Everything spun a full circle before she managed to regain control. When she did, she was headed straight into the other car, which had settled in the ditch on the side of the road. She swerved, missed the car by inches, and came to rest beside the same ditch without dipping into it.
Her heart sped, her hands held the wheel in a death grip.
Lights from her rearview mirror told her the driver behind her hadn’t fared as well as she had.
She shoved her car into park and jumped out. The boots on her feet were meant for the office. She slipped as she walked back to the other vehicle.
“You okay?” she asked long before she reached the passenger door. For a brief second she didn’t see the man inside moving. She grasped the door handle and pulled.
Locked.
Then he looked up and shook his head before disengaging the lock.
“Are you okay?”
“Great, just great for a guy with his car in a ditch.” He looked up, and Rachel forgot to breathe.
Chapter Two
Jason wasn’t sure which had zapped him more, the fact that he’d managed to ditch his car or the bright blue eyes of the woman staring him down. No jacket, her light brown hair hung close to her face while snow settled on top of her uncovered head. Her cheeks were flushed with the cold, her lips . . . good lord, he needed to look past her lips or he’d start talking like a teenage kid with an instant crush. He blinked, breaking the contact, and moved to unbuckle his seat belt.
With the car at an angle, he needed to crawl over the center console.
The woman extended her gloved hand. “Here.”
With the grace of an elephant, he managed to get one leg over and into the passenger seat, and then the other, before taking her small hand.
Outside the car, he stepped into half a foot of snow, and his Hugo Bosses slid.
She glanced down. “Looks like you’re about as prepared to deal with this as I am.”
He took in her footwear. “At least you have boots.”
“I don’t think this is what Steve Madden thought of when he designed them.” She shivered, closed her arms around her waist. “You sure you’re okay?”
Jason looked back at her car, the flashers blinking over the snow with every blip. “My pride is bruised, my bones are fine.” He reached into the car, removed his overcoat, and retrieved his cell phone.
She started moving from foot to foot, the cold obviously settling in.
He handed her his coat.
“Let’s call from inside my car.”
“Do you let strange men into your car often?”
Those lips smiled and his stomach flipped.
“Only during blizzards.”
“This isn’t a blizzard.”
“It is to me. C’mon, I won’t bite.” She didn’t take his coat before walking back.
Jason followed, his eyes moving to her license plate before he opened the passenger door and climbed inside.
She already had the heater on high. Rubbing her hands together, she shook her head, sprinkling melting snow over the both of them. “Thanks for stopping,” he said.
“I almost bit it myself. Still kinda surprised I didn’t, to tell the truth.”
“I noticed your plates. California?”
She nodded, her cheeks turning redder as her body warmed. “My first snowstorm. I had no idea this was in the forecast, or I would have bought chains.”
“Took me by surprise, too.”
She found his eyes, and he realized he was staring.
He remembered his phone and dialed for help.
Nathan answered on the fourth ring. “Hell of a night, Jason.” His mechanic and keeper of the family’s personal aircraft had a thick Scottish brogue.
“Tell me something I don’t know.”
“What can I do for you, lad?”
“I managed to park my car in a ditch.”
When Nathan stopped laughing, he asked, “What are ya drivin’?”
“The Audi.”
“Well, that would be your first problem. This is a Jeep kind of day.”
“Your words of wisdom astound me, Nate.” He proceeded to tell him where he was and noticed his female companion looking at her watch. “How soon can you come?”
“I need to finish up here and I’ll be on my way.”
“Finish up where?”
“I’m at Betty’s. Her power is out and she needed a proper fire set.”
The widow Betty was on a property adjacent to his, but far enough away in a snowstorm to delay Nathan’s trip.
“So how long?”
“Her road isn’t plowed. I need to get back to the house and collect the truck. Might take a little time to find a tow. At least an hour.”
“An hour?” On a good day he wasn’t twenty minutes from home. He considered asking the woman with eyes as blue as the sky to drive him there. But she looked about as anxious to drive in the snow longer as he was to sit in his car for an hour waiting for a ride.
“Longer if you keep yammering at me.”
“Fine.”
Jason hung up, knowing he wasn’t going to rush a man twice his age.
“An hour?” his companion asked.
“Yeah. Tow trucks will be at a premium tonight. I can wait in my car.”
She looked at him like he was crazy. “And watch as another car comes over that hill and plows into you?”
He glanced over his shoulder. She had a point.
“I live close by.” She looked at her watch again. “And I need to get home. Why don’t you wait there for your friend?”
He wanted to ask if her husband would mind but realized how that might sound to a woman alone on the side of the road, much as he wanted to know her marital status.
“You sure?”
She lifted her pink lips in a half smile. “You’re not an ax murderer, are you?”
“Gave that up last week. Messy.”
She grinned and looked through her rearview mirror. “Need anything from your car?”
“My briefcase.” He opened the door.
“You might want to put your flashers on,” she told him. “A dead battery is better than a smashed in hood.”
Jason’s eighty-thousand-dollar car sat sadly in the ditch, and all he could think of was the next hour of his life in the company of a woman who looked like an angel.
I hope you’re not married.
“Thank you for this,” Jason said as they inched away from his abandoned car.
“It’s all good.”
He watched her hands gripping the steering wheel and noticed the tightness of her jaw as she concentrated on the road in front of them. “Does this have four-wheel drive?”
“I wish. When I bought it back in LA, I never thought I’d be driving in the snow. First time for everything, I suppose.”
She crawled through a right-hand turn, her eyes wide.
Jason stopped staring at her hand when her words registered in his brain. “This is your first time driving in the snow?”
“Yep.”
His heart skipped a beat and his hand moved to his seat belt. He’d driven in the snow since he was old enough to reach the pedals. Easy to do when you grew up on fifty acres of private property that housed an airstrip. There was no lack of motorized toys growing up, and he and his brothers raced them all against each other.
There was no risk of this woman racing.
He tried to see the speedometer reading on the car but couldn’t without making his intention clear. If he had to guess, she wasn’t going over fifteen miles per hour, which would normally make his skin itch to press the gas.
“You’re doing well,” he said.
She turned her head, briefly, and flashed a smile. “I think a turtle could move faster.”
He almost agreed before she turned down a residential street and pulled into what he assumed was her driveway. Her sigh was short of comical when she cut the power to the engine.
“You don’t park in your garage?�
�
“I’m not completely unpacked.” She glanced at the closed garage door. “It’s still full of boxes.”
“Oh.”
She grabbed her purse from behind his seat and pushed out of the car. Jason followed her a few short steps along a snow-covered path to a small patio. He found himself holding his breath as he awaited what was on the other side of the door.
One step inside and his hope that this California bred, reluctant snow driving woman was single plunged.
“Owen?”
She’s married. Of course she’s married. Why wouldn’t a woman with a snow-melting smile be married?
“In here.”
A young voice.
Married with children.
She shook the snow from her jacket by the front door and started to take it off when a teenage boy walked around the corner. “I was starting to worry.”
Jason stared.
The boy stopped short and sized Jason up from head to toe.
“I made it. I told you I could handle it.”
The boy spoke without looking at her. “You driving in the snow is like me taking a semi to school tomorrow . . . who is this?”
The kid was young, probably not old enough to drive himself, but he had spunk.
She turned to him. “This is . . .” Her smile fell. “Oh my God, I don’t know your name.”
“Jason Fa—”
“You don’t know his name?” Owen turned an accusing stare her way.
“He was stranded on the side of the road!” She placed her hands on her hips. “Don’t look at me like that.”
“Like what? Like you’re crazy for bringing a stranger home? Like that?”
“I’m a good judge of character.”
Owen didn’t appear convinced.
“I’m not an ax murderer,” Jason told him.
Owen rolled his eyes.
“Go get your dad. I’m sure I can convince him.”
Owen pursed his lips together and narrowed his eyes.
“His dad isn’t here,” she told him.
Jason was fairly certain there were several colorful words that exploded out of Owen’s mouth under the cloak of a grunt before he articulated, “Don’t tell him that, Rachel. He could chop us into tiny pieces by morning. No one knows us here enough to look for the parts he leaves behind.” On that, Owen turned on his heel and stormed away.
“Owen!” Rachel turned to him. “I’m sorry. He’s protective. Just give me a minute.” And then she was gone.
Jason slowly set his briefcase on the floor and undid the buttons on his jacket.
Rachel, her name was Rachel.
Dad wasn’t there.
And her son was black.
“He drives an Audi.” Even as the words left her mouth, she realized how lame they sounded.
Owen stared her down like a man and not a fifteen-year-old boy.
“Jack the Ripper was a surgeon.”
He had a point.
She tried to make light of it. “But Ripper didn’t drive an Audi.”
“Was it an R8?”
Rachel didn’t even pretend to know what that was. Her eyes must have given her away.
“You’re hopeless.”
“He’s just waiting for his ride. It’s freezing out there.” She paused and shook her head. “Why am I arguing with you?” I’m the adult.
“Because even your parents told you not to bring strangers home.”
No, technically her parents told her not to talk to strangers. Not bringing them home was a given.
“You’re right.”
Owen opened his mouth and then promptly shut it.
She looked over her shoulder. “I’ll drive him back to his stranded car.”
“No.”
She stopped. “He needs to leave.”
“You can’t get into a car with a stranger.”
“I just drove him here.”
She saw the moment his brain short-circuited with her problem. “How long before his ride gets here?”
“I don’t know, an hour . . . I think.”
Owen muttered something under his breath and rubbed the top of his head like a man twice his age. And in that second, he reminded her of Emily. God, Em would often pull her hair out while solving a problem.
“Why are you smiling?”
Rachel attempted to stop, knew she failed.
Being stared down by a kid half your age made you laugh.
She bit her lip.
With a roll of the eyes, Owen turned and walked back into the living room.
Rachel followed and watched him track the stranger with a turn of the head when he walked past and straight to the kitchen. The rattling of a utensil drawer followed his disappearance into the other room.
“Is everything okay?”
“It’s fine.”
Something crashed to the floor, Owen muttered something she was certain wasn’t appropriate. Then he emerged from the swinging door, holding a butcher knife and the cordless phone.
“Owen!”
He set the knife and the phone down next to what looked like the homework he was doing on the small dining table between the living room and the kitchen. He resumed his seat and glared.
“Maybe I should wait outside for my ride.”
“Don’t be ridiculous.” Rachel took a step toward the table. “Owen, that’s enough.”
“As long as Mr. Suit doesn’t do anything, I won’t do anything.”
Rachel placed both hands on her hips. Her amusement over Owen’s actions started to turn sour. “You’ll just end up cutting yourself.”
“I’ll go.”
“No!” Rachel pointed toward the couch. “Sit. I’ll make us some coffee. You!” She moved that finger to Owen. “Finish your homework and stop acting like you were raised in Compton.” With that, she stormed through the swinging door into the kitchen. Forcing a deep breath, she looked at the mess Owen had left from the frozen pizza he’d managed to make for his dinner.
“Wow, she’s bossy,” Rachel heard the man say . . . what was his name? Jason. He looked like a Jason.
Owen said something she couldn’t quite hear. The swinging kitchen door had felt a little retro when she’d bought the house, now it felt cumbersome. She hurried to put the coffee on.
By the time she stepped back into the living room, Jason had removed his coat and sat on the couch. She caught his eyes and looked at the top of Owen’s head, which was ducked into his homework. When she looked back, she mouthed the word sorry.
Jason offered a smile and shook his head.
“Coffee will just take a minute.”
“That’s great. What’s your address? I’ll let Nathan know where I am.”
Rachel gave it to him and moved to Owen’s side.
“What are you working on?” She tried to ease the tension in Owen’s face.
He glared at her.
She accepted his anger so long as he maintained a level of respect.
They sat in silence while Jason finished his short call. “He’s about a half an hour out.”
Rachel wanted to tell him not to hurry, but the tension in the room wouldn’t go away until he was gone. “That’s fine. How do you take your coffee?”
“Black is fine.”
She poured the coffee faster than a coffee shop waitress and brought it back.
Owen hadn’t moved a muscle, and she was fairly certain he hadn’t progressed on his homework either.
“This is good, thanks.”
She took the seat opposite of Jason and tried not to stare. Short brown hair, blue eyes, strong jaw, the kind you knew Clark Kent would have, if he were real. Wide shoulders that looked at home in his suit. He didn’t wear a tie. She wondered if it was a casual thing, or if he’d lost it before getting in his car for the long drive home. Without thought, she looked at his hands for the first time. No ring.
A strand of wet hair fell across her face. She closed her eyes to stop staring. The need for that hallway mirror wa
s now pushed to the front. Not that she needed her reflection to know she looked a mess. Still, it would be nice to casually glance at herself and know she wasn’t a complete disaster.
“You weren’t kidding when you said you’re not moved in.”
She followed his eyes to a box that doubled as a coffee table. “Not yet. I’ve been doing the home improvement thing on my weekends before I clutter the space.”
“Looks like it’s coming along.”
“Thanks. Owen and I have mastered the art of the paint roller. Isn’t that right, Owen?”
He grunted.
Outside the living room window, the snow falling with the streetlight behind it looked like a scene from a movie. “This isn’t going to be gone by morning, is it?”
“Probably not.”
“At least tomorrow is Friday. I’ll only have one round-trip into the city.”
“You mean to drive to work tomorrow?”
“It’s a new job. It’s not like I can call in for a snow day.”
“I wasn’t suggesting that. You can take the train.”
She cringed. “No, no.” Yet even as she said those words, she knew it was only a matter of time before she had to overcome the anxiety around public transportation. “I’ll leave early.”
Jason looked as if he wanted to say something, glanced at Owen, and changed his mind.
“The trains are safe. Trust me, I’ve lived here all my life.”
“I’ve been told.” She sipped her coffee. “I’m just . . . not . . .”
“She’s paranoid of being mugged,” Owen announced.
Rachel sighed.
“Really?” Jason asked.
“There aren’t a lot of trains in California.”
“Do you take the bus?”
“God, no.”
“Germs and mugging,” Owen chimed in.
Jason glanced around the space. “Germ phobic?”
“No!” she said, as if that was ridiculous.
Owen opened his mouth again, and she cut him off. “Drinking out of a water bottle instead of a drinking fountain is just smart. It doesn’t count as a phobia.”
“Do you fly?”
She blinked, happy to finally say yes to something. “Sometimes.”
“Twice.” Owen kept announcing her secrets.
Jason stared at her as if she’d grown a horn on her head.
Not Quite Crazy Page 4