Page 76 of If I Didn’t Have You

“Repent,” she murmured. “Repent hard.” Her head slowly swiveled to meet my gaze. “And maybe not mention your true intentions to the police.”

“Right.”

A banging on the window startled me, and I let out a loud scream that was completely unnecessary. Ben stood at the window, his eyes flashing over me in worry.

I’d just tried to kill his mistress.

I was such a bad person. Terrible person. God, I was going to hell.

“Clara! Open the fucking door!”

My fingers wrapped around the handle, but when I pulled, nothing happened. The door was smashed somehow.

Thank God for the stay of execution.

“The only way out is forward,” Georgia whispered. “I hope your acting skills are up to par.”

22

BEN

She sat there in shock, not moving as her fingers still gripped the door handle. I tried and failed to get in to check on her since the front end had smashed into the pillar, effectively crushing the doorframe. She was fucking lucky she wasn’t driving faster, and that the airbag hadn’t deployed.

Luck seemed to be on her side in that she hadn’t driven straight through the gym. Instead, it settled half in and half out. She had no physical signs of trauma, but the blank look on her face said it all.

She was freaking out in that beautiful head of hers. I wanted to stay with her, to make sure she was okay, but River was looking at Clara like she had intentionally driven through the damn window, which was just ridiculous.

Clara didn’t have an evil bone in her body.

Sirens grew louder as the ambulance and fire truck arrived on the scene. There was nothing for me to do here, except step aside and let the professionals take over. I had damage control to do. There was going to be one hell of an insurance claim, along with repairs to the building.

And the little matter of convincing River that this was all one big misunderstanding.

So, as much as I didn’t want to leave my wife, I walked away, leaving this to the professionals. River was sitting on a bench, her face pale and flushed as she pressed her fingers to her pulse on her wrist.

“You doin’ okay?”

She nodded, but stared out at the car vacantly.

“Quite the close call.”

“She tried to murder me,” she whispered. “Your wife actually tried to kill me.”

“No,” I laughed, hoping she would find the whole thing funny. “You know Clara. She would never hurt anyone.”

River’s eyes slowly turned to me. “I saw her, Ben. She was already driving too fast, and then she turned the wheel toward the gym. Toward me!”

“No, you must have that wrong. I’m telling you, Clara’s not like that.”

She shoved to her feet, getting in my face. “I’m telling you that she directed that car toward me! She was trying to murder me!”

“River, do you hear yourself? You’ve known Clara all your life. Do you really think she’s capable of something like that?”

The confusion that swam in her eyes told me I was getting through to her, but there was still that set to her jaw that said she was not backing down on this.

“There must have been something wrong with the car. Wyatt will take a look, and he’ll be able to tell us what happened.”

That seemed to appease her for now, but I didn’t dare walk away, not when she still looked so damn convinced that Clara was trying to murder her. What possible reason would she have?