed up again. The producer didn’t have to go into work at the TV station until noon, and his son, Tyler, was at a birthday party.
Annie was grateful for the help. Grateful enough to invite Kelly over for coffee, but Kelly was closing on a home for a client and couldn’t leave. So much for playing Cupid.
Annie finished her chores, then left the men to their work and drove back to Hope Hill, listening to the weather report on the way. Hurricane Rupert was sweeping through the Bahamas. It had spent most of its strength in Cuba, so it’d been downgraded to a category 1 hurricane.
She didn’t see Cole again for the rest of the day, although she kept catching herself looking for him. She hadn’t seen him since that morning when she’d run into him crossing the courtyard, and he’d offered to blow off a couple of his sessions so he could go with her to her feedings. She had thanked him, but declined, reassuring him that she wouldn’t be alone since Ed was sending over people. He had promised to go with her at midnight.
Annie completed her afternoon sessions, then she grabbed a quick dinner in the cafeteria with a handful of her patients. After dinner, she drove back to the house for the evening feeding.
David was gone, but Ed’s nephews were still there, as promised. They had an away game the next day, so tonight they were going to keep going with the cleanup until they finished.
They were sweeping up the last of the rubble when Annie left to drive back to Hope Hill at seven. She had to give it to them, they were hardworking kids.
She took Reservoir Road as usual, the fastest way to work. At this time of the evening, with the sun setting, the drive offered a spectacular view. The soft light of the setting autumn sun gilded the water with a golden glow. The breathtaking serenity was so awe-inspiring she decided to bring a Hope Hill group here for a meditation walk next week, if not sooner.
Screech. Crash.
A dark SUV hit her from behind.
Adrenaline slammed into her. She gripped the wheel. Ohmygod. People, pay attention!
She couldn’t see the driver, not with the last rays of the sun turning his windshield into a mirror.
Her instinct was to brake, and she had her foot on the brake pedal before she changed her mind. At any other time, she would have put that bump down to an accident, but she’d just had an intruder at home. Instead of pulling over to exchange insurance information, she kept going. They could both pull over a few miles down the road at the gas station.
Bam. The SUV hit her again.
OK. That couldn’t be by accident. Her heart raced. Don’t panic.
Annie sped up to get away from whoever was behind her, but that meant she had to keep both hands on the steering wheel. She couldn’t call for help. Her phone was in her purse on the passenger seat.
The SUV caught up. This time, it hit her little Prius harder, with intent, pushing her toward the shoulder.
Her breath caught. Less than five feet of grass stood between the road and the water. She was not a good swimmer. Not even in a pool—forget the giant reservoir. In the dark.
She pulled to the left so far that she was in the opposite lane. But the SUV kept bumping her, kept herding her to the right. No other cars in sight. Where was everybody? She was on a back road, but still.
Cold fear rode her.
She drove as fast as she dared, but not nearly as fast as she wanted. If she went too fast and the idiot hit her again, she might lose control, spin out, and end up in the water. She held the steering wheel in a death grip.
She didn’t dare take her eyes off the road to look in the rearview mirror.
Joey?
Or was it someone else? This didn’t feel like Joey. Joey drove an old camo-painted pickup.
Except . . . he did have access to a bunch of cars. The gas station had a repair shop in the back.
Focus on the road. She would think about the who and the why after she survived. Go, go, go.
She had maybe five hundred feet left before she’d pass the end of the reservoir and be surrounded by dry land. The SUV’s driver knew it, too, and rammed her again, harder. Her teeth snapped together so fast, she nearly bit off her tongue. That her airbag hadn’t gone off yet was a miracle.
Four hundred feet to go.
Bam.
Three hundred feet to go.
Bam.
She skidded onto the shoulder, fought hard, and veered back onto the road as her heart threatened to burst with panic. She had to stay on the pavement.
Two hundred feet.
The sun dipped below the horizon.
Bam.
One hundred feet.
BAM!
Annie’s Prius flew off the road.
The car rolled. Her purse slammed into her temple a split second before the airbag slammed into her face. Then the side airbag slammed into her shoulder.
She was still screaming when suddenly everything stopped.
For a moment, she was too stunned and shocked to move. Then a whole new wave of panic hit. Oh God, the water. Was she in water? She scrambled to see.
Dark sky. A stand of trees up ahead. The car was right side up, having done a full roll. But she was still on solid ground. An overwhelming sense of gratitude filled her even as her heart still madly pounded.
She beat the airbags back and scanned the twilight as she sobbed for breath, desperate to see who was out there.
What did he want?
Would he come now to finish her?
Chapter Sixteen
ANNIE PEERED THROUGH the windshield and caught movement by the road. Fear screamed, Get out! Run!
She turned off the engine with a shaky hand. The locks popped. Then common sense returned. Nonono. She grabbed to lock the doors again. She needed to just sit tight until the police came.
Phone.
She released the seat belt and swept around for her purse with her right hand, searching the passenger-side foot well.
The sharp knock on the driver’s-side window had her jerking forward so hard she smacked her head into the console. She turned, caught sight of a shadowy face, but then recognition hit before she could scream.
“Are you OK?” Pete the mailman shouted from the other side of the glass.
Breathe.
Annie straightened in her seat and pushed the door open. “I think so.” Breathe. “Did you see a dark SUV?”
“I saw taillights. Nothing else.”
As she moved to get out, Pete put a hand to her shoulder. “You might have injuries you don’t realize. Let me call an ambulance.”
“And the cops.” She lay back against her seat, every inch of her sore. “Ask for Harper Finnegan.”
Pete sat on the grass. “My knees are shaking. Sorry.” He dialed. “Are you sure you’re OK?”
Before Annie could answer, the other end picked up, and Pete reported the crash.
Annie closed her eyes, willing her heart into a normal, steady rhythm instead of weak, panicked flutters. It’s over. I’m safe.
She could move everything—she tested herself limb by limb. A few spots seriously hurt, but nothing was broken.
She raised her fingers to the place on her neck that burned, but she felt no wetness, no blood, thank God. She turned her head to look in the askew rearview mirror. With the door open, the dome light was on.
&nbs
p; Just an abrasion. She flinched at her reflection, reached up, then dropped her hand. She was too far gone to fix. Her hair was a mess, wide-eyed shock on her face. She looked as if she’d been tumbled in a dryer.
She had been tumbled.
Breathe. She chose to focus on the positive. At least the airbag hadn’t broken her nose.
“I’m fine,” she said, not so much to Pete, but because she needed to hear those words herself.
Long breath in. Hold. Slow breath out.
OK, she could do that. She could calm down. She knew how. She had this.
But as shock ebbed, anger took its place. If she found out that Joey had been in that SUV, or his popcorn-for-brains cousin . . . She was going to revise her principles of nonviolence and strangle the idiot. This went way beyond stupid.
She stilled.
Yes, it did, didn’t it? Whoever had been in the other car had gone way beyond scaring her.
She couldn’t see Joey, or even Big Jim, running her off the road like that, then driving away. But if not one of them, who?
She could not have another stalker, could she? What were the chances?
Long breath in. Hold. Slow breath out. That worked, so she kept the breathing technique going. She didn’t want to start hyperventilating and scare Pete even worse.
Then Harper Finnegan arrived, sirens blaring, the ambulance right behind him.
Harper made sure she was OK before he moved on to police business. “I’ll take pictures and measurements, write up what’s here, then I’ll meet you at the ER,” he told Annie while the EMTs fussed over her.
“I’ll go with her,” Pete offered, still pale as a postal envelope.
Annie shifted as one of the EMTs checked something on her back, pulling up her shirt. She wanted family with her. Would Kelly come? Did she want to call Kelly?
She looked back at Pete. “I appreciate the offer. But let me call my cousin. She can meet me at the hospital. Could you please find my bag for me? It’s somewhere in the car.”
The ride to West Chester Hospital took only twenty minutes. The EMTs kept her entertained on the way, working to determine whether she had a concussion, taking her blood pressure, then starting an IV. They put her in a neck brace, even though she told them she didn’t need it.
They asked her about her older bruises. She told them about her mad dive into the pool. They made her work at convincing them that she wasn’t a victim of domestic abuse, which she liked, because it gave her hope that if someone else was abused, the EMTs would help her, or him.
All Annie wanted was some kind of cream for the stinging abrasion on her neck, some kind of ointment with lidocaine. Of course, that was the one thing they didn’t have in the ambulance.
They did let her call Kelly.
“Are you OK? I’ll meet you at the hospital. I’m leaving right now.”
For some reason, Annie’s eyes filled with tears as she thanked her cousin.
Pain pounded in her head. She closed her eyes and focused on her breathing.
She had about five minutes of rest before they were at the ER. She told the EMTs she could walk. They insisted on pushing her on a gurney anyway. She was taken right through into a small evaluation room that had green curtains for walls. The nurse who popped by a second later, a Hispanic woman called Maria, took Annie’s vitals again and checked the IV.
“Dr. Chen will be with you in a minute.” Maria gestured with her head toward a short, older gentleman who had just walked into a room on the other side of the nurses’ station. Before she left, she drew the green curtain that turned the bed into a sterile cocoon.
And then Annie was alone, closed in.
Kelly will be here in a minute.
When heavy footsteps headed her way, she looked toward the sound. Then a large shadow fell on the green divider. Definitely not Kelly. And not Dr. Chen either.
The hefty outline of the man in her kitchen flashed into Annie’s mind. Her heart clenched as she stared at the curtain. Then anger flared. She was not going to be a sitting duck again.
She grabbed for the IV stand.
Chapter Seventeen
COLE PULLED BACK the curtain and stopped in his tracks. Annie was sitting in bed, lifting her metal IV pole, ready to swing.
“What are you doing?”
She put down her weapon and lay back on her pillows, the fight going out of her. “I thought you were someone else.”
She’d been scared. A bruise darkened her pale cheek.
Cole’s hands clenched into fists at his sides. His heart beat the old war-drum rhythm he’d thought would never sound inside him again. The war drum demanded death.
A red abrasion on her neck looked as if someone had tried to choke her.
“Seat belt,” she said when she caught him staring.
“Who was it?” He kept his voice even, because flying into a rage wouldn’t help Annie, and he’d come to help if he could.
Her chestnut hair spread on the hospital pillow in twisted tangles, almost as if floating in water. He thought of the dark waters of the reservoir where he’d been told the accident had happened.
She could have gone in and not come up again.
He fought the urge to reach out and fold her into his arms.
“I couldn’t see,” she said.
Fear clouded her eyes, which did nothing to dampen his murderous impulses. Her fear slammed into him like a torpedo into a submarine and ripped his guts apart.
“How bad is it? What did the doctor say?”
“I haven’t seen him yet,” she said just as the man showed up at Cole’s elbow in a white coat with a black stethoscope hanging around his neck.
The doctor began to speak, but he had his head turned toward Annie, and Cole could only see that the corner of the guy’s mouth was moving. He stepped out to give the doctor space and give Annie privacy. Cole wasn’t the husband, or the boyfriend, so he had no right to be there.
The thought bothered him more than it should have.
He shoved his hands into his pockets and turned his back to the curtain.
A woman was running down the hallway toward him. She resembled Annie—except blonde and with a lot more makeup, clothes tight instead of Annie’s easy, natural style.
Cole recognized her from TV. Annie’s cousin.
“In here.” Cole nodded toward the curtain behind him. “She’s OK. The doctor’s with her.”
“Thanks. Hi. I’m Kelly.”
Cole took the offered hand. “I’m Cole. From Hope Hill.”
“You work together?”
“Not exactly.”
“Oh.” Kelly pulled her hand back, probably evaluating just how crazy he might be.
“I’m going to get a cup of coffee. Would you like some?” he asked, because she suddenly looked uncomfortable with him, and because he didn’t want to chat, didn’t want to explain that he was deaf.
He didn’t want to go through the whole ritual of the surprise, then the apologetic murmurings, then the pitying looks, then the awkwardness of the person not knowing how to talk to him. The whole one-act play when the other person pretended hard that everything was A-OK, while acting completely weirded out.
He couldn’t read Kelly’s lips because she suddenly dropped her head, looking down at her boots, but he got enough from the shake of her head. So no coffee.
Cole walked down the hallway and kept on walking until he found a waiting room with vending machines, where he pushed the button for espresso. He took his time drinking as he worked on sorting himself out, the blonde already forgotten.
His mind was full of Annie.
Everyone at Hope Hill kept telling him that denial was a bad thing, as if Cole didn’t already know that. Combat didn’t allow for denial. Threats had to be immediately assessed so they could be immediately eliminated. When you saw a suspicious package on the side of the road, it did no good to pretend it probably wasn’t an IED.
And it did no good to pretend that his interest in Annie was strictly
friendship.
He didn’t think about his friends a hundred times a day. He didn’t run his day so he could spend as much time with them as possible—wouldn’t have, even if they weren’t scattered across the country. He didn’t want to touch his friends so badly that not doing so required all his military discipline.
So Annie was more than a new friend to him.
Annie Murray was the first woman he’d been attracted to since he’d gotten home from overseas. Maybe more than attracted. And that hadn’t happened since . . . ever.
He’d never had trouble finding a willing woman, but he rarely thought the requirements of a relationship were worth the benefits. Some women specifically targeted Navy SEALs. Weird groupie women who wanted a SEAL boyfriend for bragging rights, for the whole my-boyfriend-can-beat-up-your-boyfriend thing.
Like his last relationship, Evie.
“Mark called me a bitch,” she’d whine. “He’s totally stalking me. Are you going to let some punk talk to your girlfriend like that?”
To which Cole would say, “What did he say, exactly?”
“Get out of my house, you crazy bitch.” Evie included hand gestures for full dramatic effect. “He scared me. What if he hit me?”
“How is he stalking you if you were at his house? Stop freaking going over to him, Evie.”
At which she usually exploded, accusing Cole of not caring.
He learned over the years that not caring was code for not doing what I want. The few relationships he’d had were all based on what a woman wanted from him. Bragging rights, his combat pay, protection. He didn’t much mind.
He’d wanted things too: peace and companionship, a warm body to come home to when a mission ended.
As he drank his bitter coffee in the hospital waiting room, he thought about what he wanted after Hope Hill, about going back home to Chicago. When he’d first arrived here, he couldn’t wait to be back in the solitude of his apartment. And now . . .
He thought about having someone with a soft smile who brought him enough peace so that he fell asleep next to her. Someone who, at the same time, challenged him, called him on his bullshit.