Valley of Shadows. Shirlee McCoy
call for help.”
He stared at her, his gaze never wavering as he straightened in his seat, slid his free hand over the gauze Miranda still held, and nudged her hand away from it. “It wouldn’t have been a good idea.”
His tone matched his gaze—icy and unyielding, and Miranda knew he wasn’t a man who would take betrayal lightly; that he’d demand his own justice for any wrong done to him. She swallowed back her fear, tugging at the fingers still wrapped around her wrist. “You were unconscious and unresponsive. You need a doctor.”
“I need to catch our ride. I need to find the man who betrayed me. I do not need a doctor.” Hawke tried to add emphasis to his words, but they came out weaker than he intended. The fact was, he probably did need a doctor, but he didn’t have time for one. They didn’t have time for one.
“You’re bleeding pretty badly.” Miranda leaned in close, the scent of apples and cinnamon enveloping him.
No woman had a right to smell that good.
And Hawke had no business noticing.
Unless he missed his guess, Miranda was one of those rare people who remained untarnished by the world. He, on the other hand, was more tarnished than most.
He scowled, frustrated as much by the direction of his thoughts as he was by his physical weakness. “Bleeding is a whole lot better than being dead. Which is exactly what we’d both be if you’d been foolish enough to call an ambulance.”
At his harsh words, Miranda jerked back, her face pale in the dim light, her dark hair a mass of curls around her face. Hawke knew enough about fear to recognize it in her eyes. Guilt at putting it there made him want to wrap an arm around her shoulders and reassure her that everything was going to be okay.
Instead, he kept the gauze pressed to his head with one hand and grabbed the road map with the other. “Our six hours are ticking away while we sit here arguing. Put your seat belt back on and let’s go.”
The fear he’d seen in Miranda’s eyes disappeared, replaced by stony resolve. “I may not be able to make you see a doctor, but I’m not going to let you drive. Not when you could pass out again.”
She had a point, even if Hawke didn’t want to admit it. His head throbbed with each heartbeat and sudden movements made him dizzy. Losing consciousness again was a real possibility no matter how hard he might fight against it. Passing out while driving could get them both killed. Then again, giving Miranda control of the car might do the same. It would be easy enough for her to drive to a police station and turn them both in. “I’ve driven under worse conditions.”
“And tonight you don’t have to. I don’t see a problem. Unless you don’t trust me.” She was issuing a challenge, but Hawke wasn’t in the mood to meet it.
“I don’t trust anyone.”
“That makes two of us.” She opened the car door, got out. “So, I guess we’ll just have to figure out how to accomplish our goals anyway.”
Hawke figured he had a few options—tell her to get out and go it alone, or pull out the gun and demand she get back into the passenger seat or let her have her way.
The first appealed only in as much as he could convince himself he didn’t care if Miranda lived or died. Which wasn’t much. The second might have worked, but imagining the fear and horror on her face when he pointed the gun at her made Hawke hesitate, a strange and alarming development in an already frustrating night.
“I don’t like losing.” He ground the words out, but Miranda just smiled.
“I guess that’s another thing we have in common.” With that, she shut the door and started around the side of the car, leaving Hawke wondering how a woman who didn’t look capable of hurting a fly had bested him.
FIVE
Miranda’s heart slammed in her chest as she rounded the car, Hawke’s words echoing in her head. The anger on his face told her just how much he didn’t like losing. Yet, here she was heading around the side of the car with every intention of doing things her way. What was she thinking? He had a gun for crying out loud.
But if he planned on using it, he already would have.
Maybe she should make a break for it, run into the convenience store and ask for help. She doubted Hawke would try to stop her. Unfortunately, the same instincts that told Miranda that Hawke wouldn’t hurt her, told her that she was better off with him than without. She needed answers before she could return home. Without them, she risked putting her brother and sister in harm’s way—and staying with Hawke seemed the only sure way to get those answers.
She pulled open the car door, saw that Hawke had moved into the passenger seat, and did her best to act confident and unperturbed. “Where to?”
“I’ll mark the route on the map. Then we’ll drive straight there. No stops for anything. We’ve already lost enough time. We can’t afford to waste any more.” He met her gaze, his expression unreadable, his anger concealed as he opened the glove compartment and pulled out a pack of highlighters.
“All right. Let’s do it.”
It took less than a minute for Hawke to highlight a yellow path from their location to a small town near a lake. When he finished, he highlighted a second route in blue. “The yellow route is the quickest. The blue uses the most back roads. We’ll try yellow first. If there’s too much police traffic, we’ll switch to blue.”
“Okay.” Miranda’s hands were moist against the steering wheel, the reality of what she was about to do pulsing through her veins. Until now, she’d felt more like a victim than an active participant in Hawke’s escape, but she could no longer deny the role she was taking. Running from the police, aiding an accused killer.
If they were caught…
“You’re doing this because you have to, Miranda Sheldon.” Hawke’s voice broke into her thoughts; his words offering assurance before she’d even voiced her doubts.
“Do I?” She whispered the question, not expecting an answer.
“If you don’t, we’ll both die.”
“That’s a worse-case scenario.”
“If you really believed that, you would have run into the store and called for help instead of getting back into the car with me.”
“I need answers so that I can go home. It’s the only way to make sure my family is safe.”
“You’ll get the answers you need. We’ll get them. And once we do, you’ll have no worries about those you love.” He rubbed at the back of his head, his hand coming away bloody again.
“You need to keep applying pressure to that.”
“I need to get to Lakeview.”
Miranda took the hint and started the engine, pulling out of the parking lot, following Hawke’s directions back to the highway. It was late, traffic sparse, what few cars there were passing in flashes of light. Miranda should have been lulled by the darkness that stretched out before them, by the quiet hum of the car engine and by Hawke’s silence.
Instead, she felt wired, her body trembling with adrenaline, everything in her begging for action. Finally, she could stand the quiet no longer. “What exactly is going to happen when we get to Lakeview? Are we taking another car? A train? A plane?”
“It would be difficult to take a train or car to Thailand.” His words were so matter-of-fact they almost didn’t register.
When they did, Miranda cast a quick glance in Hawke’s direction, saw that he was watching her with a dark, intense gaze.
“You don’t mean Thailand as in the country?”
“Do you know of another Thailand?”
“No, but I’m hoping there