Page 42 of Unmasked

She crossed her arms over her middle and leaned against the fender as she waited for Knox to arrive. It didn't take long. What felt like no more than two minutes later, his truck came into view, and he pulled to a stop behind her, then shut off the engine.

She was already moving toward him before he was out the door, and she banded her arms around his waist, burrowing her head against his chest as he enveloped her in his strong arms and hauled her close.

“You okay?”

Feeling him against her, the strength of his heartbeat, the heat of his flesh, immediately calmed her and brought her world back to rights. “I am now.”

CHAPTER

TWENTY-SEVEN

He wrapped his arms tighter around her and pressed a kiss to the top of her head. “I’m just glad you’re okay. You had me worried.”

Everleigh shifted a tiny bit closer and lifted her face to his. “Me, too.”

Keeping one arm banded around her waist, he lifted the other to her face and tucked a lock of hair behind her ear. “What happened?”

She let out a little half laugh, tinged with disbelief and a trace of fear. “I don’t even really know. As soon as I turned onto the road, my car started bumping and shaking like crazy. I don’t know how you drive this every day.”

He smiled down at her despite the worry spreading through his body. As soon as he had pulled up just behind her, he had seen the wheel resting on its side in the ditch. She was lucky she wasn't hurt whenever it came off. Thank God she hadn't crashed into the ditch and totaled the car. “Did you hit anything?”

Everleigh shook her head. “A pothole, but that's nothing new from what I can tell.”

Her sarcasm brought a smile to his face. “No, it's not new. I'm pretty sure these same potholes have been here for thirty years.”

“That's ridiculous,” she said fiercely. “I'm going to talk with somebody and have them come fix the road.”

“Good luck with that,” he grumbled. “Not enough people live out here, and they don't care about the ones who do.”

Pity flashed across Everleigh’s face, immediately followed by anger. “Well, it's time for that to change.”

He admired her spirit, but he didn't have the heart to tell her that things would likely never change. He swiftly changed the subject, gently easing her away. “I told you that foreign piece of crap would give you trouble.”

Everleigh rolled her eyes but couldn't contain the smile as she stepped back to lean against the fender of the expensive hunk of scrap metal. “Yeah, yeah. You can pick out the next one for me.”

He took her chin between his forefinger and thumb then pressed his lips to hers in a hard, quick kiss, unable to stop himself. “Absolutely. We’ll make sure we get you into something safe and reliable. Can't have my woman broken down on the side of the road.”

He released her chin and tapped her hip. “I'm going to take a look and see if I can figure out what happened. Stand over here, away from the road.”

He positioned her next to the rear quarter panel so she'd be safely out of the way of oncoming traffic. She lifted a brow and threw a meaningful look at the empty road, a tiny smirk on her face. He pressed his lips together to contain a smile. Yeah, she was right. This road saw maybe a total of twenty cars a day, but he wasn’t going to risk her safety, and she knew that.

Everleigh folded her arms beneath her breasts and watched him curiously as he retrieved the wheel and tire and rolled it back over to the car. He knelt down next to the front bumper to take a closer look. The axle had embedded itself into the ground when the wheel came off, drawing the car to a halt. What he couldn't figure out was why the wheel had come off in the first place.

Ice streamed through his veins as he speculated on what could've caused it. He knew it would've been easy enough to loosen the lug nuts, and he wouldn't put it past the person who had been sending her photographs. He made his way around the vehicle, checking the other tires, but the rest seemed to be fine. So it was just one wheel. Thank God.

Losing the lug nuts on just one had been enough to scare her but not hurt her too badly. Still, she could have drifted into the other lane and hit another vehicle head-on, or been thrown into the ditch and badly hurt, if not killed. The man sending her pictures had been escalating, resorting to more dire measures for reasons he couldn't begin to fathom. He couldn't rule out it was an accident, but he wasn't willing to jeopardize her safety.

He lifted his gaze to hers. “Have you had any work done recently?”

She shook her head. “I bought it brand new at the dealership when I moved down here. I've only had it… what? A little over a month?”

So that ruled out the possibility that the dealership had forgotten to tighten them down. She'd been driving around for weeks, and if it had been a mistake on their part, it would've happened far sooner. He was suspicious, but he tried to hide his anger even as he seethed inside.

If it wasn't an accident, where could it have happened? From what Mason had told him, she had the meeting with a friend downtown, but he had a close eye on her and her vehicle the entire time. Ruling that out, what was left?

A shiver snaked down his spine as the events of that morning lined up in his mind. Maybe at her parents’ house? The possibility made him see red and set his skin on fire. If that were the case, that meant the photographer knew where she lived.

He could feel Everleigh’s eyes on him, but he couldn't bring himself to look her way as he dug his phone from his back pocket and called for a tow truck. He arranged for her car to be taken to a garage in town which would hopefully have it fixed up within the next day or two.